28 to 30 October, 2021
I wanted to go to Leicester to see the Diwali lights and to meet up with our friends, Avi and Farrah. It’s about halfway between London and Sheffield and on the same route so that was handy. The lights were being turned on for 24th October and the crazy Diwali day was 4th November, so we were nicely in the middle.
When we arrived in Leicester, I was immediately struck with how much more genteel it felt than Sheffield. Sort of like Bristol but a bit grittier. A first it also seemed busier, at least at the station. I got on my cab app and a taxi arrived quickly to take us to the Holiday Inn. It was a nice big room with a car park view. The hotel in Sheffield had a view onto the next building. One day I’ll have a nice hotel view!
After a rest we opted to not have any dinner but to go straight to Belgrave Road, which is also known as the Royal Mile or Curry Mile. It’s a big Asian community. Belgrave Roa hadn’t changed since we were last there. There’s a big, illuminated Ferris wheel and there are Diwali lights strung along the road with some illuminated decorations on the lamp posts. It looks very festive. Last time we were there for Diwali night and there were big crowds and fireworks. It was manic! This time it was deserted apart from some busy restaurants.
I’d said that maybe we could find a simple bowl of dhal and skip anything fancy, but most of the places had bigger meals or were fast food outlets. Apart from Bobby’s. Bobby’s is the best-known Indian restaurant in the area. It’s a vegetarian hotspot. I didn’t really want to go there so we walked on. I tried to go into a shop or two that were selling Diwali trinkets but, despite their open doors, they were closed – or so I was told as soon as I put my foot in. We walked along to the end of the road.
Right down where it started to thin out was a Chaiwala and I thought we could at least have a cup of masala chai, but again I was ushered out – more kindly this time. They were apparently setting up for their grand opening the next day. And so back we went to Bobby’s and miraculously got a table immediately. Then we waited. We probably waited longer than we’d ever waited, since Krish is notoriously impatient, but there wasn’t anywhere else to go, and it was wet and chilly outside. Finally, they came for our order. I wanted dhal and a puri, and true to form Krish (who always over-orders) wanted dhokla and chaat and naan. And we waited again – a long time. We weren’t alone in our impatience. At every table people were looking around wondering where their food was.
The dhokla came first, then some naan, then some puri – I forget how long afterwards. We ate the dhokla, which is a spongey type of pancake. It was slightly spicy. Not bad but not as good as our friend, Rakhee’s. I had two pieces. Krish ordered a lassi to cool us down from the spice. I ate two more teaspoons of dhal. Krish ate everything else. The chaat never came, nor the lassi. Finally losing patience, Krish asked for the bill – the chaat was on there so he told them to take that off, and the lassi had never made it to our order. The verdict was – slowest and most unfriendly service ever, but the food had been very nicely made. We took a look around the street for something else (I’d barely eaten) but there was nothing and everything was dark – so we ordered another cab and went back to our room, settling for a cup of tea and sharing a pack of hotel biscuits.
Overnight my stomach was so sour, and by morning I felt truly ill. I could barely move from the pain in my abdomen and lower back. Krish lingered in the hotel with me, we fashioned a hot water bottle from my drinking bottle, and he went out for an hour or two at a time, while I stayed in bed hoping to recover by evening so I could see our friends later that day.
Krish found this plaque. Attenborough was educated at Wyggeston Grammar School for Boys!
Krish picked me up a sandwich – an omelet on white bread, I told him. Only they didn’t know how to make an omelet so gave him a fried egg one instead. I got brown sauce on it, said Krish, I know you like that. Oh well, I couldn’t eat anyway. I drank though, whatever I could stomach – some very weak tea, some ginger beer, some coconut water. It was clear I wasn’t going anywhere with our friends. I told Krish, please go anyway. I’ll feel less guilty. he said no, so I told him to call and explain and maybe during the chat he’d change his mind. He did. I was glad for that.[/caption]
He was out for three or four hours. They had fun. I’m so glad. In retrospect, I’m pleased I didn’t go. If my response to spice had been that bad from Thursday, how much worse would it have been if it had happened on Friday night with the journey ahead! Ah well, spice or not – DONE!
I took an extra dose of my meds in the evening, having actually managed to eat TWO CRACKERS! Yay.
The next morning, I planned to stay in bed and ignore the jibes from Krish about going to seek breakfast. Instead, I took another pill, ate some crackers – AND A COOKIE, yay. I didn’t feel quite right but at least able to move about and talk without sounding like someone had strangled me. Avi and Farrah had said if I was feeling well enough, let them know and they’d pick us up to go over. I messaged them that I was OK and to get back to us.
We then had a lazy morning with Krish packing and me just resting and praying. Just before we checked out, Avi phoned to say he would come by at 1pm. So, for one hour we explored around the old centre, and I was able to get some photos. Leicester has a small but interesting medieval quarter. There’s a big Richard III connection in Leicester.
We bought gifts for Avi and Farrah – a lovely scented candle (winter scent) and some halal chocolate (harder to find than I would have imagined, considering the Moslem population. and we went into the visitor centre and I bought two Diwali items – a bird with a bell, and a string of birds with a bell. They’re both very pretty and seeing the price now, I should have bought many more. Then we heard from Avi that he would leave in ten minutes so we headed back to the hotel to collect the case. That is, Krish headed back and I sat across the road where Avi would be pulling up. The following photos are of the fancier shopping area, Loseby Lane.
It was really nice to see him. He took us to his place by the scenic route (I now surmise) and picked up somewhere from ‘our favourite place’ which was grilled marinated chicken on a bun and some chips. He ordered mine plain. They live in a small community with suburban housing and their place is traditional and neat. it was my first meeting with Farrah, who was wearing a hijab (she wore it for dinner the day before so obviously that’s a normal thing, although I’ve seen Instagram photos of her with her hair showing) and was very chatty. She’s a Computer Sciences teacher and very articulate and interesting. So nice to meet her, two years after the marriage, and already chatting a little through our Instagram pages. I managed to eat half the burger which, despite being ‘plain,’ had been marinated and I tasted it for ages, I also managed a handful of chips.
Avi showed us around the house and then suddenly realised we had fifteen minutes to get our train. Panic! We raced along with us telling Avi, get us there but alive, we’d rather pay the fare again. in fact, our train was 3:32 and we arrived at the station at 3:31! (This is when I discovered getting to the station was probably a THIRD of the distance we’d travelled coming from the hotel to his house – so yeah, scenic route.) We raced through the barrier, up the stairs to the footbridge, all the way along, and saw that the train was on the platform. I tucked my cane under my arm, got down the stairs as quickly as I could, grateful for someone who was holding up the boarding process a bit, jumped in the closest door to me and we took off. This is the second time we have absolutely rushed to Leicester station and just made it. I hope it’s not a trend.
The train back was packed, mostly with football fans – definitely Arsenal at an away game, definitely drunk, and definitely super noisy and boring. Every five seconds or so someone – usually the same person – started an awful fan song which the others joined in or not. The second song seemed to need some clanging and banging of the train seats and overhead railings. Joy! Facing us across the table sat a man with his young daughter. She was watching a video on her tablet the whole time so wasn’t subjected to the swearing that was part of the whole thing. Anyway, no ticket inspectors, no hassle, straight through to London in an hour. And here’s the song:
F*ck em all!
F*ck em all!
United, West Ham, Liverpool
Cos we are the Arsenal!
We are the best!
We are the Arsenal!
F*ck all the rest!
At St Pancras, my taxi app was painfully slow and eventually it told me no drivers. I tried once more, and we settled for a bus and ended up taking two buses after seeing the best bus was 19 mins away (what???). We arrived home 90 mins after our actual arrival in London. A bowl of soup and a small slice of bread and off to bed with a hot water bottle. So, all in all, a bit of a blip here and there but a good trip.
I really needed to eat but so many places were closed, till evening or forever. I saw a café that I’d read about and went in. It was so warm and lively in there but every seat was taken so I bought some orange juice and we carried on.
I think Google led me slightly astray!
It was an old train, not very clean, not very busy. And definitely not many masks. Even the ticket inspector wasn’t wearing one. There are four stops -Leicester, Derby, Chesterfield, Sheffield. I confess to not looking out of the window. I watched Last Christmas, or 3/4 of it – terrible. At Leicester someone got off and a woman showed up with a cloth. A millisecond swipe at the table and off she went – wow! At Chesterfield went to the toilet, or tried to buy in the end there were three of us waiting and engaged engaged engaged. A young woman suggested people get in without a ticket, head to the toilet to evade inspection and no one can use it. But waiting there meant I could see the scenery. Green fields giving way to gorgeous old stone houses and scattered old row houses on narrow streets – I was in Yorkshire all right.
Sheffield station isn’t remarkable and there are no maps and no information booths. We headed outside with Krish asking me, which way – I’d put him in charge of that since my map reading ability is poor at best and results in confusion all around. We found a map on a board and started walking. We passed some long sheds called interchanges.. People were sitting inside waiting for buses. Ahead was a huge multi-level car park and Krish told me there was a long walk around or we could climb the million steps and go through it. I resigned myself to the steps – maybe five flights on different levels … Gah…. But I did it. On the other side another map and we headed down the road. (Later we discovered that, had we turned the other way, we’d have been looking at our hotel not very far away. Live and learn!)
