Andrew’s - Incredible India

Here are Andrew’s parting thoughts as we begin the long journey home. Enjoy and I’ll post mine when I return to the Bluegrass state.

Sitting at an Internet Cafe in Delhi (which will
heretofore be referred to as Hellhi… which may
indeed have been the initial intent, just never quite
interpreted correctly), I can now recount the final
hours of the trip through Incredible India.

When last I wrote, we were sitting at a nice relaxing
rooftop restaurant while eagerly anticipating our
train to Hellhi…

Our search for a sacrificial goat proved futile, but
we still had high hopes riding on Ganesh.  Head
downstairs and hit our first stroke of luck, the guys
at the office offer to drive us to the train
station… well, that’s lucky, not to mention darn
nice of them.  Okay, done.  Arrive at the station and
queue up at the reservation office, where we hope our
prayers will be answered and we can upgrade to a
higher class coach.

We are about eight people back from the counter, but
would you believe that an hour and fifteen minutes
later, there are still three more folks to go?  Our
train is scheduled to depart in another forty-five
minutes, and we both feel that it is actually possible
that the line will not move in time.  Amazing, but
true.  All of this is moot however, as one of my first
guesses proves correct, this lineup isn’t able to help
us anyway.

SIGH.  Okay, go to the ticket conductor office, as
requested and there we are told to wait until we are
on the train.  Okay.  Pile onboard, find our seats,
watch as the remainder of the cabin begins to fill…
many are foreigners like us, but Ganesh does not favor
us.  We get a full complement of six college buddies.
They pump out the Hindi beat and cavort about loudly.
It is with a lot of envy that we watch the other
compartments, all blissfully quiet and respectful.
Well, there is always the possibility of an upgrade.
The conductor eventually comes up to us and informs us
that it is not possible, there is room, but the AC is
not working.  So be it, and now we’re glad that we
didn’t find any sacrificial goats after all!  Damn you
Ganesh!

The twenty hour ride back to Hellhi is far too boring
to recount here, but suffice it to say that I find
ways to amuse myself, and others as it turns out.
Having switched off my brain, I opt to simply note the
number of roach sightings, how many we go after, and
how many are confirmed kills.  We also come up with a
small number of lists… so:

Number of cockroaches spotted: 69*
Number of roach kill attempts: 43
Number of confirmed roach kills: 33
Number of times rodents are spotted: 4 (+1
unconfirmed)
Number of swigs of Black Dog (each): 7

* This is in our immediate vicinity, and only until we
hit Jodhpur station about 7 hours later, about a third
of the entire trip.  I expect that the number would be
infinite if we were to take in the entire train, or
even the entire coach.  It inspires some of the folks
in nearby compartments, from where we hear the
occasional thump and cheer.

Our lists are broken down by category:

Things we have learned:
=======================

- The concept of the queue is not graspable by the
culture at large.  Accept it.  Live it.  If you don’t
elbow someone out of your way, you’re just not getting
it.

- Tourism sadly encourages a welfare-like sub-society
of beggars, touts, and commission rackets.  This is
only exacerbated by the duality of pricing admissions,
etc.  If everyone sees the tourists paying 25 x the
price of locals, it is expected that they are
literally floating on large cushions of $$$.

- In India, watch where you step.  Carefully.  There
is livestock, roadkill, and bio-landmines aplenty.

- Farm animals belong on the farm, not in the city.
Period.  Sacred cows included.  We did note that in
certain parts of Delhi, sacred cows don’t appear to
exist… it may be that financial and government
institutions are natural religious exclusion zones as
far as the cows go.

- Book train tickets well in advance, AND it pays to
pay more.  See above regarding the roving roach motel
that is the 3-tier AC coach.

- I personally have learned that Kara is grossed out
by the cockroach.  Apparently farm animals are all
good and clean (enough) though.

- Monkeys might be cute, but they sure as hell not
very nice.  Avoid like the plague.  Don’t carry food
items on you in monkey-infested locales.

- There has been a massive mistake in the
interpretation of certain Hindi words.  For example,
Hellhi and Delhi.  Case in point, there is a section
of old Hellhi that has mistakenly been called Pahar
Ganj.  It turns out that the intent was Pahar Grunge.
It’s an easy substitution, and I can see how it may
have been missed.

- Owing to atmospheric conditions and local
air-pollution levels, afternoon pictures of New
Hellhi, look as good as Old Hellhi smells.  Sad, but
true.

- India is where old Christmas decorations come to
die.  Used in all manner of ways, particularly in the
art of pimping your tractor / rickshaw / truck.  We
have thought about a new show for cable, “Pimp my
Tractor”.  Seriously, you should all witness some of
these creations…

Things that are cool:
=====================

- I think it’s cool that we get to line up with the
“Freedom Fighters” in what passes as queues at the
train stations!  I expect that means army regulars,
but who doesn’t want to be a Freedom Fighter?!

- Muffin tops.  Here it’s out and about, while the
west goes for cleavage, the locals go with the
venerable muffin top.  If you’ve got it, flaunt it -
we’ve all heard that before.

- Forts, and how every town and village seems to have
one.  They all have cool histories too… like that
dude who liked to throw people over the walls to see
what special patterns they would make on impact.

- Government approved “Bhang” shop, selling “special”
lassis and camel-safari packs.  (note, we did not
visit the establishment, but were amused by its
presence).

- AC setting on most air-conditioning units,
physically speaking.  I should note that this is
something of a commonality in the world at large, I
seem to recall a meat-locker setting on a bus in Peru.

Things that are NOT cool:
=========================

- ANY supposedly western-style toilet requiring a
bucket to function as designed.

- Monkeys.  Period.

- Roaches and rats, regardless of where you find them.

- Lists, of this variety.  See comment on boring train
ride above.

After what seems to be a short eternity, we finally
arrive at the Old Hellhi station.  Having previously
sworn off getting ripped off by any rickshaw-wallahs,
we giddily head straight for the metro station nearby.
I have to admit that Karim’s restaurant aside, we may
have found a second thing that we like here… the
Metro.  It’s orderly, very modern (makes that dinky
LRT back home look like something out of a museum).
It’s also packed, the kind of packed that if you were
to keel over, no one would notice until they
disembarked… heck, it’s even clean and queues are
actually ENFORCED!  Sweet.  The look of surprise when
someone gets sent to the back of the line is like a
MasterCard commercial, it’s priceless.

We stay at Hotel Fifty-Five, which I actually
recommend, if you need to actually stay in Hellhi…
and it’s even in Connaughty Place.  We enjoy another
fab meal at Karim’s, and the aggravation of helpful
people who can’t seem to take no thank you.

This morning Ganesh toys with us.  Our first
destination is a coffee-house, but it appears that
none open prior to 10!!!  WTF?  Even the McDonald’s is
closed.  Not that we’d be going there, but still…
it’s the principle.  Shopping is up next, and we hit
the State Emporiums, where prices are fixed and the
quality questionable.  In a capricious and ironic
twist of fate, the only one we are interested in
(owing to us only visiting this one state), the
Rajasthali is under renovations… However, all is
well as Ganesh smiles upon us as we walk back to the
hotel and come upon a princely find, a 10 Rupee note.
While some might question the wisdom of picking
anything up off the street, we take it as a sign of
favor and luck… our flight will NOT be delayed.

Please Ganesh.  Pretty please… with a goat on top?!

So, at this point we are just killing time, with about
nine hours to go before our scheduled departure.  A
fabulous meal awaits us just a few short steps away,
and the amazing and clean Dubai airport is ready to
receive us with welcome arms (and impressive urinals
that are worthy of the gods themselves!).

Allow me to remove my sarcasto-goggles for a moment…

India has, as a complete surprise given the first
couple of days, turned out to be a fantastic place to
visit.  Some might say that India changes you… and
it does.  For certain, it will make you appreciate
what you have back home, and for the opportunities
that we take for granted but are the stuff of dreams
for most of the people here.  Delhi, if anything,
should be experienced (if only for the briefest of
moments) before the magic that is Rajasthan (at least)
is taken in.  It will provide perspective and contrast
to the charms you’ll encounter elsewhere.  The food is
glorious, the colors vibrant, and the history rich.
Like a creamy shahi paneer dish…

Oh wait, that’s my cue to go and feed the
extra-dimensional hole that I call my stomach.

Namaste all!

Posted on February 07, 2009 at 2:29 AM

Comments

 

You still amaze and dazzle me!! I remember daily, all!!

LOV YA
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It was nice reading about india. I love to go there in holidays. I found so many places which are really beautiful. I done quality inspection in some of places which are really good to travel for. Thanks for your sharing nice information.

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Is it possible to get the “Incredible India” posters from somewhere?

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I have some list there

Number of cockroaches spotted: 69
Number of roach kill attempts: 43
Number of confirmed roach kills: 33
Number of times rodents are spotted: 4 (+1
unconfirmed)
Number of swigs of Black Dog (each): 7

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