Adventures in The Lost World 7 - Onward, to the Battle of the TennisCourt

It was supposed to be an easy start, setting off at 9 for what should be a short and simple ride to Kohima...

Getting out of town was down steep broken streets, with the usual oncoming jeeps, mopeds and motorcycles. I came up to a very steep sharp left bend with broken road and potholes, and stalled. Will was behind me and is a good rider, so he easily stopped in time as I gathered my thoughts, girded my loins and set off on a bit of road I would not have done on a Bullet two years ago. It ended up no problem. Via the back streets we reached the main road and settled into the chaos of Indian town traffic. Once out of there the roads were the usual mix of good tarmac with occasional potholes and rough patches. There were long queues of lorries at odd points, maybe taxes, maybe checkpoints. Especially into Nagaland Hill Country.
Here the tribes do not want government. Any government.

 

 

And back on the road, with trees and potholes, sand and bend after bend. 

The army presence was recognisable. A few foot patrols, trucks with mounted machine guns beside the road and sparse settlements.

I did not fall too far behind and we reached Kohima by early afternoon, which was the plan.

Getting through the town was an event in itself.

Plonked on steep hills were buildings made from tin and wood, rush roofs and even, as the advert said, 'solid setting concrete'. It all looked like a complex puzzle of seeing how many buildings you can fit on steep slops before the top one topples the rest in an avalanche of every building material under the sun. Including the bamboo scaffolding.

The interesting part of the town was the police force. In full camouflage with self loading rifles and automatic weapons, the lady police officers were dressed to kill.

It was all very inspiring.

Up to the hotel, which Alex had warned us about. Continuing to always stay in the best places, In this town we luckily got an upgrade so only two rooms shared a bathroom.

Once we finally found the well hidden rooms, Paul and I were sharing a bathroom with Michael and Will. That was likely to be an unpleasant and possibly even explosive mix.

Foolishly they were slow to get sorted out, so Paul and I got the first use of the shower. The doors to each bedroom could be locked from either direction to give privacy. So we locked their door, permanently, and showered in peace.

Once they complained enough Paul got out his Leatherman and took off the lock for our door on the inside of the bathroom, to ensure we could get into the bathroom whenever we wanted. We left the other lock to keep them out.

Once we unlocked their door Michael immediately went to lock us out, but was temporarily surprised their was no lock, before looking at our innocent faces and figuring what we'd done.

We washed and brushed and loaded ourselves into the van for an interesting jolting drive through town. The van rarely got out of second gear and we ground our way in heavy traffic to the cemetery for The Battle of the Tennis Court.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Tennis_Court

The War Grave Commission has done an excellent job. The site is well looked after and sobering. Seeing the multitude of graves of young men, from many different regiments, many parts of the UK, many countries and different religions. All the graves were for the Allies war dead. Most tombstones faced the tennis court itself, the Muslim graves faced Mecca and there was a big memorial to those cremated.
Two weeks of attacks, lobbing grenades across a tennis court.

And so many young men dying so far from home. The fear, the pain and despite the fellow soldiers, probably the loneliness. But we cannot know what they felt and hopefully we never have to feel the same.
So we wandered around on our own and reflected.
And met up and chatted respectfully. And wanted to sign the register, but none of us had a pen.
So we hopped in the van and waved at the soldiers on the slow trip back. Most of them waved back.
And another evening of beer and whisky and spicy food. But the beer was warm and very expensive, the service was reluctant and the food was slow to arrive. Still we could sit outside and smoke and talk.
But as usual we were all in bed by 10.
Paul and I locked the door, to avoid any temptation for our neighbours.
The wifi was slow, so it was an early night, ready for a short hop the next day...