Thursday 22^nd November

Congratulations to our illustrious friend Pauline Shelley, nominated and elected to:

The Tasmanian Honour Roll for Women

I had lunch with her yesterday and she was quite stunned; she had just received a letter informing her of this nomination and election.  She was more than surprised that I was not more than surprised… I had, of course, been in on the whole process.  Her daughter Becky, a very efficient organiser, had co-ordinated a team to get documents together in support of the application and we were all – naturally – sworn to secrecy. 

We are all so pleased and proud!!

India #24

We broke our ten days in Goa with a few days on trains and in Hampi, some 500 miles inland from Goa.  Pete had been there before and knew we would be mightily impressed.  The train trip was wonderful.  Half of it was through thick, lush green jungle, the other half through flat farmland.  In the middle of the jungle we saw a most amazing waterfall cascading down through a cleft in the jungle, just spectacular!  The train somehow wound round so we could see it on both sides.

This was a very friendly train.  Pete and I went for a walk down the end of the carriages – these trains are very long – and on the way he was accosted by a party of young men, travelling in a pack.  We met similar packs of men of all ages all over the place.  They would go off for a long weekend, maybe Fri-Mon, to Goa or some other holiday place, and they would kick up their heels most mightily.  Mary and I observed this with a jaundiced eye.  At one stage, we asked some of them where their wives were.  “At home, ofcourse!” they would say, indignantly, “Looking after the baby!”  When Mary suggested that maybe the wives would like a holiday too, the answer was, “No!  No trips!”  For all we know the wives were kicking up their heels at home too, free of husbands, but somehow we doubt it….

Anyway, these young blokes started mucking around with Pete.  I am not sure why -  must have been staring out the window looking for ratfamilies - but he got out his leatherman and offered to pull out any aching teeth with the pliers, because he said he was a dentist.  He could also cut their hair with the tiny scissors, if they wanted.  They thought this was HILARIOUS and fell about.  They followed us back to our seats and spent most of the trip with us.  Much laughter!  They thought Pete and Vish were just THE BEST.  They decided that Pete was some sort of Australian superman.  At one of the stations, where some of us had got off for a bit of a stroll, they all came rushing up to our window to shout, “Hey hero!”  Pete was amused but also just slightly bemused by this.  Later when they were all crowded into our carriage, they said something about Pete’s wife.  “Oh no!” he shouted, putting his arm around me, “This isn’t my wife!”  From then on his status as a LEGEND was sealed.  One of them – these blokes were only in their late twenties – spent the rest of the trip beaming adoringly at Pete and gazing admiringly at me – all a bit disconcerting, really. 

After many hours the fanclub dispersed.  They probably went off to dream of being Australian Superheroes… An older man who had been lurking on the edge of the crowd finally got his chance to step forward and talk to Vish and Pete.  This was Mr Rao, a retired engineer (I think) who had his finger in many pies, and who could talk very knowledgeably about all of the things Pete and Vish wanted to know about – the geology, economy, agriculture etc of the landscape we were travelling through.  This was nice for Mary and me; he wasn’t as rowdy as the fanclub, and felt no need to stare at me (concubine!)  Neither did he particularly want to talk to either of us women, so we could just sit back, read our books, chat idly, and gaze out the windows.

Another man who wanted to talk to Pete was an old codger, 88, who was up the other end of the carriage.  I somehow think he followed me back from the toilets, not quite sure how we acquired him.  He was quite deaf and so it didn’t matter too much what we said to him, he just wanted to shout at us and tell us his story, which was indeed very interesting.  Although he could hardly hear a word we said, he somehow managed to work out that Pete was a Catholic, divorced, and that he had “relations” with me.  He thought this was just shocking.  “But,” shouted Pete, “We don’t have ‘relations.’  We just sip tea and read books and laugh together!”  The people in the next compartment to ours could hear every word of this; they were highly amused and I caught a couple of young Indian women sniggering away and looking at me with great sympathy.