Slept in again, damn we need an alarm. Decide to check out the Basal Hotel's breakfast. Up past the urinal, lightly used at this time of day, thank g. Settle into bench seats on the sun side, Soph cops some young guys hanging and parading in the alleyway outside, but they clear out prior to our coffee coming. Coffee is more nestle then espresso unfortunately as the guys here are very friendly and full of helpful info, not to mention one of the brothers, I am guessing, is quite a handy painter. The scenes on the walls capture very well the surrounding landscape from terraced landscapes to temples, local festival parades and forrest paths.
We try Airtel with thought of changing across our local sims from 2G to 3G but find out that the service has not yet been rolled out regardless of the media release in December.
We wander the bazaar in search of some oat cookies Soph saw a couple of days ago but her memory appears to be as effected as our morning routine. Wednesday crowds similar to Tuesdays feel a little lighter on traffic. The sun is streaming onto the right side of the bazaar so it is the place to laze if able. Further down in the bazaar however traffic picks up and around the hospital it is back to it's usual bustle. It's amazing where people, generally male, will spit.
I can kind of understand in some of the villages because the dust off some of the roadwork or in the cities from smog produces phlegm easily, but people will spit mostly anywhere and anytime. Overall it doesn't bother after a while, and I am yet to cop a misdirected shot, but it is the phlegm clearing that still ekks me. The best is when you are at a food place and someone in the kitchen area is struggling to get it up. Unseen, is not out of sight out of mind. It is crazy I would prefer to see an albino rat on the sink in a food place rather then hear the dulcet tones of hgggrhquip coming out. It still makes us giggle. The other is someone nearly dieing from a coughing fit whilst standing over your food. I am sure worse things have and will happen but it still has shirk factor.
None of the above occurred where we grabbed lunch which was great. In fact lunch at Assas Bisht Restaurant in the Nanda Devi Marg just near the temple was fantastic. Dhabas where you can get a sense for what they are cooking prior to taking up a bench are great, especially the ones without menus. On the bench was a spinach dish with chickpeas and dried red chilis, a potato dish, rice and a dal fry with tomato chunks. All served with chopped coriander and great crunchy chapatis.
We decide to hang out with the sun for a little longer and so take a path we are yet to explore meeting a wanna be Indian Justin Beiober by the name of Mayank Berry on the way. His English is probably the best in Almora though with a definite American accent. He entertains us as we collectively wander along with two songs of Beiobers egged on by Sophie. Interrupted only slightly by a monkey trying to marauder Sophs mandarin bag, saved by a swift move by Mayank on the right side. We question his absence from school but he identifies that some schools are on their winter holiday being fifty days, though the offset is that summer holidays are only ten days long. So he won't be back at school until Feb.
On the way back passed by a boxed washing machine moving along on a guys back. Then a bit further some concrete bags and so on. A couple of days ago a two guy team passed us in the Lallal with some reinforcing metal pipe that had to be full length eight meters but curled back on itself, working their way through the crowd. One guy with his head in the loop created by the bend and the other guy down the other end. These guys are amazing. As are some the women, up at Kasar Devi yesterday we passed a girl with half a forrest balanced on her head. But she was followed by successively shorter examples with marginally smaller baskets and loads reducing down to twigs. Taught early.
Feeling peckish we venture from our semi warm bunker, into the frigid air outside. In the bazaar nearly everything is shut, but a few people are camped around little garbage fires. The news that sucking in the fumes of burning polycarbons appears to have missed the local bazarites. Still I can totally understand the desire for warmth. The cows either also like the warmth or the fact that garbage has been piled up because they are loitering around and poking through what is not already burning. Cow peeing next to a fire, cows in the dark alley, head in trash. It is obviously cow time.