Three Tests Completed with Help.

Sometimes people match their names, and sometimes they don't. Maybe to misquote the bard, some people are born with the right name, and some people achieve their names.

As a teacher, you get to see a lot of, how shall we say, unusual names. Sometimes they fit and sometimes they don't. Mojito for instance is as sober and sensible as a judge, but Amethyst's only career goal was to become a pole dancer.

Amblis it turns out is a bit more playful, a bit more demanding and a bit more naughty than her name suggests. She has tested me today, I think to see if I can handle her and how I handle her. To see if I will give up on her. To perhaps prove worthy of her.

Whenever there is a challenge or a test there always is help at hand if you look hard enough. Perhaps this is the test itself.

The first little 'test' was about 200 yards from the hotel at 6.30. Coming up to a the junction to get on the main road, I clicked my left foot down to go into first, an hit empty air. Nothing. No gear lever. I found it about 20m.

This was one thing that Pandit Jhee hadn't done personally yesterday. He let one of the 'boys' of the shop fit the gear lever. And of course it wasn't on tight.

I tried to fix it on myself, but didn't have the correct alan key. Tony Bike Centre wasn't open for about another four hours, and I couldn't wait for them. So I drove up and down the streets for a bit until I found a sleepy looking man outside a hut selling car parts. I borrowed the right tool from the owner, who looked on with amusement as I struggled to do it myself before he did the job properly with a big hammer and some pliers.

However, as soon as we hit the road, Amblis roared into life, and sped off incredible power. It was exhilarating, but also felt very safe as well. There was not too much traffic around, and I made the ring road in what seemed like a few minutes compared to the last time I tried to leave Delhi. Unfortunately though I was told the wrong exit, so went the wrong way for about 20km. It took a few stops, a few people's opinions and a lot of looking at maps to try and work out where I should go. It would help of course if they put the the odd sign up, but that is just wishful thinking.

The second test was about 50km southwest of Delhi on National Highway 8. I went round a tollbooth, and suddenly the bike didn't feel right. Like someone had undone a bolt in the frame. She started shaking and jerking, which is quite scary at 60km an hour.

I managed to slow down and stop, and realised with a heavy heart, that I had a puncture in my rear tyre. It was completely flat.

But fortune had smiled on me. I was actually right by a petrol station, with a tyre wallah sitting in his yellow shack just by the exit. I wheeled Amblis over and let them get to work.

Worryingly it seemed to be staffed by chldren, but they knew what they were doing, and had the rear wheel off in about a tenth of the time I could have done it, and moments later the inner tube out.

An older brother came to supervise the actual puncture repair, and I had a spare inner tube in my kit, so I was ready to go within an hour. THey charged me 500rps, which I felt was a bit stiff as it was just labour, but was money I couldn't really begrudge.

So powered west, the sun getting higher and hotter above me. The road was much better than the one north to Shimla, so I could maintain a steady 80 (kph). The kilometres slipped by, sometimes slowly, sometimes fast.

About 20km short of Jaipur was the third test. I was kind of expecting it, these things always come in threes and I had been joking to myself, wondering what it could be.

As I crested a hill, the road down appeared empty before me. I had kept the speed constant and not really pushed it. But now, with the desert wind at my back, I thought I wonder how fast I could get. I put my body close to the petrol tank and opened up the throttle. 75. 80. 85. 90, the needle crept up. And then the engine coughed and died, and I was left freewheeling down the hill.

I pulled over. I had filled the tank with 500rps of petrol, which I knew from Dans calculations would do me about 300km. Including the distance I had wasted this morning, it was about right. I had wanted to see how far this would take me.

For those of you who have never ridden a motorbike, you don't have a petrol gauge on your dashboard. You just have to estimate. But running out of gas is not the end of the world, because you have a 'reserve tank'. To access this you have twos a little tap on the engine. I was therefore not at all phased about this, in fact I was quite pleased as it had proved my calculations about petrol consumption had been correct.

So I spun the tap, kicked Amblis back into life, and headed back off, secure in the knowledge that I would be able to drive at least 80km before I ran out of reserve.

But perhaps I was overconfident, because a few hundred metres down the line, the engine coughed, spluttered and died again. For some reason the reserve tank hadn't kept fuel. It was totally empty.

So there I am in the middle of nowhere, with no petrol in the tank. The last station a good 5km back.

But I didn't panic, I didn't loose my temper or cool. I looked around for help, and sure enough it came to me. A man on a motorbike had pulled up about 100 yards ahead to answer his mobile phone. He didn't speak any English but he managed to understand that I needed petrol.

'Station 8 kilometre. One litre. I get'. And he sped off. Within 10 minutes he was back, with a young man in coveralls clutching a 2l bottle of petrol. Once in, Amblis roared back into life, and I was able to carry on. At the petrol station I filled up properly.

So Amblis tested me today. I was without Dan and his understanding and practical experience of bike mechanics, but I passed all three, perhaps in a different way to he would.

Most of the time I feel that I am my name. I have had luck thrown at me from all direction, wherever I have been it comes out good.

I don't know if Amblis will achieve hers, she certainly didn't act it today. I am sure though that these are not the last tests that she will throw at me, but I am equally sure that help will be at hand when I need it.

I remember slapping the petrol tank as we pulled out of the station and saying 'OK girl, you've made your point. Time to behave now'. And she did, all the way through the Jaipur rush hour. Which incidentally is a doddle compared to Delhi.