“Big ol jet airliner”

Another flight back to London. I have no idea how people do business travel. One of our friends once did more than 200 flights in a year working for a management consultancy – it was the MBA equivalent of “If it’s Tuesday, it must be Belgium”

It’s not quite filing copy as the bullets fly overhead…

To keep herself busy between bursts of high level captain of industry behaviour Memsahib writes a monthly column for Supply Management magazine about her experiences of India. I have already exhausted the references to the “obscure guest publication” component used on the Missing Words round in “Have I Got News for You” and was forced to retreat licking my wounds when she started quoting the titles of some of my more technical reading material to me.

To be fair (and biased) she does as good in spinning a rip roaring tale as you’re going to get in a trade journal – even though she leaves out the bits about bribes, spies, mysterious deaths in conference rooms and who exactly forgot to process form J7/34/9X in triplicate rather than duplicate.

Check it out here

It’s not quite polishing grapes on your breast – yet.

Fruit for breakfast is wonderful, especially when there is more variety that the citric acid covered pre-sliced and packed choices available in certain ready-meal heavy supermarkets. Pomegranates are not something I’d really eaten much of before and the way Memsahib refuses to share at the table, not something I’m eating much of now.

It turns out that the preparation for these involves our houseboy removing the individual kernels by hand. I have emphasised strongly to Memsahib this is not a service she should expect to carry on back in London.

"How much is that doggy in the window?"

Puppy update for all you dog lovers. Of the original Magnificent Seven, one has apparently gone to the big kennel in the sky while we were away (our driver is vague on the details for fear of distressing me I suspect). Three have been adopted by local families as pets leaving three to live the unchained life in front of our apartment. There are a lot of stray dogs in Delhi, but they are generally well cared for by the people around them in day to day life - a dog’s life in India doesn’t seem too bad.

Back to Skool

Hurruh. I’ve just found out my application to do a part-time distance MSc has been accepted. Start in two weeks. Not sure how the subsidised student bar works remotely but I’m sure I’ll figure it out.

If there was ever a case of the wrong kind of snow…

We’re back for a week on London and Nature lays on some blizzard conditions to remind us of what’s in store when we return. Of course it means that we’re housebound the day after we arrive, meetings are cancelled, appointments to see friends fall over. Might as well not have come..

Except that we’re going to the snow on the weekend and this is all wonderful – assuming Heathrow doesn’t fail us. Fingers crossed, but I know the great British service economy will get us through (What’s that Private Frazer, speak up I can’t hear you)

“You can checkout any time you like, but you can never leave”

Simon, Leigh and Anne are taking their turn to go to Wildflower Hall. They love it. In fact they love it so much they actually don’t leave it and spend the entire time enjoying Spa treatments.

They do manage to see Shimla from the window of the car taking them back to the airport.

“The monkey always rings twice”

We’re all off to the Monkey Temple. This is great, monkeys everywhere fighting and eating whatever peanuts you hand them from the bags sold from the vendors at the entrance. Of course there are also the ubiquitous cows wandering around the temple who also like peanuts. One of them attempts to keep nuzzling the bag out of my hand and persists in following me and nudging my hand. Cows are like zombies in films, you think they move slowly and they’re far away and you don’t need to worry and the next time you look up – it’s all gone 28 Days Later.

One cow ambles over to a wall where a monkey is sitting and vacuums up some of his nuts. The monkey obviously isn’t going to let this go and draws back his fist and belts the cow one – it’s almost a subcontinent version of Bear vs. Shark.

The whole time were wandering around, Anne is a little on edge. It turns out that she doesn’t particularly like monkeys, finding them a little creepy. We calm her down over it and she seems to start to accept that they’re actually not too bad when suddenly we round the corner and see a monkey attempting to get to know a puppy in a cruel and unusual manner especially as he obviously hasn’t bought it dinner and drinks first. Anne runs over yelling, shooing away the monkey and decides her original instincts were justified – they really are little f*ckers

“You don’t have go home, but you can’t stay here…”

Alexandra, Jane, and Sukie have decided we all need to stop into FabIndia as it’s been at least a day since any shopping was done. Simon and I lose interest after a while and drift around for a while, grunting when repeatedly asked “What do you think of this?” and attempting to go to our respective happy places in our heads while the sartorial water-boarding continues.

Eventually the light bulbs over our heads light up and we realise that with both drivers outside, we could take one back the hotel. With a speed that shames Carl Lewis we’re out the door and heading back.

Eventually the girls return. It turns out that they were eventually turfed out of the shop, albeit ever so politely, as the staff all wanted to lock up and go home having passed their closing hours by a good 30 minutes.

“Dancing queen, young and sweet…”

I’ve neglected to mention that the hotel we’re all staying in has for the evening bar entertainment, Romania’s finest singing duo. They’re actually good entertainment value if not always in the way intended. Comprising a man who deals with all the background tasks of playing the keyboard or guitar as required and a singer who Simon suspects has borrowed her wardrobe from a previous job in another Eastern European “hospitality” industry – silver tinsel lamé is quite stylish when you know how to wear it.

The best part of the evening is when they start to notice that we are the most appreciative table in the audience by a large margin and start to take requests. The girls want at least one Abba song evening and a Central European cover of a Scandinavian accented phonetic rendition of English is great after at least two double Brandies.

“…a wafer thin mint…”

We’ve met up with the worlds worst Bananarama tribute band (blog passim) and are planning New Years dinner. There is a hotel in Jaipur which has a reputation of the finest old style Raj dining room. We secure a booking after much work as there is much sucking of breath by the receptionist about availability before they eventually concede there is space, but are warned that jacket and tie are obligatory for gentlemen. Eventually we decide to risk it having no other option.

The women of course are unfazed as they always have several outfits suitable for any occasion. I blame Memsahib for not anticipating all my needs when she packed the bag. Good help is hard to find.