Ramoji Film City Adventure (i.e. Delhi Belly)

I woke up at a painful 5:00 on a Sunday morning to go to Ramoji Film City with my friends, Kaustubh (Roy) Chowdhury and Ratul Dasgupta.

That was not the only thing that was painful, starting in the night, my stomach was feeling very upset, with sharp pain strikes which could only be relieved by going to the toilet about every 30 minutes or so.

As I was sitting there for 20th time on the toilet, it suddenly occurred to me that I may have a finally caught a case of Delhi Belly.

I always feel that an appointment made, should be kept unless there is a damn good reason not to, so despite feeling sickly, I showered, ate some breakfast, changed and was ready downstairs to meet my friends and go the Ramoji Film City.

We were supposed to catch the bus at 7:00, but of course it was late. During that time I was thinking about staying home.

Then, Ratul and Kaustubh (Roy) also arrived (late), and they seemed so happy that we were all going to Ramoji that I got all excited about spending the day with them and I reasoned with myself that it will all work out for the best.

Lately I had not been getting enough sleep, so I thought that maybe I could sleep a little on the bus and everything would be all right.

The bus finally arrived at 7:30, 30 minutes late, so I just followed the flow and we piled on the 'luxury' touring bus.

The first thing that surprised me was how filthy this 'luxury' bus was. Here in India, there seems to be a broad definition range of what 'luxury' actually means.

When I sat down, there was actual dirt on the seats and garbage lying around on the floor. The windows hadn't been washed, probably since the bus was originally made. I mentioned to the tour operator how filthy the bus was and showed him the filth on the seats.

He looked at the chair, touched it, did not comment, just turned around and walked away. If you ignore it, it will go away.

Since I arrived, I tried to keep the attitude that I would try and be as Indian as possible and try my best to not question.

No one else was complaining, so I sat down and tried not to think about the infestation of little crawling microscopic louse, blood feeding ectoparasitic insects, and skin burrowing - mangy scabby mites that all must have been living and populating in the bus chair since the 1970's.

(Yes, you may have guessed that I have a bit of hygienic cleanliness issues.)

So, trying to forget all the horrible disease ridden infestations that were making their way into my cloths, skin and hair, I sat back, became one with the pests and started to enjoy the ride.

As we drove around Hyderabad, picking up more and more passengers, INDIA was passing before my eyes as I gazed out through the smeary greasy windows of the bus.

Cows chewing meditatively, screeching cars, trucks and rickshaws, masses of tanned leather skinned natives moving along doing countless activities, aggressive policemen bossing people around and hitting people at will with their bamboo sticks - just because they can.

There were strange languages and writings everywhere and constant religious symbols and temples on every street. The whole scene was splashed with colour, exotic images, people walking around and pure chaos.

It's hard to explain what I was thinking. I'm used to an orderly Dutch way of life where everything is placed properly together and it all looks like it was created that way.

In India, I can not help but wonder; how do the streets, people, buildings, cows all stay in one piece?

How can people stay alive sleeping on the sidewalk every night? How can filthy people that probably don't bath and don't have any medical attention live so old and look so healthy?

There is the vibrancy of life every where I looked, but how does it all exist? It just does some how... Yes, I am in INDIA, and I'm part of the chaos and somehow it all seems to work.

I'm sorry if what I just wrote doesn't make sense. The wonder and feelings I get when I see everything around me are hard for me to convey in writing. I see it but I don't understand how it all seems to happen...

Ok, I'm getting into some sort of philosophical existentialism discussion that I can't get out of, so I'll continue with my story.

Meanwhile, things were churning around in my stomach. The bus ride across town and out into the rocky hills surrounding Hyderabad took about 2 hours. Towards the end, my stomach was chanting, toilet, toilet, toilet!!! Where's the toilet!?!?

We finally arrived and the first thing I did was run out of the bus and rush to the toilets.

A funny thing about India's toilets, they are labelled 'He' and 'She'. I'm not sure why I find that funny. But I mentioned it to Roy and Ratul and I think they found humour in my observation as well.

After purchasing tickets, we walked through yet another gate, got back on our 'luxury' bus, drove past shanty towns growing on the property of the park, the bus splashed through open sewers.

I kid you not - ok, it was a swampy wet area that the bus drove through, but by the smell it must be where they dump the sewage.

Finally we arrived at the actual entrance to the park!

When we started walking, I noticed that my head was starting to hurt, throb and pound with every heart beat and step I took. I started to heat up in the hot tropical sun. I also noticed that my body was vibrating slightly any time I moved.

However, being the good trouper, I strove forward. My main concern was that Roy and Ratul should have a good time. I'm a super tough guy who can handle everything. No problem.

Ramoji Film City was not created as a tourist park. It was created for Bollywood filming.

It is like the Hollywood tours in California, they have set up the film city so that tourist can also come and enjoy themselves and look at the sets where their favourite Bollywood films were being produced.

While we were there, I saw several films being shot off in the distance in several areas of the park.

The sets were pretty cool to see. They had mini Taj Mahal and several other famous Indian and world landmarks, palaces, banks, libraries, all these fake buildings were used for filming.

My favourite set was the mock airplane. It was fun sitting in there as if we were flying in a plane.

What was so amazing, the day after my tour, I was watching a Bollywood film and there was a scene in a plane. That plane in the film was exactly that set where I was sitting! That was such a coincidence!

Everything in the park is used for filming, like this photo showing Ratul and myself. Despite being desperately sick, I always seem to have the energy to break out spontaneously in song.

This giant guitar is in front of a fake music studio for when they film people in a movie where they are acting cutting an album.

Despite all the very exciting things to do and see, I couldn't help but deteriorate as the day went on.

After lying down in a gazebo for about 30 minutes, Ratul and Roy convinced me go get help and have the first aid people check me out.

We arrived at the help station. By then I was sweating, having difficulty breathing as I forced myself to walk forward, head and body pains, temperature and my body was vibrating at any movement.

She called an ambulance to pick me up. A little mini ambulance came to drive me to a nearby hospital. The ride was hot, bumpy, and down right horrible. But even then, I managed to continue looking out the window, just so I wouldn't miss a moment of seeing India go by.

It's amazing, even when I'm being whisked to a hospital, possibly DYING, and I'm still peering out the window. I just can't stand to miss anything.

We arrived at the hospital. As you can see by the photo I was near death. ha ha! It looked like some rural hospital with some rural doctor who could barely speak English.

He checked me out, took my pulse, blood pressure and temperature.

It was funny while he took my temperature. I was sitting there with the thermometer in my mouth and I couldn't talk. I suddenly had to go to the toilet NOW!

I wanted to let Roy and Ratul know so the doctor could speed things up. I thought I'd spell it out, but how could I spell it out in a simple way so that my friends would understand?

So I wrote with my finger on the desk 'HE' (remember when I mentioned earlier in this post, that's how they label the toilets?).

After doing it 3 times, to my surprise, I saw a light bulb switch on in Roy's eyes and he immediately told the doctor that I needed to go to the toilet right away.

The doctor literally grabbed the thermometer out of my mouth and said it was enough and I ran off again to some hole in the floor to painfully squat for a while.

The doctor said that I probably ate something bad or drunk some bad water. He gave me a bunch of pills and advised me on what to eat and drink.

I felt very guilty that I was messing up Ratul and Roy's day, but they assured me that it was ok and they were ready to go home anyway.

They're such nice guys, I will never know if they really wanted to stay or not, but I just accepted their kindness and we called a cab and went on home.

This sickness has had a pretty big impact on my health over the week. Actually, I'm still not feeling 100%. I'm also being plagued by cold sores on my lips, head aches, rashes and just plain tiredness.

I'm not sure what caused this, maybe the water I drank or the prawns I ate at Bar One. Maybe it's just all this super spicy Indian food I've been eating that's slowly burning holes in my stomach. Or, maybe it's the fact that I've been getting 4 to 5 hours of sleep some nights.

Probably it was the water combined with all the above mentioned aspects that have cut away at my immune system.

Since I've been sick, I started to focus on getting a full nights sleep. My SAP training is very important and there are too many fantastic things to do and see for me to mess it up by being sick.