Reading Martin's journal

This trip was my first ever to an asian state. Though I got quite a few hints beforehand some situations caught me totally by surprise, and not always pleasant ones I should add. In fact the overall impression of this city was really not as pleasant as I expected it. Remember, all the following statements are my personal impressions and reflect in no way any universal opinion or judgement. I explicitly apologize if I should offend anyone by this or related posts.

It was Saturday, 4th of Jan when I left home at 07:00 for Berlin-Tegel airport. I checked in for a 55 min flight to Frankfurt. After almost getting lost (as always!) at Frankfurt airport I checked in for Doha, Quatar. I never before had a flight with Quatar Airways and I can only recommend it to anyone who likes friendly and personal service on long distance flights (unlike Lufthansa)! After 6.5 hours of flight, which took us along the western Iraqui border and just touching the Saudi Arabian peninsula we finally approached Doha Airport.

Since there is 2.5 hours time difference between Frankfurt and Doha darkness had already set in. And what a sight it was! You defintely can judge the wealth of a state/city by the way it illuminates in the night. You defintely could see from flying in only, here is where the money is at home! And ooh.. the scent when I left the plane, what a wonderful air to breath...clean, warm and a mixture of strange spices in the air...I felt reminded of "Tales from 1001 Nights", just strangely wonderful and fascinating at the same time. Think I have to pay this country a visit sometime.

After a few hours of waiting I finally set of for Mumbai, another 3.5 hours flight straight east and 2 more hours time difference. During the flight I had the doubtful pleasure of watching my first Indian movie made in Bollywood. What can I say...I mean, without being too impolite....it was crap! Every 5000 sequel sitcom episode I ever saw has more acting skill per minute than there was in this whole 2.5 hours movie, it was even to bad to laugh about! Anyway, thankfully even that movie had an end and we finally touched down at Mumbai International Airport at 03:25 on the 5th of Jan.

And what a difference it was compared to Doha! Wealth, almost hurting decadence on one side, a dark and threatning moloch on the other. I was warned before of the bad air, but I wasn't prepared at all of what to experience when exiting the plane. At least I understood during the next days why I almost nowhere saw any non-smokers areas. It simply doesn't matter if you smoke or not if you live in Mumbai, cause your health even in the long run wont change to the better if you dont smoke!

The airport itself looked like some Joe's backyard garage really, chaos and planlessness everywhere, unfriendly, not to say hostile military members all over. The immigration process made me feel like being set back in time to my early school days when my teacher tried to tell me how to paint an "a". But I even managed to satisfy this contemporary behind his tank-like desk who used all his might of the uniform to make 100 percent clear who was the customer and who had something to give away in this conversation. At least I got a very good rate later for exchange some Euros to Indian Rupees and gladly left the international part of the airport.

But with this the real adventure just begun...

After decades of construction my website is finally up an running: www.kkds.de

Passing the last men in uniforms and filling in the 4th or 5th form while being on airport ground I finally left the international part of the airport. There was a long corridor before me which looked at first sight like a dark floor in a shopping mall with shop-like windows to the left and right. And for the first (and last!) time in Mumbai I was alone in a public area (it took a while for everyone to pass those last officials of course and once passed people rushed through here)! The left side was completely dark, closed obviously, but the right side...

As I moved on and walked by those "shops" suddenly people shouting at me from behind the windows! It appeared that all windows had a slot on the lower end, like you know it from bank counters. Behind every window there were 5 to 10 people trying with huge gestures and loud voices to gain my attention, obviously to sell something to me. It took a while til I finally could make out they were offering taxis! Fortunately we had a coach arranged from the hotel itself that was meant to pick me up, so there was no need for any negotiations with these guys, who - so I was told - not necessarily deliver where you want to go in the first place. Well, but still I did not see anyone holding a sign with my name on it as it was arranged with the hotel guys, so I just moved on. There was a 90 degree turn to the right at the end of the corridor and I was facing the exit, with two new shocks waiting for me!

I mean as usual Mid-European walking out of a builing in January your bio-rhythm expects something like 0°C or the likes. I was walking against a wall! A wall of smoke and heat and humidity! Of course I knew what to expect, but knowing and feeling it is obviously quite another cup of tea! It felt like a sledgehammer right into the face actually, taking away my breath for a moment and while trying to get used to it and making first acquaintance with my new best friends during the next days - mosquitos - I saw the second surprise!

Humans! Thousands - and I mean THOUSANDS - of humans gathering in front of the exit! I mean it was something like 5 in the morning but the crowd in front of the building looked like the audience to the Super Bowl waiting to finally enter the stadium! There was a fence built up from the exit of the building down along the wall for about 75 m or something so people leaving the airport were meant to walk freely but at the end of the fence the path just led into the waiting crowd.

Well, it was a very strange feeling walking down the path, people calling and pushing behind the fence and... oh... some of them had signs in their hands! Signs with names on it! I walked along trying to decipher the signs but I reached the end of the fence without having found my own name... shit.. what next? Okay, maybe the man with the sign didn't make it to the front row of the fence and he is strolling somewhere in this place here. So I moved on into the crowd but only after a few steps it was clear this would lead me nowhere. I would never find anyone here, all the more once leaving the fenced area I must have been something like a free target. How many people can gather around you and shout the word "taxi" into your face? Quite a lot I tell you!!

For a moment I felt helpless and somehow too much pressed, so I just made my way back to the fenced area to get me at least some breathing space. May be I just overlooked the man waiting for me, so I walked the path back up having another closer look at the people in the front row. And indeed some 20 meters up I finally found it! A small piece of paper that had in thin, even smaller letters my name on it! In fact they had even two men waiting for me who took me finally to their car and for the moment I was quite happy to leave this place behind!

After decades of construction my website is finally up an running: www.kkds.de

I've seen traffic in Paris and I've seen traffic in Athens, I've heard of traffic in Italy, and I always wished there was something like a forced-learning-weekend for German car drivers in one of those countries, just to get them a new attitude to their cars as an item to *use*, not as a status symbol anymore. But Mumbai....well...

As we left the airport area the first things I noticed were those so called Auto-Rikshas, three wheeled motorbikes (50 or 80 cc judged from the sound) with a rear seat for the passenger and a roof. And I dont know how to make that clear to anyone who has never seen it... the streets were FULL, full of these apparatuses! During the following days I got the impression that at least two thirds of the male Bombay inhabitants owns such a thing, and somehow they are ALWAYS on the road.

Roads that sometimes dont deserve the name, roads that are sometimes wide enough for two cars, but the typical Indian driver first of all seems to believe in the might of the horn! Where there are two vehicles along side there's always room for three, and where there are three, why not four and so on, just use the horn.... amazing! I only saw very few individual car drivers, maybe just 20 percent of the traffic, 10 percent lorries, the rest taxis and Auto Rikshas. And now imagine a 45 tons truck right in the middle of a bunch of mosquito like honking Auto Rikshas, all at a speed of 40 mph! You bet, if they hadn't have those roofs that made them pretty high, they'd defintely even try to go UNDER the truck if necessary!!

Then, just for a moment, try to imagine what would happen in Germany if there were those barriers across the road every 2 km! Main road, 3 lanes (which means about 8 vehicles along side), driving at 40 or 50 mph, and suddenly everyone breaks down to literally zero, just to climb over an about 10 cm high and 10 cm wide barrier laid across all lanes of the street! Not like you know it may be as soft ramp to slow down the traffic...no... rectangular concrete, that almost makes you wonder if its better to get out of the car/riksha and lift it over manually! And of course there seems to be some kind of law that its going faster for everyone if you keep honking ALL the time....<sigh>

After this (for me!) pretty adventurerous drive (and this was in the middle of the night, remember) we finally arrived at the hotel. Lots and lots of friendly people there (no idea what they were all doing there at that time). I got my room and was quite happy to finally lay down on a bed and let it sink in..I am in Bombay, wow! I told the desk guy to wake me up at 07:45 just for sure, though I was defintely way to nervous to fall asleep NOW. Only a few hours til we would finally meet... Thinking about it once again how it might be, what to say as first words, how to make a dream come true at all, suddenly there was a noise.,,

I didn't realize what it was right away, but it grew louder and louder. And louder! Then I realized it... this is a plane, and a bloody huge plane....and its....crashing right into the building, oh Goddess, what a luck, I'm flying 10.000 km just to die in a plan crash while in my hotel room! I was awaiting the impact every second, the noise was so loud, the walls were shaking......no impact, but...the squeaking noise of wheels touching down on the runway...and all of a sudden I realized why this lovely hotel was so much cheaper than most of the others. It must have been about 50 m away from the touch down point of the domestic airport in direct line of flying in. Later I saw it...could almost touch the gear while they were flying over the roof......luvly place!

After decades of construction my website is finally up an running: www.kkds.de

With this discovery at least it was clear now I would not accidentally fall asleep, in fact it was pretty difficult during the next days to get ANY sleep at all that lasted longer than one hour. And being woken up once every hour by a noise that outperformes every "Motörhead" show by the factor 10..., not exactly a sanitarium for heart patients I guess!

So I took a long shower, ordered a small breakfast and waited, always trying to calm myself down and not getting mad while watching the clock moving so unbearable slow. Finally, at 08:00, I picked up the phone and dialed the magic number. At first beep the call was answered and I heard the voice I was longing for so much (and hadn't heard for more than 24 hours now!). She told me to be with me in a little more than an hour, click!

And again... waiting... so pathetic, when I look back, either I spent the time waiting and then time wont move at all, or I wished it would stop, but it did exactly the opposite and was flying by, hours as seconds, pretty much unfair somehow! Anyway, just when I thought she might not have found the hotel or something else happened to keep her away from me, the doorbell rang. For an infinitesimal fraction of a second I hesitated. Only a door left between the person who changed my life during the last 4 months and me. Was it all just a dream? Was it just a projection of wishes? Two lonely people that cling to eachother or rather cling to what they WANT to see? Two souls that met before in some other life? The answer no longer 10.000 km but only about 2 meters away. Go and get it, that's what you're here for!

I opened the door and looked out... nothing... noone there! I took a step out of the door and looked down the dark corridor... there she was... 3 meters away... almost anxiously hiding in the shadow... the most beautiful being ever walked on this earth... a little more than 5 feet tall, long, black hair, huge, somewhat scared, black eyes, dark with shades of silver shining skin, a glowing aura of blue light around her, both her hands pressed to her mouth with an occasional snobbing. Cant remember what I said, if anything, I just fell in love for the second time and all nervousness instantly was gone as if it never existed.

All this thinking about what and how to say once we see each other face to face...useless...I cant remember anything of the first two minutes. She sat down at the most far away point possible opposite to me still having her hands pressed to her face, even her eyes (as if she could not stand my ugly appearance) and she... cried. While trying to talk to her I moved closer, reached out to touch and console her, and as I did she jerked frightened and almost jumped up... oops... wrong move...

Don't ask me what happened and how it did, but we managed to leave behind the difficult part of "making conversation" pretty fast and let down all natural defences just to find the loving heart we were hoping for. Considering who was meeting here for the first time one might have expected a time of getting used to each other, but it did not feel as if this was the first meeting IRL, it felt like meeting the long time lost lover again. And all we had experienced during endless chats and webcam sessions suddenly became real, no illusions, no projections, no dreams, just love, pure and simple, and for a moment the outside world with all its problems didn't exist anymore, for a moment...

After decades of construction my website is finally up an running: www.kkds.de