Delhi-where everyone drives like me!

---

What a crazy place! The flights were fine although the Doha-Delhi one was just over 3 hours, and I was gutted with this as I thought it would be longer and planned to sleep, but between food service and crying babies it didn't happen. I'd done all my ringing round at Heathrow, to say my farewells, and did a bit of shopping and sat down to have some food. It was then I opened the card from Gareth, Michelle, and the boys reading 'There are just some things in life that just have to be done' and I got a little lump in my throat, not quite believing I was off on the first of many travels this year, that I have wanted to do for so long.

I got through security no problems in Delhi and luckily despite all the mess about to get a visa, there were no problems. The man on the desk was asking 'only you?' 'No friends?' Not yet I told him, but I'm sure I'd meet some later. I managed to change £100 into rupees, as I was told you can't take currency in or out of India unless you're a citizen and it's less than a certain amount in 500 and 100 IR notes.

I collected my bag no problem, it was just coming around the carousel as I walked up, so I made my way outside to meet my pre booked taxi.

The tour group I've booked with offer additional services such as the one I'd booked which is known as a Planeterra supported project and this one was called 'women on wheels' which promotes and supports women working in India whilst providing safe travel for females. After reading about the scams and possibly safely elements of being a single western female solo traveller, I had no hesitation in booking this, but now to find her. I had a good look around and approached many people holding boards, but my name was nowhere to be seen. I dug out my paperwork and called the number. No connection. Called another number. No connection. Wandered around a bit more. Sat and read a bit more paperwork, called another number-ringing!

I explained I'd booked transport and was reassured my driver would be about 20 minutes, so I waited. Less than 20 minutes passed when a lovely young smiley girl came up to me and eventually confirmed she was my taxi. We just had to wait on some others to arrive, so off she went. About ten minutes later I was joined by two girls from Denmark, cursing the ATM machines (they'd tried 4 and still no cash) and also cursing the men for staring so much.

I'd read about this, and yes the men do tend to just stare at you, weather it's because you're female, western, tourist, blonde or a mixture of the above, you do get stared at, but I'd prepared myself for this and dressed conservatively and just carried on my business as normal.

This Danish bird didn't like it one bit and decided she's never coming back to India again. I told her to chill out, we'd not even left the airport yet, but she was adamant this was her first and last visit.



It just went over my head to be honest, but then again my eyes were burning from tiredness, and most things go over my head anyway. After lots of waiting about, the two Danish girls and I made our way to the Carpark with our driver, as it seemed the others we were waiting on had maybe gone already.



Our taxi was a battered old Honda, and actually as I looked around, 99.9% of vehicles were scratched and scraped and I was soon to experience why.

Now there is absolutely NO road discipline here at all. Not a jot. Everyone uses horns, the beeping is constant and with a mixture of cars, tuk tuks, bicycles, motorbikes, pedestrians and dogs in the road, it's a case of weaving in and ducking out where you can. Our driver told us the traffic is always bad in Delhi and a 20 minute journey would take us over an hour.

I couldn't keep my eyes open and lent my head on my backpack and nodded off. I kept waking up to sharp braking and glanced out of the window. The side of the road which would be grass verges back home was a carpet of litter, and a man was openly having a pee amongst it. Dogs roamed in it, and I thought it was lack of sleep, but no, two monkeys were just kicking about by the side of the road.....

Finally we got to the hotel and I hoped my room would be ready as I just wanted to get a bit of sleep. The two Danish girls were more concerned with getting hotel wifi, and all I could think was 'stop dicking about with the bloody Internet and get checked in-do you not know how much I need to sleep?!'

Whilst they were messing about with wifi passwords, I wandered up to read the notice board and got accosted by a girl who threw her arms around me and said 'yay! I finally meet someone on my trip!' She introduced herself as Katarina, from Bolivia and had arrived yesterday. It turned out I was sharing my room with her, so she gave me the key and headed out.

I was surprised that the room was a lot nicer than I thought. 2 clean single beds, clean towels and a TV. About 6 plug sockets all with different pins and the honking horns of Delhi from the window. I found my earplugs and climbed into bed, and managed to have a couple of hours sleep before Katarina returned with her shopping to show me (lots of cheap colourful tops for about £2) and declaring she had to do her hair as she looked like a lion. (She did, and for this I may now refer to her as Shakira, as like her Latin American buddy, had a mass of blonde hair and the curves like JLO)

Now I thought I'd packed light and toyed with the idea of bringing a hairdryer, when Shakira pulled out hair straighteners and all sorts and proceeded to tame her mane.

We made our way downstairs for 2pm to meet our group and Chief experience officer (CEO) whom I learned was called Raghu (as in the bolagnaise sauce, so that was easy for me to remember) I also learned that Shakira was a CEO for the same company in South America, so told her I'd pick her brains as that's another destination on the list in May.



Our groups consists of a guy from Belguim called Chris, a mother and daughter from Adelaide, 2 blokes from Cape Town, a pair of friends one from London the other from Brisbane. Pearl the Canadian woman who had messaged me prior to this trip to say hi. She had arrived yesterday minus her luggage, and it didn't look to be following her anytime soon. She flew Malaysian airways, who have also lost some planes recently, so I made a mental note to avoid that airline in the future. A couple of others would be joining us later, but for now Raghu told us all we need to know about our trip. He briefed us on tipping, touts, and tea (don't have the special one-it's got cannabis in it) and lots of other things about India and Nepal.



After a quick change we got in a cab and made our way to the Red Fort, which is a world heritage site and was home to the Mughal emporer, many years ago. There were signs around here saying 'No honking' and I must admit it was quieter than where we'd just come from. It was still so packed though and there were people everywhere. The actual journey was again a life risk in itself-I knew it was bad, but didn't expect it to be THIS bad! After that we went to India Gatewhich is a huge arch structure built after the Great and Afghan War to honour the Indian soldiers who lost their lives. It was quite a nice place, but typically people trying to sell you stuff and grabbing your hands to plaster henna tattoos on. Again the roads were filthy, and discarded corn on the cobs littered the pavement. Such a shame.



Next we went to Connaught place which has shops and restaurants and is a bit more 21st century. Shakira was dying to go to Dunkin Dohnuts, but no matter how hungry I felt, no way was I travelling all this way to eat bloody Dohnuts! We had a wander around the markets which were lovely-lots of nice clothes and handbags, but I didn't need anything and will try not to buy the usual hoards of crap I end up coming back with.



We got the metro back, and despite it being only 3 stops, from leaving Connought place to Karol Bagh where the hotel was, the skies turned pitch black and a thunder storm ensued. We waited about 10-15 minutes for it to pass, and then made Arun for it. Drainage doesn't seem to be a strong point here either and the streets were like streams with water gushing down them.

We had an hour before going for food and I tried to keep awake, but Shakira had a snooze. We went to a restaraunt just around the corner, where Raghu assured us it was fine to eat chicken here (but never lamb as sometimes it's goat and they don't know how old it is......) I had a bottle of kingfisher which added to my Jetlag, and had a standard chicken biriyani and naan which was quite nice but more spicey than back home. I wondered if I'd maybe feel a bit lonely as despite joining the group, I'd come here alone, but everyone was having a good chat and it was a lovely atmosphere, and besides I think I was too tired to care.



Back to the hotel and I braced myself for a cold shower as there hadn't been any hot water for a couple of days. I was in luck though and as I was getting undressed I saw the mirror steaming up so jumped in and had a lovely hot shower and washed my hair. My eyes are still burning typing this so am straight to bed now ready for breakfast at 7am tomorrow.

First impressions of India:crazy, dirty, busy, but not as smelly as Thailand, and I've had hot water and a flushing toilet-what more can a girl want?!

---

Photos

Red fort
Made from red sandstone and a bit fort like I guess!

India Gate
Where all the protests happen apparently!