Tuesday, March 12

This morning Mini made us an Indian breakfast with pappad and whole boiled eggs in a rich gravy.

Irma went shopping and had an argument with a taxi driver who insisted that she needed to go on a sightseeing tour, while she insisted that she had a meeting in twenty minutes and she needed to get to the homestay right now.

She did too, although complications led to me sitting and talking with Abhijit and Megha for forty minutes when they arrived; before Irma emerged from the room, having successfully organised a large event in Helsinki.

We set off in an Uber cab that Abhijit called to see a Nook somewhere in the same part of town. The Nook lives in a small three room building, somewhere between a shed and a house. We met the young man who runs it and looked around.

I photograph some of the young people in the computer room where a small gang of younger boys are huddled round some ancient laptops playing what look like games from the nineteen eighties.

I will move into the other room where Abhi sits with a group of mothers. They have started making and selling clothes and he will talk to them about the steps they need to take to turn their activities into a viable business.

We will spend a couple of hours there, observing and later participating in activities and discussions.

Abhi will decide that he needs a beer and we will settle on Cochi Fort as somewhere we can get to quickly and then eat and drink. Megha will immediately order some beef and a beer, and then other things including chicken. Abhi will follow suit. Irma will order noodles and a beer.

I will feel fairly awful: not so much sick as faint. I will have a tomato soup and a beer.

After several hours of beer and conversation we will walk home, saying our goodbyes halfway when they turn right and we turn left. By this point Irma will have agreed to work with Defy, I will have agreed to work with Abhi on his Rage idea, and we will all have promised to see each other again in May at Abhi’s wedding in May.

At the homestay we will do the little packing we need to do and then Irma will go downstairs to pay. She will learn that, despite what the website says, they accept cash only and end up speaking to the owner who lives in Germany. Words will get exchanged.

We will then get charged for drinking water. Will we pay for water? No we won’t. More words will get exchanged.

We will get free water and go to bed. I will still feel awful.