Indian Madness!!

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Right now we are in Nepal having a much-needed break from the onslaught of India...

We landed in Delhi in the middle of the night (never a good idea) and were taken for a complete ride for the following 16 hours. We got into a "Delhi traffic Police pre-paid taxi" as our guidebook said that this was about the only way to avoid being ripped off - wrong! After ignoring a string of touts and locating our assigned taxi, we sped off into the dark streets of Delhi, dodging cows along the way.

After a while, our driver declared he was lost and we stopped at a hotel to ask for directions, where we got re-directed to a "tourist office" around the corner. They called our chosen hotel for us and Scott spoke to the so-called receptionist, who said that the hotel was all booked out. Get real - we're in low season and on the brink of a full-scale nuclear war; there was no way it was booked out! We tried to get our taxi driver to take us there anyway but he refused and drove off, leaving us with the "tourist office". They, of course, just happened to know of a hotel around the corner that they could take us to. The price was reasonable, it was the middle of the night, and we had no clue where we were, so under the circumstances, we went along with it.

The next morning, the reception refused to take our money and instead escorted us back to the tourist office to pay - the perfect time for him to make his sales pitch. We wanted to book a train ticket to Agra but they were apparently all booked out for a week and, besides, it was Sunday so the ticket office was closed (all lies we found out later). Instead, he suggested we book a trip to his brothers beautiful lakeside house - in Kashmir!

Needless-to-say, we left and caught a rickshaw to Delhi train station to see for ourselves. Our driver told us there was no ticket office for foreigners - only Indians could buy tickets there. He confirmed this fact with several "random" Indians and it did seem to be the case, so we stupidly spent the next 2 hours being driven all over the city by him to several booking offices, and constantly told a pack of lies. Instead of waiting a week for a train ticket for $5, they were happy to offer us a car the next day for anywhere between $45 to $90 per day!

Thoroughly frustrated and trusting no-one, we decided to leave the rickshaw and walk the 2km to the area of hotels we'd wanted to be in the night before. It was right in the mid-day heat of 40 degrees C, and we had our backpacks on, but at least we wouldn't be taken to some random location yet again. Along the way we were constantly hassled and told we were going the wrong way (all a pack of lies - we can read a map!) and were followed by several people - very irritating!

We finally got to where we wanted to be and checked into a hostel - at last a bit of peace and quiet from the mobs outside! Seeing that our hostel ran buses to Agra, we booked on for the next morning, keen to escape Delhi. We then found out from another backpacker that the ticket office in the train station is in fact only for Indians, but just above it on the first floor is an office especially for foreigners, a fact our rickshaw driver had skilfully hidden from us all morning! After being intercepted and wrongly re-directed several times, we eventually found our way to the booking office by 1.30pm, half an hour before it closed for the day. Five minutes later we had our train tickets booked onwards from Agra - phew! It had taken from 8am until 1.30pm to buy our tickets, but eventually we had them and a celebration was in order - I am ashamed to say we retreated to McDonalds! (no Big-Macs as cows are sacred!)

The next morning we got our bus down to Agra, home of the famous Taj Mahal. We paid our 750 rupees entrance fee (Indians pay just 20 rupees!) and went in. It was very beautiful, just like in all the postcards, and very peaceful and tranquil. It was so nice to have Indians talking to us other than for the sole purpose of extracting money from us. To be honest though, that's the last time we spoke to anyone genuine...

The next few days were spent doing day trips to the ruined city of Fetepur Sikri (where we had rocks hurled at us by a group of teenagers for not giving them pens) and the town of Mathura, home of the Hare Krishnas (again, any enjoyment was marred by the constant hounding). We then boarded a notorious overnight train to Varanasi, and amazingly had no problems at all (apart from the Indian family below us who wanted us to go and look at their carpet shop when we arrived there!).

We were actually glad to just be out of Agra with our health, however, as we'd read about a full-scale scam there a few years back where hotels had intentionally poisoned their guests in order to make them stay longer. The hospitals were even in on the deal and were charging ridiculous and unnecessary treatment fees - unbelievable!

Varanasi is situated on the banks of the River Ganges and is one of the most holy cities in India. Despite this, it is still filthy and dirty. A sign outside one restaurant proudly claimed that it was "less dirty" than its competitors!!! People swim downstrean from where corpses are being washed prior to cremation, and further down the bed sheets are washed. If a person dies of leprosy, however, the body is not burned, but instead just thrown into the river with rocks tied to it. Now where is the sense in that - burn the healthy bodies and let the diseased ones slowly rot in the holy river!

Despite all this, Varanasi is a really interesting place to visit as the "ghats" (steps which run along the riverbank) are always lively and full of pilgrims taking an auspicious dip, and there are numerous religious services, including those open-air cremations!

From there we travelled by bus for a gruelling 2 days to reach the town of Pokhara in Nepal. What a difference to India! Here, the people smile and cheerily say "namaste!" even if they don't want to sell you anything! Even the animals look happier. The cows and water-buffaloes look strong and healthy and wander around the lakeshore, instead of having their ribs showing and scrounging around for food in the piles of rubbish lining the streets!

I loved Pokhara immediately as it was the perfect idyllic get-away. Set beside a pretty lake, and surrounded by the snowy peaks of the Himalayas, it is picture-perfect. Unfortunately, Scott and I had both picked up stomach bugs in India (not surprisingly) so trekking was out of the question. We did hire a boat for an afternoon and went swimming in the lake though.

An eight hour hair-raising but beautiful bus ride (reminiscent of South America) brought us to Kathmandu, where we are now. Last night we went to the Rum Doodle bar where all the famous climbers hang out. It is a kind of Hard Rock cafe for climbers, with pictures and signatures of all the people to have climbed Everest, including Sir Edmund Hillary.

Tomorrow we are going to go to some smaller towns and hopefully catch some more views of the Himalayas - with monsoon looming though we will have to be very lucky.

We are going to fly out of Delhi at the beginning of next month, so plan to travel to a few more places in India and give it a chance to redeem itself! We'll see. I just hope we manage to escape getting ill this time. It is amazing, but until you come to India you cannot believe it. It truly makes everywhere else I have been seem like child’s play, including South America and China! When we go back into India we will be tougher though so maybe it will be easier?!....

For the moment though, we are quite happy relaxing in beautiful and friendly Nepal and watching the world cup!

Love Sharon x

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Photos

camel
Early morning Camel ride at Jaiselmar