Well, after 3 and a half weeks in Mumbai I am finally back in Blighty. My house is still standing, my car still works, and it's not as cold as I thought it might be. Although I had really forgotten that it was actually hot in India - most of my life is either in an air conditioned hotel room, in an air conditioned car or in an air conditioned officer so you just assume that the world is 22 degrees C or less. On Friday I went outside at lunchtime and I was honestly surprised that it was absolutely baking. It's funny how quickly you can forget where in the world you are when you spend most of your life in a hotel room...
Going to the International airport in Mumbai is a bit of an experience in its own right. The first thing you need to learn is Never Accept Anyone's Help They Are All After Your Money. This caught me unawares the first time I was there - foolishly I thought people were offering to help because they were being helpful, not because they wanted to be paid for some service that you could really do without. When you fly BA out of Mumbai there are helpful BA staff wearing sashes that are on hand to shepherd the (business class) passengers through the melee. I was flying Jet this time which has no such benefits. First of all I had to get into the terminal - there are security guards who check your ticket before they let you in. This is somewhat challenging if you have an internet booking and they don't have the manifest for your airline at the security desk. When they threatened not to let me in I pointed out that I had a booking and it wasn't my problem that they didn't have the passenger list. After a few moments of tense stand off they decided it would be too much trouble to argue with me and let me in. Key learning in India is that if you are forceful enough you pretty much let you do what you want. If you look at all unsure or apologetic they are fairly firm.Once inside the terminal it was impossible to work out where I needed to be so I reluctantly let a porter help me. He got me through the X-ray queue and deposited me at the Jet check in (for a small fee of course). I find it really stressful to be always worrying about whether I should tip and if so, how much. One of the things I enjoy being back in the UK is the knowledge that pretty much anywhere I go I don't have to be anxious about unfamilar tipping!
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