Celebrity

If you have any unfulfilled dreams of being a celebrity, go to a place full of Indian tourists and no foreign ones. For example the Daulatabad fort will do great. I met exactly two other foreigners and thousands of Indians there. They were asking me my name, country, following me around, wanting to take photos with me (sometimes I refused, sometimes not) – no autographs though. The school trips were best, I even got an offer from a (maybe 15 year old) girl to take her home with me!

But mostly (unless the people were too “aggressive”) I didn’t mind this all too much, just found it strangely amusing. And as elsewhere in India, I had a couple of nice conversations, though limited by our knowledge of English and Hindi/Marathi. And no one knows Czech Republic, so I mostly just say Europe as my country. And if they enquire more, Czechoslovakia has a decent chance of success.

The fort itself is amazing and huge, with a special dark curving passageway through which any attackers would have to pass while the defenders would welcome them with burning coal, arrows, and boiling water. Nowadays it’s a great place for bats.