Useful things to bring to India

Goggles for the bus trip or even better a helmet... I caught a bus to Tirunvamalai yesterday and didnt realise when I followed the suggestions from the hotel owner in Pondicherry that I was catching the LOCAL buses..
The scary green rattlers with no windows, no seat padding, no luggage storage and usually no shock absorbers...
It was actually remarkably easy to work out where i was going though... even if I cant for the life of me pronounce Tirunvamalai properly. Bus No.1 took me to the interchange.. I got off the interchange and wandered about till I found an information booth which sent me to the wrong spot. I then found a freindly local (and had to explain yes my husband was working at home).. who pointed me to a green rattler from hell...
Actually its pretty amazing to bounce through the countryside.. there were very small farming communities hugging the roadside.. school kids riding their bikes home from one small town to the other. Women working in the rice field. (It made me think of the bloody Dilmah tea ad with the ridiculously affluent Dilmah family talking about their fine tea and I am sure the woman looking traditional picking the tea werent paid a comfortable wage for their back breaking work).. or I could be wrong... it looks like a hard physical life working in these areas. I saw children herding goats.. during school time and wondered if the cycle of poverty ever changes for people here. In Ireland over a few generations things have changed for many Irish finally) but does it happen here as well.. and can it happen.
So I ricocheted into Tirunvamalai and found my first freindly Australian and Ramana's Ashram. Its a lovely space but I am confused..