What a farce!

God, we've had the worse day! India is having a bad affect on me, and I've been losing it with people quite a lot lately, so I'd decided that this was going to be the day I kept my cool.

So, although we're back in Tamil Nadhu (my least favourite state, ever) on a stop over from Munnar to Mysore, I was full of the spirit of a challenge as we trotted off to the bus station to catch our 'hourly' bus to Mysore.

During our two hour wait for the next bus, we noticed two guys watching us, and generally being a bit shady. This happens a lot, so we weren't too worried, just a bit on guard, especially when they started chatting to Ben, shaking his hand, and muttering to each other. Then we got on the bus and they sat with us. Damn. Mainly, they were just annoying, but they were being all pally and sitting a bit too close for comfort, so politely told them we weren't interested in chatting, and asked them to leave us alone. They didn't. When we got up to move seats, they sat behind us, then when we moved back, they moved back, then they started being a bit aggressive with Ben, trying to get a reaction out of him, so we decided to cut our losses and get off the bus. Waiting for the next one seemed like a better option than sitting with them for 6 hours, then arriving in the dark, wondering whether they'd try to follow us. Then they also got off. Ggrrr. Now we were annoyed, and sure that their motives were suspicious, so we caused a scene! What the heck, everyone was already staring at us anyway. At least we could give them something to stare at! I went up to the station master and tried to explain what was happening, and how we were being hassled, and he confronted the guys and tried to persuade us to get back on the bus, but we refused, and said we'd get the next one. In the meantime, these guys had got back on the bus, then off again, and were watching us the whole time.

It was really weird. We're really not sure what they were trying to do, but they worried us enough to want to get the hell away from them, so after waiting for a while, we decided to leave, get the bus tomorrow morning instead, and trotted back to our hotel, a bit shaken and confused, but happy we'd trusted our instincts. We'll get the bus tomorrow morning instead, and hope those guys aren't still there..!

Bit of a strange day. I wouldn't say I lost my cool, but I did end up with very pink cheeks, and all hot and sweaty, and it wasn't exactly the relaxed, carefree day I had in mind. Oh well. Just another day in India. Phew, only 9 weeks to go.

Debs