Reasons To Roam

If you want to get away from it all, you don't need to book up a package tour. The chances are you've got enough confidence and knowledge of the world to go it alone. You don't need me to tell you that! But have you thought through the possibilities?

I've repeatedly been astonished by people's weird reasons for travel. When I eventually got to India I encountered a fascinating collection of seemingly eccentric travellers - all in their 40s and above - who could have put any line-up of Hindu gods to shame, for sheer originality.

I briefly shared train benches with people who were following a "travellers' route". (As well as the Taj Mahal, their routes invariably included some old colonial outposts, described in novels, or long-forgotten place names whose elusive magic they were there to investigate.) There were people who'd decided to take their bird-watching a little further afield. (Had I seen the egret by the river? Or that interesting long-billed bird with grey tail feathers?) There were train-spotters and train travellers. (Apparently, there are some quaint single-gauge steam trains still in operation in India.) One couple in their 60s were there on an exchange organised by their local Rotary Club. A 50-something German couple I got talking to had decided to try and recapture the romance of their youth. This involved a three-week whistle-stop tour of the whole of India - so I doubt they had much time or energy for romance!

Some of the people I met had braved India for more spiritual reasons. Many were there to seek out a form of meditation, or to check out a faintly remembered guru. A few were even making the visit of a lifetime to a teacher whose advice they'd followed for several decades. Did he too have Mercedes lined up outside his ashram?

Having followed and succeeded in the rat race, some had decided to explore alternative lifestyles... Auroville, a community near Pondicherry, was a magnet for many. Its founder (known as 'The Mother') apparently said in her inaugural speech that the purpose of this new community was to be "a universal town where men and women of all countries [would be] able to live in peace and progressive harmony, above all creeds, all politics and all nationalities". Staying there for a few days certainly gave me food for thought.

One of my own main objectives while on this trip was to visit the little Indian girl I'd been sponsoring for some years. Visiting her village - mud huts, a communal pump for water and only the most basic of schools - was a real eye opener. It made me begin to think about the kinds of challenges that mature VSO volunteers face when placed in a similar village. I met a few of these too - people who'd decided that now their family responsibilities were reduced, they could go off and 'live the dream', if only for a couple of years.

Of course, there were plenty of people who were there for the sheer pleasure of the trip. Their only objective was hedonistic enjoyment. Vegetarians were enjoying new freedom and status in a country where this lifestyle choice was considered the norm. Culture vultures were doing a tour of local music and dance festivals - feasting their eyes on more colours and curves than they'd dreamt possible. (I too saw an eight-year-old girl dancing like a pro and heard tabla-playing that was capable of mesmerising me for hours at a time.) And some wise free spirits were enjoying the low cost of the sumptuous ex-colonial hotels in Rhajastan, Kashmir and Delhi.

The reason to come home? Delhi belly, of course. A cheese sandwich had never tasted so good.

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