On the road to Kasauli .... tea and bfast

After a few minor “near misses” we pull over for a cup of tea. There are side road tea shops all over India. There are even some that you can drive through. They are not like the places where you pull up to a window and order. Rather you pull over on the side of the road and there is a man with a stand selling tea. These tea sellers are mostly from south India in Kerala. They sell tea in so many places in India and around the world that there is no place that someone has gone that there is not a tea seller from Kerala there first. It is said that Neil Armstrong could not have been the first man on the moon because there must have been Indian man from Kerala there first to sell him tea. 

In this story, we pull off the road at a petro station and go into a breakfast / tea shop and have our tea. The Indians call it chai. It is nearly always about 3-4 ounces, in a small paper cup, very sweet and milky. There are exceptions but most Indians have their tea this way. We enjoy a cup of tea and head out to Kasauli. We get stuck in little traffic in one of the tri-cities called Chandigarh. What this really means is that we come into some traffic lights where we actually have to stop and wait instead of just slow down and keep going at an intersection. Chandigarh has nice roads with modern traffic lights that give you the exact seconds you have to wait. It is the right of all motor bikes, auto rickshaws and bicycles to get in front of cars and busses so they can get out ahead of you. They are smaller and can maneuver their way to the front. From what I can tell, this may be their only right on Indian highways. Bigger and faster vehicles take most of the rest of the rights. Our schedule included a trip to a Pastor's house for breakfast and then to his church to hear him preach and then on to Kasauli. Because of the traffic or traffic lights we are late so we stop for breakfast on the way and then go right to church. We stop at a government restaurant. I ask my host what that means. My host explains government restaurants have standards that they follow… usually. I ask if that means it is better. Yes,….well maybe. I ask if it is better than a private restaurant. Yes it ... could be. I do not ask any more questions. I enjoy two sunny side up eggs (actually they are over easy which is really what I wanted but could not explain it) and some paratha (flat Indian bread) with curd (like yogurt). The breakfast is delicious and I am a fan of government restaurants. We get into the car and head to the church. On our way to the church, I notice some dark ominous clouds off in the distance on the horizon. As we get closer, what I thought were clouds form into peaks of mountains. We are nearing Kasauli.