hobnobbing with D. Llama

Contary to what you read in the papers the Dali Llama does not live in the exotic sounding town of Daramasala, he lives in a small town up the road called Mcleod Ganj which has a less sexy name. We've been here with a large group of the world's press for the past few days. On our first day we wandered around following the CNN camera man trying to get in shot and overhear people being interviewed to try and work out what was happening- it turned out to be a sort of extraordinary general meeting.

Anyway its a nice place, we visited the rather harrowing museum and have been walking in the hills. We also had cooking lessons. This being India, and a bit of Tibet, every other person in town offers massage courses, meditaion courses, crystal therapy, chakra cleaning and a million other routes to salvation...we opted for salvation through the stomach and are now the maharaja and maharani of Momo making (dumplings).

We also visited Aramitsar and stayed with the pilgrims at the golden temple. The Sikhs were all increadibly friendly and hospitable and everyone and their wife wanted pictures with us.

Amritsar is also the jumping off point for Pakistan and we piled into the back of a jeep with a load of Indians for the border closing ceremony. It's a sight to behold; bus loads of people fill the grandstands on both sides of the border while they warm the crouds up with patriotic techno music (the UK needs some patriotic techno music). Everyone waves flags and dances while the soldiers warm up round the back (you get a better view from the VIP stand where we were sitting and you could see them doing star jumps and calf stretches). A MC whips the crowd up in earnest at 4.30 with chants of Hindustan and Pakistan from the respective camps. the soldiers all then take turns to rush up to the border wrench open the gate and high kick in front of each other their moustaches bristling furiously. The culmination is the simultaneous lowering of the flags which are then spirited at great speed back to their respective customs posts to cheers. It was a real carnival atmosphere, with popcorn sellers and everything.

Next stop is Chandigar the modernist punjab capital (the old one is in Pakistan) and then meandering down south so we have a tan in time for Chrimbo- less than one month to go!!!