Horrifically long update alert

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Finally! I have actually had time to walk about and check out a bit of Rishikesh! I have been working/worked like a dog since arriving - as mum said they really are getting "their pound of flesh" - I have literally been at work since I arrived here. It sounds like an exaggeration, but since moving down the hill to Rishikesh and my flat (which is very nice!) I have slept there and had one day off in the last 12. To make matters worse, Ananda really do own you six days a week as the staff bus makes the 45 min journey up the hill and down only four times a day, so you have to take whatever bus gets you in for your shift. This means leaving around 90 mins before you start, and getting home around an hour and 15 after you finish. Thus a 9 hr shift becomes a 12 hr one and there is no time to do anything either side.

Despite the shock of slave labour, the actual work is really good. I still can't believe I am working here and apparently as one of the staff members in the world's "number one destination spa" (Conde Nast awards 2005/6/7) etc. I am mainly doing reflexology, swedish and aromatherapy massage, and start giving reiki treatments this week. The treatments room are proper plush and I have to do a thali ritual to start every treatment which involves lighting a flame and waving a plate around 3 times holding symbols of the five elements of the universe. I also have to do a foot ritual every time beforehand, which is basically a footbath in himalayan water with stones from the Ganges. It is good to do this as it takes up treatment time and when you have several 90 minute massages to do in a day shaving off any minutes of actual movement is great, so I am tending to give lingering foot washes. The guests don't seem to mind it as having your feet washed is really nice anyway!

I have been having serious trouble adjusting. I don't know if it is because the shift in my head has finally taken place and I am actually ready to stop living out of a plastic bag like a gyppo and put some roots down, or if the whole effort factor required to get out of bed every day and slog my guts out for an indian wage is affecting me, but I have been feeling like I am not sure if I am doing the right thing for once. I know for work I need to do this as I am learning so much, plus after working here I can get a job just about anywhere, but I have never had trouble adjusting when abroad. It's a strange feeling! It is getting better but still, I wonder how long I will last. I don't think it will be til April. I will aim to get the first 3 months out the way and then see what I feel like. I could be elsewhere earning money after this so I think this will start to really on grate me after January. Financially it is going to hurt a lot if I stay for months on end here.

My uniform saga continues. I now have to wear mens trousers and mens shoes with a female spa top. Everyone keeps pointing out the mismatch as if I am totally unaware of it. If only. One thing you must not be in India is lacking in self confidence or have any kind of body issues. Not if you are my size. Colleagues walk up and stare and touch at my shoulders in wonder, and the personal trainer told me I had a "big bottom, but a good, firm bottom" the other day after we did some stretching together in the gym. And at the staff party I went to sit down on a bench and four of them got up. As if my arse is that wide?!?!

And so, the staff party. Amazing, amazing, amazing! I was absolutely not in the mood - I was on an 11am-8pm shift and so closed the spa and had to get straight on the staff bus and onto the party without going home first. I had a hipflask of rum as backup, but had been told there would be drink. It was held in a hotel down here in Rishikesh and on arrival there were most of the tibetan staff, who sat on one side looking quiet as they do not drink. Slowly the other therapists, yoga teachers and ayurvedic staff turned up - and most of the indian blokes started drinking whisky and turned into lunatics on the dancefloor, jumping around like a school disco. Food was served at midnight, by which time anyone who was drinking was completely off their faces, crazed with the surge of alcohol. I was completely amazed and in awe at the range of dancing styles displayed. It was incredible. So were the woollen pullovers and polonecks on show. The most shocking jekkyl and hyde change was one of the yoga teachers. I actually took a class with him when I was staying as a guest at Ananda, and he held an early morning outdoor class in the ampitheatre. I was totally in awe of him during that class and felt quite nervous around him, as he came across as the ultimate yoga guru. At the staff party all that changed. He got properly on it. The next day he proudly told that he had lost 1kg at the party through dancing and sweating. It is amazing to think that the yoga teachers at Ananda, supposedly one of the highbrow places to come and do yoga, also like to lose it occasionally and work their way through cheap rum and bad ravepop classics at staff parties. Bravo!

The food so far is great. I go to the staff building every shift and get a meal. Always indistinct dhal, some veg and non-veg options, but the tandoori rotis are amazing and made fresh by a man with a poker who uses it to stick the dough on the inside of the tandoori oven wall, and once it has bubbled and browned he skewers it and aims at your plate where it lands with the force of a harrier jump jet. Fantastic. We also have a massive vat of masala tea served at 10am and 4pm which is the sweetest, spiciest, yummiest tea I have ever had. It is lush. It is even better than good coffee. I have been turned.

My colleagues at the spa are also wonderful. The rest of the hotel area I find some bitchiness but mainly from girls whispering and giggling somewhere in the vicinity and as soon as I turn round and say "yes?" they fall silent and look ashen faced and scared. It's quite amusing. There are also an amazing amount of indian lookalikes of faces from elsewhere here. One of the managers here looks like an indian version of Blakey from On the Buses - but I can't tell anyone as no one will understand. I can't stop staring at him?!?! The likeness is incredible. And the bus driver is an indian version of one of the Mario Brothers. Same hat and nose.

I had a pervert guest last night, who was very persistent in asking for his 'favour'. He was an 50-something south african, who looked indian to me, holidaying with his wife and mother in law. He was booked in for a 90 minute swedish and I knew things were going to be awkward when whilst face down he started writhing around moving his pelvis side to side, because he had obviously become alive in the groin area. It is most disconcerting giving a therapeutic massage but seeing the receiver actually getting off on it. I know these things happen, but then he seemed to almost want me to know, and he asked if I had ever been to Bangkok, because they are very liberated there and really finish everything off in the spas. By that I hoped he didn't mean what I thought he meant. He then asked me if I did 'extras', and I told we didn't do that sort of thing here sir. Then he came right out with and asked if I would do hand relief like they do in Bangkok. He also asked if I hypothetically I could come to his room for a 'treatment'. Just as I was about to kick one of the legs off the massage table and skewer him with it, the dreaded moment came to turn him over to the face up half of the massage. I was absolutely dreading what I would find. As he turned over I piled on loads of heavy towels on his groin to disencourage any life there, and he asked me "so there's definitely no chance of any peekaboo?"

It was turning into the most uncomfortable 90 mins I have had for a long time, but I got through it and listened to him waffle on about how good it was to have a family as you get older because you can go to Bangkok and get serviced but when you are back in the hotel room alone it eventually gets very lonely. I take it what he means by this is he now has a wife to do it for free whenever he wants. Poor woman. Dirty old b*stard. After the treatment I told my manager and everyone else who was working the closing shift. Everyone was suitably repulsed. The guest had no idea and even found me after the treatment to give me his card. And a pawltry 100 rupee tip. Ergh.

Anyway, this sort of thing happens every so often when you massage people for a living, but I am just amazed that people come to Ananda and STILL ask for it. Surely it is obvious if there is one place they don't do hand relief it is here?????

Moving on, I am on early shift this week so have to get up at 4.30am/5am to get the 5.30am bus which gets in to work at 6.30am, to start my shift at 7am. I finish at 4pm and then wait for the bus and get home just after 5pm. That is basically how it goes, 6 days a week, on varying shift patterns.

I am happy to stick it out for 3 months like I say, but I really think after that I will be ready to explode. I have started having visions of a lost month on the beaches of Kerala living on 20p a day doing nothing apart from swimming in the sea an drinking coconut juice, and the more I think of it the more I want it. This is basically what I did in Mexico when I was due to work somewhere and had a bad feeling about it so went south to surf last minute. It was the ultimate remedy for a stressed out mind. I have found a course in Goa I want to do which takes place in Feb or March - this could be perfect timing for a change of scene for my last month or so in India. So I am soldiering on - still a great experience but struggling with the pain of non-EU working hours and generally having my backside owned 6 days a week by the boss man.

Thank god for masala tea.

Ananda: first impressions

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The night train was as bad as I expected. It could have been worse though; I could have been in a cheap seat. I was in AC class in a 4 berth sleeper, but couldn't work out which cabin I was in. In the end I went in with 3 middle aged indian men who seemed alarmed at me being there but we got chatting and they eventually told me I could stay. It was only for 4 hrs anyway as the train left at midnight and I was due to get off at 4am. They snored in stereo so I didn't sleep at all. On getting off at Haridwar it was like a refugee camp with bodies strewn all over the floor under rags. It was worse than any station in Delhi for people sleeping rough. My lift was nowhere to be seen so I was easy pickings for the beggars/taxi drivers/nutjobs. I fended them off and eventually found my lift. Another one hour drive through Haridwar and up to Rishikesh and finally I reached Ananda. It was in the pitch black but I could tell the scenery was spectacular and we crossed the Ganges several times I think.

It was about 0530 by the time I got to Ananda so I was feeling very spaced out indeed. It is a maharaja's palace on top of a hill, and the estate spreads out for miles around so no one is allowed to build anything anywhere. It is a most serene and other-wordly place, enshrouded in mist and beautiful landscaped gardens all around.

My room in the hotel is plush, and this is one of the basic ones. I fell into bed at 6am and got up at 10am, and headed over to the spa, where I will be working for the next six months. Oh my god. It is amazing! I had a few treatments to get the feel of them and they were fantastic.

Uniform is another matter. I have to collect it every morning from the staff building laundry section and even though it is a LARGE, indian large still only fits a 4ft person. The trousers, meant to be baggy indian style, ride up my calves and look like capri pants. Although a conversation with my boss today gave me hope - I look such a horror I think he is willing to get some trousers tailored for me. Yippee.

I am about to check out of Ananda and get the staff bus down the hill to Rishikesh for the first time. I have been staying on site for the first few days to get a 'feel' for the place. I also get to see my flat tonight for the first time. It ould either be very good or very bad. I will know in 90 minutes.

Back in Delhi!

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Having had a fantastic week with the Carnegie crew in northern India, but alas not finding any Carnegie-Rajs on our retracing of Grandfather Carnegie's 12 year stint out here in the 1920s/30s, I am now back in Delhi, feeling rather confused and disorientated. I popped back to UK last week (popped!?) to deal with stupid indian visa nonsense and managed to get my business visa sorted for my job. Also managed to end up hideously out of pocket due to ridiculous visa fees but that's another story. Also got to see some faces I have been missing terribly since being away (*swoon*) albeit spectacularly briefly...but it was enough to buoy me up for the next six months!!!

My flight from Heathrow last night was really empty. I moved into my own aisle and had 3 chairs to myself, stretching out with my legs up the wall. It was more comfortable than business class?!?! I landed at 11am and am now in a holding bay in a house in south Delhi suburbia, like human cargo, waiting for my night train up to Haridwar. It has the most amazing antique toilet, that is an absolute delight to use.

I start my job tomorrow and am well up for it. Especially because I have been informed that for the first two days I will be staying at the spa/hotel as a guest, in my own room, receiving treatments, in order to get the 'experience'. Bring it on. I am dreading the night train tonight only because I am completely over sharing train cabins with nutjob strangers and going to sleep straddling my rucksack in my bunk to combat thieving hands, but at least this will be the last night like this for a while.

Currently I am watching 'The Shaolin Road' on telly which is basically teaching me how to be a martial arts master in one hour. Without moving off the bed. Brilliant!