Delhi
INDIA
India is Waiting For You
By LYNDI
Saturday, May 21, 2011
India is a lot of things to a lot of people. First of all, it’s home to over 1 billion people, making it the second most populated country on earth. Secondly, it’s a rising economic and nuclear power playing with the Big Boys in European and American relations. But thirdly – and for Aaron and me most importantly – it’s a tourist magnet.
All the stories I’ve heard from fellow travelers that had toured the Indian sub-continent were pretty universal: it’s tough. Tough because of the unrelenting sun and heat and tough because of the Indians and their exhausting behavior. Every traveler reports encounters of scams, tireless taxi drivers following you through town to offer a ride, shopkeepers – desperate to make a sale – grabbing your arms as you wander the small and pungent markets. Yet through all these reports, I’ve never talked to a single person who didn’t fall in love with the country and its people. So how bad could it really be?
Our first Indian experience was quite a pleasant one. We called the New King Hotel from Swaziland to book a room for our first two nights in Delhi – the rest we would make up as we went along. We both know it’s never a good idea to book a room sight-unseen, but we had a solid word-of-mouth recommendation, which in our book, is as good as a 5-star rating.
Through a rather dodgy Skype connection, we spoke to a man named Sunni with perfect English and he booked us a room for two nights and also offered an airport pickup for 500 rupees (approximately US$12). When we declined the seemingly expensive offer, he warned us that if you ask to go to New King Hotel from airport taxi drivers, they’ll tell you it burned down, is closed, being remodeled, etc. and will take you to their cousins’ brothers’ moms’ dog handlers’ hotel instead where they make a hefty commission for bringing in tourists. Either that, or take you to a different New King Hotel since copyright apparently hasn’t made it to the sub-continent. But we decided we could make it on our own and he happily replied, “No problem, ma’am. India is waiting for you!” with such enthusiasm that we knew we had picked a winner.
After an uneventful 11 hour flight from Johannesburg, we arrived in New Delhi at around 2:30pm local time. Anxious to leave the baggage claim in fear that taxi drivers would be ready to pounce on any fresh blood, we exited security to find some giddy families awaiting their loved ones and a few professional drivers patiently waiting for passengers. Hmm. Not the chaos we had expected.
We bought a pre-paid taxi from the stand in the airport and paid 350 rupees ($5) and headed outside to the waiting taxi line – sure that they would struggle for our bags to get us in their taxi. Nope. We handed it to one guy; he helped load our bags and took off. Alright – we were on to him! He would surely take us to the wrong hotel – in fact, he was probably taking us to an obscure ATM right now to have us pull out all our money and rob us! Not even close. He dropped us off about 500 meters from our hotel (due to a bazaar/market area we would have to walk through) and quietly thanked us. Maybe with all our big bags in a busy pedestrian area someone was going to rifle through our things without us noticing? No! We walked easily to our hotel, got our room, walked past the screaming naked man in the lobby (that’s another story entirely) and sat on our bed in disbelief. Was India going to be this easy??
Hahahahahahahaha. Ooooh – that’s a good one. Well, the events really did play out like that. Uneventful. But the true tests were yet to come. Granted, India had not thrown down any of the events that other travelers had warned us of, but they still had a few good tricks up their sleeve.
After dealing with the drunk, naked man in the lobby, Sunni asked us what our plans in India were. We didn’t have a set itinerary, but told him we would go to Nepal to do some hiking and then re-enter India and head towards the state of Rajasthan. That’s when Sunni told us about the “best way” to see Rajasthan – in a private minibus! But – we objected – we wanted to go by train. He gave us a bit of a soliloquy about how the minibus was the best way because it’s air conditioned, you have a personal driver, it’s quicker, you don’t have to worry about your bags, etc. But no matter what we wanted to do, he had a good friend at the India Tourist Board that could help us out. And when he threw in a free ride to the place, how could we say no?
So the driver drops us off in front of an office that indeed has the official-sounding “India Tourist Board” sign out front, we walk in and sit down, accept some chai tea that we’re offered, and then the scamming began. Sunni had recommended these minibus tours and lo and behold – his friend’s office was offering just such a trip! The rest played out something like this:
Pradeep: “Minibuses are the best way, blah, blah, blah – vacation time in India right now so no trains are available for two weeks, and you must make up your mind immediately because it’s 6pm on Saturday and we’re closed on Sundays”.
Us: “Umm… okay. We really don’t want to go by minibus. Aren’t there any trains at all?”
Pradeep: “Well, I’ll check.” (Clicks on his mouse a few times, two seconds pass, then…) “Nope all full”.
Us: “Wow. That must be a really fast computer to check all train times in all of India so fast. Okay, how much does this minibus tour cost?”
Pradeep gets on the phone with the “official company” (and I swear it was just like that bad game show with Howie Mandel, “Deal or No Deal” where he calls some fake guy in the next room): “Oh! Very good offer! $980 US dollars per person!”
At this point, Aaron literally has a plume of smoke emitting from his head because he’s so angry and can hardly even speak. So me: “Um. That’s absurd. Do you have a brochure or something we can look at?”
Pradeep: “No brochure. No time. If you don’t make a decision now there will be no trains, no minibuses, nothing is open on Sunday, and you’ll be stuck in Delhi to rot! Buy now!!”
Because Aaron was furious and also because I think I could see Pradeep growing little devil horns on the sides of his head, we had to make a hasty exit. We thanked him for the tea and his time and ran away.
The next two tour agencies we stopped in had similar stories and similar minibus offers, though without the pressure since, of course, they are open on Sundays like most people. The truth was that train tickets were mostly all sold out due to vacation time in India, but the rest was just lies.
Disheartened, weary, and severely jet-lagged, we returned to our hotel, stopping enroute to check out the train times for ourselves online. Since everyone and their dog is a travel agent in this city, Aaron decided to ask the guy named “Dimples” at the internet place about train tickets. When he swung his computer screen around so we could see what he was doing, we knew we’d found our man.
He admitted train tickets at this time of year would be very difficult, so we should do Nepal first and come back to see India. Sure, it will be 120 degrees by mid-June, but after 100 degrees we can’t tell the difference anyways. So he helped us go through our route, made a few recommendations as he was familiar with Rajasthan, and charged us just 50 rupees ($1.10) for each ticket he booked. Total cost for seven train tickets for two people plus commission? Just over US$100. Great success.
So with a huge burden off our shoulders, we enjoyed the next two days in Delhi by walking through markets, eating delicious street food (I have no idea what anything is, but it sure tastes good), and stocking up on a few supplies that we would need for traveling.
Sure, there’s about one million people walking through the markets at any one time, and it gets so hot and humid that you soak your shirt. Yes – there’s grown men peeing in all corners of all alleys and stray cows wandering around – but it’s great. With our fears subsided and scams averted, we relaxed and looked forward to our bus journey to Kathmandu… which would prove to be one of the worst experiences of our lives. Stay tuned.
