Cyber cafe Tue: 17:20

I have in my hand a piece of paper... Actually, I don't and by paper I meant passport and really should have said Bangladeshi visa anyway. This is good news as is saves a rather ugly trip back round.

From the last news I left Shillong and set out for a long day's ride into Tripura (pronounced "Tipura" for some reason). I knew I wouldn't get to Agartala and the Bangladeshi border but was aiming for a small town mentioned in the LP, Kailashahar. So small, no one had heard of it even when they looked at the map.

However, the road turned out to be something of a dog, close to the worst road back in Uttar Pradesh. With the day wearing on and me wondering what it was that quite has me end up bouncing through potholes in the hardcore of the tarmac-a-distant-memory road following twist after twist of the mountain road I came to the conclusion I wouldn't be making it to Kailashahar tonight. I was on schedule to reach a much bigger town, Karimganj, it would have to do.

In fact, following the none-existent Indian road signs I managed to take the bypass round Karimganj and had to ask a policeman about hotels. He directed me to the Kalpataru Hotel at n24 51.854 e92 22.110 in the middle of Karimganj, Assam.

Not an expensive place but clean and comfortable (barring the ever present road noise in India) and super keen to make sure everything was OK for me. So keen it became a little intrusive. I was their first foreign visitor for a year (and this is the best hotel in town...).

The restaurant guys brother came in and gave me some low-down in Tripura and I resolved to set off earlier than I had planned, 8 rather than 9.

Come 8am with the bike all but packed I had gathered a crowd of maybe 50 or so onlookers and the usual pictures to be taken. A misty morning which soaked my visor which was then covered by the dust from the roads (a curious combination) resulting in an opaque visor for a few hours. I had to ride visor up which is OK until you realise just how much black goo you have to pick out from your eyes when you finally stop.

As predicted, the roads in Tripura are very good -- as good as you can expect in the terrain and on the rare straights you can merrily whizz along in the very light traffic. Most of the road is twisty turny so you don't really achieve much and regularly get stuck behind a wheezing truck.

Finally into the standard Indian city of Agartala after another 6.5 hours today. Like the other NE states, a bit cleaner than than those in the N of India. The preferred hotel only had the most expensive suites available and I said I'd look elsewhere. When I came out to the bike, though, there was a crowd of a good 100 or so blocking the road and at least three video cameras. Most people accept that when you're reading (the LP, say) they should accept that asking you questions is impolite but one guy kept persisting, "What is your problem?" By problem I think he meant issue or difficulty but he became the problem as he just wouldn't give me a break. I told him so and he just ignored me. By the time I was done reading where a hotel out of town was (I had had enough of the attention by now) I caught a glimpse of a handheld microphone being pushed forward and some talk about TV. Time to scarper!

I found the Ginger Hotel at n23 51.748 e91 16.954 on the way to the airport in Agartala, Tripura. It's very much like a Euro-travelodge but without the character. It's also not cheap and they've pared things down to the bone. I could watch films (and, despairingly, THFC score an injury time winner against LFC) in the cheapo place in Karimganj but that's way too expensive for the Tata owned Ginger chain. They don't even have a proper restaurant, a fast food style hall and a rather limited room service menu. No bar, it goes without saying... They do have the Internet but you must get a wifi card to use it (even if you use the fixed PC) and for that you need a working mobile phone... I ask, you. Anyway, Ginger Hotels. Don't bother unless you have to.

They did suggest that the mobile phone issue might be because of the proximity to Bangladesh. Can't have those foreigners talking, can we?

Today has been mostly spent in the service of the Bangladeshi visa. When they finally realised I was waiting there was a form to fill in and I had to pay USD65 at the main branch of the state bank of India. So I found the main branch which wasn't working and hadn't been since yesterday (some network fault). Quite why they kept it open, I have no idea. They suggested going to alternate branches. I found one and queued to be told to go upstairs where I was shunted about and finally told to go back to the main branch as they were now working and only they handled foreign exchange -- not that I was in a position to pay in USD, merely that they were the only people who could convert it into Indian Rupees.

Back there, I went straight to the main man (one of the few advantages to being a rare foreigner is the ability to queue bust if you know who to talk to) and then to the foreign exchange man who looked up the exchange rates from what was scribbled on a whiteboard behind me and then eventually it was paid. There was a German there going into Bangladesh as well and he suggested that Chittagong and Dakla might be the only places that do foreign exchange and technically you're not allowed to export Rupees, so money might now be an issue!

Anyway, back to the visa office which had officially closed for lunch but I burst in anyway, handed over my forms and was told to come back at 3:30. That gave me a window of opportunity to whizz down the road and see a floating palace in Neermahal but there were no signs whatsoever. Nor were there any signs giving you any clue about what was happening in Udaipur, City of Temples, City of Lakes. I was right on my time limit so I turned around and came back having seen nothing. Ho hum.

Finally, an interview with the visa boss man to check I wasn't just some layabout waster trying to sneak into his country and I'm sorted. I'm off into Bangladesh tomorrow, who knows what's in store there and whether I'll have any chance to report in on it.

Sat here in the Cyber cafe there's a regular queue of people poking their heads round the door to look at the foreigner!