See all Posts in the Wanderlust – A Travel Blog Series

People who travel are blessed with stories. Stories about people. Stories about places. Stories about events. The really great stories, the stories you remember and retell your whole life are often about when things went wrong. You don’t remember the thousands of flights that were on time. You remember the time it took you three days to get home from New York City. 

Sometimes those stories are born of simple bad luck, like a sudden storm that causes you to miss a flight. Sometimes those stories come from poor judgment. Was it really a great idea to run with the bulls at Pamplona? Sometimes those stories come from a unique combination of bad luck and questionable judgment that could only happen to you. 

One of those stories combining bad luck and worse judgment is the time I got caught smuggling whiskey in India. It was 1980 and I was on a walkabout around the world after college. I had spent a month in Nepal camping, trekking and just hanging out. My plan was to travel south through northern India to Calcutta and then on to Madras. 

Upon hearing my plans, a fellow traveler informed me that West Bengal, where Calcutta is located, is a dry state, meaning that alcohol is illegal there. He suggested that if I bought a bottle of whiskey in Kathmandu, I could double my money by reselling it in Calcutta. 

Being young, broke, inexperienced in the ways of the world and perhaps not all that bright, I thought this sounded like a great idea. So I bought a bottle of Scotch whisky (for about $17) and stuffed it into my knapsack for the journey south. 

That journey was memorable for a couple of reasons. First, the distance from Kathmandu to the Indian border was roughly 100 miles. The bus was small and jam-packed with people and animals. The most comfortable place on the bus was snuggling up with the luggage on the roof, rather than cooped up inside. The route was mountainous and the road was awful. So awful that that 100 mile journey took eight hours to complete. That included the time it took to reposition a bunch of grapefruit-to-basketball-sized boulders so we could ford a stream that had partially washed out. 

Upon arriving at the India-Nepal border village, I learned that India does not issue visas at land borders. Which meant that I had to spend the night there, take another eight-hour bus ride back to Kathmandu, get my visa and take a third eight-hour bus ride through the mountains back to India.  

Good judgment comes from experience and experience comes from bad judgment, so now I have the experience and judgment to check for visa requirements before starting any international trips. 

Continuing the journey south through India, our little bus would occasionally be stopped at roadblocks manned by the local gendarmerie with their jaunty uniforms and machine guns. They would check papers and occasionally poke through the luggage for anything suspicious. You can see where this is going. 

At one of those stops, the whisky was discovered. This was a problem. Everyone off the bus. Every person was patted down and searched. Every bag was emptied and the contents scrutinized. I remember that they even tested my can of shaving cream to be sure it did not contain contraband. 

I was hauled off into an office full of very serious-looking policemen. They told me that whisky was forbidden. It was against the law. They wagged their fingers in my face for emphasis. The only thing I could think of doing was to be humble and apologetic and offer to give them the whisky, which they declined. They scolded and wagged. I apologized and offered. 

This went on for hours. My fellow passengers were remarkably patient. I think that more than anything else, they were curious to see how this was going to turn out. In retrospect, what the police really wanted was a bribe. I was naive enough that this never occurred to me at the time. 

The police eventually grew so exasperated with me for not figuring this out that they shoved the whisky back in my bag and sent us on our way. My fellow passengers quickly suggested that we were likely to be stopped and searched again, so they advised that we drink the whiskey to prevent the problem from recurring. 

By this time, I was pretty committed to doubling my money in Calcutta, so I declined their generous offer. We were stopped again along the way, but the whisky was not discovered, and we arrived in Calcutta without further incident. 

I soon found a café owner who was happy to pay $34 for my illicit nectar. I doubled my money, and I had a story to tell. Luckily, my story had a happy ending. 

If I could take away one lesson from this experience, it would be to respect the laws and customs of the places you are visiting. It is their country and their laws. They can be forgiven for not having much patience if you don’t. Some stories you could do without.