Me Too!

As I am known for being a "Me Too" by my family, and not wanting to miss out, I have bought myself some wheels as well! 

I'd mentioned the fact that I wanted a bike to Hiren, (one of Tom's work mate's) and he kindly took us to Laxmi Road (which is a crazy, busy shopping area in town) to buy one.

Practically the first bike shop we went into, we found a bike that I liked and bought it, (with a little bit of bargaining from Hiren). The bike didn't have gears so they agreed to fit them for me as well - all for the princely sum of 2900 rupees (about £40)! They said it would be ready in an hour, so we decided to get some lunch while we were waiting.

We found a small vegetarian restaurant a short walk away which was very similar to Kalyani Veg. I had my favourite dish, a Dosa and Tom wanted to try a Paper Dosa to see how different it was to a normal Dosa. When our food arrived, we were shocked at the size of Tom's meal, it was enormous! It was thinner and crispier than a Dosa and it wasn't stuffed with masala potatoes, they instead came in a separate bowl. I'm not sure if Tom had any idea of how to tackle eating such a big weirdly-shaped thing at first, (he did manage it though) it really looked like it would've made very effective sun hat!

Inside it was a small pot of masala potatoes, and a knob of butter.

When we returned to the bike shop, we were dismayed to find out that my bike didn't have gears installed, like they had promised, but the shop keeper was now insisting on 700 more rupees in order to fit them! After a short discussion/argument between Hiren and the shop keeper, who was being extremely rude and refusing to budge even slightly on the price, we demanded a full refund! I was a bit disappointed as I was quite excited about getting a bike. However all was not lost, as two doors down there was another bike shop and Hiren managed to bargain the price of a bike with gears and delivery home the next day down to just 3400 rupees (£46)! Great! 

Check it out!

When we walked out of the shop, receipt in hand, the previous shop keeper was standing outside his shop and if looks could kill, we'd have all been dead! It was slightly amusing and scary at the same time, we thought it was best not to walk past him and instead ended up jumping in the next auto rickshaw that came past and getting out of there quick! The thing is though, if he'd have been reasonable to us and cut the price even just by 100 rupees, we probably would've kept his bike and not gone elsewhere.