Day 2

My first full day in India has been superb, Kolkata is an immense city and so full of life. If it differs from my perception of the place, then maybe it's a little easier to just be an obvious foreigner. Kolkata is a great place to just leave your guide book and get lost in its narrow streets which I did. I also visited the Victoria Memorial building, a stunning reminder of the British Raj. Set in beautiful gardens the 4Rs entrance fee means its a great place to escape the chaos that lies beyond. On the steps leading to the main entrance, Kerry and I were in high demand. It was time for any Indian and his wife, kids and mate to have a photo with the white couple, we had to make a sharp exit as a queue was forming. The Victoria Memorial itself is a stunner and reminded me alot of the Cunnard Building (with bells on) at Liverpools Pier Head.

After a power cut ruled out the English presentation at the planetarium the rest of the day was dedicated to eating. Its not hard to find food in this city, every street corner and sometimes whole streets are swamped with mobile kitchens cooking tonnes and tonnes of various curries to feed the millions. For tea, I chose a more upmarket venue, meaning it had tables and chairs and the owner was delighted to have and recommended a few dishes, including a paneer(cheese) butter masala and a lentil curry called Chola Bhotura

India

On the 1st March 2010, after almost 2years 2months travelling I went to bed in Bangkok but could not sleep with excitement.
The following day at 15.30pm the plane I was on touched down in Kolkata, India. An hour later I was sharing a taxi heading into the centre of this city of 15million people. It seemed like all 15million were on the streets at once as our battered yellow taxi weaved its way through tiny gaps in the traffic, beeping his horn relentlessly. I was mesmorised by the chaos that is daily life here in India. I was heading to Sudder Street, the so called backpacker area of town. In the 45mins it took to get here I did not see one westerner, which is a good thing. Sudder street, to my relief is a miilion miles away from the Khao San Road of Bangkok, there are just a handful of travellers here and Indian life still dominates proceedings. I checked into the Galaxy hotel on Stuart St, a side street off Sudder st (300 Rs) and went for a wonder.

Without a plan or a map, I followed my senses. I wondered down busy side streets, the scent of Begali cuisine enticing me and listened for the sounds of Bollywood, the latter being nearly impossible over the constant horn blowing. I was drawn to a hole in the wall where people queued. Being Britsh I love a good queue, so I joined it and ended up with a chicken tikka wrap(16Rs) for my troubles, delicious.
Everywhere you go,it seems people are drinking tea, a legacy of the Britsh, so I stopped for a spot of tea or chai served in a clay pot(5Rs) which are used once and then destroyed, the chai was delicious by the way with a hint of ginger.

The Kiwi job interview!

On Friday afternoon, I called into one of the largest apple growers in the area to ask about a job. I met Steve and he asked me to come back on Monday morning and in the mean time I should get on the 'piss'. Monday morning came and I was in Steve's office 8am prompt. Question one of the interview, "So, did you get pissed at the weekend?" He was taken aback when I said no. "An Irishman not pissed on the weekend, thats a first!" I could sense the job running away from me...'Well maybe not, I'm English, from Liverpool', "Same fucking thing isn't it?" I got the impression Steve only employs pissheads and decided against telling him about my 3month abscence from the drinking scene. Instead I told him how cheap beer and wine are in South America and that I heard in Vietnam US$10 can buy you 100 beers. I was back on track, he offered me a job pruning apple trees, I should have started yesterday but rain has stopped play. I had time for a coffee in the staff room, equiped with pool table and a bar with beer on tap, I will soon be falling off the wagon I thought.

I remembered my job interview with Halifax bank, I realise a job in mortgages is totally different from working in an orchard, but I find it ridiculous that companies employ people to employ people! During my Halifax interview, in a group of 10 or so other candidates, I was given a task of being a handbag and 60seconds to talk about being a handbag. I wonder how long it took the 'HR' personel to come up with this interviewing process and how much money is spent by such companies. Furthermore, in light of the recent financial crisis and the bailout of such banks by governments, you have to wonder about the way things have been done or run in the past. I'd like these companies to fold, but that would only hurt the working class, the people who have no control on decision making and the future. So, instead I can only hope for a reduction in the big wigs and there expense accounts and the people who come up with the bulllshit idea of making Neil Gavin talk about his life as a fucking handbag ( excuse my Kiwi). I must ask my new boss Steve for his views on this. Like I said before, I know different jobs require different interviewing techniques but I prefer the honesty of the Kiwi approach, where a spade is a spade and not a handbag.

My photo gallery.

I have set up a photo gallery on photobox.
Here is a link to the gallery

http://www.photoboxgallery.com/neilgavin

Gis a job?

After 15months on the road, it was time to get a job, well lets be honest it was a good run, even by my standards. We bought Kiwi Kenny, our campervan in Christchurch and headed north to the wine growing region of Marlborough where I had lined up a job grape picking with Jeeti, an Indian guy. After meeting up with him,I was far from convinced he was a genuine employer and so the job ended before it began, but good news arrived next day in email form. I'd written to several of the regions wineries and Cloudy Bay replied offering me a job as bird scarer! I didn't know what to make of this at first and checked it wasn't 1st April, no, still March. Excitement grew as I pictured myself as Worzel Gummidge chasing birds(the feathery kind) between vines. That afternoon I made my way to the vineyard and met up with Erika, I was offered and accepted the job which involved chasing birds on a quad bike but scarecrow attire was not neccessary.

It's 7am the following morning and there is an icy chill in the air as I climb from my toastie warm bed and step outside of Kenny. The warm glow of the sun is near but the surrounding hills block out the horizon to the east. To the west the stars melt away into the blue sky and what stars they were, I'm not sure I have seen such an impressive sky. I quickly heat some water for my weetabix and then drive the short distance to Cloudy Bay's Mustang vineyard, one of about eight of theirs in the area. I meet 'Kithy'(Kathy), read about health and safety and by 8am I'm sat on my quad bike ready to bird scare. I'm so overwhelmed by the natural beauty of the area that I have to pinch myself, this isn't work at all, this is pleasure. I set off on patrol up and down the long rows of vines, scaring a few birds but not many, the cold hits me again as between vines the sun's warmth is absent. Lunch time arrives in no time, I wonder if time will pass so quickly after a week of this.

Mid afternoon, and I sense trouble, I'm right the magpies have invaded, upto forty of them and I'm not talking about the polite, well mannered magpies we know and love, only interested in shiny stuff. No, white backed magpies are notorous grape killers and I break out into a sweat. Foot to the floor I give chase but, I get to within 20metres and startle them, one of them stays low between the same vines as me, its like a scene from Star Wars, honestly it is, I can almost touch him. Sensing my breath on his feathers and at high speed, he pulls off a Luke Skywalker style manoevre weaving between vines and is gone. Behind me, the gang have re-gathered and are laughing at me and making murderous swoops on the helpless grapes below. At the end of my first day, I have mastered driving at full speed whilst standing up, waving, clapping, whistling and barking like a dog, I believe if Alan Sugar witnessed this type of multi-tasking, he'd be saying 'you're hired!'. As I type this on my laptop, sitting in Kenny, a magpie has just landed on a wooden post, looked at me, took a shit and left. It's as though they know what my day job is...
Well, 4 weeks have passed and the bird scaring is over, for the past week I have been walking up and down the rows of vines looking for and removing broken posts. I finish the job tomorrow, I think. My boss Jeff, has less personality than a than a turd and I have had longer conversations with the grapes. Infact one day I was chatting to a grape and he couldnt contain himself, he thought today was the day he'd be picked, crushed, fermented, bottled and shipped somewhere far and wide and when drunk he lives life through the eyes of the drinker for a few days before he is no more. This particular grape believed in reincarnation and told me about his previous lives. He fondly remembered the good old days when he regularly found himself himself on a country estate in Europe and spent his final days viewing fine art, dining out and galloping around the paddocks. Then he sighed and reflected on more recent years, bright lights, loud music and often the inside of the toilet, followed by more drinking. He sighed and regretted the increasing trendiness of wine with the younger generation maybe this year would be different he told me, I wished him luck.

So, I have now bird scared on the dancefloors of the UK and the vineyards of New Zealand, regrettably I feel I was more successful on the dancefloors, much more.

Now, and then!

May 7th 1999, I stumbled off the Korean Air jumbo jet full of beer, whiskey and seaweed(the Korean idea of a snack) and jumped on a bus headed for the Captain Cook Hostel. A few months earlier I had decided that university wasn't for me and that a year in Australia was. Bodies were sprawled all over the place in the hostel, it had been a good night I could tell, I hoped tonight would be the same. I dumped my gear and headed down to the bar below, it was 9.30am, I had a schooner of lager and went in search of the opera house and harbour bridge. I walked down Oxford St the gayest place on earth, I thought I'd stepped onto the set of YMCA, Elton John couldn't have dreamed it any better, or should I say worse. I was shocked at the poodle walking poofs and Freddie Mercury look-a-likes, I pushed on looking for Mick Dundee's side of town.
After a days sightseeing and several schooners, I arrived back at Captain Cooks and the place had livened up. I had a friend staying there and he introduced me to most of the cool kids. I hadn't slept for about 40hours and now wasn't the time to try, 'another schooner please sport'. The booze flowed, I had drunk myself sober and was getting drunk again, I won a pool competition beating an Irishman called Glen. He wore a Celtic top which stretched over his ale gut and had short bleeched blond hair, quite a sight. He nicknamed me 'scouser' which was hilarious because he had a lisp and couldn't pronounce his 's', so he called me 'thcouther'. We drank bourbon and coke at the bar and he continually requested 'sweet child of mine' to be played. He suggested we headed to a bar in town where we might be able to make some money playing pool. I told him later and then burst into song, 'Poor Scouser Tommy', the whole bar of 50plus were silenced by my performance, I was surprised by this, at home such an event had become so regular that I was generally ignored, now I had a captivated audience. There were a few southern United fans in the bar and they shouted a few things back, I calmly suggested we should take this outside, they declined but had the last laugh a few weeks later when they won the European Cup. We moved on from our bar and hit Kings Cross and it wasn't long before I had my first encounter with an Ozzy bouncer. I did at least have time to pull my pants up before I was thrown from the premises. I managed to behave myself in a seedy lap dancing bar and was offered extras upstairs, on telling them I was skint, they informed me I could pay on credit card, "I'm not sure my parents would appreciate 1 x blow job on my Barclaycard statement, but thanks anyway love". I realised why the place was free to get in when I got my bar bill, I ran like the wind and ended up in a 70's club chatting to people who couldn't understand a word I was saying and so I chanted football songs at them instead, I didn't last long in that place either. It was around this time I realised I was alone, for how long I did not know, I didn't care, I was enjoying myself. I only have flashbacks from here on, I won some money on a pokie machine, smoked a joint with a Russian and found a mobile phone and called England on it. At some point I realised I didn't have a clue where I was and instead of jumping a cab, I wandered the streets. When I did find my way home, rather than entering through the door, I climbed the front of the hostel and through the window of my dorm room, it had been a good night. The next day before breakfast, I had a beer...


March 7th 2009, almost ten years later and feeling a bit tired but very sober, I step off the plane and enter Auckland airport. It's not Australia but it's close and I feel happy to be back in this part of the world again. Like ten years ago I have the intention of spending a year here and working my way around the country, but I have changed and arriving at the backpackers in Auckland city I realise how much. After checking in, I immediately inspected the toilets and the kitchen and was not totally satisfied that the cleaner was doing his/her job properly. I looked disgusted at the scattered empties left from the night before and frowned at the two 20 year olds having a beer, it wasn't even lunch time. It was when I was reporting back to Kerry that it dawned on me, aaaaaahhhhh!!!! I'm getting old. Only days before, Kerry told me I have alot of grey hair, and has started to call me the 'silver fox', now I'm inspecting hostels for cleanliness, I hve been spending alot of time in libraries too, I like people watching, I enjoy going for walks, I'm eating loads of vegetables and going to farmers markets, I just got really excited because I found an apple tree so I picked five apples from it, for free, I complain alot about the price of things, I have started writing, I wrap up warm when I go outside, I constantly tell Kerry to be careful when she's crossing the road, my back hurts, I go to bed just after dark, I haven't been drunk for ages, my bum feels soft and I enjoy talking to middle aged people, I find them interesting...So, what do you make of all that. I have changed havent I? But so have you. You're greyer than me, you actually have a library card, your back and knees hurt, you've been eating veggies for ages and you won't even stay in a hostel, haha.


Anyway, I realise I have changed but I think for the better, afterall where did my antics actually get me?

Since writing this I have taken up knitting!

Hillsborough 20th anniversary

20 years ago today(15/04/09), 96 Liverpool fans needlessly lost their lives in Sheffield at an FA cup semi final.
Gone but never forgotten, RIP. Justice for the 96.
You'll Never Walk Alone.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hillsborough_disaster