Kebabs, death, racism and panpipes.

Varanasi 1^st December 21:05

Hell of a holiday period. So I’m in Varanasi, Benaras, Kashi and all that. Big river called Ganga, lots of tiny alleyways to get lost in and many tourists in alibaba trousers. Hmm. In fact on the subject of tourists I heard a Canadian fella ask a waiter for a banana lassi then remark. ‘yes banana, I know you have lots of them.’ Ahh racism, lovely.

Nasi is pretty relaxing and there’s a restaurant that has an organic all you can eat breakfast. Smoked ham is nice with scrambled eggs and seeded brown bread. Apart from that walking along the ghats, sitting having a read and then playing the odd hour of ghat cricket here and there. It’s nice to have a break its ruddy hard work all this travelling lark. The last few weeks have rushed past.

From the freezing kashmiri nights in Srinagar to Christmas dubstep/metal in Kathmandu. ‘Kashmiri nights’ is also the name of a world music project I’m working on. A lot of Sitar, baverian brass and pan pipes. In fact I remember having a conversation with Jonas in Mcloed Ganj about how in most European cities you can find a Native American man playing panpipes with some sort of backing CD. Yet in India there is a strange lack of panpipists.

Moving on… …Trekking was excellent, not much to tell just a hell of a lot of walking lots of photos up and down thousands of steps. A lot of steps. Too many an escalator wouldn’t have hurt, and then you have the choice.  Pokhara was a bit touristy to be honest, which is a comment I love to make as much as possible as a tourist and equally love to take in from other people.

I tell you what Charles, Jaipur was nice. Amazing choice of hotels and lots of restaurants and really close to all the major attractions which was very useful cause I don’t like walking when I’m on holiday.

but very touristy and a lot of tourists which was a shame.

Pokahara is pretty relaxed particularly in the lakeside area. Particularly when compared with Kathmandu.

Kathmandu’s ramshackled concrete buildings are crammed in around streets where people, motorcycles and Maruti Alto taxis negotiate for space. You are constantly looking over your shoulder for motorcycles. The buildings are all a few stories high so it’s can be quite choking during rush hour where there is a nice healthy dose of smoggy air waiting for you also. Spent a few days there over Christmas.

Christmas day was bizarre. Having met Rob’s friend Roshan he explained that his friends were putting on a dubstep night at a rock and heavy metal club called ‘purple haze’.  This entailed  a lot of screaming over dubstep, makes a change from cliff Richard and shaking Stevens. I left after 30 minutes to get a sandwich and go to bed with a full belly.

I then headed back to good old India. Having travelled for around 12 hours I made it to the train station in India where I had missed my train despite most trains being delayed by 5-10 hours. Because of this I had to hang around in the train station from 00:00 to 06:00 for the next train. Then came the most frightening non event of my life.

Due to so many trains were delayed the ticket hall floor (about the size of two tennis courts or more accurately 4.5 badminton courts with the .5 being linked laterally to the 4 badminton courts arranged in a larger rectangle formation.)  was Sergio Ramos-ed with people sleeping on the floor. Having negotiated my way past sleeping heads and feet, large wrapped luggage and a small group men playing cards I reached the middle of the ticket hall when it all went a little bit weird. Suddenly there were loud screams in the centre of the mass of people to my right followed by shouting in Hindi, immediately after this the crowd, like a terrified Mexican wave emerging from the centre of all towards the platform At which point not knowing what happened I am pushed with the crowd and the shouting and noise has also followed.

I did a little poo in my pants and I am still unable to understand quite what happened and I’m not sure if anyone running in that crowd new either. It was pure fear-driven chaos probably deriving from a bit of shouting in a room full of sleepily befuddled people. I think that counts as a near near-death experience. My heart was thumping.

I ended up in Lucknow eventually. It was nice, it had a lorra history. It also had a place that lonely planet claims to be the best Kebabs in the world. I take issue with this for many reasons. Put simply I have had better.  I will say it was the most tender kebab meat I have ever had. BUT there is a litany of reasons why it is NOT the best Kebab in the world:

1.      Salad. Salad consisted of onions and a squeeze of lime. Not good enough, even the most rudimentary of kebabs should include chillies, lettuce, cucumber, tomato and onions. All of which should be slightly warm from being in an open counter all day.

2.      Bread. Now the quality of the bread was fine. Very nice paranthas indeed. However bread did cost extra. I don’t care how many rupees you charge for the meat, the bread should be free.

3.      Sauce. There were no sauces. (Ketchup, mayo, mustard and special sauce are essential.)

4.      Selection of beverages. I cannot fathom how anyone can fully enjoy a Kebab with out a can of lilt.

5.      Portion. The Kebab was only big enough for one meal.

I propose the best Kebab can be found at

Al NAWAZ, Curry mile, Rusholme Manchester.

Submit your entries and foiled wrapped sample kebab to

The Kebab Kouncil (formerly known as the Kebab Kollektive)

PO BOX 172

KORNWALL UK

(The above section is a frighteningly similar to a Manchester comedian’s material about Kebab shops, minus the bit about a drunken kebab not being perfect until you’ve pissed up the outside wall of the kebab house.)

In Lucknow I also had a weird moment at The Residency where the English were held up in the 1857 Siege of Lucknow. Two shaggily dressed men asked If I could take their photo for them, then they posed, I asked ‘do you have your camera?’ they said no. So I took a photo with my camera, I showed them and they then nodded and walked off. I’m still confused.

LOVE YOU BYE!!