I’m sorry about the last post, was a bit more of a novel than a blog, and so will endeavour now to do a short spicey blog than the long rambling ones.
Anyway, plane was practically empty and so had a slightly more comfortable time going to the loo, which as most of you know is a regular occurrence with food poisoning, being able just to get up and out rather than clambering over the fat balding business man making both our lives unpleasant. Nice to see the recession has had its upsides! I transferred at Doha and boarded the plane. Despite this plane again being practically empty and everyone having allocated seat numbers the large Indian cohort of migrant workers seemed to not quite understand that they had allocated seats and thinking it was a free-for-all aboard, they ran to the steps to board as soon as the doors of the departure lounge opened onto the tarmac. The ground staff struggled to keep order as throngs of Indians dodged service vans and buses, completely disregarding the safe walking lines suggested. I and this German girl just kept laughing at the chaotic scenes unfolding before us. This was my first taste of Indian culture; mayhem!!
I arrived at Delhi airport at 3 in the morning to a slightly more organised scene. I waited for my hold luggage to come, and waited, and waited; before asking a member of staff if all the bags had come. “Yup” said the smarmy tit. Not the most helpful reply especially when you are still feeling like crap.
A young very helpful girl then came up and asked if I was still waiting for my bag. “Yup”.
She smiled, and looked for it in the system. “Its in...let me see here...Singapore...are you continuing onto Singapore?”
“I Don’t like noodles”
We smiled and she punched a few more keys, “It will be at your hotel by 6 tomorrow.”
“Brill news, thats not too bad eh?”
“Along with your $100 in compensation”
“Haha, really? That just cut 50% off the cost of the flight!”
Feeling a little better after this recent announcement of compensation I found a cheap hotel at a desk in the airport, went back and told the girl where I was staying then got a cheap taxi. We weaved our way in and out of deserted streets with the sun just beginning to rise but the street lights still on. There was an eerie feel to the place. I had been to India before and had seen the chaos of traffic on the streets and so to find myself in this almost idyllic silence was rather unexpected; but a pleasure nevertheless. I got to the rather run down street lined with the seedy looking and sounding places like the Princes Palace and the Luxury Plaza. Mine, the Hi-Life hotel, was no exception. It was incredibly close to Connaught place and the New Delhi train station. This was handy in my state, no long journeys! But the place had either never got going or had faded over the years. Transiting Indians sat with their doors open, TVs blaring the latest Hindi hit and dipping their Naans into Dal and other spicy curried dishes. My room was spacious, if a little grubby. The Sat TV was a welcome addition with BBC news.
The next night was the eagerly awaited cricket world cup final. I sat in lobby with the locals and staff. The match had its highs and lows; people whooped and cheered at every move India made which edged them closer. The street outside was deserted and all shops closed. The match concluded with India on top. Everyone spilled out onto the streets. Children not much older than 10 rode motorbikes precariously with at least 3 passengers and trucks with Indian drums being beat processed up and down the narrow streets with people dancing all around and on top. Fireworks, confetti explosions out of pipes, homemade grenades and firecracker bundles the size of tables blinding all in sight were set off as people either dived for cover of set off other ones! I walked around with the first backpacker I had met since arriving; a big Dutch bloke with an incredible laugh and a real passion for life. He whooped, hollered and danced in the street. We spent hours in this crazy atmosphere. We thought it would be good if we could get a bird’s eye view. We climbed up to the top of my hotel and after climbing up a ladder- half made of bamboo and the other half unfinished, we were at the top and by sheer good fortune the hotel was the tallest for miles around. The lights of Delhi shimmered in the heat and fireworks exploded all around. The city block we were in suddenly had its electricity cut out for an hour. The sky instantly darkened and the fireworks were even more impressive than before. The sound of the drums and beats seemed run in time with the hum of the generators being kick-started. We whooped as we glugged from our beers almost crying in sheer delight at the sights and sounds all around us. Nobody seemed to have a care, this was the night!! The fireworks faded, electricity came back and the sounds of the cheering from the streets subsided as people took their parties back inside. Dutchy shed a tear as “normality” resumed at 2 am. We said our goodbyes as he went back to his hotel with both of us knowing that we would probably never see each other again but what we had seen that night we would both never forget.
I woke up late the next morning, got a coffee and then rode the metro to my new hostel. I needed somewhere to meet people and this hostel looked the place. It was run by this Indian guy with the most incredible story of how he had toured Europe doing his medical degree at and operating this drug distribution company in Eastern Europe. The guy who was in charge of his company in Europe effectively stole from the company and then disappeared. He became bankrupt off the back of this as his suppliers and customers sued his ass off. He came back to India choosing to take a bit of time out from his degree (he had a weird set-up and he was only declared bankrupt in Ukraine whilst having money elsewhere, I didn’t quite understand and neither did he I think). He arrived in Delhi and looked for a hostel before he was to start travelling. Not finding one, the business man in him set one up. He knew from past experiences how to run the place and he got the beat just right and has since opened 2 more in Agra and Jaipur. The stories he told though were just brill; like running from the cops in various places with anatomy textbooks under his arms and a stethoscope flapping round his neck!
I visited various places and sights with people from the hostel and chilled at night with them and stayed there for 4 days. However I was rushing round Delhi trying to procure certain items for my travels in the maze of markets and so never spent long in anywhere however Qutab Mindar and the lotus temple were particularly impressive. The red fort looked stunning from the outside, but was closed on Mondays.
I met up with my dad’s friend in Delhi, Neraj. He and his wife took me out in Connaught place to a rather swanky joint. She was an incredibly sweet and bubbly lady and quite a character! Neraj who was as equally sweet and pleasant would often be just about to open his mouth to start a sentence when she would start and go for a good few minutes. Neraj would lose his train of thought and resume his soup. We guzzled down several bottles of Kingfisher, which was a most welcome change to the period of enforced sobriety in Syria and Turkey, and ate copious quantities of crispy wontons and noodles (I do like noodles after all!!). I boarded the metro, sat down exhausted and a little drunk and tried to make sense of the last week and abit since leaving the tranquillity and simpleness of Mar Musa. It was too hard, I gave up and read the adverts as the metro whistled by station after station. Saket arrived.
I had promised the owner we would share a beer that night after I returned from the meal, he was already drunk and so we had one each. We made our way up to the roof top. It was already 11 and I had a train at 7 in the morning. We sat up there and told stories. We both got bitten to shit by mosquitoes but we didn’t seem to mind and just kept talking. I woke up, had a coffee and got to the train in time. I had decided to buy on the day. I walked up to the desk and asked for one way to Agra.
“2nd class?”
“Yeh, that’s great thanks”
I paid the 62 rupees (£0.80). The guy had this kind of smug look about him saying, “hehe stupid white boy! Doesn’t even know what hes let himself in for”.
I got chatting to this nice girl at the platform. The train rolled up, I asked where she was sitting, “2 AC, you?” (2 AC is as close to 1st class in India and bout £8 for a journey in distance roughly equivalent to London-Manchester).
“2nd class”
She smiled smugly like the ticket guy as we ran for our respective carriages.
The train was rammed. Some guys sitting in a luggage rack helped me up there. We got chatting and they were mostly running away from something or running to something (girlfriends and families). They were a great laugh and it sure helped to laugh in the cramp sweaty conditions; I felt sorry for the poor women we were sitting above as sweat poured down from our brows. About an hour in a group of uniqs (incorrect spelling I know) came round the carriage. These are guy’s outcast from society (generally gays and those who have been forcibly castrated) who are “allowed to live” by forming a “third sex” working mainly at births of boys where they are said to bring good luck. They came round in women’s clothing doing a sort of homo-erotic touchy feely comic act with the passengers demanding money or else they would put a curse on you. It was great fun and I put in 10 rupees (£0.15). Not high enough to be groped thank you, not too low to warrant a curse. Other groups of musicians and whatnots came and went, none as fun as the Uniqs.
I arrived soaked in sweat, sore and generally quite exhausted. I saw the girl from earlier, “enjoy yourself?” she enquired sarcastically fully expecting “it was horrible, bloody peasant class!"
“Hell Yeh!” I replied.
I think with her hippo-hippie look she looked down on me as some sort of weirdo. Me and a guy in agra agreed on hippo-hippee, it means “hypocritical-hippy”, you see them everywhere. They wear these flowing 3/4 length trousers, a vest to show off their henna tattoos and flip flops to embrace the local culture. You sometimes see them in the hostels and cheap hotels (generally they tend to inhabit the more expensive places) and generally look down on those who didn’t wear “what the locals wear” and do “what the locals do”. Some are genuine pricks, excuse the French. In fact I am yet to see these distinctive “3/4 trousers” in use in the general population; most of the people wear jeans and t-shirts. I’m sure I’ll meet a real hippie at some point who doesn’t look down on us and who carries the look off and is a really nice guy/girl!
We parted ways and I bought some samosas for the cycle rickshaw ride there. They were the spiciest ones yet!I looked around and got a cycle-rickshaw to the backpackers hostel.
Im currently In Khajurho doing a job, I’ll tell you about that next time!
Admin-New pictures up on my gallery of Syria. Enjoy!
Oh and also I forgot on the last one, happy 18th birthday brother Callum. Hope you didn’t have too many nippy-sweeties!
Come on where is the next blog? Enjoyed this one. Mum
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