Traveling with Jay Cutler in India Day 6: 4 X Mr O Hangs On Here's a bit of description of traveling with Jay in India: Day 5 and 6
Leaning our heads in towards each other, our noggins almost touching as we peer forward toward oncoming traffic from the backseat of the BMW… If we could we'd be holding hands out of fear, but we didn't. (Jay Tried, but I said no - no bromance today, bro.) Our driver/chauffeur today is one crazy dude. We're no longer in a convoy, and late for our flight, so the shackles from Hades have been undone.
We're doing over 130km/hr on this two lane road back to Chandigarh Airport as we slalom between cars and motorbikes. We're no longer polite, I noticed. We are nudging cars off the road while straddling the middle lane with oncoming traffic coming towards us. At one point we passed a car that was passing a car, so yup, there's three cars across with two cars side-by-side coming at us. That's when Jay woke up, "You have GOT to be kidding me, bro!" The truck that just missed us almost took out the side view mirror and made this gawd awful noise from the vacuum created by our two vehicles. But never mind that, because we blew right past that directly into stopped traffic.
"Yakula mochocolata, higwhaytollala?" or something like that. Our driver rolled his window to ask what was going on up front. The guy our driver talked to had been sitting there 3 hours, but had heard there's a road back a ways that goes around the traffic jam. So now, we do this U-Turn and head back from whence we came. Since we were already late, and now even more late, the speedometer cranks up to 13okm/h even faster.
“How did we get to this” Jay asked.
“I don't know man, but it will be good to get out of here and eventually into Delhi.” By now we are bumping on dirt roads across farm lands and through little villages that looked more like villages out in the Moroccan planes than anything else. "Dr Livingston, I presume?"
We'd been in the state of Punjab for 3 nights. We'd left Mumbai on Friday and today is Monday afternoon. As I write this, we are on Air India Flight 863 to Mumbai via Delhi - 45 min flight to Ghandi International. Reflecting back on our 72 hours in Punjab, it was very much like the car ride we just experienced.
In Punjab, we were either going 100mph or standing still - in hiatus, either resting or waiting, or a combination of both. In my previous blog I wrote of our drive to Amristad from Ludhiana. After that crazy trip, which took 2.5 hours, we pulled into the hotel where the fitness conference was occurring and where Jay Cutler was to make an appearance. We were half asleep when we pulled up to what seemed about 30 to 35 men all waiting for Mr. Jay. We hadn't come to a complete stop when our doors were opened and Mr. Jay was pulled out and escorted to the stairs for a bunch of quick welcomes and photos.
We're starving. We hadn't brought enough snacks and now here we were surrounded by town officials, hotel workers, throngs of fans and our police escort, along with hotel police. It was warm and muggy, the air was stale from so many people in small spaces. I'm lightheaded. But here's Jay smiling and complying with the obligatory pictures and cordial welcomes.
In this short amount of time, I learned a lot from Jay. There he was, setting the example. You can not represent bodybuilding or being the former Mr Olympia by being an asshole. As tired as I know he was, he didn't show it. He was 100% professional. Everyone there loved him and immediately elevated him to a God Like Level.
The plan was to go directly up to a suite to eat a late lunch and decompress from the long ride. I'm still half asleep, carrying two bags of gear and my mono-pod, while trying to film and take pictures. Just like that, Jay is gone again in this 4ft by 5ft cell with officials and machine guns. I managed to find him 30 minutes later on the third floor in a suite eating while getting a massage. By now we've been sharing that look. We looked at each other, knowing we were going to have to jump into the fray here pretty soon - warriors and brothers in combat all in the name of bodybuilding in India!
After a bit, I went down to wait for Jay so that I could film him coming out of the elevator and escorted into the venue. I waited and waited, wondering what in the hell happened. So here's what happened… In short, the elevator broke and 6 of them were stuck in the coffin like confines of a metal box! Jay looked up and around and was like, "Shit we can't get out!"
Eventually, two of the occupants with him were able to pry the door partly open - enough to call for help. Security pulled them out and threw them into another elevator. Out of the frying pan and into the fire! Later, Jay and I had to laugh, because we rode the same elevator and the sign says 10 person limit - 10 persons in Punjab but, defiantly not in the US!
Lots of questions - Lots of answers - yada yada. Lots of pictures and pomp and circumstance and then we are out of there! In the interim I was called up for a bit of recognition. Next thing I know there's a line of people waiting to take pictures with me as well as Jay. Just completely un-real.
We jumped back in the car with a wave of Punjabies following us to say good bye, and off to a real nice hotel in the area for dinner. I think we ate around 7pm, and were done by 9pm. Then it was a 3 hour drive back to Ludhiana. Traffic was much more tame, so we all fell asleep. Since I was sitting in the front next to the driver, I woke up when what felt like someone turned a light on my face. I opened my eyes and there was a truck no shit 100ft in front of us. I naturally stepped on my fictitious brakes and willed our car onto the shoulder narrowly being missed by a truck passing a bus.
Jay and I never slept again on the trip until we got back to the hotel.
(avec sa celebre imitation de sly ! c'était pas ma guerre mon colonnel)
si vous ne voyez pas les photos il est grand temps de créer un compte sur MD et de vous connecter... & poster aussi..