A Decade of Travel, a Lifetime of Change

Our travels started more than forty years ago when my two roommates and I decided to leave the US from separate locations and meet up in Europe. To everyone’s shock, we pulled it off without cellphones, or even much money—mostly because we planned to meet up in Luxembourg, a country so small the odds in favor of chance street encounters were almost 100%, but also because one of us [cough Jaya cough]was carrying the BS, a blue suitcase so enormous it took up approximately a third of the country’s square footage and was visible on satellite images.

Flushed with success (not to mention mobile phones, better credit ratings, wheeled suitcases, and the ability to drink legally), Janine, Jaya, and I recklessly decided to repeat this feat four decades later.

Just to make it more interesting, this time we chose to visit India, where the odds against randomly linking up are approximately a bazillion to zip. Nobody who knew the three of us believed it when we actually managed to meet in the middle of India. So obviously, we just had to push our luck by continuing to meet every year. (Actually, that last bit nobody had any trouble believing.)

Thus for the better part of the past decade, my two old friends and I have traveled to India every January to explore a different part of an endless country. Like the rest of the world, all that stopped with the pandemic three years ago. All of a sudden, we were “vulnerable”, sheltering in place as Covid’s death toll reached into the millions. Like the rest of the world, we channelled our amazement at surviving into a determination to make the most of every precious day.

As we were planning our first post-Covid trip **, I wondered what changes we would find in India, both over our Covid absence, and over the past decade of our India travels.

**And by “planning” I mean of course, that we follow one simple rule: we do whatever Jaya says. So if anyone wants to know why we did or did not do something in India, the answer is simple. Because Jaya said so.(Hey, it’s worked perfectly for the past 50 years, so we see no reason to make any changes now.)

To the absolute and ongoing amazement of just about everyone who knows us, in January 2023 the three of us took our Covid tests, slapped on our facemasks, and arrived at the Chennai airport from the US, the UK, and Gujarat at approximately the same time.

We piled into our pre-booked taxi and listened to some of the most beautiful trucks in the world making noises which would result in severe throat-clearing and even an exasperated “Excuse me!” where I live in Scotland, or for horn honkers in certain parts of New Jersey and Los Angeles, result in certain death.

Our theory is that in India, vehicle horns are a polite form of radar, sounded at all times to let other drivers know of your presence on the road. And in the world. As I heard the horns, and I breathed in the noise, color, sound, and smell that could only mean India, I thought nothing had changed.

I was completely wrong. And totally right. The India I first experienced all those years ago was the old India. Roadsides were public urinals, cows wandered freely along streets and highways, and litter was everywhere.

The friendly people we met went out of their way to help us, the food was fabulous, and marvels so ancient I can’t get my American mind around them were waiting around every corner. (Sure the US has some Viking graves, cave paintings, and native peoples whose traditions extend for centuries earlier. But for the most part, we Americans rarely encounter anything older than Great-Aunt Fanny.)

India: Unchanging and Completely different.

I began to catalog the ways India has changed over the past decade.

On past trips, we got all our directions via queries shouted by our driver to passersby. Now, GPS is our guide and Google is our guru. In previous years, we loved experimenting with a variety of auto-rickshaws, taxis, private drivers, etc. But in the two years BC (Before Covid), an Uber-type app swept across India. As Jaya demonstrated, it sends your Ola driver almost instantly, and you could travel in air-conditioned style, complete with touch screens offering maps, news, entertainment, etc.

On earlier trips, significant time was allotted to the never-ending search for western toilets, and that even rarer Westerner’s Holy Grail: toilet paper. (Much, MUCH clandestine paper napkin liberation occurred at each of our restaurant stops.) In the past decade, the Indian government has spearheaded the installation of over thirty million toilets. On one trip a few years back, we were invited to sign the guest book for the grand opening of the first toilets on a small temple island. Now almost every house, business, and regular restaurant boasts facilities and even TP. 

Another thing that has changed in the past few years is the intensity of demand for pictures with foreigners. The polite and even shy requests for photos we encountered our first trip years ago have grown into insistence that borders on stalking.

At popular sites, we can barely get through the throngs taking their own pictures, almost always blocking out and frequently facing away from the treasures displayed. The poor guards’ whistles sound nonstop as they attempt to keep selfie-takers from hanging off or climbing the sculptures for a better view of themselves. But apparently the only thing that could distract them is the one missing piece for their digitized composition: women in western dress. “Selfie Madam?” is the incessant refrain following us across India.

We’ve gotten used to this plea and have developed a rule: we only pose with children. But…there are a LOT of adorable children in India…

India, as always, is a study in contrasts. High tech entrepreneurs building tomorrow’s apps will consult with a temple to discover the most auspicious timing for their product release. Visiting foreigners still shouldn’t drink the water, but they can buy some of the most high tech products on the planet. When it comes to medical access, India has implemented a sweeping coverage that puts most of the world to shame, and their sophisticated expertise has elevated it to a preferred destination for medical tourists, myself included.

India has been building a world-class medical system, which has fed a growing medical tourism industry. A few months before our trip last year, some rogue blood vessels on my middle finger decided to party, and their shenanigans produced a growth that looked a lot like a misplaced manly appendage. While this could have led to all kinds of interesting personal developments, I really wasn’t up for seeing it waving as I tried to type. My doctor said it could be months before the NHS could remove it, so my choices boiled down to paying a private doctor here in Scotland a shedload of money for removal of my embarrassing mini-member, or going to a doctor while in India.

 

Jaya activated the Indian Mother Network, and found a relative: her husband’s cousin’s mother-in-law’s niece is what I think she said, but actually I lost track. With that close family tie, Jaya was told to just bring me in, no appointment needed.

Doctor Shobana S, a well-known dermatologist dressed in a beautiful sari, greeted me serenely from behind her desk. A few minutes later, my unwanted mini-appendage was history. Cost for the procedure, including her consultation fee and prescriptions was less than dinner and a movie back home. For the rest of our trip, this became our new monetary unit. (As in, “How many fingers is that statue?” Or “That guide wanted half a finger, but Jaya bargained down to just a third.”)

So what was the biggest change we’ve seen in India over the past decade?

Was it the delicious new foods?

Was it the time we were famous for 15 minutes?

Like everyone else, I’ve wondered what being a celebrity would feel like. Well, I found out. And you can too. Here’s all you have to do:
Step 1: Go to the most rural part of India you can (kind-of) pronounce.
Step 2: Be a western foreigner. Bonus points for being female.

Was it the once-in-a-lifetime experiences?

Was it the exotic wildlife and birds we observed?

 

The incredible museum collections preserving India’s heritage for the world?

Maybe it was the incredible art, music, dance, and theater?

 

Or maybe it was the historic sites — palaces, forts, temples, and incredible achievements over millennia?

 

 

 

 

 

 

As we visited more states each year, seeing change in India showed us the changes in ourselves. Walking the same place and seeing the same things as our ancestors millenia ago showed us our common heritage.And of course, observing changes in India over the past decade points out the ways we’re changing too. We know the chance to travel together as friends is a rare and fragile thing, and that the passing years, the dangers of pandemics and wars and time mean that each day of every trip is a gift we have to welcome with thanks and laughter.

As we’ve toured the marvels left in India by past generations, I’ve often wondered what we will leave behind for our descendants to marvel about.

We tell people back home, “If you want to see an India full of stunning historical and artistic treasures, you’re in luck. You’ll find toilets along the way, on-demand drivers to get you there, and familiar American fast food choices that can’t begin to compare with the delicious foods of India. You can get a world-class medical procedure at bargain prices, amazing food, and all the photos with total strangers you ever/never wanted. And most of all, you’ll get to spend time in a country full of the 1.4 billion nicest people you’ll ever meet. And that one mean one who got us kicked out of the temple that time…”

Change? In India or in us?

Well, two little girls from opposite sides of the States and one from India can grow up, attend the University of Chicago, and share a flat. Half a century later, they can all meet up in India every year, to travel, search for toilets, explore antiquities, eat parathas, and watch the future unfold.

Only now they can pay for it all using their phone-thingies. If they can just remember where they put them…

If you would like to hear more about our travel adventures, like that time we were kidnapped in Bangalore, joined an archeological dig as they made an amazing discovery, or did NOT race our camels across the desert, please check out our best-selling books on Amazon.

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PS: if anyone would like to point out the mistake(s) in my lists of India visits by year, I will send the first correct one a copy of one of our books.