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Day 11 - A fateful / fatal day... our driver from the night before planned to take us to Hawa Mahal, Jantar Mantar and City Palace before visiting his Guru friend. All was going swimmingly as we paid our fee for the Hawa Mahal and went round each of its 6 floors. We admired its multi-colorured glass windows and high arches. Olivia spotted a cute mischevious monkey on the 4th floor and after a wander we made it to the 5th floor. Admiring the views and an adorable monkey family, Catherine suddenly told Olivia to get over by the nearby male tourist who had been shouting. Seconds later a large monkey grabbed Catherine's leg and the chase began. Soon Catherine, Olivia and two tourists were running at full speed down a spiral walkway being chased by angry, horribly noisy monkeys. The floors seemed never ending but eventually, amid crazy looks from fellow tourists we reached the first floor, however a monkey was still following us so we sprinted out to the entrance and the horrid 2 minute ordeal was over! At this point Catherine thoughtfully took a photo of the doors Olivia liked and noted she had lost a hairband on the run before having a hand wound doused in alcohol wipes (thanks Aunty Caro!) and her sore arm examined and almost keeling over! Soon(ish) recovered we discussed the ordeal with the other two, the girl had had a monkey on her head and met a Hawa Mahal worker who discussed poisonous monkey claws and tetanous. Lessons of the morning - do not visit 5th floors, always get vaccinated for everything and monkeys hate the English! After much persuasion our driver finally accepted we did not want to visit the Guru and have a healing stone rubbed over Catherine's arm and we returned a little traumatised to the hotel. At the time of writing Catherine's bruise has been purple and a vivid yellow shade and hopes of a full recovery are imminent. That day also brought our very first sleeper train to Mumbai, we found our bunks on the list and soon made friends with Gaurav who worked for The Times of India and the interesting Ravi who taught us Indian Rummie and bought us playing cards, tea and very salty tomato soup. Despite a few victories Gaurav was the undisputed card champion! After a traumatic day for Catherine it was nice for her to meet a man who decided within the hour he wished to marry her so she could stop working as a lawyer. Sadly my "fiancee" back home had already promised to look after me! After a quick Veg Thali our friends left and we slept faily well and woke up in Mumbai.
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