Festival Fenders!

Bank holidays in the UK are typically characterised by repeats on TV, jammed out of town shopping centres and unseasonal rain - and these are the good ones. In India in contrast the flowers come out garlanding doors, chalked on pavements, and draped over the fronts of Auto-rickshaws, Cars, and Buses. This really does lend a festive air to the streets, however this doesn't extend to the driving style which is even more distracted and chaotic - if that is possible.

5 star hotels are all fine and good, but when Mrs Reiver flops through the door after a long day sometimes she needs emergency treatment - for her this means ideally Cheese and fast.... the hotel restaurant which refused to serve us an early dinner last night certainly impaired its future trade. In order to mitigate future risk I trawled the streets today and sourced emergency Pringles and cheese, which now rests happily in the mini-bar: as small but reassuring symbol of home - the cheese not the mini-bar! It is unlikely that even the most boutique of hotels would recreate the randomised under the stairs wine cellar from home.

After a week in the country it all feels strangely familiar, with the extreme contrasts and noisy backdrop inherent in every day becoming the norm. The house-hunting starts in anger over the next couple of days - for me its not location, location, location but kitchen, kitchen, kitchen - whilst creating a Indo-Geordie cookbook might have a huge natural readership - I plan to have fun experimenting - roll on the Tandoori stottie!