Hindi Words:
Dost = Friend
Dosti = Friendship
Last night, after hanging out with Abhishek Ritz, Sunny and Apurva, I got back late to the 13 bed dorm at Hostel Vimal Ganga to find it more crowded than ever before. I had gone from living in a spacious almost empty room to a tightly packed quarter. Just as I was lying down on my bed, a guy in the bed opposite me caught my eye and gave me a friendly smile.
Across the beds we began chatting amid the tussle of the rest of the dorm. Within seconds I had learned many interesting things about this man. His name was Raghav. He was the same age as me. He was from West Bengal, and so, his first language was Bengali – the same which they speak in Bangladesh. Raghav asked me if I wanted to go up to the rooftop. It was his first night at this hostel and he knew there was a rooftop. I had been staying here for over a week and I didn’t know what he was talking about…
I followed Raghav up to the rooftop where we surveyed the litter decorated fields and dusty roads of upper Tapovan from ahigh in the starry navy night.
The more Raghav and I talked, the more it felt as if we operated at the same frequency – the same wavelength. Despite having been exhausted, both physically and with a depleted social battery, I suddenly found myself conversing with renewed ease. I’d never found it so easy to talk to anyone during my entire time away from home.
Raghav complained about all the people in our dorm. There were whole families in there. Families shouldn’t be staying in hostel dorms; they should be staying in hotels. Not only was there a whole family squeezing into our 13-bed dorm, but there were also a couple who were having sex in their bed – covered only by a feeble curtain. Raghav was amused I hadn’t noticed.
Raghav loves cooking, as well as the culture and politics around it. He has pride in Indian cuisine but loves western food and watches lots of foreign cookery shows. He told me about Punjabi cuisine and their love of maakhan (butter). He informed me with exciting passion, that when I go to Punjab, I will experience delicious maakhan because Punjabis put it on everything, especially Parantha. When I told Raghav that my favourite Indian food is Parantha, he smiled. It is his favourite food also.
We paced around the rooftop, looking up to the mountains on one side, and down the dusty streets into upper Tapovan on the other. Raghav, giving-out about Indian culture, explained how he has had to stop inviting his female friends home in the past because he runs the risk of his family attempting to arrange a marriage between them. ‘Indian aunties’ Raghav lamented, are always trying to play matchmaker. In western countries, people worry about their career first and marriage later, Raghav said to me. But in India, it is the other way around. There is pressure to focus on getting married when you’re young, and you can worry about your career later… It makes no sense to Raghav.
After spending a long time chatting on the rooftop of Vimal Ganga, Raghav and I decided we would check-out of the hostel together tomorrow. Raghav had a couple of other hostels on his radar he wanted to try out. We also agreed we would go and look for some tasty parantha for breakfast.
The new day dawned fast. I reconvened with Raghav and we quit the Vimal Ganga in search of parantha.
We entered one of the first cafes we saw. It was entirely outside, a large and verdant garden with canopies over some of the tables. Instead of filling myself with parantha as planned, I fell to the allure of an enormous bowl of fruit and muesli caked in coconut cream and with a side of peanut butter toast. With it, I gulped a mug of milky filter coffee, large and strong.
Raghav ordered a plate of aloo parantha but was extremely unimpressed with it. I wasn’t surprised. Last night, Raghav left me with the impression that he has a very high standard when it comes to food. He stated that his parantha had clearly been made for tourists like myself. It was too thick and had been fried instead of grilled. It was inauthentic.
We talked about the weather in India and how I’ve been struggling with the heat. Raghav warned me to be careful. He has seen white tourists like myself faint from sunstroke. Then he called me a polar bear because I’m white and I like COLD weather… apparently.
After satiating ourselves on the sickliest fruit and muesli bowl you could imagine, and what looked like an equally sickening greasy flatbread, Raghav and I went on a tour of the nearby hostels, demanding to see the state of the rooms before we checked in. We eventually settled on a place called: The Moustache which was roughly between £6-8 a night and came with a swimming pool & a games room.
Raghav asked me if I’d like to play pool. I told him I’d try. We didn’t play a serious game just messed around.
After checking in and lying down for a rest, Raghav eventually suggested we go to the 60s café for some food. I wasn’t feeling hungry but I said I’d accompany him. What I had assumed to be a crappy little bakery turned out to be one of the coolest Cafes in Rishikesh. Heavily branded around the Beatles who wrote many songs in Rishikesh when they lived here in 1968, the 60s café has a large garden of tall plants, and a menu full of western and Indian food alike.
Raghav wanted pizza. But he wanted me to choose the pizza for him. So he got up and walked away while I made the order. I ordered him the Rodriguez pizza: pesto, spinach and fetta cheese but unfortunately, they weren’t serving pizzas at that time. So I had to call Raghav back and he ordered some pasta instead.
Raghav said he thought he could guess which pizza I tried to order for him. He guessed correctly. Says he’s good at knowing things like that. Raghav’s friend Gaurav came to meet us. Raghav ordered Gordan Ramsey’s bananas, which were caramelised bananas with vanilla ice-cream. We all tried some and it was very delicious.
Then Raghav randomly rushed off to meet another friend who had just arrived in Rishikesh, leaving me alone with with Gaurav.
Gaurav and I went back to Moustache hostel and got talking about bungee jumping. I hate the thought of going bungee jumping. I also hate the thought of not going bungee jumping; as one my biggest fears, it will continue to haunt and mock me if I don’t do it.
Gaurav also has apprehension about doing the bungee jump, but he’s very serious about doing it. And now that I seriously contemplated it, I started to feel sick and nervous. Could the thought of bungee jumping be that terrifying? Or was this sudden sickness part of something else? That salty lemon water from yesterday for example…
Raghav and his other friend came back and started playing table tennis. Just as I was being introduced, I was realising that however terrifying the thought of bungee jumping may be, it could not be strong enough to make me feel this bad. Delhi Belly had clearly struck again…
Raghav and his two friends eventually left to go and map out Raghav’s journey for the following day. He’s here in Rishikesh on a much more spiritual journey than I, heading up into the mountains on a pilgrimage of sorts, and he’s not the only dost I’ve met here who’s undertaking such a journey.
Back at the Moustache Hostel, I lay down in the games room, trying to ignore what the hell was going on in my stomach. But then a guy walked in and started talking to me. Two guys in fact. Their names were Nimesh and Sachin. They ordered some spicy corn and shared it with me. I took a tiny spoonful just to be polite because I was concerned my stomach was about to come crashing out of my ass.
Nimesh is from Assam originally (north-east India), though he lives and works in Jaipur. Sachin is from Indore. They both invited me to the rooftop for some whisky. I delightedly accepted. Nimesh’s warmth was powerful.
Up on the rooftop, I met another guy called Armat. Raghav eventually came back and Nimesh gave me some whisky and water. Armat talked about what a ridiculous basket case Joe Biden is. He said the American President could learn a lot from the Indian Prime Minister, Modi. He also rambled away about Donald Trump, Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak, critical of all of them, but not contemptuous either. Armat has been the first Indian I’ve met in India who has been to the U.K. He goes at least once a year. He is from Delhi and gave me a severe warning about his city. If I thought Mumbai was a struggle… I’ve got another thing coming.
Everyone kept ordering snacks and freaking out over the fact I hadn’t had my dinner yet. I must have been dangerously sick… there’s simply no other explanation…
After passing around plate after plate of peanut masala (the best food ever invented to accompany a beer) It was decided that we must go out for more food. We hit the sleepy dark streets of upper Tapovan and walked through the black of night – and it was very black in the streets of upper Tapovan for there were no lamp posts.
Conversations changed and the Hindi ramped up. Talking intensified and I soon realised that the guys around me were arguing with each other – and it was no friendly argument.
Me and Sachin sat at the table as Dal and roti was laid out before us, while Armat and Nimesh bellowed at each other with Raghav occasionally trying to separate them or hold one of them back. Sachin began to eat and kept trying to get me to eat too. But I was more concerned with finding out what the hell was going on. I couldn’t stomach any food anyway.
The argument got taken outside. I got so bored I became very tempted to start eating the Dal in front of me despite my sickness. But suddenly, Raghav and Armat returned and joined us for the meal. Armat seemed in a bit of a bluster but Raghav looked very happy and content. There was no sign of Nimesh…
I went looking for Nimesh and there he was outside. He’d been crying. He wouldn’t explain what the argument was about. All he’d say was that: ‘it’s hard to talk about politics in India.’ Then he said he was going for a walk down to the Ganga and asked me to accompany him.
We walked through the dim alleyways of Tapovan. Nimesh had a rare kindness which remained brightly intact despite his obvious deep upset. He stopped at a late night ice-cream stand and insisted on buying me an ice-cream, and when I didn’t let him, he got one for himself and tried to force-feed it to me. I couldn’t help but laugh.
Down a network of interconnecting alleyways we went, harbouring numerous coffee shops which would be open and alive with life come morning, interspersed with hidden hostels – the glare of light from their windows showcasing westerners playing table-tennis or hanging out on cushions. Part of me felt silly for not being with them. But I can be with them anytime, I told myself. Nimesh and I emerged from these winding alleys onto the stoney bank of the Ganga, where we sat on large rocks, removing our shoes and socks and placing our feet in the water.
We were staring at the great Hindu temple of Mahadev opposite us. It was beautifully lit in the night. As we walked and sat and talked, I saw another side to Nimesh. He was just was warm, but his kindness went to new depths, and he appeared wise beyond what I’d expect for someone in their late twenties. Nimesh is Hindu but has fascination for all Religions, especially Christianity. When he spoke about the people who litter and drink alcohol by the holy Ganga, he became a mixture of deep sadness and overflowing anger. ‘Indians are stupid,’ he said. The tide crept up the bank, pouring around the rocks where we sat and almost enveloping my rucksack before I had time to notice. I felt bad for Nimesh, as I began to get a sense of just how important the river Ganga is to him. But I also fear that if he comes to London like he plans he will not find the British to be the warm and welcoming people he assumes them to be.
We got up and grabbed our footwear before it was swallowed up by the water. The Holy Ganga has more than enough litter in it already.
