Friday, January 4

We all got up at 6:30 and Uday arrived at 7:00 in his car. We packed Naa’s luggage into the boot and all drove to the airport.

On the way we passed an accident at a road junction. A car had hit a man. If the collision had not seriously injured him then the way the crowd tried to manhandle his limp body into the back of a rickshaw certainly would.

Naa goes into the airport at 7:30 and I try to photograph her leaving. This proves impossible so I photograph the entrance she goes through instead.

We started having water problems in the middle of the night. The pump started working at random intervals. When we get back from the airport the pump will go on and stay on. I will phone Anib.

Irma will go to a treatment and Arjun and Molly will attempt to fix the water system. Eventually Anib will arrive and the water will start working again sometime after midday.

Naa will stay in contact with Irma using WhatsApp. When Naa has collected her bag at Dubai, gone through immigration, entered security, emigrated and finally boarded her flight, Irma will call Tangaraj and we will go to Sumundra Beach.

Naa will send a message to say that Finnair has replaced the plane with a bigger and better one that has more capacity and more facilities. She has her own fully reclining bed/seat, and her own in-flight entertainment module.

We will walk the length of the beach and then walk back to have ginger lemon sodas at Oyster at the beginning of the beach.

We will come back for a dinner of pasta and a short session of TV on the Rafale controversy, which dominates every channel. Everyone will agree that Rahul Gandhi lost the debate in an embarrasing way.