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Published: January 16th 2016
So, we're off again!
Another train to Manchester, saying goodbye to the permanent grey that appears to have take over the UK, and arriving just over half a day later in Delhi. Although it was an overnight flight it was a short night and broken by a change of plane so we had very little sleep when we arrived at around 7.30 am Delhi time giving us a long day to get through! We were staying in a residential area in a nice hotel but very chaotic outside and followed the hotel owners directions to get to a nearby shopping centre just to get our bearings and get something to eat. Just this walk was a challenge dodging traffic of all kinds, people and all sorts of things just dumped in the road. The shopping centre looked largely familiar with shops such as Zara, Costa, Burger King and Mothercare. We were pretty spaced out and just wandered round aimlessly until we decided a coffee might help which turned out to involve a complicated transaction to buy a card and load it with cash to then take back to the coffee shop to pay. This almost took more energy than we
could muster and after the coffee we had to give in and let ourselves have half an hour sleep back at the hotel. We forced ourself awake with an alarm and set out to have a look around in the other direction but popped into the nearby metro station just to get an idea of how it worked.
This is where our jet-lag really caused us problems because we got ourselves into an increasingly difficult situation just by being led by other people, knowing full well that Delhi is full of people trying to get something out of us. Somehow we were just talked into being helped by people to find tourist information and went on the metro to the middle of the craziest central square, and then trailed about trying to work out where we were, being pointed into a 'tourist information' place that was just a commercial tour operator and spending a good half hour or more listening to them advising us to change our plans, to cancel everything we had booked and instead take a car around Rajasthan. The guy had won some tourism award presented by the vice president a year or 2 before (or
was it really him or just someone that looked like him?) and had lots of great review letters to show us (I've never hand written a review for someone!). We were really struggling against his constant persuasion which switched from almost bullying to being our best friend. We took lots of details from him and ended up booking a half day tour for the following day as a try out of one of his drivers. By the time we got out it was dark and it seemed even more chaos had descended on the area. We just wanted to get ourselves home but after being sent in different directions trying to find a metro entrance, we discovered that people were queuing a long way just to get into the station (they screen all bags for entry) and I could not face that. Unfortunately there was traffic chaos in the roundabout outside also so a taxi was a no-no. H used his magic gadget (ok, I concede that sometimes these things come in useful!) and we worked out which way to walk towards the next station on the metro. After fighting through the crowds we got onto the right road away
from the central area and set off walking down a very large dark road. Realising that this was also not going to be fun we hailed an autorickshaw and probably paid far too much (50p!) for a journey to the next station. Getting on there was fine and we made it home, very tired, but in one piece and not too light in our pockets! (H: magic gadget = smartphone + offline map)
Once we'd left the travel agent and started to talk it was clear that much of what he'd told us was ridiculous. In reality we were never anywhere near parting with money, but it was still scary how easily we were carried along by a variety of people when we think of ourselves as fairly well seasoned travellers. We decided that we didn't even want to take the car the next day and asked Rajesh at the hotel to cancel for us. We had a lovely dinner in the hotel and finally went to bed.
Sadly jet-lag continued to be a problem for me and I didn't sleep at all well so got up feeling groggy. We decided on a easy day and as it
was a Monday and not much open, we just went to Humayun's tomb and then for a walk in Lodi Gardens. Both had impressive muslim tombs and were quite peaceful places to wander away from the outside chaos. It was clear to us though that Delhi's pollution problem (which has been in the news recently due to their trial of allowing odd/even numbered cars only to travel on odd/even numbered days) was going to make staying there pretty unpleasant with a constant smog sitting on the city which seems to get right into your nose and throat.
Rajesh was not around the second night so the group food and drinks that had been going on the night before did not happen and we seemed to be the only people eating in the hotel so early to bed. Still not a great night for me but we had booked a car for the next day so set off to see the sights of New Delhi. We started at the president's estate and walked around the government buildings which are huge and very impressive. The city is getting ready for Republic day when they have military parades etc in this part
of the city so everything was being spruced up. Further down the street there was a huge gathering of police and army which our driver said were being trained for the day. Security has been stepped up everywhere in India recently due to an attack on a military base near the border with Pakistan a week or so ago.
From there we went to Purana Qila, an old fort with beautiful mughal buildings and then attempted to find a mosque down a crazy chaotic alley packed with people all shouting and pushing. We kept asking people where it was but it was very hard to get a straight answer. At one point a man was saying we had to take our shoes off but if we'd done it there we would have been walking barefoot down a filthy street - a bit overwhelmed by this point, I refused to go any further and headed straight back to the car. Oh well!
We retreated to a posh part of town for a pleasant lunch then went back out with the driver to the modern art museum. This turned out to be enormous with lots of really interesting stuff but
hard to take all of it in at one go. The garden of the gallery was filled with fantastic sculpture but all just dumped on the grass close together without any explanations - I think they could do with a decent curator.
Finally we went to see the memorial to Gandhi which is the place he spent the last 144 days of his life. His last walk across the gardens towards the area where he used to pray is marked out in footsteps and then a small shrine placed where he was shot. The main building has huge amounts of information covering the story of his life, even the most important bits of which I have to admit I was unaware. The 2 rooms he lived in have been left as they were - there's one with a bed for sleeping and a platform for meditating and the other was used as an office with a low bench and desk. His only belongings are framed on the wall - a set of cutlery, glasses and case, a hunting knife and a pumice stone which he washed with. (There might have been a couple of other things but this is
like that game where you have to remember what was on a tray and it was 3 days ago!) It was all very sobering. The saddest thing is that very little of what he hoped for India and the world has happened and seems unlikely that it ever will.
We return to Delhi later in the trip but as a first experience it certainly didn't grab me. We did however learn a few probably very important lessons for the next few weeks - just say no and ignore them even if they seem like they're being nice and you feel rude; don't keep arguing about the price of a tuk-tuk/taxi if the difference is only 20p; occasionally it is ok to find a western restaurant and have something familiar to eat!
The following day was to be our first Indian train.....but I'll leave that for next time!
Hope all ok and a bit drier than when we left.
S + H x
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Mike Chip
non-member comment
Bon voyage
Hi Sarah and Hugh, thank you for your inspiring pieces about South America. Certainly getting near the top of our list of places to go. Look forward to hearing more about India. I remember an afternoon watching the parakeets in Lodi Gardens many years ago.