03 Dec 2015
Delhi I - First Night, part 1
I’m currently in Hoi An, a lovely seaside-town in eastern Vietnam. So why is this post titled “Delhi”, you may wonder. Well, the reasons are complicated, but they involve a very generous restaurant owner, at least 7 shots of rice wine and the realization that if I can’t be bothered to write about certain parts of my journey you probably couldn’t be bothered to read about them either.
In that spirit - and several others - I’ll procrastinate writing more about the Middle East by writing about my arrival in India instead.
I’ll say this much up front: Of the countries I visited during this trip, India was the one that felt strangest to me. In terms of getting out of my comfort zone, it was a fantastic success. It was also a series of impressions and experiences that made what else I saw of Southeast Asia seem…tame.
India felt extreme in several ways. Some things were extremely pleasant, others extremely annoying. As a result, India probably had the strongest effect on my perspective. Was that a consistently pleasant experience? Well…
Arriving in Delhi
I reached Delhi around 11pm, after a short layover in Abu Dhabi. Obviously I had some images in my head, but the airport really didn’t match them: Turns out, Delhi Airport is actually very new, very clean and suspiciously quiet.
After a long day I was glad to see that my eVisa carried me through immigration without too many questions (I did get fingerprinted though). I had booked a hotel in advance and was eager to find it and go to sleep. Luckily the airport terminal has a direct metro connection to the city centre. While trying to figure out the ticket system, I started chatting with two local university students who had just returned from a trip to Europe and took me under their wings, making sure I got off the metro at the right stop, namely New Delhi Station.
So that was lovely. I got out there and took a tuktuk (hehe) to my hotel. And that’s where that evening suddenly turned around.
My point-of-view
I’m worldly and well-traveled, easily adapting to a new city like a shark smoothly sliding into a new current.
We are cruising past Connaught Place, a circular area full of shops and bars, one of Delhi’s central sights. The night is lively, but cooler than Oman and calmer than I expected of India. Suddenly the driver pulls over and asks me to repeat the address of my hotel. I read it out to him. His English is tough to understand but he wants to know which block the hotel is at. I don’t know, the email doesn’t say and I don’t have internet to check. Not to worry, he says, he’ll just drive me to the Government Tourist Information and they’ll find out.
I decline and show him the map on my phone, telling him to just drive up there. He insists on going to the tourist information, telling me that the area around my hotel is cordoned off for a festival and he can’t drive there. This seems weird, because I didn’t see any blockades or signs and it’s really rather quiet. After about 5 minutes of arguing I relent and tell him to just get on with it.
He then drives to an unassuming-looking building down the road with a big sign saying “Government Tourist Information”, stops and ushers me in. I’m greeted by a middle-aged man with a badge clipped to his shirt and he invites me to sit down in an office. The shelves are full of travel guides, brochures and a few framed official-looking documents and letters.
He then tells me that the city is a bit out of control due to a big festival taking place in the centre. When he looks up my hotel on a map he finds out that, yeup, it’s definitely blocked off right now. The internet connection is down at the moment, but we can call my hotel from his office. I read the number to him and he passes me the handset. I recite my booking code into the handset and I’m being told that yes, the hotel is difficult to reach right now, but they’ll think of something and call me back. Lovely.
Tourist-information-guy then tells me that it might be difficult to find alternative accommodation tonight, since every hotel is going to be booked out because of the festival. Pretty much impossible to find anything under 150 USD a night, really. But I could spend a few days in one of the surrounding cities, do some sightseeing. He proposes to put together a nice tour around Rajasthan, maybe a week or so including all the major sighs and cities. A nice idea, but unfortunately his plan for one week costs about as much as I budget for a month. So maybe I would like to take a private car to Agra tonight, see the Taj Mahal tomorrow? A cheap way of evading all the hassle with the festival and all? He quotes me 200 USD for that, which seems…steep. I politely decline. Man, at this point I’m getting proper sleepy.
Eventually the hotel rings back, informing me that regrettably they could not find a way of getting me there. Of course they’ll refund me for it, but I’ll have to find another place to stay. A bit of a blow for me, because I wasn’t planning on spending 150 USD on a single night and my new friend really didn’t know any hotel that would have cheaper rooms available. Checking online would help, but the internet connection is still down.
Eventually, around one o’clock he does think of one or two places that might be a bit cheaper. The tuktuk driver, who has been faithfully waiting outside agrees to drive me there after getting the address from the tourist information. I almost fall asleep on the way and get hotel room at the other end of the city. I haggle the price down to 70 USD, go up to my room and pass out on the bed immediately.
Until next time,
Arne