Trying to leave Delhi... and failing!

Once again, didnt hear the alarm because of the ear plugs....

When the door of our room wouldnt open and we had to call reception to let us out we should have read this as a sign that we wouldnt be leaving this city today.

We checked out, said our goodbyes to the nice staff and headed off to the railway station to buy some tickets... or so we had hoped. Walking down the main bazaar, remenicent of a farmyard and recycling plant, we arrived at the chaotic New Delhi train station. We thought we had made it, but now, we were wrong, according to a man at the station entrance we could enter the station. No ticket , no entry. Another young man verified this, stating that the international tourism ticket office was under renovation and that we had to go to the new ticket office by rickshaw over 1km away! we once again tried to get in, but were stopped again. Stupidly - but with 20 kilos on your back and sweating like pigs (Patricia is no pig of course, but me, well, maybe) you look for the easy way out, and yes we fell for another scam. Two in two days... not bad going.

We went to another supposedly official Tourism bureau asking for tickets, only to be told by a man (who claimed he has studied in Harvard and was a personal friend of the English reporter John Simpson) that there were no trains to Agra (home of the Taj Mahal) today and that we could book a trip through him to the Himalayas instead!! When Giles questioned the fact that there were no trains, he accused him of calling him a liar and told us to leave.

If only the nightmare had ended here! Back out on the street, another man approached us and told us that this was not a safe area for foreigners and that we should go with him to another official Tourism State office and get a train ticket from there. When he started to write down the number of the richshaw license on his mobile and tell the driver not to overcharge us, we knew something was up. But off we went to this new ticket office and on arrival went in. Seeing dozens of backpacks in the entrance made us feel slightly more comfortable, but once inside and sitting down we realised that this place was just as bad as the previous one.

After the usual "where are you from", "i have many friends in Spain and England", "my brother was studying in Bristol", and of course "there are no more trains to Agra today, Sir" (despite only being 1pm), we were asked if instead we would like to go to Rajastan!! And then that the only way to Agra was by car, at a cost of 108$ for the two. The man told Giles that he looked stressed and that he should relax... "India is not an easy country to travel in". How can we relax if after three hours we still havent got anywhere!!!

On leaving the travel agency, we saw Houdini (the man who wanted to help us an hour before) just standing there waiting there for his commission, of course there was none. So off we went back to the station, managing to enter through a side door, slip through the taxi ranks and finally got to find the official travel office for foreigners. At last, we were there, we had the sensation of having completed the army assult course, which we are sure was easier than what we just had to battle with.

But of course, after another two hour queue we couldnt get on the train we wanted and couldnt leave today. After all that we had got absolutely nowhere!! Of well, another day in Delhi, and so we went back to the hotel we left five hours earlier only to be told there was no room available! But you have to look on the bright side (there always is one) and we found a better hotel in the area and we highly recommend it: The 'Yes Please Cottage', and we spent the afternoon at the National railway Museum (Giles' favourite), which was great until we were attacked by mosquitos.

So this is the end of day two, lets see if we can actually leave Delhi tomorrow and head for Agra, home of the famous Taj Mahal. We have train tickets, so hopefully, all being well, tomorrow well take the two hour train journey at 6am, so its no ear plus tonight as we HAVE to hear the alarm clock.

Sorry, no photos at present as we cant upload them from here, but we will put them up at a later date.

Delhi must mean Chaos in Hindi

After 7.5 hour flight from Paris we arrived in Delhi, where it took another hour to get through customs, and another 40 mins to cross Delhi to our hotel in the central bazaar area - Pahar Ganj of Delhi. The hotel was no Ritz but at 25 dollars per night then what can you expect. At least we had air conditioning, but it was so noisy we had to sleep with ear plugs in! And of course, didnt hear the alarm the next day.

And so it was out and about into Delhi, and what a place! There was a cow eating out of rubbish in front of the hotel, dogs walking everywhere, hundreds of motorised rickshaws stopping every few seconds offering you a ride. Central Delhi is really dirty and very smelly, if its not the smell of cow s**t, or human urine, that almost knocks you senseless, then its the tons of rubbish just lying on the floor wherever you go. For once in my life I wished i had a cold and blocked up nose. But no such luck!

A local 19 year old called Banti who seemed nice saying "No, I dont want your money, just to practice my english" started talking to us and for some reason managed to persuade us - as we thought it was out of the kindness of his heart - to follow him to the supposedly official Government Tourist Office where we thought we were going to pick up a free tourist map, only to find that someone tried to persuade us to book a chauffer driven car to take us around Rajastan for a week for 450 dollars! Of course when we got outside, and the boy realised that we didnt buy a trip and he wasnt going to get his commission, we asked us to buy him a dictionary to improve his english! We later found out that this type of scam is common and that he was going to return the book and take the money!

After that, we grabbed a rickshaw and headed into the Red fort (Banti had warned us earlier that this area was far too risky for foreigners) which was a huge fort build in the time of the Mughel power. Buy this time we had both sweated so much that we were soaked...
Not surprising with 32 degrees and 87% humidity. We then decided to go to the Jama Masjid Mosque which is the largest in India. Being as adventurous as we are, we choose to walk through the old bazaar back streets, an incredible network of narrow streets full of tiny shops selling all you can imagine and nothing you really need. Once againg smell was overpowering and there was rubbish everywhere.

We noticed that everyone-men, women, children- was starring at Patricia which in part was because we were almost the only foreigners around but more so because they could see her arms and her legs and all indian women, wear a sharee which covers them from head to toe.

Arriving at the Mosque this actually became a problem and despite Patricia now wearig a shawl, an extreme muslim fanatic approached us shouting in arabic, pointing at her neck and ankles which were still to be seen. This now brought attention to us, and half a dozen kids now started pulling at us shouting "chocolate, chocolate", other men aproached women started starring and us desperately trying to get away through the crowded market stalls and rush into the mosque... ironically our safest place to be!!! Thanks Allah, we owe you one!

After this stress, the intense heat, and having lost litres through sweating, we thought we' head back to the hotel before sunset... walking around that area in the dark would not have been too much fun. So it was a good indian dinner on the roof of our hotel and time for bed. End of day 1. And to look forward (?) to another day in delhi.

Hotel searching via internet

What most made us laugh was the small print on the screen "maps are provided as an aid in planning, we are not responsible for the acuracy".


This hotel is supposedly in downtown Delhi in the hustle and bustle of the old city ... but according to the web locator its in the middle of nowhere! Of course, we won't be staying there!.

Searching for a hotel (without travel agencies) for the first few nights in Delhi has been a painstaking experience, as prices indicated for mid range hotels in guide books, then turn out to be four times as much when i ask them to email me the rates! Must be different rates depending on which part of the world you come from! Paying 150-250 dollars for 5 star is not really backpacking style, so we turned to the internet to find our first home in India.

After writing to 5 or six of our chosen places, and not getting a reply back, i found a real little gem, the Hotel Polonia, http://www.princepolonia.com/ in the central but noisy street market area of Delhi. The fact that its 25 dollars a night for a deluxe (whatever that will mean by Indian standards) means that its far more in our price range. Besides the photos look good on their web page and love the explanation behind the hotel's existance if you get to read it.

Stuck between two time zones!!

This is what Patricia has just discovered. Delhi is 5.30 hours ahead of GMT as is the rest of India. I thought all countries were either hours ahead of hours behind, well, you learn something new every day!And if i thought this was weird, Tehran (won't be going there), Yangoon (wherever that is!) and Adelaide (well being down under must have its differences) all have the half-hour sindrome. But the winner is Kathmandu... 5.45h ahead of GMT!! Now that must be confusing for arranging an international conference call, but then again i can't imagine there is too many to those!

The Indian Embassy in Madrid... Is this a taste of things to come?

Our visas at last!!

The Indian Embassy in Madrid... Is this is a taste of whats to come?One would think we were trying to get out of the country, not into it! Obtaining the necessary visa for India is a nightmare in itself, as the embassy is as chaotic as I imagine Delhi railway station to be!I had previously phoned them to find out how to get visas, only to be told that there were serious delays as they were refurbishing the embassy, funny as i cant see how that should affect things, and more so as they were supposedly doing the same thing last December when we initially thought about going!!

After two hours queuing outside to get in, with a numbered ticket in my hand, i had another hour and a half wait in a run-down waiting room with no air-con, paint peeling off the damp-ridden walls, and a crooked poster of the Indian Prime Minister on the wall, only to get a response that the visas 'should' be ready three weeks later, and to come back then. Of course, three weeks later, when it was time to go and pick them up (something i 'gentlemanly' left poor Patricia to do) they weren't of course ready.

Patricia's 4 hour wait to be attended was frustrating yet 'entertaining': people complaining because their passports were lost, others angry because their visas were’nt ready in time for their flights, etc, etc. Ours of course weren't ready, as was only could be expected, and she had to go back a couple of days later. But the important thing is that we have them and time to start packing! We're off in 7 hours!!