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Published: September 21st 2007
I made my fateful coin toss moments after my last entry and as a result headed for the bus station and West to Pushkar. I did not however end up in my classy hotel but instead at another 100r a night establishment.
The accomodation was fine and I met a load of people in the 'restaurant', 3 Germans, a Brazillian and a lovely Aussie couple. It was here where my previously immaculate digestive system was taken to bits! My mistake was to agree to have one of the propriortors 'special Lassi's' which he told me he was famous for. A lassi is like a Yoghurt based milkshake...... The special bit as i discovered about half an hour later was that it was full of marijuana!
So I spent the next hour or two talking absolute nonsense to my new international friends and followed that up by re-defining 'eye of a needle'. Unfortunately things still have not improved in that area but lets not go into details!Suffice to say that I think the Yoghurt in my lassi was just a touch ropey!
Pushkar is a very spiritual place built around a lake that is said to be the lake of the lotus flower where Life began in the Hindu religion. The lake itself is very pretty, the priests are not. Basically they try and tie a bracelet round your wrist and then ask for huge donations to ensure the happy life of your family.... I didn't bite (Sorry to my relatives!) in spite of him trying to grab my arm repeatedly to tie on his wares and the guy got really nasty and tried to tell me I had to leave. I invited him to find a new place to store his bracelts along with a suggestion of an appropriate location and he sloped of into the crowd to find another foolish tourist. From talking to the Aussies, they gave one of these guys 200r and he had the same reaction, he told them it was more appropriate to give 5000! ( about 55 GBP!)
One thing that you have to get used to if you travel here is the fact that 99% of tourist facing people here are as crooked as the day is long, if you only have to turn away 25 inflated fares/prices and pesterings a day then you have done very well.
After Pushkar I got a nightbus to Agra, the home of the Taj Mahal. The nightbus was highly unique and my first 'private sleeper' bus journey. I would not hugely vouch for these as the sleeper birth was filthy, and the suspension was completely shot. Our driver decided to stop for an hour only twenty minutes after we set off as his mate's bus did not leave for a while and he wanted to have breakfast with him in the morning in Agra! Many other such stops saw us arrive in Agra just the 4 hours late.
The Taj Mahal.... Wow! the place is genuinely impressive, I spent six hours there with two Isreali's that I met on the bus and we caught the sunset which was really beautiful. I also found out a lot more about Israel and was surprised to hear that in my new friends opinion 80% of the people there are not particularly religious and that they both eat pork.
I did not spend the night in Agra and instead headed for the train station to catch the sleeper train to Varanasi.... third time lucky for sleep on a sleeper! thankfully I got plenty of sleep and woke up feeling pretty refreshed. Unfortunately the train was running 5 hours late as it kept stopping during the night. I grabbed a tuk tuk with two Aussie's to a guest house and then we went for a walk to the Ghats of the Ganges (Plus an enthusiatic young German bloke we picked up along the way). This is where you see people diving in the polluted river on the TV. The ganges is a very holy river and thousands of people come to bathe in it every day.
We watched a 40 minute ritual celebration and then the place went crazy as groups of men came running down the Ghat chanting with massive statues of various gods which they throw in the river.
From here we walked through the back alleys to the burning ghats. This is where people are cremated 24 hours a day on funeral pyres before their bones and ashes are thrown into the ganges. It felt really intrussive being there but that did not stop lots of people from trying to offer their services as 'guides'. It was a very interstesting experiance.
On the walk back enthusaistic German man stood in a cow pat - I found this highly amusing as his flip flop was stuck in the offending mass!.... I was tempted to add to his wow by running up behind him, pulling his shorts down and shouting 5-1 at him but managed to resist :-)
The next morning I took a boat ride along the Ganges at sunrise, took a long walk along the river and took a tour of the cities temples. Tonight I take a night train towards the Nepali border and this time tomorrow I should be approaching Kathmandu.
As I finish my Indian Odyssey I feel its time to see how India measures up as a travel destination. Now I have only been here for three weeks and have not managed to get off the tourist circuit to far, this will be the same everywhere so I have come up with a formula to compare places ... the 'Chunk Tetley travel index'
I will give each place a score out of ten for various things relative to me. I'll do this for everywhere and by the end of my trip i will have my own league table! Please note that I have only been to a small part of India and this is just as I see it and others may disagree on various things.
Transport - 6 : its cramped, dirty and often late but it is cheap and there is a lot of it
Food - 2 : Hygene issues make it tough to relax and enjoy a lot of things..... and I have been struck with the Delhi Belly and still have it a week later! Also very surprisingly, everything is pretty bland!
Cost - 9 : Everything here is cheap, especially if you pay the proper price!
Sites & Activities - 5 : There are not many activities here and most of the sites are dirty and undergoing repair..... The Taj earns most of these points on its own.
People (tourist facing): 2 Unfourtanately the tourist industry here is as bent as a nine bob note. The non tourist people (I didn't meet many) were lovely
Accomodation - 7 : You can have whatever level of amenities you want and all are cheap, hygene in common areas are a near constant let down
Hygene - 1 : Everywhere other than Shimla was absolutely filthy, people here do not use bins and the streets are full of faeces and rubbish, wild dogs are everywhere
Safety - 8 : Inspite of high levels of poverty here you never feel threatened, India feels like a safe place.
Total score India - 40 (out of 80)
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SANDEEP THAKRE
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Oi
Give more points to India ..