Sharing in Delhi

My three flatmates, like me, are all volunteers with Asha. Although Asha's primary focus is on health in the slums of Delhi, it also takes a long-term view and provides a wide range of training for different people in different circumstances. The volunteers living in the flat in C-9 are all English Teaching Volunteers (ETVs). All the ETVs are fluent in English and amongst our group, all have tertiary qualifications, although that's not a requirement for the job. We are enthusiastic about making a difference in the lives of others, even if it's only a few people at a time.


Bec (pictured above teaching) is an Aussie who has finished university and wanted to do something (a) different and (b) useful before she went into full-time work. She featured on the Australian Channel 7 National News last week. She had been filmed whilst the Channel 7 news team were covering the Commonwealth Games. The Aussie CWG athletes made a very generous donation to the work of Asha, so the news crew wanted to follow up with the work on an Aussie in the slums of Delhi. So if you saw that news broadcast, that's Mayapuri. I worked with Bec for a few days and then took over from her in Mayapuri. She's now having a bit of a holiday in central India, before heading back to the Land of Oz to look for a 'real' job.


Jess (pictured above sitting on the wall surrounding a 12th century tomb near our flat) is a Kiwi and is considering studying to be a teacher. She works in the Zhakira slum, which is over an hour's drive from where we live. Her classroom is a miniscule concrete box without windows, perhaps 3m x 3m. When there are more than 10 pupils on the floor, it becomes an impossible environment in which to teach. Although Aussies traditionally mock the Kiwi accent, Jess' Indian students have never noticed until her lesson on Friday. In a lesson about food, she wrote the word 'bitter' on the board and pronounced it for them. They all told her that she had mispelt it: No, miss, butter is spelt with a 'u' not an 'i'. She kept repeating it over and over again, trying to convince them that 'bitter' was a different word from 'butter'. We'll see how they do on the test. :-)

Anjuli is from England, and to make our lives so much easier, speaks fluent Hindi. The rest of us are struggling. Anjuli is a qualified language teacher and will be working with Asha for a year, designing curricula for different levels, overseeing lesson plans and making the lives of ETVs much easier.

All my flatmates are easy to get along with. We take turns to get up early to pump the water. Sometimes someones cooks and sometimes no-one cooks. I'll write more about food later. Now that Bec has left, we each have a bedroom to ourselves, but that will only last for two more weeks, then new people arrive.

Our routine is to get up early or later (depending on who's doing the water), have breakfast and wait for the driver, who takes us all to the Asha office. Those of us who are teaching in the slums (me, Bec and Jess) photocopy our worksheets, gather our resources like extra copy books and pencils, do any admin that needs doing (like paying the rent) then we head off to Mayapuri and Zhakira. We teach all day then find our own way home. By 6pm it is dark, but our market is open until about 9pm or thereabouts, so we sometimes do a little grocery shopping before dinner. Then it's lesson preparation for the next day, followed by a shower to remove all the grime, sweat and dirt accumulated from a day in a Delhi slum. After that it's a bit of a chat if we're in the mood, or we logon to the Internet to update blogs, send emails and so on. By 10 or 11pm the whole household is asleep, getting ready for another Delhi day!

Living in Delhi

On Friday 15th October I began the next phase of my travels, and perhaps my life. I moved into a flat in Delhi with three other English teachers. We are all volunteers with the Asha Society, an Indian NGO which works in Delhi's slums to improve health, education and living standards. Over the next few days and weeks I'll write more about Asha, my work and the children I teach. This blog entry will focus on our little flat in Sector C9, Vasant Kunj in southern Delhi. If you go to Google maps and search for 'Pocket 9, Vasant Kunj, New Delhi, Delhi, India' you will be able to see approximately where I live.


By Delhi standards this is a middle class neighbourhood. In Australia and the UK, it would probably be considered a slum, which is ironic when you consider what a real Delhi slum is like. I can't photograph the outside of our flat because all the buildings are so crushed together, so the photo above shows the flats in the next block, and gives you some idea of what ours looks like - and how close it is! The photo to the right is the view from our front door.

The inside of the flat, and indeed most of the houses and flats in the area, are quite nice. Our flat has three bedrooms (each with two single beds), two bathrooms, a living room, dining room and kitchen. The floors are all tiled, and whilst all the furniture and fittings have seen better days, it is comfortable and very functional.


Living in Delhi, even in a middle class neighbourhood, has its challenges. For example, water is only provided for an hour a day. We take it in turns to get up at 7am and start the pump to extract water from the mains into the ground level tank, and then pump water to the tank on the roof. If it is not completed by 8am, then we have no water for the day. Our water pressure is gravity from our roof, and since we are on the top floor, that's very little. The photo on the left shows the ground level water tanks of our neighbours and ourselves. Ours is the one closest to the camera. Although it's a pain to do it this way, and we have to be really careful about conserving water because our supply is strictly limited, when you read about the living conditions of the slum kids, you'll see what a tremendous luxury it is to have water pumped into your home, and a toilet of your own.

We also have the blessing of electricity with that most wonderful of inventions: air-conditioning. After a hard day struggling in the oppressive heat of the slums, it is glorious to turn on the AC and relax, before having a shower. The electricity is reasonably reliable, compared to Pakistan anyway, although it is not uncommon for everything just to go off, then restart a few minutes later. At least we have electricity, and we can have a fridge to keep our food cold.


The street outside our flat is like pretty much every street in India - jam-packed with traffic, with horns honking constantly, the pavement has holes 30cm deep in places and in other places the holes in the pavement disappear into what is probably an underground sewer or drain. It smells bad, but then you get used to it, like everything else. In our neighbourhood, as everywhere, the rubbish is piled up periodically in the street, but not actually taken away anywhere. The cows, stray dogs and squirrels then pull it all apart looking for food. Bizarrely, we also seem to have a neighbourhood pig, which joins in the garbage-gobbling. It's the only one I've seen in India and I'm not sure if it belongs to someone or if, like the cows and dogs, it is just a stray.


I'm happy with mye little flat and it's great to have a kitchen in which to prepare my own meals. Now I just have to remember how to cook! :-)

Delhi's Red Fort and the Jama Masjid

After the Commonwealth Games were over for me, I had one last day of being a tourist in Delhi before heading off to teach English to slum kids. More of that later.


I walked to Delhi's Red Fort (not to be confused with the Red Fort at Agra), which was once a Mughal fort and has played an important part in the history of Indian nationalism and independence. There was not much left on the inside of the once-massive Mughal fort, after the British cleared it out in the 19th century. Still, the fort itself is an impressive sight and can be seen from quite a distance.

The Museum of Indian Independence was of special interest to me, as my own ancestors were involved - but on the side of the British. One ancestor, William Kelman, received a medal for his participation in the Affair at Kurnool in 1839, which the Museum described as one of the first coordinated moves towards Indian independence. The link above provides an entirely different view, and was written by a British Officer in 1911.


The other interesting viewpoint was that Indian independence in 1947 seemed to be attributed almost entirely to Subhas Chandra Bose, who opposed Mahatma Ghandi's views on non-violence and organised Indians to fight alongside Nazi Germany and Japan in World War II. Gandhi and his part in the struggle for independence was seen as very much a small part in the story. Although he is mentioned, Gandhi has some photos and a diorama of him, whereas Bose has several galleries devoted to his life and his wartime exploits.

My next stop was the Jama Masjid, a large mosque built around 1650 by Shah Jahan, who also built the Red Fort. The ushers were grumpy and rude, and insisted that all westerners wear ridiculous outfits (see the photo below) regardless of how well they were covered and whether or not they were actually Muslim. Not much to say about this mosque - if you've seen mosques before there is little special about it, apart from its age, and the attitude of the custodians makes it an unpleasant experience. As a rule, Indians are overwhelmingly friendly and helpful, but as with anywhere, there must be exceptions to the rule.

Two Religions

In between visiting Commonwealth Games venues, I managed to squeeze in some more sightseeing of a spiritual nature. First on the agenda was the Bahai temple, shown above. It's the latest in a line of massive Bahai temples, each with nine sides. From the outside, it looks a lot like the Sydney Opera House, if it was folded up. There's not much to see and do here, since absolute silence is required inside. Visitors are ushered into the temple in groups of about a hundred, then they sit quietly, then leave. I was interested to see whether it was possible for a crowd of Indians to be absolutely silent, especially after seeing and hearing how impossible it was to achieve this during some of the CWG events, even after repeated requests, stoppage of events, and so on. Maybe the crowd that goes to a Bahai temple as tourists is better behaved than their sports-interested compatriots, because it was actually fairly quiet. It was a great deal quieter than the catacombs under the Vatican, where you can see the graves of the Popes. Michaela and I visited Rome last year and were startled at the holiday atmosphere at the Popes' graves, with people laughing and joking, jostling each other and generally goofing about, all the while the Vatican ushers were going around loudly saying 'Shhhhh' every few seconds. Maybe the Vatican ushers should take lessons from the Bahai ushers in maintaining silence in a sacred place. :-)


Most of the visitors to the Bahai temple in Delhi were not followers of that faith, as was shown a few minutes after exiting the temple. We were all required to be in bare feet, and the tiles around the temple were blisteringly hot, so someone decided to sit next to one of the nine pools surrounding the temple and dangle their feet in. Everyone else quickly followed suit, as the photo shows, and so did I. It was absolutely blissful, feeling the cool water around our very hot bare feet. This lasted for several minutes until a small posse of security guards swept down and ordered us all the get our feet out of the pools, which we did. Playtime was over.


After retrieving my sandals and going to the museum of Bahai history, I headed off to the ISKCON temple next door. ISKCON is the International Society of Krishna Consciousness, usually just called the Hare Krishnas in the West. Most of the devotees seemed to be Indian, with a few Westerners thrown in, and all were dressed in the characteristic pale orange robes with shaved heads and a tiny ponytail.


The highlight of this visit was the 'Vedic Expo', which was an over-the-top sound-and-light extravaganza, explaining the principles of the Hare Krishna faith (they are basically a denomination of Hinduism, which focusses purely on Krishna). I was let into a pitch-black room, all alone, then there was a lot of crashing and banging, followed by a lecture on the faith, all the while different parts of a static diorama lit up. I was then ushered into another pitch-black room and the process was repeated. This is definitely not a place for children, with almost total darkness, apart from strobe lights on some really scary-looking figures, and lots of loud noises and shouting. Not exactly my cup of tea for a religious experience, so joining the Hare Krishnas is another career choice that is now out of the question for me, along with sports photography.

Incidentally, there were a bunch of Hare Krishnas (Indian and foreign) singing and dancing at the exit of one of the CWG venues. The local people seemed to regard them much as we do in the West: try to walk around them and just keep moving. :-)

My Commonwealth Games - Diving and Ribbon Waving

The last two events of the 2010 CWG in Delhi that I attended were the 10m Diving Finals and Rythmic Gymnastics Finals (you know, that thing where young girls in sparkly suits wave ribbons about), both held on Wednesday 13th October.

I attended the diving specifically to watch Matt Mitcham, who was probably the only Australian athlete whose name I knew before the competition. It was really interesting to see live, as opposed to televised. For one thing, there is a 30 minute warm-up period before the actual event. There were two 1m boards, three 3m boards, and three platforms at (I think) 5m, 7m and 10m. What was great to watch was that every board and platform was in simultaneous use as the divers warmed up. Someone would do a brilliant dive off the 10m platform while others did their moves from the boards or other platforms. There was a constant flow of fit young men, flinging themselves into space in the most graceful of ways. The photo above shows Matt Mitcham during the warm-up. Note the empty stadium.

There was also a man dressed as a CWG official, who did a Mr Bean-style tumble off the 10m platform, after pretending to lose his glasses in the pool. It was very silly but great fun.

There were three Aussie men in the finals: James Connor, Ethan Warren and Matt Mitcham. They all performed creditably. After 4 of the 6 rounds, it became obvious that it was a showdown between Tom Daley of England and Matt Mitcham of Australia. Then Tom Daley scored a perfect 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10. Unbelievable. Matt came back with a great dive but then his last one was a shocker, scoring 6s and 7s. And so the gold went to Tom Daley with the silver to Matt Mitcham. I must admit, it's the only time in the Games I've actually felt disappointed. I guess that's because of my expectations. I expected Matt to win and when he didn't, I somehow felt silver was not quite good enough. It's crazy the way the mind works.

Incidentally, I had breakfast the next morning with Tom Daley's uncle, who happens to be staying in the same hotel as I am. Nice chap. Made me feel better about him getting the gold. :-)

When the diving was over, I raced over to Indira Gandhi Stadium to catch the last hour of the ribbon-waving thing. When I say 'raced', I really mean crawled along in Delhi's appalling traffic, weaving about in an auto-rickshaw (three-wheeler, Australians call them tuk-tuks), listening to the blare of car and auto horns, driving up the wrong side of the road, dodging police wherever they were.

As usual, once I'd made it through the traffic, there was still a 2km walk to the stadium, followed by several security checks, including a radiation detector. I wasn't radioactive, in case you were wondering.



I saw lots of ribbon waving, and ball wobbling, and something to do with rope twirling. Some of it was quite entertaining. Some of it was saddening, for the performers for whom I'm sure it is a very important sport. Like when they drop the ball and it bounces off the stage, then they have to prance about to pick up another ball, all the while trying to pretend that this is all part of the act. Or when the Aussie girl put the ball behind her back, bent forward, then reached back and couldn't find the ball. The look of terror on her face was something to see.



Anyway, Australia's Naazmi Johnson won gold in the individual All-Round Final. As I knew that this was the really, really last time I was going to sing my national anthem in public (well, for a long time anyway) and as there was no-one else left in my stand, I decided to belt out the words at full volume. This caused enormous hilarity amongst Indians in other stands, who came scampering over to videotape me singing! I'm glad that I brought so much joy to the remaining spectators. Maybe I'll be on youTube one day. :-)

My Commonwealth Games - Athletics

Watching the last night of the athletics at the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi was an absolute highlight of my visit to India (so far!).

I got to sing my national anthem (loudly and badly, but enthusiastically) a total of four times. That's a great feeling. I met some Kiwis who were running late as they had just watched NZ win the gold in the Rugby 7s. They were ecstatic! They were in Delhi to watch their nephew compete, confirming my earlier suspicion that I am the only foreigner watching the CWG in Delhi who is not related to an athlete. I wonder if I could adopt one.

So what was so great about this night? Well, first of all, I got to meet Jacob Groth who was in the Australian Men's 4 x 100m relay. They placed 4th in the final, missing out on a gong by just 0.25 of second. They were great to watch. Not being the shy type, I asked Jacob to sign my ticket for me, which he graciously did. Even better, he gave me his competitor number from his running shirt (#1045). It is a really cool souvenir which he also signed. It totally made my night. He was very friendly and his family were soooo proud of him. What an accomplishment!


Australia won gold in the Men's Pole Vault (Steve Hooker), the Women's Pole Vault (Alana Boyd), 4 x 400m Men's Relay and the Javelin (Jarrod Bannister). All the competitions were a delight to watch. The photo shows the Aussie Men's 4 x 400m Relay Team who leapt the barrier separating the track from the crowds, to come to our stand.

Another highlight was the Women's 5,000m, which saw Kenya place 1st, 2nd and 3rd. As those women ran around the track they just looked so fluid and synchronised - they were a real pleasure to watch. The photo at the top of this page shows them racing by, in a blur, with no-one within cooee of them.

Finally, the big surprise of the evening was the Indian Women's team winning gold in the 4 x 400m Relay. Not just a surprise to me, but to the commentators, the media and the 64,000 Indians in the stands. It was an absolutely brilliant experience. It became obvious after the 2nd baton change that the Indians had a chance of winning a medal - something that's really unusual for them in athletics. Then when the 3rd baton change occurred, the runner just took off, leaving everyone else for dead. The crowd was going absolutely apoplectic with excitement, including the Aussies and Kiwis who for once were cheering on the same team: India!

When the last runner sped over the finish line in 1st place it was pandemonium in the stands, with 64,000 people jumping up and down shreaking with delight. If joy was something that you could measure, on this night it would have gone off the scale. It was awesome to see so many people so happy.

Now at CWG events, most of the Indian crowd leaves about an hour before the end, leaving the stands abandoned to the few diehards and people like me who are just enjoying being there. On this night, no-one left, as everybody waited for the chance to sing the Indian national anthem when the Women's Relay team were presented with their gold medals. Within seconds of the medal ceremony being over, I would say that 60,000 people stood up and made a beeline for the exits, causing much crushing and confusion. But they organisers had a trick up their sleeves: they played 'Jai Ho' on the loudspeakers. It had an instantaneous effect: everyone stopped making for the exits and started dancing in the aisles. What a sight! What a method of crowd control. :-)

By the time the last medal ceremony was over, there were perhaps 100 people left in the stands. I made up for their absence by singing very, very loudly. :-)

Humayun's Tomb

I took a 'day off' from the Commonwealth Games to do some sightseeing. On Tuesday I visited Humayun's Tomb. Humayun was a Moghul emperor who lived in the 16th century. His magnificant tomb is considered to be a forerunner of the Taj Mahal, and has the distinctive dome copied later at the Taj. By contrast, Humayun's Tomb is not of solid marble, like the Taj, but of mixed red sandstone and white marble, giving it a really striking effect. It is surrounded by dozens of acres of 'Mughal gardens', which include many fountains and water channels. It was peaceful, beautiful and quiet.







The last picture is of the tomb of Humayun's prime minister.

Ram Lila

We are currently in the festive season in India, not just because of the Commonwealth Games. There is a nine-day festival called Navratna in which, amongst other things, the entire Ramayana is performed throughout India in events called Ram Lila.


The Ramayana is one of the key Hindu scriptures and tells a very long story about battles between good and evil. Ram Lila is the enactment of the long saga, and takes place over many nights. There are national Ram Lilas, and practically every community has a Ram Lila of its own. I'm currently staying in Ram Nagar, Pahar Ganj and the local Ram Lila is being conducted in the park right next door.


It is massively crowded, and people wander in and out throughout the show. They all know the plot and clap and shout whenever the mood takes them. It's very much like an English Christmas pantomime: it only occurs at a certain festive time of the year, everyone knows all the stories, the costumes are garish and the makeup outlandish, the audience participates with the actors, and the amatuer acting is (what can I say?) enthusiastic!

I've been to a few nights and they are great fun. I don't understand the words, but I've got a basic grasp of the story of the Ramayana, so I can work out what's going on. If not, I just sit back and enjoy the spectacle!

My Commonwealth Games - Road Cycling

Sunday 10th October saw cycling's 112km women's road race and 165km men's road race. The women's event started at 9am and the men's at 1pm. The heat was absolutely blistering. By the end of the men's event it had reached 41 degrees Celsius.

In contrast to the 20km walking race yesterday, this track actually had a formal entrance, to allow spectators in. The photo to the left shows the entrance. Welcome to Delhi - as long as the world's TV cameras don't see it, it doesn't count.


The next photo shows the security barriers: four buses parked across the road. Note the people on the right simply walking around the unmanned security barriers. I guess that if they were terrorists they would have to carry their own bombs around the buses, and that would be really annoying for them. Perhaps that's the deterrent.


I found a spot near the race track, and quickly identified the only other spectators. Indian spectators didn't begin to arrive for hours, so it was a lone Australian and two Welsh supporters. They were the parents of Alex Greenfield, a Welsh sprint cyclist and three-time European track champion. Once again, the only foreign spectators I had seen were parents of competitors. It was great to chat to them, as it was about 20 minutes between sitings of the riders. We took every opportunity to escape from the stifling heat in the shade of a building, then we would wait for the race helicopter to get near us. By this we knew that the pelaton was near and we would come back out into the glare of a Delhi summer's day. I took a few photos, but at the speed they were travelling, most of them didn't work out. So it looks like a career in sports photography is not going to be one of my options when I finish travelling. The photo shows two Australian women leading. I'll be honest - I don't know which ones they were, as they all looked alike whizzing by in their identical uniforms. Australians won gold (Rochelle Gilmore) and bronze (Chloe Hoskings) and I'm hoping that this is a photo of them! :-)


Apart from the heat, the riders (and spectators) had to content with a violent wind. This kept blowing the centre barriers over onto the track, sometimes into the path of cyclists. Luckily, it never occurred when the peleton was going by, since there would have been no room to manouvre and disaster would have occurred. The Delhi Police were very quick in righting the barriers each time, but I couldn't help wondering whether removing the advertising from the barriers might have been more effective.


The men's race was also good to watch. It started out with 125 riders and finished with about 40. Allan Davis of Australia took gold in a really tight finish. The photo shows an Australian team member. If you know who it is, please let me know! :-)

My Commonwealth Games - Weightlifting

On the afternoon of 9th October I attended the 94kg class men's weightlifting event. I knew nothing about weightlifting but had the good fortune to sit near Keisha from New Zealand, who was a former weightlifter herself. She was able to explain all the intricacies of the sport and was really friendly and helpful.

The event was interesting for me, as I had not realised how much pyschology was involved. As the end of each section (snatch, then clean & jerk) there was real gamesmanship with competitors raising their own weight in order to force an opponent to follow-on, and lift immediately after he had just finished. In turn, the response was to raise the weight more, until one of them gave in and actually attempted to lift the nominated weight. It was fascinating to watch.


The event was won by Samoan Faavae Faaliuli, but it was great to watch Scotland's Peter Kirkbride win silver. He leapt about and waved to the crowd, clearly enjoying himself and proud of his achievement. He was living for the moment and loving it. This was in marked contrast to Australia's Luke Adams, with whom I spoke after he won silver in the 20km walk in the morning. I asked him how he felt and he said that he was really disappointed. He was so close to getting the gold (he was just 3 seconds behind his team mate Jared Tallent) and yet hadn't been able to pull it off. He said he had given it everything he could, but it just wasn't enough. I felt really sorry for him, but wasn't sure how to respond. There's no point in saying that I would personally be thrilled to win a silver medal at the Commonwealth Games, because of course I have no expectation of doing that. Luke Adams had expectations, and they were not met. So I cheerfully told him that I thought he was an inspiration to watch, that it was a great race and he had made Australia proud. I hope that helped, but if it did, his face didn't show it.

My Commonwealth Games - 20km Walk

Well, what can I say? Welcome to Delhi - some things don't work as they should, but most things can be overcome with patience, good humour and a cunning, devious mind.

I showed up for the start of the 20km race walk this morning (9th October) at 6:30am. At the 1st road block I was told by a CWG official that spectators had to enter at another road block, some 200m away. I walked there to be told by Delhi Police that spectators were not allowed to watch at all. I explained that the CWG official had told me to come to him to be let in and could he sort it out please, as the race had just started. He thought long and hard, then got out his mobile phone. At the same time two members of the Australian media contingent arrived in an auto-rickshaw. Nicole and Dallas from Athletics Australia had been driving around for 40 minutes from roadblock to roadblock and couldn't find a way in. I told them that there was a CWG official at the other road block down the road, and maybe he could help them, although the Lord knows that he couldn't help me. So I jumped in their auto and we beetled back to the 1st road block. We met the same CWG official who told me that the media weren't allowed in because they were late and that I wasn't allowed in because the race had started. Nicole politely but firmly explained that the reason they were late for the media group, and that I was there after the race had started, was because we had all been sent from pillar to post by different officials. 'Oh well', he said, 'you can walk in then'.

So I joined forces with the two Aussie media folk and we walked through the Delhi Police barriers for about 300m until we got to the next set of barricades, this one manned by soliders with machine guns. 'We're media', our intrepid leader announced, as we barged past the machine guns and sand bags, with me in the middle cleverly disguising my complete lack of media credentials by a large pashmina and a fierce expression. We were then beside the walking track, but separated from it by a 3m-high mesh fance. Not bad, but we could better.

We kept walking and came across two more Aussies, Carly and Rosie from Ballarat. They had walked into the VIP area completely unchallenged and it was only when they sat down that someone asked to see their credentials. As they didn't have them, they were thrown out, and were now standing in some bushes near the walking track. They quickly joined our little 'media' team, and then another Aussie official appeared from the bushes. So we re-arranged ourselves so that those of us without any credentials were in the middle and those with uniforms and badges were on the outside of our group. In this formation we managed to make it through the bushes all the way to the Start/Finish Line. At this point, the kind Aussies who'd helped us get there had to leave to do their jobs, whilst Carly, Rosie and I stood next to the official CWG cameraman, trying to look, well, 'official'.

Amazingly, our ploy seemed to work, and we were completely unchallenged. We had a magnificant spot right next to the Line, and an unobstructed view of the track and, most importantly, the walkers.

Word quickly spread amongst the Aussie media, who were desperate to interview anyone at all. Two hours is a long time in sport and there's only so much that can be said about the humidity. So we were soon greeted by several media reps, asking if we could 'do them a favour' by talking to them. So hey, why not?

I was on ABC Radio which was broadcast live in Australia, but since it was probably close to midnight in the Land of Oz, I can't imagine that there were many listeners. All three of us were interviewed by Foxtel, who just loved the story of having to sneak into the Commonwealth Games to cheer on Aussie athletes. TVNZ interviewed us because they couldn't find any Kiwis, and Aussies will stand in as second-best on that score.


We had a great time. Best of all, Australia's Jared Tallent from Ballarat won gold and Luke Adams won silver in the men's competition. Jared's wife Claire Tallent won silver in the women's event. The photo above is of Jared crossing the finishing line.


When the race was over, the media mobbed the medallists in the centre area (between the 'up' and 'down' lanes of the walking track). Since we had done such a great job impersonating the media, I simply followed a uniformed cameraman, marching forcefully across the track, then Rosie and Carly followed. It was brilliant. We were able to take loads of close-up photos of the Aussie athletes, and chat to them about the race.


So, thank you to Nicole and Dallas for getting me through the first two barriers, and thanks to ABC Radio, Foxtel and TVNZ for playing along. Most of all, thanks to the Aussie race walkers who were so inspiring to watch - you were absolutely worth the effort to get there.

My Commonwealth Games - Swimming

On October 8th I went to the heats of the swimming. Not so much excitement here, since no medals were at stake, but great to see it all the same. I watched the heats of the men's 1500m and the women's 200m.

It was a good venue, apart from the pigeons flying around inside the stadium. According to the local newspaper, they had been in eggs in nests when the roof was put on the stadium, and now they were trapped inside. The Indian CWG committee is trying frantically to remove birds from enclosed arenas, not to mention butterflies which fly in competitors' faces, as well as the infamous stray dogs and cobras in the Athletes' Village. They should have it all sorted out by 14th October.


Speaking of which, the Hindustan Times ran an article on the animal invasion at the Athletes' Village, showing a photograph of the boundary wall where the sand beneath it had subsided by as much as 60cm, allowing anyone and anything to 'slither through', as they put it. They then helpfully gave the precise location of the breach in the wall to all their readers, and directions to find it. If the athletes weren't feeling secure before, they should be feeling a lot less so now.


Security during the Games is a hit-and-miss affair. When I entered the swimming stadium I had a quick pat-down from a female security guard and that was it. When I had entered the gymnastics stadium the day before, I was patted down, my bag was xrayed, and a bunch of things were confiscated. It was hilarious. They confiscated my panty liners as a security threat! I took them out of the confiscation box, held them up to a female security officer and said 'these are for ladies - why are they banned?'. I was immediately allowed to keep them. I then grabbed my rechargable camera batteries from the same box and asked why they had been confiscated. I was told that they could be thrown at the athletes. I looked the security guard in the eye and told him that I could also throw my camera, including its internal batteries, and my bag, at the athletes but that I had no intention of doing anything of the sort. I was allowed to keep the batteries. They had also confiscated my tiny bottle of hand-sanitiser, which had been through airports from Iceland to Islamabad without a single query, but I decided that discretion was the better part of valour, and let them keep it. I feel a lot safer now.


The swimming events ran slowly, with competitors time-and-time again having to stand down from the platforms while the crowd were told to be quiet. The swimmers would mount the platforms again, then the crowd would start screaming, all the time the announcer begged people in English and Hindi to be quiet for the start. Nobody listened. Nobody ever does.

My Commonwealth Games - Gymnastics

I arrived in Delhi on 6th October and went to my first Commonwealth Games event the next day. It was Artistic Gymnastics - i.e. the kind with rings and vaults as opposed to streamers and balloons. It was absolutely awesome!

I sat near a Welsh couple, who were the parents of Clinton Purnell who was representing Wales. It was brilliant. They were so friendly and they explained all the intricacies of the competition to me. I would have been clueless otherwise. I met Clinton, although he was not in the finals for that day's events he had come up to say 'hello' to his folks. He was in the finals for the Vault the next day, which sadly I could not get tickets for.

Across the aisle from me were the parents of Reiss Beckford who represented England. Again, they were great to talk to and they were SOOOO proud of their son. Reiss won a silver medal in the Floor competion. He was also in the finals for the Rings - I think he finished 4th. His mum hardly watched him during his whole performance - she was so nervous she had her face in her hands most of the time. :-)


It was a great day for Aussie gymnasts. Tom Pichler won the gold medal for Floor - he was awesome. Later on, he came up to the stands to sit with other Aussies - I assume that they were his girlfriend's parents, or maybe his own family. He was absolutely mobbed by the Indian spectators, and the CWG volunteers had to keep telling people to sit down and be quiet. He must have signed a thousand tickets and was really gracious about it all. I had him sign my ticket - he was really friendly and just enjoying the moment. The photo at the top shows Tom receiving his gold medal and Reiss receiving his silver, and the one to the left shows Tom in the stands, signing tickets while an official tries to keep people away from him.


Australia also won both gold and silver in the women's Uneven Bars. I have a photo of our flag hanging from the ceiling - twice! Australia also won the men's Pommel Horse through Prashanth Sellathurai and Sam Offord was the gold medallist in the Rings. I was able to sing my nation anthem (loudly, out of tune, and almost alone) a total of four times! I loved it. :-)

I was sitting next to a really friendly Indian family who seemed to think that I was personally responsbile for the success of the Australian gymnastics team, congratulating me each time someone did something great. I wish I was responsible - they put on a brilliant peformance. Thanks Aussie gymnastics team!

Conversations with Pakistanis

One of the joys of travel is talking to people and listening to their view of the world. Pakistan was no exception. Every new person I met began with the question 'where are you from?'. When I said 'Australia' the inevitable response was 'Australia very nice'. The next question was nearly always 'are you married?'. When I answered 'no' there was universal surprise, especially when I had my daughter with me. Sometimes I responded that I had been married before, but not any more. On hearing this explanation, a bookseller in Taxila told me that the problem with the West was that marriage was not permanent - it was just like visiting. So bear that in mind all you marriage visitors in the West!


Many people were at pains to talk about religion, and explain that really Islam and Christianity were 'the same thing'. Both believed in one God, and had the same ancient prophets like Abraham, Isaac and Jesus (whom Muslims call Isa). This was often followed up with a diatribe against Hinduism, with its multiple gods. In Rawalpindi, the people with whom I spoke seemed to be more antagonistic towards India than to the West.


Women in Pakistan were practically invisible in public places. In just over a week there, I probably only saw a couple of dozen women in the street, and none at all in shops or restaurants. All of the conversations I had with women were at tourist sites, like the Damon-e-kah lookout, when they were in large family groups. Having now arrived in India, the contrast is even more stark, where the streets teem with both men and women in more-or-less equal numbers.

There are also other tourists in Delhi, whereas I did not see another Westerner in Pakistan, even at the tourist sites. What with women and tourists all around me, I am no longer stared at wherever I walk. My days of feeling like a nameless film star are over! :-)