On a Shoestring to Coorg

by Dervla Murphy

  To me, the library is Ooty’s most exciting feature. There are now only ninety-six subscribing members and the wistful, veteran librarian who gave us permission to browse cheered up no end when I went into ecstasies about the fabulous collection of nineteenth-century first editions which just happen to have accumulated on these shelves, where one finds few volumes published after 1939.

  Also near St Stephen’s are rows of enormous shadowy shops that must have done a roaring trade forty years ago and are still pretending to operate with mainly empty shelves. Their ancient, dusty owners peer listlessly from unpainted doorways across the rooftops of the bazaar to the lines of fir-trees on the highest crest of the Nilgiris. If they lower their eyes to observe a scruffy white woman and her even scruffier child walking down the otherwise deserted street they bow obsequiously and I am overcome by gloom. Then to cheer myself I reflect that, depressing as Ooty is now, it must have been even more so when infested with mem-sahibs who enjoyed being fawned on by ‘niggers’.

  Yet I am glad we came here, because of the journey up from Coimbatore. We left Udumalpet early this morning – still with the Iypes – and for two-and-a-half hours drove straight across a densely populated, dull plain where many bullocks were ploughing poor soil. Then we said good-bye to our friends and took another bus, heading for the tremendous blue wall of the Nilgiris. The road soon began to climb gradually through plantations of palms, which are oddly unattractive when grown en masse. Then suddenly it was climbing so steeply that within minutes the air felt chilly and the plain we had just crossed looked like a view from an aeroplane; no wonder the Nilgiris were almost deified by the heat-demented British! Again we had front seats, which gave Rachel a good view of the scores of half-tame rhesus monkeys who sat by the roadside cheering the bus on, as it seemed. Every acre of these precipitous slopes is heavily forested and I have never before seen such an extraordinary variety of gigantic trees.

  When at last we emerged on to the grassy, treeless highlands I could have fancied myself back in the Himalayas had this whole area not been so built-up. Ooty is at an altitude of 7,440 feet so even at midday, in winter, it is quite cold when one is out of the sun, and now, at 7 p.m., it is perishing. As we carry no woollies I have had to wrap both my flea-bag and a blanket around me. We are staying in what is absurdly called a ‘Tourist Bungalow’, run by the Tamil Nadu State Board. In fact it is a multi-storey hotel, opened in 1963, and it compares very unfavourably with similar establishments in Kerala. When we were shown into our Rs.10 single room there was no water either in the carafe or in the bathroom, the latrine was filthy, the wardrobe door was broken, the sheets were dirty and there were revolting stains on the wall over the bed. All these seemed unnecessary drawbacks in a place that advertises itself far and wide as the ‘Ideal Tourist Home’, but to give the management its due a brigade of servants appeared within moments of my complaining, to rectify matters.

  I am a little worried tonight about Rachel’s foot. This afternoon I had to carry her down from Elk Hill – she feels even heavier than usual at over 8,000 feet! – and I don’t quite know what to do next. I have a logical distrust of unknown Indian doctors, some of whom buy their degrees without ever opening a medical text-book, so if possible I would prefer to postpone treatment until we get back to Coorg. But at the moment Rachel is tossing and muttering in her sleep, obviously half-conscious of the pain.

  8 January. Gundlipet.

  This morning Rachel insisted that her foot felt better, but it looked worse. I was therefore relieved when the bearer who brought our sloppy tray of luke-warm bed-tea told me ‘a very smart doctor’ was staying in Room 87. Praying that this gentleman’s smartness was mental rather than sartorial I carried Rachel to him and he assured me the foot needed only a washing in salted water and a plain gauze dressing. Having given it this treatment I left the patient doing a jig-saw with the doctor’s 10-year-old twins and went off on my own to explore.

  As one walks through Ooty’s less lovely areas a great deal of poverty is evident, and poverty always seems more harrowing in cold weather. Quite apart from the foot complication, I would not have wanted to spend more than twenty-four hours in this tomb of the Raj. But it does have a good Bata shop where I bought strong walking shoes for Rs.25. I also found a small bookshop where imported paperback porn stood shoulder to shoulder with austere tomes on Hindu philosophy and a fat collection of Radhakrishnan essays cost me only Rs.6.

  After lunch Rachel limped the two miles to the bus stand without complaining, but despite her cheerfulness I still feel uneasy. Experience has taught me that she is incredibly stoical about personal pain, though she will burst into tears if I accidentally tread on the cat.

  The descent to the Mysore plateau was no less beautiful than yesterday’s ascent and quite different: India’s landscapes are endlessly varied. But by now I really have had a surfeit of just looking at the countryside and never coming to grips with it. Beyond Ooty, to the north, stretched mile after mile of open downland with fine plantations of firs and eucalyptus. Then begins the descent, around a series of brilliantly engineered hairpin bends. As one Indian said to me recently – ‘It was worth having the British to stay, if only for the roads they left behind them.’ (Had the Indian Empire never existed, who would now be building India’s roads? China? Russia? America?) Far below we could see an immense brown plain stretching away to the horizon: Karnataka State’s wildlife sanctuary of Bandipur, which is 3,000 feet above sea level.

  Bandipur cannot compete with Periyar; most parts are accessible to jeeps and it is a well-organised tourist centre. However, we enjoyed the golden-brown forest and saw a peacock strutting across the road and lots of monkeys, some of whom made Rachel’s day by climbing into the cab at octroi posts. We also saw several working elephants going about their Forestry Department business and a mongoose disappearing into the undergrowth.

  The sun was setting as we left Bandipur and came to undulating, cultivated land where dark red earth glowed in the hazy golden light and the glossy green of palms, plantains and wayside banyans stood out against a deep blue sky. Then a purple-pink tinge dramatically suffused the whole scene as the sun dropped lower, and its last slanting rays burnished the classical brass water-jars that were being carried across the fields on the heads of slim women in vivid, graceful saris. At such moments the simple, timeless beauty of rural India can be very moving.

  It was almost dark when we arrived in this little town and I felt dismayed, though not surprised, to observe Rachel’s silent suffering as she hobbled across the road to the nearest doss-house, where there was a vacant cell just inside the street-door. Mercifully, we are due tomorrow at the Hughes’s place in Sidapur, to which we were invited when we met Jane and David at Byerley Stud, and I know a good doctor works in the new hospital near Sidapur, which is partly subsidised by South Coorg’s coffee-planters.

  9 January. Mylatpur Estate, near Sidapur.

  This has been a day I should prefer to forget, though I am unlikely ever to do so. From midnight neither of us got much sleep, as poor Rachel tossed and turned and whimpered, and by dawn her foot was at least twice its normal size. No water was available in our reeking doss-house wash-room, so I decided it would be more prudent not to remove the bandage in such spectacularly unhygienic surroundings but to concentrate on getting to Sidapur as soon as possible. Accordingly we caught the seven o’clock bus and arrived at the big village – or tiny town – of Sidapur at twelve-thirty. The Hughes had explained that Mylatpur is five miles from the village so I tried to ring them, but I had no success because the Indian telephone system is one of the two greatest technological catastrophes of the twentieth century. (The Irish telephone system is the other one.) Rachel then volunteered to walk half a mile to a hitch-hiking point on the outskirts of Sidapur, and though her foot was far too swollen to fit into her sandal she did just that, hobbling on her heel. (If V.C.s were awarded to 5-year-old travellers she would have earned one today.) After standing for only a few minutes we were p
icked up by a neighbour of the Hughes, but we arrived here to find the family gone and my letter announcing the date of our arrival on top of their pile of mail. However, they were expected back at tea-time and their kindly old bearer did all he could for us.

  I at once put Rachel to soak in a hot bath, boiled a safety-pin and scissors, punctured the menacing yellow balloon, squeezed out a mugful of pus, cut away inches of festered dead skin and was confronted with a truly terrifying mess. Not having the slightest idea what should be done next, I simply disinfected and bandaged the wound and at that point Rachel reassured me by announcing that she was ravenous. She added that her foot felt fine now, though a bit tender, and having eaten a huge meal she went to bed at five o’clock and has not stirred since. (It is now ten-thirty.) But of course she must have medical attention and Jane has said that first thing in the morning she will drive us the ten miles to Ammathi Hospital to see Dr Asrani, a U.S.-trained doctor in whom everybody has complete confidence.

  10 January. Green Hills, near Virajpet.

  Everybody is right about the inspired skill of Dr Asrani, but that did not lessen the shock when he said Rachel would have to have a general anaesthetic this afternoon to enable him to probe her foot fully, clean it thoroughly and dress it efficiently. We both still have the residue of our Christmas infection and he admitted he would have preferred not to put her under with a partially stuffed nose: but to do so was the lesser of two evils. At this point my nerve broke, though I regard myself as a reasonably unflappable mother where things medical or surgical are concerned. I hope I maintained an adequately stiff upper-lip, in relation to the general public, but Rachel at once sensed my inner panic and was infected by it. She herself has absolutely no fear of anaesthetics, having twice been operated on in Moorfields Eye Hospital, yet the moment her antennae picked up the maternal fear she went to pieces and a very trying morning was had by all.

  As the patient had finished a hearty breakfast at nine o’clock she could not be put under before 2 p.m., so Jane volunteered to take us back to Mylatpur, return us to Ammathi after lunch and arrange to have us collected from there by the Green Hills car. She has been a friend beyond price today and I bless the hour we met her. When she had filled me up with a quick sucsession of what she called ‘Mum’s anaesthetic’ (rum and lime-juice) I began to feel quite sanguine about Rachel’s chances of survival and to marvel at the good fortune that had provided us with such a capable doctor in such an unlikely place.

  It is not Dr Asrani’s fault that the local anaesthetic techniques are fairly primitive; when it came to the crunch I had to hold Rachel down while a beardless youth clapped a black mask over her face and I begged her to breathe in. No foreign body was found in the wound, nor was it manufacturing any more pus: so I felt secretly rather proud of my do-it-yourself surgery. (Had I not been a writer I would have wished to be a surgeon and I always enjoy opportunities to carve people up in a small way.)

  To my relief Dr Asrani did not suggest any form of antibiotic treatment but simply advised me to steep the foot twice a day in very hot salty water, keep it covered with dry gauze and leave the rest to nature. His skill is such that Rachel came to – in an immensely cheerful and conversational mood – precisely eight minutes after the bandage had been tied. Half an hour later she was her normal self again and we set off for Green Hills where I found, as though to compensate me for the morning’s trials, my first bundle of mail since leaving home. There were ninety-seven letters, if one includes bills, advertisements, an appeal for the Lesbians’ Liberation Fund and a request for advice about how to cycle across Antarctica.

  12

  Ancestor Veneration in Devangeri

  11 January. Devangeri.

  It is remarkable how easily in Coorg past and present blend together. As we drove this morning to Devangeri, I noticed side by side on the back seat of Dr Chengappa’s car a stethoscope and an ancient, heavy dagger for cracking coconuts. Every Friday morning the doctor goes to his Devangeri Ain Mane (ancestral home) to honour his forefathers by cracking six coconuts before the sacred brass wall-lamp in the prayer-room and ceremoniously spilling the milk while chanting appropriate mantras. Then he returns to his Virajpet clinic to give scores of lucky patients the benefit of his first-rate, up-to-date medical skills: and one is aware of no conflict between his roles as Karavokara and as South Coorg’s most eminent physician.

  Dr Chengappa, one of Tim’s oldest friends, is our Devangeri landlord – or rather, our absent host, since no Coorg would accept rent from a stranger. He is tall and handsome, with that air of soldierly authority which marks even those Coorgs who have always been civilians, and he has most generously agreed to let us occupy two rooms in this empty joint-family house four miles north of Virajpet. As soon as I saw the place I knew it was absolutely right for us; Tim has proved himself a man of imaginative understanding by ignoring those who said that foreigners must have running water and electricity.

  Three miles from Virajpet the narrow road divides beside a small rice mill and, taking the left fork, one continues for another mile until a dirt track branches off to the right. Following this down a slight slope, between low stone walls and tall tamarinds and palm-trees, one soon comes on a wide, neatly swept expanse of pinkish earth in front of an imposing, two-storeyed, brown-tiled house, freshly painted white, with verdigris pillars, balcony-railings and window-surrounds. On the left, as one approaches, are two solidly built granaries; on the right is the well – some eighty feet deep – and beyond it stand three white-washed thatched huts where the Harijan field-labourers live. Moving around to the side entrance, opposite these huts, one sees roomy stone cattle-sheds and two threshing-floors now overlooked by great glowing ricks of rice-straw. And all around, at a little distance, stand majestic trees that must be centuries old – some bearing enormous, cream-coloured waxen blossoms with a powerful scent which fills the air at dusk.

  The house faces east, like all Coorg dwellings, so it is quickly warmed after the cool mountain night and never gets too hot during the tropical afternoon. A long paddy-valley stretches away in front – slightly to the left, as one looks out from the main entrance – and is bounded in the distance by high forested ridges. At this season it is a sheet of pale gold stubble on which cattle may unprofitably graze.

  Because of the Coorgs’ emphasis on ancestor-veneration, their ancestral home is also their main temple. Apart from the compulsory return home for Huthri (which applies not only to family members and servants but to any cattle which may be on far-off grazing grounds), the Ain Mane is the scene of every important spiritual and social event in the life of a Coorg. Traditional Ain houses usually stand on a height, overlooking the family’s paddy-fields, and because the majority are invisible from the motor-roads passers-by imagine this countryside to be underpopulated.

  The Chengappas’ Ain Mane was built in 1873 and does not exactly follow the traditional pattern. One steps from the portico into a long, high-ceilinged sitting-room, dominated by portrait photographs of splendidly attired ancestors – all good-looking, proud and keen-eyed. Behind is an even longer but windowless dining-room, containing the sacred wall-lamp, and five doors open out of this room, one of them into the kitchen. At the far end, on the right as one enters from the sitting-room, is a steep double ladder-stair. The right-hand ladder leads to another high-ceilinged room, forty feet by fifteen, which was completely empty when we were escorted upstairs by Dr Chengappa and Tim. It is a most splendid apartment, lit by five tall, wide windows which open inward and have occasional panes of red, green and yellow glass mixed with the ‘penny plain’ in no particular order. Outside, the slope of the tiled portico roof is directly below and each window is protected by a row of strong perpendicular iron bars. At the far end of the room from the stairs is a most attractive double door, with what looks like a Georgian fanlight imported direct from Dublin. It leads to our bedroom, which has a decrepit bed in one corner, complete with supports for a mosquito-net, and in another corner a pretty little rose
wood revolving bookcase containing a complete set of The Gentleman’s Magazine for 1882. The big arched window also sports several coloured panes – which in Devangeri a century ago must have been the ultimate in status symbols – and the disintegrating cupboard contains numerous bundles of letters addressed to one of the Chengappas and posted in Cambridge in the 1890s. Our ceilings are of wood, our plaster walls have recently been painted a cool shade of turquoise and our earth floors are polished dark red. The whole house is beautifully kept as the family maintains a permanent caretaking staff. At present this consists of a tubercular, pockmarked little man called Subaya, his attractive 18-year-old daughter Shanti and his listless 9-year-old son who is no bigger than Rachel. None of the family speaks English – only Kodagu (the Coorgs’ language), Kannada (the Karnataka State language) and some Hindi (which is totally unlike either Kodagu or Kannada and has an entirely different script).

  When Tim and Dr Chengappa had departed Subaya furnished our living-room by carrying upstairs a small table, three wooden camp-chairs and two tiny stools (for kitchen furniture). To reach our latrine and wash-room one goes down the ladder, through the kitchen and out to the compound. But fortunately what I have been referring to as ‘the kitchen’ is really a sort of pantry-cum-dining-room; if it were the true inner sanctum kitchen, where the fire burns and the cooking is done, I could not walk through it without causing a havoc of pollution. The sun-worshipping Coorgs are also, very logically, fire-worshippers, and the kitchen fire is considered sacred. Like the wall-lamp, it is seen as symbolising the power, unity and strength of the family and when a Coorg dies his funeral pyre must be lit with embers from his own kitchen fire.