Fueled by the several magazine reports and exquisite photographs of Mauritius, the
wife and I decided to take a vacation to Mauritius. Such was the anticipation
of the sun kissed beaches and the blue waters that the coo chi-coo’s had
started a week earlier. We were all set, the shades, the hats, the sunscreens
and shorts and spaghetti strap tops all packed.
We
embarked on our journey on a Wednesday morning. Hotels booked, itineraries
fixed, we thought we were the only smart people. On reaching the airport we
discovered that there were at least another 70 couples as smart. Probably every Indian married from Sunday to Tuesday
that week seemed to be flying with us. We felt kind of old and our romance was
more of a comfort level, missing the initial euphoria. But we ignored it,
consoling that even after more than 2 years we had enough romance to go to
Mauritius. Our eyes were already waiting to be sun burnt.
Our
ordeal started soon enough. The flight supposed to take off at around 4 a.m.
took off at 6 a.m. giving us first of our sleepless and uncomfortable nights of
the entire journey. What was more demeaning is that the air hostesses treated
us with the same disdain that they treated the other honeymooners. I wanted to
scream, “I am their senior and demand some respect”, but alas, that was
restricted to the second track of my head. My request for a brush and some
paste was met with a look that made me wonder if she even knew of it. I was
thus more convinced that Mauritius would still be untouched by the extreme commercialization
of the western world. I was already happy…
We were
to get down at Plaisance International Airport, wow... French, I
thought. In general, I have found that Indians have a fetish for anything
European or American (mind you not western… even Africa is to our west). Anyways you can imagine my
disappointment when I got down at Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam
International Airport. I realised that since they couldn’t pronounce Sri
Shivasagar Ramgopalam, the name sounded a mix of French and Indian. Anyways we
moved ahead and out of the terminal to be greeted by the warm air simmering at
31C. I was happy.
The bargaining started right at the airport, first
with the currency exchange guy, who dished out Mauritian rupees against
dollars, depending on how much you and your wife were comfortable in asking for.
After 2 years of marriage, bargain is pretty much the only thing you are
extremely good at. Then came the prepaid sim cards, still so much discrepancy,
I shiver to tell. We marched to our van, headed to our hotel. The road reminded
us of our honeymoon to Kerala, with similar fields and small row houses lined
up on both sides. The hotel was a typical spa cum resort. The room was also
nice. We threw our luggage, fired the AC and dropped dead on the beds… The heat
had taken its toll for the first time, but after a good nap, I was happy.
The rest of the day was spent just loitering and
deciding what to wear. The second day we went to Casela Bird Park. The taxi
driver asked for 2000MUR (4000 INR). I was shell shocked to pay as much as a
return flight ticket to Ahmedabad, for something that was just 1 hour away, but
we went ahead. The only place I found written tariffs was this one. We enjoyed
our interaction with Lions and Tigers, feeling happy that we had patted their
backs, as if they were old school buddies. The day ended with severe headache
from the heat. The AC stopped working in the middle of the night. The hotel
repair-man, who was kind enough to pay a visit at 4 in the morning, told me
very cheerfully, “Its Mauritius, its ok at 29C in an AC room”. I felt like
bashing him up, but kept quite and asked the hotel for a fan. Imagine staying
in a 4-star hotel with a table fan to keep you cool. But I was happy.
The next day we had the south island tour. It started
with a tour to the ship building factory, which was just a workshop of 4 people
making souvenir ships for gullible tourists like us and selling it for a
fortune. We skipped buying anything. Then we saw the beautiful temples of the
island and the huge statue of lord Shiva. Truly impressive!! Then we saw the
seven coloured earth. We returned home, thoroughly exhausted. I was wondering
when the Indian government will learn to market our beautiful tourist spots
like this. Here we were roaming the whole day in extreme heat to visit a Shiva
and Hanuman temple. Back home I don’t even realise how many of these I pass
daily. But an eventful day. The AC stopped again at 4 a.m. The fan kept me
company. I was happy??!!
The fourth day we did the acclaimed North tour, with a
so called fort (smaller than my office premises) regaling us. Then we trudged
to the only city in the island, Port Louis. Shopping was on our minds. But when
we heard that the same “Original Lee jeans” was available at 3000 MUR and also
300 MUR (which we bargained to a 100 MUR), we had our doubts and escaped the
flea market. With sugarcane fields meeting your eyes everywhere you would
imagine that its juice would be dirt cheap. But behold, we got a glass of sugarcane
juice for 100 MUR!! One fellow traveller told me, “I could have a bath in
sugarcane juice of this amount in India.” All I could do was smile and wonder
at the travails of international travel. The day ended. I kept on wondering,
what did I do today? The smokescreen of those wonderful pictures was fading and
I kept on wondering wasn’t Goa or Kerala better? After a fight with the
manager, we were given another room for the night. Thank god for his kindness.
Was I happy? ....ahem lets move on…
The fifth day was the most exciting, at least on
paper. We were to do water sports. We anxiously got onto our speed boat which
took us 30 meters into the sea and we did the undersea walk, which was more
like a 3 minute sham of a walk in the underwater. The promises of seeing nemo
and other coloured fishes, shown in the Disney movies were never fulfilled. The
ride got over before we could realise we were breathing through our oxygen
masks. Then a speed boat ride to the waterfalls, which I still don’t know why
we did. The guy driving the boat was kind enough to give us some thrills while
riding. The other “water sports”, like parasailing and bumper ride were a sorry
joke as well. The excursion at Mandwa was more fun and actually, water sports.
The room AC worked properly tonight...Wow...Miracle... Wasn’t I supposed to be
happy?
The sixth day was spent in the pool, in the true blue
beaches and just relaxing. This somehow was the best day of the six. I got to
know from my hotel that the previous day sports had cost me 2500 MUR more. The
AC gave up on us again. I was definitely not happy.
The seventh day, we couldn’t wait to leave the island.
With four sleepless nights back to back and an angry sun taking his revenge on
us, I couldn’t wait to go back to the air conditioned premises of my office and
the sweaty evenings of Mumbai.
I kept questioning, how it was possible to be romantic
in this sultry weather? The wife said, “Maybe it just made it easier for
couples to be hot and sweaty, without even trying.” All my blue coloured dreams
were whitewashed. I wish people spent all that money and time on the pristine
beaches down south and did all the water sports, a mere 45 minutes from Mumbai.
With a bottle of water costing me more than 300 INR, I wondered what drove more
and more people to Mauritius. My mirage had already met reality and the sun had
set on my international exotic holiday. We returned back with severely tanned
skins and a question, what the hell did we exactly do?
