My first meal in India wasn’t a plate of potato faces, but it was an option.

I'm here with my travel companion Cameron, and we sit outside for breakfast, letting the last of the night’s chill burn off while our travel‑weary bodies bake back to life under the watchful eyes of several staff members who don’t seem to have a clear job.

After our long-haul flight to Delhi and trek to and around Agra, we’re too tired to care what we eat and heap our plates with curried this‑and‑that from the amply-stocked buffet.

I even smeared Nutella on a dosa, mistaking it for a crêpe.

Namah Resort, part of the Radisson Individuals group, is intended to be our little islet of luxury after two days of trains, taxis, and hunger; a brief pause before India carries on pricking at our patience with hot needles.

But even by breakfast, it’s dawning on us that luxury hotels in India provide theatrical over‑staffing, ceremonial fuss over inane requests, and a heroic disregard for punctuality.

Service and status

Today is Monday, and the unsophisticated pile of food on my plate is my first meal since Friday.

The interim period of hunger has been spent getting to India and trekking across it to position ourselves for what promises to be a lively Hindu wedding.

We look and feel feral after our journey, and the comparative luxury of Namah Resort is stupefying.

The grounds are beautifully manicured semicircles arranged into an elegant terrace that slopes down to a lawn overlooking the Kosi River.

It's also situated within Jim Corbett National Park, making it an ideal staging point for a tiger safari (you can book one directly through the hotel).

We have an adventurous itinerary planned for our time in India, much of which involves waiting on grimy platforms and roughing it on packed trains.

Looking younger and significantly cleaner after our showers, Cameron and I spend the day sipping masala chai, admiring the view, and chatting about the service industries in the UK and India.

Inspiring the conversation are preparations at Namah Resort for a party held in honour of its Esteemed Leaders.

A huge amount of effort is being poured into preparations for the event on the lawn.

While we drink, a scaffold awning is assembled, moved, dressed, used, taken down, moved again, redressed in different colours, and used again.

The number of staff involved is silly, and they all chip in with great enthusiasm to execute their own mini‑task.

Everyone has a role, even if it’s not needed. There’s a dedicated Holder of the Tassels and a Supervising Holder of the Tassles.

Far more people than needed contribute to the preparations, and there’s an obvious reverence for seniority, presumably a consequence of India’s caste system—a hierarchy so old and ingrained that it even seeps into preparations for a garden party.

By mid-afternoon, the Esteemed Leaders arrive in crisp suits. The hotel staff croon over them in a sickly sweet way.

Namah Resort is just one among thousands of hotels in India, and in the cosmic order of things, a very insignificant place indeed.

But judging by the reverence of the staff for their bosses, Namah Resort is its own little fiefdom. One that they seem lucky to be welcomed into.

Having been reminded of just how large and diverse the world is on our trek across the subcontinent to get here, the servility of the hotel staff seems equal parts foolish and alarming.

Chai and parties

Afternoon tea and biscuits merge seamlessly into an evening drinking session, kicked off with two expensive cans of imported Budweiser for me and a rum grog for Cameron.

The ordering process for the drinks is like a joke with no punchline.

How many people does it take to serve a drink in India?

One to take the order, one to fetch the glasses, one to pour the drinks, and another to deliver them to the table.

So we give up ordering drinks from the hotel and graduate onto some Kentucky bourbon I packed, before heading down to the restaurant for a dinner we shouldn’t have bothered with.

Service is a drawn‑out, fussy affair, and the food is poor because the best chefs are still attending to the Esteemed Leaders, some seven hours after they first arrived.

The tureens that hold the curry have been swapped since this afternoon for ornate ones to crank up the sense of occasion. These are the evening tureens, I suppose.

Namah has more staff than guests, and more tureens than leaders.

A DJ blares lively tunes while green lasers dance across the lawn, but there are too few guests to coalesce into a real party.

The leaders—all eleven of them—mingle awkwardly, like it’s parents’ evening.

How much pomp and self‑congratulation can you pack into seven hours?

If this were a ticketed event, it would be considered a loss-making failure.

The lifeguard in canvas uniform

The following day, we take a dip in the hotel’s pool, filled with freezing cold mountain water.

A single guard with a baton is employed to watch over it.

Apart from us, the pool has stood empty all day despite being supervised like a cultural monument.

The guard is so sternly reverential of the empty waters, we even ask him if it’s okay to take a dip, lest we commit a grave faux pas.

When we climb in, the guard takes his leave, presumably to avoid accusations of watching our semi‑naked bodies.

Our splash about is fun, but the need for a ceremonial pool guard baffles.

Is he employed to watch over the pool only while it is empty, in case (say) somebody steals the water?

Would he jump in wearing that heavy canvas uniform if we got into difficulty?

In a country of mostly landlocked neighbourhoods, I’d be surprised if he could even swim.

Bagpipes and Indian luxury hotels

By late afternoon, the groom, Ollie—an old friend of Cameron—arrives with his family.

We make for the restaurant for the scheduled afternoon tea the hotel prides itself on, only to be told it has been replaced by a dance ceremony celebrating the culture of northern India.

In the most punctual Indian way, it starts two hours late.

The dance troupe is heralded by a group of bagpipe players whose instruments are so comically out of place we mistake them for Ollie’s wedding band.

Ollie has a Scottish connection, and the unlikely prospect of him booking bagpipes for his Hindu wedding seems more feasible than native Indian dance routines being performed to them.

But no, they are part of the hotel’s evening entertainment.

The performance, when it eventually starts, is spectacular, even if we don’t understand a moment of it.

Starburst outfits and spinning discs of fire make for an enthralling display, even if the cultural and ceremonial aspects are completely lost on us.

Two dancers wearing a single cow outfit move through the small but appreciative crowd in the mini amphitheatre.

When it reaches me, I offer it some chai!

Radisson Individual. Very Individual

After the dancing, we sit up chatting with Ollie and another friend, Finn, who has arrived separately.

To celebrate the occasion, Cameron opens a fine bottle of Scotch he has brought with him to India.

It deserves the proper crystal glasses that he sends several hotel staff on an earnest team effort to find.

But the 40-minute wait for them to appear proves too long for us, and we decant a couple fingers into whatever receptacles we can scrounge.

To pair with this fine drink, all we have are some distressing vol-au-vents served at the dancing ceremony. They taste of nothing at all and have the texture of loose egg.

But for all the pomp and fuss, Namah Resort has offered up a rare cocktail of peace, rest, and simplicity, which are extremely difficult to come by in India.

And in such a surreal setting so far from home, familiar faces feel like an apparition.

The pool guard has returned to his silent vigil, the egos of the Esteemed Leaders have been soothed for another year, and we have that Hindu wedding to look forward to.