When we arrived at Pingal, there were a handful of men hanging aroumd the one open shop, of the town's two. We asked where the chokidar (care taker) of the Gov. guest house was, and we were answered with a laugh. It seemed nobody had used the guest house since the British left Hindoostan in 1947. Though the road still passed through Pingal, Pingal had been by passed in this age of jeep travel. People traveled faster nowadays than the speed of foot or hoof. There was no need of a gueat every 20 or so clicks. We broke the locks off the doors of this guest house (actually the front building was the cook house and the rear building the guest house) and swept it out with a sage brush. There was graffiti on the walls from the time of the British, and a resident bat that flew over our heads all night.