Hell of a day...

On the bus ride to Sultanbatheri

Our first morning in Sultanbatheri, we rose super early, dozy but excited about our day ahead. Whilst checking in to the ‘Issac Resort’ hotel the night before we had arranged to hire a jeep for the day to chauffeur us around the various sights our new locale had to offer. Onrayaram our driver arrived at 6.30am-ish and we squashed into the front seat beside him. He set off in typical Indian style, one hand on the horn and swerving to ‘avoid’ anything/one that got in our path…..certainly wakes you up of a morning! Our first stop was the Wayanad Wildlife Santuary, tiger spotting! After collecting our tickets and park guide we set off into the park at a slow amble scanning the undergrowth intensely for the stripy wonder. We passed a peacock, some spotted deer, several impressive termite mounds, hunners of monkeys, almost caught a glimpse of a barking deer, and a few chickens……..not a tiger to be seen.

All credit to our guide and Onrayaram, it seemed out of all the jeeps in the park we stayed the longest. They did appear to be trying quite hard to find one for us to goggle at. Onrayaram headed off the beaten track, not too far down a sandy path our guide loudly whispered to us to look to the left. The jeep slowed and we saw what we were told were fresh tiger tracks, probably from about an hour before. Bums. It was exciting nonetheless, although I couldn’t help imagining one of the guides had been out earlier walking around on stilts with paws, it seemed so ridiculous to believe one of these amazing beasts could be only a km or so away….

A little further along the track we saw another set to the right of the path, heading the other way…obviously the guide was going back to camp for a cuppa. Slightly disappointed and with a real hunger to spot the grand cat we decided to come again the following morning, hopefully an hour earlier to try our luck again. Once out of the gates Onrayaram whisked us back to our hotel for breakfast before taking us to our next destination. We went back to our room to use the loo and gather our thoughts on where to go for breakie.

Our doorbell rang. It was at this point our entire travelling plans were thrown into chaos. Rich opened the door to find our particularly camp assistant manager ringing his hands and looking very anxious. It would seem our India visas had expired by 10 days. Surely that couldn’t be. Rich had applied for the visas himself in Hong Kong and is usually so thorough. We were getting mildly annoyed with his wild accusations, he had to have made a mistake. We tried to shoo him away but he wasn’t for having it, we were to accompany him to the reception to wait for the manager to arrive. Whilst waiting at the desk, hungry, tired and grumpy we had a look at our visas. Start date 20/10/09, expiry 20/01/10. A three month window permitting us to remain in a foreign land was indeed now closed, yet we had not left. This it turns out is an offence, and not one to be taken lightly. Realising we were not going to wrap this up in time to head out for our next tourist jolly, we paid Onrayaram for a mornings work. He looked disappointed but seemed to sympathise with our situation, he collected his payment and sped off in his jeep.

The manager arrived and explained we should call the Indian consulate in our country and see if our visas could be extended. In the meantime, he was afraid, he would have to go to the police station with our passports to report the offence. The procedure upon checking into any hotel or home-stay in India requires a thorough checking of your passport/visa, this is logged by the hotel and is regularly checked by the authorities. If the manager had not confessed our situation immediately he would have been subjected to legal action. At this point we were still optimistic that the situation could be remedied…or perhaps a little arrogant in the belief that we had the right to stay, therefore there must be some solution, we are British after all. We called the Indian consulate who confirmed that indeed no, they could not and would not extend our visa. Ok, thanks, have a nice day. Then we called the British Embassy in India who reminded us that this was indeed an offence, why had this happened? They instructed us to report to the local Superintendent who would make out the necessary paperwork allowing us to leave India, rather than be detained. As we asked the manager and camp assistant manager for directions to the local cop shop, the tiny handful of hope was crushed. We were leaving India. I cried.

In retrospect the team at the hotel were amazing, even if we were most annoyed at them for our mistake. They couldn’t have helped us more, especially the camp assistant manager, I do hope all his efforts that day served as points towards his promotion. Annoying as he was, God loves a trier.

It was decided we would need a taxi, and an entourage. Out of nowhere pops Onrayaram. Seems the Indians do not miss a trick when it comes to making a buck. And fair enough, he had lost out on an afternoons work. Camp assistant manager, Rich and I jumped into Onrayarms jeep and whizzed off again at mach 10. We made a few stops and picked up a policeman to join our merry band. After a few wrong turns and redirections we made it to the district police head quarters. We were ushered into a very sombre pint sized court room. The Superintendent, we will call him SP, swaggered into the room stroking his humble ‘tache. I was still hoping there may be a chance of redemption, if we explained how much we had fallen in love with their beautiful country and how much we wanted to go on exploring it. No, actually there was no chance of this being allowed. SP wanted to make an example of us, fair enough. He explained we had two choices, one - face legal action and potentially a five year prison sentence, or two - leave India tomorrow. Bit of a no-brainer. And I burst into tears again. He asked us our names and what we do. Although he was directing all conversation at Rich, seems my floods of tears were doing nothing to erode the chauvanism that exists in India. Rich answered that he is a teacher, this has become our standard answer as no one seems to get the whole Outward Bound thing, and as we are asked these questions daily, it is just easier. SP snorted, ‘Well as a teacher you should not be ignorant of a countries rules…..and your wife, even as a designer she should have been aware!!’ We swallowed our pride and accepted our reprimand. A little more dressing down followed, and then we were told what was to happen. We would be granted extension of stay for 15 days, including the 10 days we had overstayed. Paperwork would be drawn up for us to present at Immigration, and we would leave the country by tomorrow AM. There would only be leniency if there were no available flights. As we sit dazed and confused, and still hungry as it is now around 2.30pm and we have not yet had our breakfast, the various people slowly set about preparing the paperwork for us. SP seems to have taken a shine to camp assistant manager and is rallying his help in preparing paperwork etc. I am not sure this is legal, but that doesn’t seem to be an issue here. It would appear we should have been busy during this period also, as SP then asks us what flight we have booked, and to where are we going? I am not sure when we were supposed to have had a chance to do this, but it did not seem like a point I should raise at that moment. Seeing our vacant faces, he garbles something to CAM (camp assistant manager) and he gets on the job, again it did not seem we were in a position to argue. CAM gets on his moby and asks us if we want to go to London, ‘NO!’ ………some quick thinking….’Eh, Thailand?’ We both agreed this would be cheap and we would not need a visa to get in. We manage to negotiate with SP that we would like some time to think and try to book a flight for ourselves. ‘Ok, you need to be back here by 3.45pm to get the paperwork finalised.’ It was now about 3pm.

CAM led us down to the nearest town to find an internet cafe. I was crying again. As we reached the town Rich and I decided to go with CAM’s travel agent as we had precious little time left to organise anything. As we found an ATM for cash CAM read out our details over the phone to the agent. ”J for jobby” he spoke into the phone as he began to spell my name… Could the day be any crueller?!?! It helped some to break the mood though…

Back at the station, after a very long wait, we were presented the papers and reminded that we had ruined the SP’s day. I didn’t think it appropriate to mention that he had not made mine either. His mood was lightening though as he introduced us to some coworkers, ‘This is Judith Mundell, she is a designer…and she has been crying ALL day, ha ha!!’

Heading back to the hotel with CAM still clutching our passports, in case we made a dash for the hills, he explained he would book a taxi to drive us overnight to the nearest airport. It was about 8pm and our flight to Bangkok was scheduled for 8am the following morning. Thankfully Onrayaram had not been enlisted, I think a jeep for 6 hours on Indian roads may have sent me over the edge. We packed our bags and had one last tasty Indian dinner, then returned to await our taxi. We hoped there may have been some silver lining in that our vehicle would have been an Ambassador, a very regal looking beast that is a common Indian taxi, it looks a bit like a mini Roller. Sadly no, our chariot rocked up in the form of a Tata Indica Vista. This looks like the cousin of a Corsa, but has less leg room. CAM makes a move to get in the front. We try to lose him, but he explains that instead of a police escort SP had told him to come with us to make sure we leave. It is now 11pm, any last dribble of a sense of humour has well and truly left the building. We slouch into the back seat huffily and close our eyes, hopefully it will all go away. I awake sporadically to find the driver and CAM getting out of the car for tea breaks, do I want a cup of chai? No thanks. At least the driver is determined not to kill us by falling asleep at the wheel, just by his crazy swerving and driving on the wrong side of the road instead.

As day breaks we arrive at Cochin airport. I am too tired to cry again. We stiffly remove ourselves from our contorted positions in the matchbox of a car. As we bundle our rucksacks onto a trolley CAM hands us a name card, it reads Joby E.J Asst. Manager. Thank you Joby, you have really gone above and beyond. I hope you make manager soon. We trundle off, Bangkok bound instead of Rajasthan…..we will be back.