Dawn is breaking as we bump along the roads out of Delhi, the start of a day-long 400km drive to Bikaner. We won't have WiFi for a while so, dear Reader, cast your mind back to Monday 8th February, when our story unfolds. The day breaks in the supremely comfortable bed in our penthouse suite, the like of which I expect we shall not see again. Unfortunately, due to our jetlag-addled sleep schedule, we were up before most of Delhi, but were able to look down at a deserted city and breakfast in the open-air rooftop restaurant in relative tranquility. Eventually we had to say our fond farewells to the comfy bed and hail a tuk-tuk to shove our bags in for the 2.5km journey from Hotel Sai Miracle to the Florence Inn. Getting into the thick of the pounding traffic energised us for the day, and after checking in we finally sat down with a borrowed copy of the giant lonely planet India guide and made a plan for the day.
We clipped the zips of our bag together, put our game faces on, and headed for the New Delhi metro. Judging by the construction all over the city and the many stations missing from the 2007 lonely planet, this seems to be a relatively recent addition to the city. Though imagining the thousands of metro passengers on the roads instead shows how necessary it is. I'm a bit of a public transport connoisseur and will happily debate the merits and drawbacks of the systems in London, New York, Paris, Rome, LA, DC, Brussels, Moscow, Berlin, Miami, etc. Suffice to say, Delhi came out well. More efficient than Miami, cleaner than nearly all the rest, and about 15p per journey. Screw you, expensive Oyster card. Despite the warnings of rampant pickpocketing from tuktuk drivers trying to dissuade us from the metro, the same level of awareness and common sense necessary on the Tube seemed adequate. There were several carriages reserved for ladies only, but the women travelling co-ed didn't seem at all bothered.
We alighted at Janpath, in order to walk through the Tibetan market leading up to Connaught Place. The goods in the market were certainly colourful and shiny, but catering to the white-people-with-dreads backpacker crowd. The lingering smell of joss sticks in my hair was the only souvenir I took from the market, and I alas remain lacking in shiny pink elephant tote bags and baggy cotton harem pants. Closer to Connaught Circus, the market shifted to street sellers focussing on the locals. We braved our first street food, paying 20p each for some tasty stuffed bread items. The fabulous thing about India is that I can be far more adventurous with food- nearly everything is vegetarian unless specified otherwise. Next on our amblings, we wandered into the wonderland of Wegners, a famous old bakery- and also perfect example of Indian "efficiency." After making a circuit of the shop, we decided on a few sweets and savouries. But can one simply point at a a biscuit, pay Rs.30 and be handed the biscuit? No! One q for ordering savouries and one q for ordering sweets. Each makes a print out of your order. Then you join another queue, bills in hand, to pay. Finally, you take your receipt the sweet counter to collect your fig tart and\or savoury counter to collect your mushroom pastry. Still- worth it!! And clearly most of New Delhi's middle class agrees, the place was packed! As we were in the queue to pay, a middle aged man in a suit took it upon himself to tell us the illustrious history- apparently in 1947, the founder Mrs Wegner up and left the country. The man who took the reins was the grandfather of the current manager, who we saw dashing about in the back.
We continued our circuit around Connaught Place, trying not to stop moving, because the touts would immediately swarm. All browsing at book titles and observation of western influx (nandos, wh smith, Costa, dominoes, starbucks, etc) had to be done without stopping. But, our constant motion couldn't prevent Patrick becoming the victim of one final Delhi scam. We were walking around the Inner Circle, by Central Park, when Patrick felt the squishy impact of a big pile of steamy, slimy shit on top of his shoe. How does one get shit on top of a shoe? By having it flung there by someone looking to create a need for their work. Sure enough, like magic, in a matter of seconds a very sympathetic shoe-shiner was on hand - rag, stool, cleaner, brush in hand - to save the day. The alternative being to continue walking with faeces seeping into his shoe, there was little choice but to follow. Other touts soon followed, most memorably a man brandishing cotton buds, which he proceeded to wiggle around in Patrick's ears, which he insisted were very much in need of a clean. The ear-cleaner was told off, the shoe-shiner laughed at when he tried to insist on the equivalent of 15 quid for cleaning off his friend's poo, and we decided that it was high time for a drink. I was in peals of laughter while Patrick shook with rage, as we started on our draught Bira at Cafe Immigrant, which had lots of feminist posters on the walls. Patrick found his good humour in the bottom of the pint glass and was ready to face Connaught Place again - though only to go as far as a cool rock n roll bar called Regents Blues. As we sipped our Laphroaig 10 year, I glanced at my phone, which refuses to give up GMT (incidentally, adding 5.5 hours to a time is trickier than it sounds). I noticed it was 9.30am on a Monday and we solemnly raised our glasses in sympathy to those starting the work week back home.
Our next metro journey took us to JLN Stadium, where the 2010 Commonwealth Games were held. It was pretty dead today though but we found a solitary cycle rickshaw to take us to Humayun's Tomb. As his powerful calves pushed our milkshake and beer filled bodies to the site, all I could think was "honey badger don't give a shit." Perhaps I'm being unkind and he suffered a sort of colour blindness that didn't allow him to see red because there was not so much as a pause as we approached huge intersections with red lights. This wasn't going to get in the way of him crossing or making a right turn! We miraculously arrived and were left to marvel at yet another 16th century Mughal tomb. Two British women behind us in the queue behind us were complaining at having to pay the "foreigner's ticket" for Rs250, instead of the Indian price of Rs20, because they'd been forced to give up their Indian passports decades ago.
The tomb was no Taj, but it was magnificent and held 100 coffins! Despite being quite central to the city, the grounds were very peaceful, with acres of parkland and greenery surrounding the dome and red sandstone gates. (Patrick's interlude: We walked around the grounds, seeing an old tomb from the Lodhi era, climbing up to the tomb proper, and drinking in the fact that dead Mughal emperors knew how to repose better than just about anyone. There was also a cool, if tiny, exhibit on the site, complete with an oddly affecting quote about Humayun from his sister, to the effect that he was a nice guy, maybe not realist enough for an emperor. 'Even a child learns to distrust fire after being burnt,' but not Humayun, apparently.
Not long after, we had to head back, making it just in time for the Dragoman group meeting. Names were stated, interesting personal facts related, and past Dragoman trips expertly referenced and surreptitiously bragged about. That's how status works in the group - who's an old hand, and who's a noob. At least, I hope that's how it works, since we've got one previous trip under our belts. Then we headed off en masse for a group dinner, where we actually started to get to know each other.
We sat near two lovely Danish kids, Annette and Patrick, who were clear that they were not a couple, going along to Mumbai, Dominic and Sarah, two unconnected but instantly inseparable Schweitzers, and another Dane named Ida).
TBC!!
Update: Fingers crossed the WiFi in our beautiful hotel in Bikaner is up to the job of uploading. We've just dressed and packed whilst listening to the call to prayer and we're about to get on the road to Jaisalmer- stopping at a rat temple end route!
We clipped the zips of our bag together, put our game faces on, and headed for the New Delhi metro. Judging by the construction all over the city and the many stations missing from the 2007 lonely planet, this seems to be a relatively recent addition to the city. Though imagining the thousands of metro passengers on the roads instead shows how necessary it is. I'm a bit of a public transport connoisseur and will happily debate the merits and drawbacks of the systems in London, New York, Paris, Rome, LA, DC, Brussels, Moscow, Berlin, Miami, etc. Suffice to say, Delhi came out well. More efficient than Miami, cleaner than nearly all the rest, and about 15p per journey. Screw you, expensive Oyster card. Despite the warnings of rampant pickpocketing from tuktuk drivers trying to dissuade us from the metro, the same level of awareness and common sense necessary on the Tube seemed adequate. There were several carriages reserved for ladies only, but the women travelling co-ed didn't seem at all bothered.
We alighted at Janpath, in order to walk through the Tibetan market leading up to Connaught Place. The goods in the market were certainly colourful and shiny, but catering to the white-people-with-dreads backpacker crowd. The lingering smell of joss sticks in my hair was the only souvenir I took from the market, and I alas remain lacking in shiny pink elephant tote bags and baggy cotton harem pants. Closer to Connaught Circus, the market shifted to street sellers focussing on the locals. We braved our first street food, paying 20p each for some tasty stuffed bread items. The fabulous thing about India is that I can be far more adventurous with food- nearly everything is vegetarian unless specified otherwise. Next on our amblings, we wandered into the wonderland of Wegners, a famous old bakery- and also perfect example of Indian "efficiency." After making a circuit of the shop, we decided on a few sweets and savouries. But can one simply point at a a biscuit, pay Rs.30 and be handed the biscuit? No! One q for ordering savouries and one q for ordering sweets. Each makes a print out of your order. Then you join another queue, bills in hand, to pay. Finally, you take your receipt the sweet counter to collect your fig tart and\or savoury counter to collect your mushroom pastry. Still- worth it!! And clearly most of New Delhi's middle class agrees, the place was packed! As we were in the queue to pay, a middle aged man in a suit took it upon himself to tell us the illustrious history- apparently in 1947, the founder Mrs Wegner up and left the country. The man who took the reins was the grandfather of the current manager, who we saw dashing about in the back.
We continued our circuit around Connaught Place, trying not to stop moving, because the touts would immediately swarm. All browsing at book titles and observation of western influx (nandos, wh smith, Costa, dominoes, starbucks, etc) had to be done without stopping. But, our constant motion couldn't prevent Patrick becoming the victim of one final Delhi scam. We were walking around the Inner Circle, by Central Park, when Patrick felt the squishy impact of a big pile of steamy, slimy shit on top of his shoe. How does one get shit on top of a shoe? By having it flung there by someone looking to create a need for their work. Sure enough, like magic, in a matter of seconds a very sympathetic shoe-shiner was on hand - rag, stool, cleaner, brush in hand - to save the day. The alternative being to continue walking with faeces seeping into his shoe, there was little choice but to follow. Other touts soon followed, most memorably a man brandishing cotton buds, which he proceeded to wiggle around in Patrick's ears, which he insisted were very much in need of a clean. The ear-cleaner was told off, the shoe-shiner laughed at when he tried to insist on the equivalent of 15 quid for cleaning off his friend's poo, and we decided that it was high time for a drink. I was in peals of laughter while Patrick shook with rage, as we started on our draught Bira at Cafe Immigrant, which had lots of feminist posters on the walls. Patrick found his good humour in the bottom of the pint glass and was ready to face Connaught Place again - though only to go as far as a cool rock n roll bar called Regents Blues. As we sipped our Laphroaig 10 year, I glanced at my phone, which refuses to give up GMT (incidentally, adding 5.5 hours to a time is trickier than it sounds). I noticed it was 9.30am on a Monday and we solemnly raised our glasses in sympathy to those starting the work week back home.
Our next metro journey took us to JLN Stadium, where the 2010 Commonwealth Games were held. It was pretty dead today though but we found a solitary cycle rickshaw to take us to Humayun's Tomb. As his powerful calves pushed our milkshake and beer filled bodies to the site, all I could think was "honey badger don't give a shit." Perhaps I'm being unkind and he suffered a sort of colour blindness that didn't allow him to see red because there was not so much as a pause as we approached huge intersections with red lights. This wasn't going to get in the way of him crossing or making a right turn! We miraculously arrived and were left to marvel at yet another 16th century Mughal tomb. Two British women behind us in the queue behind us were complaining at having to pay the "foreigner's ticket" for Rs250, instead of the Indian price of Rs20, because they'd been forced to give up their Indian passports decades ago.
The tomb was no Taj, but it was magnificent and held 100 coffins! Despite being quite central to the city, the grounds were very peaceful, with acres of parkland and greenery surrounding the dome and red sandstone gates. (Patrick's interlude: We walked around the grounds, seeing an old tomb from the Lodhi era, climbing up to the tomb proper, and drinking in the fact that dead Mughal emperors knew how to repose better than just about anyone. There was also a cool, if tiny, exhibit on the site, complete with an oddly affecting quote about Humayun from his sister, to the effect that he was a nice guy, maybe not realist enough for an emperor. 'Even a child learns to distrust fire after being burnt,' but not Humayun, apparently.
Not long after, we had to head back, making it just in time for the Dragoman group meeting. Names were stated, interesting personal facts related, and past Dragoman trips expertly referenced and surreptitiously bragged about. That's how status works in the group - who's an old hand, and who's a noob. At least, I hope that's how it works, since we've got one previous trip under our belts. Then we headed off en masse for a group dinner, where we actually started to get to know each other.
We sat near two lovely Danish kids, Annette and Patrick, who were clear that they were not a couple, going along to Mumbai, Dominic and Sarah, two unconnected but instantly inseparable Schweitzers, and another Dane named Ida).
TBC!!
Update: Fingers crossed the WiFi in our beautiful hotel in Bikaner is up to the job of uploading. We've just dressed and packed whilst listening to the call to prayer and we're about to get on the road to Jaisalmer- stopping at a rat temple end route!
Wow, It all sounds so amazing. Patrick's feces-flinging adventure would make me shake with rage, too. What a scam. The most disgusting I've ever heard of. But I am so proud of you, my son, for being able to shake it off and still enjoy the rest of the day. I dread the moment you lose WiFi. You can't imagine how much i am enjoying your photos and blog. Thank you, thank you!!!
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