What the f@*k?! Today I have deteriorated with some kind of bug. I feel slightly nauseous, my legs are aching, my eyes are sore and my appetite is gone, as is my energy. Just when I was becoming happy I’m getting over my knee issues. When will I get a break?! I haven’t given up entirely on my plan to get back on the bike tomorrow, but it will require a miraculous overnight recovery. Feeling so low, I didn’t get explore Durga Puja as much as I’d hoped, returning home early to convalesce. But I did get to experience some new rituals. Horns were blown. Old women wailed. Drums were beaten. Holy men swathed in incense smoke spoke prayer. At one pandal I observed the local community take it in turns to sit on the lap of an old lady who had a bowl of flames on her head. I was invited upstairs above the pandal and had a chat with a family living there. I was gifted with a cordial-like drink and snacks. It was while eating them that I realised I was probably feeling sick as a result of the food I’d eaten the night before. Last night as I left a pandal I was given a packed dinner and it was explained to me that the food was part of a morning offering to the gods. It didn’t occur to me at the time that I had just been told the food had been sitting around all day. I hope I don’t deteriorate further overnight. As I’m feeling so shitty with food poisoning, it feels like an appropriate time to mention the lump that is developing on my left bum cheek, right on the spot where I developed debilitating saddle-sores in Indonesia. God help me…

Typical pandal display