India - Arrival

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I know I'm behind on blogging, so hopefully the next few blogs will get us all caught up!

The trip to Delhi from Phuket was one of the longest days of our trip. Jonathan facebooked at 0452 in Phuket, we left the hotel at 0550, flew to Bangkok at 0700, transferred in Bangkok at 0900, had layover in the Cathay lounge until 1700, landed in Delhi at 2300 (-2 hours) and then drive four hours (w a driver) to arrive in Chandigarh at 0330 to the Aggarwal house, greeted by Mrs. Aggarwal who then had her driver bring us to our hotel. Around 24 hours of travel!

After clearing customs in Delhi, we were met by hundreds of random people standing in and out of the building waiting to pick people up. So many signs, but we couldn't find ours. I stood guard over our bags while Jonathan walked back and forth along the line trying to find our driver. No luck. Cell phone had no reception. Wifi wouldn't let us log in. Seriously? Clearly there is room for improvement in infrastructure here. Little did we know how true this was. Finally, the cell signal hit and Jonathan was able to reach our travel contact who coordinated to the driver. It ended up he was within 30 feet from us the whole time but did not think to pull the sign out of his pocket. The first indicator that people just do things differently here. Passing through the outside door, past the guards with the AK-47's (who are in need of serious training for muzzle control), we connected with the driver. He then suggested we wait for him to get the car and bring it to us. No way! We walked with him to get the car. Standing in the "car park" was ok, but there were lots of guys milling about with seemingly nothing to do. A little nerve racking. Jonathan and I stood at an angle facing each other to make sure we could watch 360. The driver and Jonathan loaded the bags, and we turned away for maybe 3 seconds and the luggage cart was gone.... with our med kit in it. Jonathan spotted the guy, and took off after him. After a brief intense stand-off, Jonathan was back with the med-kit and we took loaded up into the little (very little) old, dirty, cracked window, cab to head over 4 hours to Chandi. At least it had AC!

The driver then tried to dump us with another driver. He drove in circles around the airport and seemed very distracted and was talking on the phone a lot. We were on high alert. Then he pulled over along the interstate just outside the airport but before a security checkpoint, in the middle of a rough area and said he was going to have another driver pick us up as he had shopping to do. Seriously? After a fierce exchange between Jonathan and the driver, and some backup assistance from our contact, we were once again on our way.

Delhi was rough. In the middle of the night, there were people all over the place. Kids 2-5 were roaming the streets, in the middle of traffic, barefoot. There are a lot of people out here and the poverty is more obvious than other countries. Its right there in the middle of the road. Shanty towns built of old tin, fabric, and junk were all over along side the roads as well. The road we were on (HWY 1) was terrible. Torn all to heck and had construction most of the way. That pushed the vehicles to dirt and gravel side routes (not other roads, but more like driving on the shoulder). 2 lanes painted = 4 lanes of vehicles bobbing and weaving. Honking and light flashing was how people avoided each other, lanes were ignored. Surprisingly, the system worked well for them. They would get within inches on each side of the vehicles and somehow manage without hitting. The driver stopped alongside the highway at one point to take a break... grab some tea from a shack, took the keys, and left us in the car. Crazy. We finally made it to Chandigarh and our host's home at around 3AM.

Their home was beautiful. Huge, lit up for the wedding, amazing. Security manned their gate. Fortunately, Ishika's mother arrived right after we did and took us under her wing, had her driver (her and her brother in law as well) take us to our hotel that they had so kindly arranged for us. Took us all the way through check-in and then we said our goodbye's and went up to sleep.
India...to be continued!

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