I just figured out that most of my problems with Indians are a direct result of my taking everybody's advice that all Indians are out to cheat you. Keeping a constant vigil on the society around you is exhausting, and more so when everybody's trying to be your friend. I think it might be a regional thing, but I've been surrounded by genuine talkers ever since I got out of Dehli. It's almost frustrating, actually, trying to not feel bad for being a complete dick to somebody who's trying to be your friend in order to sell something, and then finding out he's actually just trying to be your friend.

This, and a handful of other revelations, came to me about 10 minutes after leaving a mechanic's shop, slightly drunk and significantly more stoned, wind blowing through my hair and in a state of pure enjoyment. This dream state was abruptly and abnoxiously broken about 2 minutes later when I had to turn around because the engine started misfiring.

For the past three days. Yes, THREE days, I've been stuck in or around Shimla with a motorbike that just doesn't know how to keep a rhythm. Granted, it was the most frustrating experience I'd had traveling so far, but throughout it all I couldn't believe how far the mechanics went out of their way to make me happy. If they spent half of the time making me feel better as they spent on the bike, maybe I'd be in Manali by now. Here's what I mean:

I passed through this town called Shimla riding the bike as if it were a sick horse, thankful for every engine fire and becoming increasingly aware of its hiccups. The bike absolutely refused to make it up the driveway out of the hotel in the morning, so a crowd of 4 Hindus helped me push it up. I was hoping it would at least get to Manali, since it got this far already. 6km out of town, I stopped at a crossroads and somebody ran up to me and asked if I wanted air in my tires. He looked nice, though, not like a sleezy mechanic salesman. Then he pointed at my engine and said the head gasket is leaking. Then, and here was the selling point, he offered to fix the head gasket for $5, including labor. $5! I spent $500 on fixing the head gasket of the thunderbird a few years ago, and that was after shopping around (initial estimate was 2 grand!). So, OK maybe that would fix the problem.

He didn't speak much English, so he dragged his friend over who immediately thrust himself on me as a "temporary english speaking friend" until my bike would be finished. First it should take an hour, then they had the wrong gasket so they had to drive another hour to get the right one. All the while I was watching the time tick by, trying to figure out how I was going to make the 7 hour trip to Manali before dark. Eventually, I got pissed off and ran off to have a tea and read my book, but the English speaker wouldn't leave me be. He had tea with me, all the time asking questions about me, about the bike, about America, all questions I'd heard so many times that they just all pissed me off. Finally, the head gasket arrived and they started putting the engine back together. This job was relegated to "the boy," not the original mechanic, so I kept an eye on what he was doing. Then I heard a loud snap, and looked over to see he'd overtightened a large bolt and snapped the end into its thread in the cylinder block. That was a big deal. I'm not even a mechanic and I know that was a big deal. It was one of two bolts holding he cylinder head piece onto the cylinder block, without which there'd be a whole lot more oil leaking than with no head gasket at all. As if that wasn't bad enough, I had to stare at this boy wide-eyed as he looked around, gave me a quick glance, and then proceeded to put the engine back together AS IF NOTHING EVER HAPPENED.

I casually walked over to him, gritting my teeth, and watched him drop as bolt and then hit his head on the handlebars just before I spoke. That was funny. He knew he fucked up, and he was nervous. I found the snapped bolt, put it in the hole where it should be, and said "problem." He looked at me wide-eyed, looked at his boss, and said "no problem" and kept putting the engine back together. I said "PROBLEM!" and motioned for him to take the engine back apart, to which he replied "no, no problem" and kept working as if I weren't even there. I took the bolt over to his boss, who only had to see the pissed off look on my face and the snapped bolt to figure out what was going on.

The boss wasted no time in getting "the boy" to take the engine apart again, and then spent a half hour pounding a screwdriver into the hole to dig the piece out. I don't know what they intended, but every hammer blow on the engine made me quiver. That didn't work, so they brought out the welder and tried to weld the broken bit of the screw to a nut so they'd have something to grab it by. But, since they only had an arc welder, they ended up just welding a big lump of metal onto the supposed-to-be-completely-flat cylinder block. All the while, my teeth were getting ground to dust.

Finally, they left it alone. The english speaker had left, and I they stopped talking to me. I knew this would happen, all the stories of having these roadside mechanics totally fuck up your bike and force you to pay thousands of rupees to get them fixed again finally happened to me. I asked the boy one last time to fix it, and all he could say was "no problem." That did it. I blew up.

Now, anybody who knows me knows that I don't blow up very often. But I spent not an ounce of effort concealing it this time. TAKE OUT THAT PIECE! NOW! WHO THE HELL ARE YOU TO TRY TO FIX THIS BIKE? I SHOULD BE IN MANALI BY NOW! WHY, FOR FUCK'S SAKE DID YOU EVER STOP ME AT THAT INTERSECTION?????

I realize in retrospect that this had a profound effect on the mechanic. It turned out, contrary to everything I'd been told about Indians, that this guy really just wanted to make me happy. He was one of these people I've seen a lot of in Thailand and Nepal, with that innocent look of happiness behind their eyes that's most common in buddhist cultures. At this point, however, he looked more like a guilt-ridden child who'd just upset his parents. The english speaker came back and told me the mechanic would take the piece over to someone who could fix it, and that it would take more time. I was pissed off. I had lost a full day at this rat-bastard mechanic. I told him to fix it and ran off before the english-speaker before could ask to come along. I'd been fucked by mechanics enough for one day. I just wanted to be alone.

Almost 2 hours later, I was feeling much better when the mechanic drove his scooter by the restaurant I was eating at, motioning for me to come back when I'd finished. Apparently he had been looking all over town for me. Instead of coming back to a functional working bike, I came back to my bike all in pieces with the cylinder block still unrepaired lying on the floor. I got ready to blow up again, but the english speaker was right there to explain the situation. Apparently, this mechanic had driven up and down the road for 20km trying to find somebody to fix it, but as it was Sunday there was no shop open that could bore it out. So, because they knew how important it was for me to keep moving that day, they offered to replace the entire cylinder and piston from a newer Enfield bike they had for sale in the shop. I'd be driving out of there in another hour. For no extra charge.

I was almost ready to cry. It wasn't just the conflict of emotions, or the fact that I knew I needed a new piston anyway and he'd saved me a lot of extra money. He had this puppy-dog look on his face of that young kid who'd broken his parent's expensive something and would do anything to make things the way they were again. This, in the country that was supposed to be full of cheaters, was too much to deal with. Then they offered me a smoke, and brought me up to a balcony, rolled a joint, and passed it around between the three of us until we were all in a much better mood. The English speaker gave the mechanic's defense, saying that I was a foreigner and therefore diserved some kind of respect, and would do anything in his power to make sure I left happy. Then we talked for a while longer while "the boy" put the bike back together. They probably knew to bring me up there so I wouldn't be breathing down the boy's neck, but I guess they were right that it made everybody happier that way. It took longer than expected, as expected, so we rolled another. Then another. Then I brought out a half pint of brandy I'd been carrying around since Nepal. Then it was finally finished. I was on my way. I gave him an extra dollar tip, and left.

So it was at this point of riding through the lower Himalayan countryside in the afternoon of a beautiful sunny day that I came to the other revalation that this whole trip closely resembled a video game. Final Fantasy, or something like that. I passed towns like Sharog and Mantaur, swerving to avoid trucks and goats, meeting companions along the way and having to negotiate tenuous deals with strange new civilizations. Or maybe it was like Zelda, where I had to get somewhere but there was always something blocking the path, in this case the bike keeps breaking down, and I'd have to meet some new characters to help me through. And the whole time I was getting experience points in bike mechanics, and once I'd reach a certain level of experience, I wouldn't need the mechanics at all and could fix the bike myself. Low level problems, like timing and carbeurator adjustments, I could do, but things like changing head gaskets I'd need like a level 8 mechanic or something.

Then my engine started coughing and misfiring. Maybe it's nothing.

But yeah I'd gained experience points in all sorts of stuff. I was a Level 1 Reiki healer. I had training in Vipassana. I had rudimentary knowledge of Thai and Vietnamese. I also had found a few buddies that I might meet up with a gain to help face a new challenge. Best of all, I was going ot a Bullet Wallas hotel in Manali where there'd be all sorts of motorcycle groups leaving in all directions for day and week trips. OK, I've never really played Final Fantasy but I'm sure it's a lot like this.

Then the engine sputtered again. FUCK. I KNEW this would happen! I drove all the way back, about 30 minutes, except it was uphill on the way back and the engine was coughing so much it would hardly chug up the hills. I barely made it back to the shop, all pissed off again. The main mechanic took me back upstairs, and smoked another two joints with me while four people in the shop gathered around my bike to try to figure out what's going wrong. They were working on the timing, and I didn't care anymore what was going on so long as it worked. Almost 2 hours later, they did something to fix it. I drove it really hard for 10 mintues to test it, came back to the shop full of smiles, and offered them money. This was the test. THEY REFUSED MORE MONEY!!! This was a big deal for me. I left full of smiles and feeling guilty for ever having doubted their intentions.

An hour later down the road, the engine started sputtering again. I found a hotel for the night and gave up. In the morning, I found another local mechanic and asked him to look at it. Just as I pulled up to the mechanic, the bike stalled and wouldn't start again. This was about 10 O'clock. If I left by noon, I could make it to Manali. He also had his english-speaking friend who had exactly the same questions I wasn't in the mood to answer. Long story short, at 1 O'clock he showed me that the timing plate had been cracked and the only replacement was at the Authorized Enfield repair shop back in Shimla, and that the only way I'd be able to fix it would be to stick the bike in the back of a Jeep and drive all the way back. This took me a while to get over, and eventually I summoned the jeep and we somehow hauled the thing inside.

I was in no mood for any kind of talking. But, this English speaker had exactly the same questions to ask me and wouldn't leave me alone about it. He asked me about sex in America. For some reason everybody who talks to me for more than 5 minutes wants to know how much I paid for my motorcycle and how many women I "make sex with." After telling me how Indian women like "polite sex" and American women "like two hole sex," I loosened up a bit. Then they stopped the jeep and bought us all beers, lowered the windows, and drove along drinking and blasting Punjabi pop music as loud as the stereo would take it...all the time my bike not rolling out the back because of a rope and a brick behind the tire. They made me feel better. That was twice in two days that I've been pulled out of a very bad mood. When we arrived, the mechanic didn't ask for any money, despite having spent all day working on my bike. Granted, he did get a free ride into Shimla and probably some kickbacks from the driver (to whom I paid 15 bucks, a shitload out here), but I gave him two bucks for the help and the beer.

So they took me to an "authorized" mechanic, who cost a whole lot more ($30) but actually fixed the bike. Turned out the valves were all sorts of fucked up becuase the engine had overheated so much (because of the busted head gasket). Oh, the domino effect. They, too, saw how upset I was at having to spend another day there, so they personally drove me to town and found me a cheap hotel.

I'd driven straight through Shimla without even seeing the city center because I was on a mission to get to Manali. Now I was stuck there, so I thought I might as well look around. And HOLY SHIT was I an asshole to ever skip it. In the midst of my struggles to find something that resembled home, this place was like a little Britain tucked away at the base of the Himalayas. It was like walking into Gibraltar, with quaint English houses and a large Protestant church towering overhead. Wierd. They had a Domino's Pizza. They had a real, deliciously overpriced coffee chain place. They had a CITIBANK. It was exactly what the doctor ordered. I was overwhelmed, not just at the city itself, but of my own initial refusal to ever give it a chance. It was a carnival, full of obnoxious Indian tourists, but nonetheless it was a place of interest. I'd lost sight of the fact that I was traveling to see India, not to get to Manali. It took three days of getting stuck in Shimla to actually ever see it.

So I got my bike by Noon the next day, giving me just enough time to make it to Manali before dark. Five hours up the road, a storm hits. I'm 100k from Manali, in a nice town called Mandi, but I get it now. I get what makes the motorcycle trip fun. It's not about the actual destination as much as the chance places you end up. Back in Rishikesh, I was riding with an Israeli couple who had rented a scooter for the day. There was a wedding in the street, with animals and a band and confetti and lots of dancing. They motioned us to stop and dance. We stopped and danced. They sprayed us with silly string, and then kissed us all goodbye as we left a few minutes later. It's these kinds of things that make the motorcycle trip what it is. And as much as it sucks to be stuck with mechanics, it's more fun to be riding in a jeep drinking beer and singing Punjabi dance tunes with actual Indians than getting stoned on a balcony talking cheap metaphysics with a bunch of dreadlocked bums. Definately a challenge in every sense of the term, but it wouldn't be "traveling" if it weren't. That would be a vacation.