Blogs from New Delhi, National Capital Territory, India, Asia - page 119

Hi everyone:-D Who wants a postcard? Send me your address and I'll get you one! A couple of you have already given me addresses (Maura, Maya, Joanne?), but even if you have I would appreciate you sending me an e-mail with the info again so I have it electronically while I'm there (read: I have no idea where I put that little piece of paper!). An update on my delayed departure: The Indian Embassy in D.C. is closed today, so my visa will not be in on time for me to leave tomorrow. Soooooo, I'll be leaving Thursday to New Delhi. Sigh....I swear, someday you will actually read about my travels;-) xoxo, Jessica... read more

So - we're on the road to Delhi. Our final stop in India. We have completely failed to be Intrepid Travellers so far, and have piked out on most things due to the heat and a general lack of enthusiasm for all things Indian in general... But we are looking forward to Delhi. Why you may ask? Is it because it's the capital of the nation? Huge bustling crowds? Largest mosque in India? The famous red fort? Huge cosmopolitan food and night life? Nope. We were looking forward to it because we were staying at the Intercontinental as a treat, and were going to live it up in 5-star style, with Indian prices of course!! We were going to go over the budget but we didn't care anymore... So we were definitely not in a good ... read more

from part of an email from mbaade to LB... So we were sitting at one of the rooftop restaurants eating dinner last night, taking in the MASSIVE Delhi bazaar from 5 stories up, drinking our strawberry lassis (yogurt shake) and suddenly, out from behind the sketchy counter, blasts ENRIQUE! And I thought, omigod, Laura Beth. We left Angel's house yesterday, came to the center of backpacker heaven in a district of Delhi called Paharganj where the streets are full of cows, bicycle rickshaws, autorickshaws that honk their horns every 5 meters, more discount goods and conmen than i've ever been surrounded with, cheap hotels, cheaper restaurants, dust, dirt, noise, bags, saris, pants, watches, cameras, ANYTHING. Prices all negotiable. Everything is twice as expensive when quoted than you can bargain for. We're having a very hard time ... read more

Delhi (Paraganj) - lets say overwhelming - it was hot, smoggy, smelly and overpopulated. Under different circumstances we'd have stayed longer but as I (Mark) had a cold and chesty cough we decided my life expectancy would improve with a move - to Shimla. Luckily we bumped into a very nice Kashmiri bloke called Niaz (technically he 'bumped' into us) who runs a small travel agency in Delhi. Seeing a chance to get stress free tickets to Shimla we had a few beers with him and went back the next day to arrange the tickets. One hour later we left with two tickets to Srinigar (northern Kashmir) and a week stay on his uncles house boat on Dal lake - now that's a salesman! ... read more

Starting where I left off last...my cabin mates...the Kumars (almost sounds like a TV show!) were really great. Raj was quite the chit chatty one trying to name drop some friends and definitely name dropped placed around the World! He's an "Astro Numerologist. Specialist in Gesture Reading." Wow, that's an interesting profession. I thought it would be rude to ask for a reading but he did ask me my birthday and later told me that I have a nice aura. Wow! Now that is very flattering. He was almost floored when I told him that I wasn't married. LOL Guess being over 30 and unmarried in India would floor anyone. :) Rakha, Raj's wife was really friendly too. They had tons of snacks that their well wishers gave to them and kept offering me food to ... read more