Embassy visit and journey to the highlands

I got up early this morning to go to the embassy, or more correctly, the British High Commission, to apply for a new passport. I got there a few minutes before it opened, but there was already a small queue of people, no doubt cursing the place being closed for five consecutive days. The two people in the passport queue took a while and I could both hear them asking realistically how long it would take and looking a bit disheartened. I sat there wondering whether my conversation with Dick on Monday would actually have had any effect. I wasn't to be disappointed as when I said my name the clerk, said 'ah Mr Wells, we've been expecting you', promptly disappeared, to be replaced by a more senior person, who dealt with my application with minimum fuss or questioning and promised to have it completed as soon as possible.

We left that afternoon for the Cameron Highlands. The bus station lived up to its reputation of being extremely chaotic and we waited a little nervously outside a cafe over the other side of the road for a while as instructed before ascertaining that the other people waiting there were also hoping to travel to Tahna Ratna. It was baking hot, so we sheltered inside the lobby of a hotel. Every time I went outside for a minute to check on the bus situation, I would come back dripping with sweat. The bus was about 40 minutes late which took us into the beginning of rush hour, meaning we were about an hour and a half late to our destination.

As I got off the bus, I thought I heard someone shout my name and found someone I didn't recognise greeting me. It turned out he was the guesthouse owner, who had been waiting for every bus that afternoon to collect us as he's forgotten to ask which bus we would arrive on and was about to give our room away if we hadn't been on our delayed one. A unexpected welcome to a really excellent guesthouse (Father's Guesthouse, Tahna Ratna)

The day ended sadly as we heard of the Bhutto assassination and spent a while watching BBC News 24.