35053668-Empire-of-the-Soul-Paul-William-Roberts

96
EMPIRE OF THE SOUL
for another day of grilling the planet. It occurred to me that a hat
would have been quite a sensible item to include in my Sri Ganesh
Industries Pvt. Ltd shopping bag, along with my notebook, two
bananas, box of sticking plasters, Hindi phrase book, and tape
recorder. A bottle of water would have been even more sensible.
I sought out another stretch relatively free of carnivorous plant
life and headed in approximately the right direction. A plume of
smoke caught my eye, rising near a cluster of rocks the size of houses
about half a mile away. Encouraged, I walked faster and more bravely,
swinging my bat at bushes blocking the route I’d picked instead of
trying to dodge them. Soon I came across five goats busily chewing
leaves from the plentiful thornbushes. It must have been like eating
credit cards, but they seemed happy enough, their eyes crazed with
lust and late nights, their bearded throats bobbing.
Before long I could see some sort of habitation constructed in the
shelter of those outsized rocks. A lurching stockade of uneven
branches like bars surrounded three rudimentary huts of hewn logs
and straw. It was the kind of place my ancestors in Wales probably
called home thirty thousand years ago.
The smoke floated up from a dying fire near an open door in the
middle hut. I skirted the fence looking for an entrance, although
anyone could have just walked through this pitiful barricade, or
even over it at many points. There was no break in the fence.
Reaching the other side, I called out some Hindi greetings listed in
my phrase book under Common Modes of Greeting. Three
brilliantly coloured birds flapped out of a nearby tree, complaining
bitterly about the noise, but there was no sign of life from the huts.
I consulted the book again, shouting the Hindi for My name is Paul;
what is your name? I hoped. I might have been asking if I could take
someone’s grandmother nude clog-dancing, for all I knew.
Still nothing. I was about to squeeze between two branches in
the fence when from the nearest hut there emerged a man with
dreadlocks that reached his knees and a beard substantial enough to
stuff a king-size mattress. Apart from all this hair he was completely
naked, unless dust counts. He stared at me and instantly I waved
back, shouting more common modes of Hindi greeting. He retreated
into his hut, re-emerging thirty seconds later holding a long crooked