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Breakfast was at 0600 hrs Indian Stretchable Time and we departed at 0700 hrs precisely, as briefed the night before. We had enjoyed our stay but we did not want to miss the plane home. Our convoy of 3 jeeps set off for the Sikkim border and onto Siliguri to catch the first leg of our flight from Bagdogra Airport. The journey was more like a white knuckle ride as we jockeyed for position on the road and overtook many slower vehicles on blind bends and many more on nearly blind bends. The views across the valley we weaved around were still inspiring and the river, sometimes meandering and sometimes racing, flowed down to West Bengal in the direction we were heading. The gangs of road-workers, predominantly women and children, repaired and built sections of the road. They sat next to piles of rocks with lump hammers, breaking the rock down into various sizes to provide different grades of hardcore. There were Kingfishers (a translucent blue and a black and white), magpies, an owl, a red sunbird and many others on our route. In places there were troops of monkeys lining the roadside waiting for food from benevolent tourists. There were also many trees in blossom that we had not seen before; one had blossom of vivid scarlet that lit-up an already picturesque landscape. The cultural difference in roads, housing, transport and business were evident all around us in both the rural and built up areas but the place still had an indescribable magic.
As we approached the outskirts of Siliguri the roads became congested with bicycles and an assortment of traders. The roadsides teamed with a mass of humanity, pedestrians, craftsmen and all manner of basic industrial workshops all in competition to earn their daily bread. As we arrived at the airport the uniformed police presence was noticeable along with the heat. We said our farewells and checked in the luggage for the flight to Delhi. We waited in the restaurant where we were joined by some Indian film stars who satisfied an endless queue of autograph hunters. The police ensured that the fans were well behaved and kept at a distance. The security checks and armed presence around the departure gate was very restrictive but open to interpretation depending on which queue one was in. The short flight to Delhi took a little longer than expected and when we finally landed we were met with a wall of, intense, 42-degree heat. We had a 7½ hour wait for the connecting flight. However, we were refused entry to the departure terminal until 3 hours before departure and were told to wait in the nearby visitors lounge. The visitor’s lounge refused us entry until 5 hours before departure unless we purchased a ticket. We opted to buy tickets to enter the lounge instead of waiting out on the street. The team were comfortable in the air-conditioned lounge and spent their time reminiscing over the trip, reading and dining in the restaurant. When we finally ventured across the road to the departure terminal we were given a firm dose of Indian over-administration. We had to queue to get into the terminal as our identities and tickets were checked and then we started the initial round of security checks before check-in. The focus on security was reassuring and the staff certainly had a job to do but they were over-manned with everyone wanting to play a part. This lead to double checking then triple checking with different standards and frustration all round. Sometimes the checks were within 10 metres of the previous one and in clear site of the checker as we moved in single file to the gate. We were frequently told to stand in straight-lines in the queues and there was no flexibility in any decision. One of the team had a cricket ball confiscated from his luggage as it was described as a dangerous item and his bag was x-rayed and searched a further 3 times before he was allowed to proceed minus boarding card for further scrutiny. Spare batteries were also a popular confiscation item for some checkers whilst others disregarded them and cricket balls! Still better safe than sorry.
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