shimla

3 December 2004

Shimla is the former British summer capital of India. They carted all this crap many many miles up into the mountains and installed a little England smeared on the side of one of them. Now its filled with Indian middle/upper-middle class tourists and some travellers.

At first glance it looks to be a high crime area because there is barbed wire on the porches and everybody has bars on the windows. But this is because there are thousands of monkeys everywhere ! So yes, it probably is a high crime area.

Getting up here was a beautiful narrow gauge railway climbing 2000 M with 107 tunnels. The camera didn't really do it justice. Every view up here is pretty epic.

Its quite peaceful, and quite beautiful. Good Himachal food. North Indian breads like Prantha for breakfast with curd. I've eaten in the middle and lower markets, these twisting mazes of stalls, noise, spices, fabrics and the occasional limbless leper. I don't think I got shots for leperosy. How do you get it ? Not just by touch.

Went up to the Jakhu temple around dawn. The laptop is having problems. Bad vibes. This does not bode well for the camera, which needs a laptop. I think the RAM has gone faulty or is mis-seated.

Maybe I shouldn't have brought it...


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