Sick Day: Maheshwar

When we were woken this morning by India's constant hum of beeping, shouting and music I was still not feeling well. Chris convinced me that a sick day would be good so in bed we stayed. After some googling we decided on bananas and water to try and control my belly as finding an English speaking chemist in tiny Maheshwar was in the too hard basket for today.

So out to the streets we went. First up was getting the right oil for my dry, fragile hair. Some googling last night had informed me that because the gooseberry oil I had purchased last night was cut with mineral oil it was no good. It was coconut oil I apparently needed. Back at the store where we had purchased hair oil last night we got our hands on some good old edible coconut oil and two litres of water. There were also many carts selling all kinds of fruit lining the streets so we took advantage and got a big bunch of grapes and some bananas. The fruit only cost us 30 rupees too which is a bargain for fruit by both Indian and Aussie standards.

Camel pack + bananas = makeshift cure

When we got back to our guest house I struggled to get up the stairs. With no food in my belly my energy was at an all time low. Chris filled my camel pack with water so I didn't have to get up to drink and force fed me bananas (on Google's advice) that I realllllllllllllly didn't want.

We used the time locked up in our guesthouse to plan the next few days and to discuss why India pollutes its waterways so freely.

Chris headed back out into the intensive heat of the day on a hunt for Western food. In a town where even finding restaurants which serve Indian food is difficult, his task was great. He returned victorious though with two packets of chips in hand.

We spent the afternoon lazing around while coconut oil penetrated my locks. Fingers crossed this Indian method worked magically.

Restaurant, Indian style

By 5pm I was feeling well enough to hit the streets and get some dinner. Again we struggled to find anywhere serving food that wasn't that weird breakfast from yesterday that now made me feel nauseous every time I smelt it. We ended up at the same establishment as last night and, because there is no menu, ordered a fried rice and hoped for the best. The restaurant owner told us to sit down and wait for 10 minutes. He then decided we should wait for 10-15 minutes. For what we were not sure but by the time he left us and his daughter and TV blaring, he'd upped our wait time to 20 minutes. We watched a mouse run back and forth as we waited and waited. We figured he'd gone to grab supplies to cook our dinner. Nope. He returned over half an hour later with another daughter. It only took him about a minute from returning though to get our plates of food to us. While it wasn't quite rice, and it wasn't couscous and it may have been a similar miscellaneous carbohydrate to what was in breakfast yesterday it was delicious enough.

On the walk home we saw a few piles of drying chillies and realised why, when our chef specified he would not put chilli in our meals, it was still spicy. India. Chillis, dried chillies, chilli powder, chilli salt. There is even chilli on the cut fruit you buy in the street.

Upon returning home, with the help of my darling boyfriend, I lent over a bucket and washed the coconut oil from my hair using cold water and again damned the lack of a 24 hour supply.

Drying chillies