The value of money has changed in the past couple of days. The official exchange rate is 83 rupees to the pound. I was offered 70 on the street yesterday morning. By the evening it had gone down to 60. I changed a 500 rupee note with a street vendor for 400 but I'm afraid money has all but run out again. The banks reopening has done nothing to ease the problem. Those who get up early enough and prepared to wait for hours finally emerge from the red tape torture with the look of a lottery winner. The rest just wait, in vain. Those lottery winners with the newly minted 2000 rupee notes in pocket can't spend them. No one has the change. Everyone seems a bit more desperate now. Nearing a week without cash has produced frayed tempers and angry shouting. The papers spin in favour of the government, but the pushing and shoving is getting that little bit worse. I saw an enthusiastic policeman wielding a long stick at a queue and it did nothing but inflame the crowd. Quite understandable I would say. It's hardly the fall of Saigon, but there is an air of greater menace. Indians seem very patient by nature, and I'm sure it will be fine in the end but it's a shabby state of affairs really.
Well I've stayed in 3 hotels so far and the promised wifi in all of them has been shocking. Broken in fact. I've had to rely on a coupe of coffee shops to get these posts out. I'm now onto the walking bit, so I can't imagine I'll be getting posts out every day as I'd like. Hey ho.
I sat and watched a cricket match yesterday. For half an hour, no one hassled me, wanted to know where I was from, or asked me for money. Everyone was happy to just sit and watch or play cricket. I even forgot about my money worries while I sat there sipping water. I wonder if Indians use cricket as a way of forgetting whatever is bothering them too?
I thought Jaipur was lovely. Agra has its plus points, but beyond the fort and TM, there's little else to say about it. I started my walk this morning from Allahabad and I enter this part of my journey with a degree of trepidation. I wander where no credit card has roamed, with just a few quid in my pocket and no accommodation. If I find a Marriott, which I won't, I'll go there. Outside of that, it's all going to be a bit of an adventure. Wish me luck - it's only walking, right?
Accommodation: not too bad actually. The overnight train to Allahabad was as good as any hotel I've stayed in so far.
Food: oh let's not go into all that again
Walking: I would describe myself as being 'moderately sweaty' after my walk today. I've done nearly 28 miles (the train got in early, so I just cracked on with it). Am currently in an overnight truck stop near Bharwari.
Grass roots cricket. Not that there was any grass.
First class overnight travel. It wasn't quite was I'd hoped for.
Hurty dirty foot.
HISTORICAL NOTE:
Kanpur lies on the Ganges almost directly in between Delhi and Calcutta, and some 50 miles south of the capital of the Oudh province, Lucknow. It was roughly the centre point of the Grand Trunk Road connecting the two great cities, and therefore occupied a strategically important location. The ability of the British to tie in northwest with northeast India, relied on Kanpur. As such, the garrison at Kanpur was significant. 3 regiments of Native Indian, the 1st, 53rd & 56th, plus 2nd Native Indian Cavalry, some 61 British artillery men and the families of the 32rd Foot, themselves being based at Lucknow.
Sir Hugh Massey Wheeler commanded Kanpur, and Lord Canning worried about it greatly.
The well regarded Wheeler knew that discontent was genuine and upon hearing the news from Meerut on 14th May, planned a defence of Kanpur based around a single location in the town, provisioned and closest to Allahabad, from where relief could be expected were it required.
Nana Sahib was Rajah of Bithor, the advisor of the civil authorities in Kanpur, had frequent dealings with them, and a high degree of trust bestowed upon him. He was also the rebel leader for the entire area. Sahib persuaded Wheeler via the civilian authorities to use 200 of his men to guard the treasury and magazine and move the women and children to safety in nearby Bithor, his fiefdom. He was to shorty incarcerate them and take the treasury for his own.
Wheeler received some reinforcements to bolster the 66 steady men at hand to bring him up to around 300 European men at arms all told. Despite this, the 2nd Cavalry rose up on 4th June.
Wheeler needed more help than was on hand, and he hoped that it would be coming from the direction of Allahabad before it was too late.
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