Udaipur, 7th December 2010

So Udaipur is lovely – beautiful place full of frilly (‘m sure this is the correct architectural term Wolfdad?) palaces and havelis all nestled round a lake dominated by the Lake Palace Hotel (think Octopussy – shown every night at the travellers’ cafes at 7 pm), shimmery sun, langur monkeys jumping over roofs… We’re not staying quite in the thick of the old town – but have a hotel with central green courtyard, with the noise of the street keep slightly at bay.   We have a nice room – but the best bit is a stone balcony with cushions that we can lounge about on, watching the goings on in the courtyard below, very Rajput zenana-style…

 In theory, this is a peaceful oasis, but being thick in the middle of Wedding Season means that our days are punctuated by drums and processions and amazing carriages and then the favoured site for wedding parties appears to be a pitch over the back wall of our hotel so we can lean over and enjoy the atmosphere second hand.  On nights when there is no wedding, the mangy fleabag dogs and their puppies who live in the rubbish patch adjacent to the hotel announce themselves and a starlight barking replaces the bhangra beat.    

Although we are very much enjoying being tourists here – sitting, watching the sun fade over the lake with a bottle of Limca – Wolfdad is trying to keep to his schedule, gets up early to go off to catch local buses to scruffy temple sites and comes home mid-afternoon sweaty and hungry.  W is keenest on home-school, demands 'work' like his big sisters and has decided he can do very advanced dot-to-dots and 'mental maths'!

 My experience of the last 2 days has involved navigating the medical system here.  M had appeared to improve on antibiotics last day or so in Delhi, but blew high fever and felt really awful our first evening here which concerned me some. So we summoned a handsome beardy paediatrician on a nocturnal home visit (on recommendation of owner – ‘very good, very expensive, always late’) – he did actually engage Maya, wanted to exclude enteric fever so arranged investigations for the next day at a ‘Diagnostic Centre’ across town (my agenda was a stool exam to exclude anything protozoan). 

So the kids and I crossed town to Chetak Circle with a kindly rickshaw driver, carrying a ziplock bag of M’s stool in my handbag.  M absolutely terrified by the idea of a blood test and culturally it’s really tough – there doesn’t appear to be any empathy extended to a child in this situation, no emla (magic cream), let alone play therapists and their ilk, and the phlebotomists here just seemed to laugh at her distress…

Anyway as of this evening, when I had to return for the results, she has Entamoeba histolytica cysts  – so basically has amoebic dysentery, or possibly has had a mixed bacterial/protozoal infection but no sign of typhus or paratyphi from the serology they did… Oh and possibly a UTI as well.  So we’re now throwing metronidazole at her as well and at least have some idea of what we’re treating. (Wolfdad has always rather fancied Flagyl® = metronidazole’s brand name, as a good name for a rabbit, or perhaps a chicken).  

Doesn’t reflect brilliantly on our ability to protect our kids, M having amoebic dysentery in under 2 weeks of our arrival, but I am as staggered as I always am at the ability of any human life to survive in such a faecal soup of pathogens as exist on every surface here.

M:  Here in Udaipur with cows on the streets you have to watch out for cow s**t which is everywhere.  Dad’s rules for cows:

·         Always be at least a metre away from a cow’s backside as they kick just as hard as horses and their s**t needs a splatter zone. (although holy cow poo is considered good luck)

·         If one is moving towards you don’t think it’s going to change direction for you because they don’t even stop for cars.  The only thing they stop for or change direction for is buses. 

As well as cows, goats, pigs, donkeys and mangy dogs roam the narrow streets. 

Last night, we went to a café called Queen’s Café for tea, which was run by a nice woman called Minakshi, who had 4 children (the youngest slept all the time we were there) – and they played with us, in their upstairs room which was also their bedroom, whilst we were waiting for our food to be cooked and after we’d eaten as well.  The Café was their home as well so we were eating at their kitchen table.  The homemade pakoras were really yummy.

We’ve found out why I’m feeling so rotten yesterday as it turns out from my blood, stool and urine tests that I have amoebic dysentery which comes from dirty water.  Amoebae are one celled organisms that get into your gut and cause cysts in your liver unless you treat them soon enough.  Lots of children in India live with diarrhoea and amoebic infections like mine.  I am getting better but I’m feeling very weak and wobbly and my family is annoying me quite a lot, as my tolerance level is low (wolfmum:  I’m taking the irritability as a good sign, as it means she’s at least got the energy to fight with us all….)  Mum and Dad say that we are all proper travellers now as we spend a lot of time talking about our guts and we are planning ‘Diarrhoea – the musical’ as we have made up some songs to make the situation funnier.

When we got to Udaipur dad was offered some recreational drugs.  It was cannabis and he rather flatly said NO! I thought Mrs Morgan would be proud of him as we had been looking at avoiding drugs, smoking etc.

WD: Mrs Morgan, you should indeed be proud (of M). Actually I was rather flattered that I’m still worth the bother.

Back home for lunch (my agenda) from a morning at Nathdwara, a major Vaishnava pilgrimage temple to Krishna 30 miles north of here. I arrived in time for morning darshan, so good to see the passion and excitement of all the devotees as Srinathji (Krishna) was revealed to us all. The streets around the temple are very narrow and filled with small stalls selling lots of pilgrimage paraphernalia, snacks and sequinned clothes. I had a cup of chai, moved aside for cows and watched a fine wedding procession with full brass military band pass along the narrow lanes. Then back on the bus over the hills and back to Udaipur. I’m hungry.

We promise to talk less about defecation in future blogs (or at least the next one or two).