Massive India update

This, my first post from India, has been a long time coming.  I started it the day after I arrived, but a combination of being too busy to find time to write, to lazy or sick to write when I did find time, and difficulty obtaining reliable internet access all prevented me from getting an update out until now.  Since I've been in India for 3 weeks already and a lot has happened in that time, I'm going to take the bits that I've written and salvage what I can by putting them under headings for each city I've visited so far.  I'm not going to give you a full rundown of the sites and activities from each stop (if you're interested, you can check out my photos on Flickr), but instead try to give you a general overview of my impressions of each area and one or two memorable aspects.  That said, this is going to be a massive post, so make yourself comfy or go use the bathroom before you dive in.

Mumbai (Bombay) - Dec 5-13

It didn't take long for it to become clear to me how different India was going to be from Southeast Asia.

SE Asia vs. India, Difference #1: On my flight into Bangkok, I devoured the in-flight meal of roast pork slices over rice.  On my flight into Bombay, I could only eat half the butter chicken before it became too spicy for my taste buds to handle.  If I can't even handle the airline food, eating authentic local Indian food is going to be a bit more of a challenge than I had anticipated.  (Update after one week: I've been handling the spice a lot better than I expected and have been able to eat pretty much everything, as long as I haven't been explicitly warned about its spiciness.  Phew.)

For some reason, all the international flights into Bombay seem to arrive after midnight, making it necessary for me to book accommodations in advance for the first time on this trip.  Since I arrived a day before Erica and the rest of my time in Bombay I planned to stay with her in a very nice hotel at the Cricket Club of India (courtesy of Anisha's family), I booked a cheap room through hostelworld.com at a place that offered complementary airport shuttle service.  It turned out that despite receiving an email correspondence from the hotel confirming that I would technically be arriving on the 5th but wanted the room for the night of the 4th, the person sending the email must not have cleared it through the appropriate channels, because after navigating my own way to the hotel, I was informed that they were not expecting me until the following night.

Now, at 2am in a decidedly not-tourist-friendly neighborhood, this could have easily turned into a bad situation.  Fortunately, the owner apologized for the miscommunication, called another nearby hotel, drove me there himself, made sure I would pay the same price as my original booking, and gave me his card to call him if I had any problems.  Besides not having the in-room internet access my original hotel had promised, my new accommodations were fine and I was grateful that my arrival in India hadn't turned into more of an ordeal.

When I checked out of the hotel the next morning, I decided that since I was not in any particular rush, I would try to save a few dollars and have an adventure by taking a tuk-tuk to the commuter train rather than taking a taxi all the way to the Cricket Club.

SE Asia vs. India, Difference #2: In SE Asia, tuk-tuk drivers always quote you a price at least double what you should actually pay.  In India, tuk-tuks have a built-in meter.  Also, Indian tuk-tuks feel much safer, more like small cars with open sides, rather than motor bikes with shaky frames for seating seemingly thrown around them as an afterthought.  (Update after one week: it turns out meters are frequently "broken", so you still have to play the same old bargaining game.)

Upon arriving at the train station, where I was clearly the only tourist, I was immediately approached by a young girl of about 7 or 8 years old begging for change.  She not only followed me for a few minutes, but pulled at my shirt and began pinching the skin on my forearms quite hard, before eventually leaving when she realized she wasn't going to get through to me.

SE Asia vs. India, Difference #3: Beggars in India appear to be much more persistent, and more frequently either children or possessing a major physical disability.  I don't know whether it's because I haven't yet spent much time in major tourist areas in India, but it also seems like they are much less likely to be trying to support themselves by selling some little knick-knack.  (Update after two weeks: I take that back.  I have never had so many people of all ages try to sell me as much crap as at tourist sights and neighborhoods in India.  The lie "I not trying to sell you anything!  I don't want money!" has become the most commonly heard phrase of the day.)

The half dozen ticketing windows at the train station each had between 20-30 people standing in slow-moving, single-file lines.  To one side was what looked like two electronic ticketing terminals, around which was a disorganized but much smaller and faster-moving group of people. I approached one man who looked to be around my age and asked him how to get a ticket to Churchgate.

SE Asia vs. India, Difference #4: Unsurprisingly, it is MUCH easier to find people who speak functional or fluent English in India than SE Asia, at least in major cities.  (Update after two weeks: Unfortunately, speaking near-fluent English makes it easier for touts and scammers to lie.  It's shocking how many "students who just want to practice English" happen to hang out at tourist sites...)

It turned out the terminals were for people with smart cards, but everybody else stands in the line to pay 9 Rupees ($0.20) or less for their paper tickets--not a very efficient system, to say the least.

Boarding the train, I thought "now THIS is India!"  Advertisements, both official and random spam pasted by enterprising individuals, covered nearly every surface in the dark, musty car.  Fortunately, it was midday, so the train wasn't nearly as crowded as it would have been a few hours earlier and I didn't feel awkward using the seat next to me to rest my large pack, given that there wasn't enough floor space at my feet to put it there.  Although I was clearly the only foreigner on the train, I didn't feel as though I attracted a lot of attention, other than a couple men seated across from me who made a few attempts at conversation before realizing either their English was not as good as they thought or my ability to decipher their accents was even worse than I thought.

As we rode down the tracks, other trains passed us by, some of which had cars reserved exclusively for women, a recent development I remember reading about in a New York Times article (yeah, mkappus, that one was for you).  The women-only cars seem like a great policy in my opinion, as 80-90% of the people I've encountered in most public places are men, and I've seen multiple articles in the paper covering incidents involving fallout from extreme incidents of "Eve-teasing" (sexual harassment).

When the train pulled into the final stop, I figured it would be pretty easy to find the Cricket Club of India (CCI) since I had looked at the map and it seemed to be a very large structure only a couple blocks from the station.  What I hadn't counted on was the CCI was not only the lodgings and restaurants I had expected, but also a cricket stadium currently hosting a match/test/whatever between the India and Sri Lanka national clubs.  Amidst the madness, I eventually figured out where I needed to go, and thus began a week in Bombay that was wonderful but decidedly not what I had been expecting from my India experience.

You see, when I heard that Anisha and her family would be putting up her friends from overseas in a hotel, I figured it would be nicer than the guest houses where I had been staying.  What I did not count on was a luxury room with air conditioning, daily housekeeping, room service, mini-fridge, etc.  On top of that, we each received a gigantic gift basket full of snacks, saris for the girls, and a car and driver to take us sightseeing and shuttle us to and from the wedding events.  Let's just say Bombay turned out to be a nice break after two months of backpacking.

It was fantastic to reunite with Erica, one of my closest friends from college, and getting to spend some quality time with her for the first time in years was something I was really looking forward to.  During our time in Bombay, we were also joined by a couple of Anisha's other friends who had flown in for the wedding: Nancy (who would be joining us for the rest of the trip), Tiffany, and Tiffany's friend, Diana (who, like me, already planning to be in India and was invited along by a close friend of Anisha).  We were also expecting to be joined for much of our trip by Carolina, another friend of Anisha, and her husband, but they got stuck in Dubai for a few days because it hadn't occurred to them that they might need visas to enter India (huh?) and then suddenly decided to return home early without telling us immediately after the wedding, which frankly was quite fine with us given the inconsiderate attitudes they had shown in virtually all of our interactions.  The rest of us got along tremendously, especially Erica and Diana, who seemed to discover an endless stream of shared interests and habits.

SE Asia vs. India, Difference #5: As the more astute among you may have noticed, in the span of a couple days, the make up of my travel companions went from four guys and no girls to four girls and no guys.  Ahhh, back in my element!  Not really a difference between the regions/countries themselves, but I'm sure it had a significant impact on my experience of them, especially considering the wide gap in respect accorded to men and women throughout much of Indian culture.

Although the groom's family is very traditional, Anisha's family is decidedly not, so the compromise between a full-on traditional Indian wedding with days and days of events and a simple western-style wedding plus reception turned out to be spreading many of the events out over the month leading up to the wedding itself.  I was a bit disappointed to miss out on the prepared dances and some of the other traditions I had heard about (and seen in a last-minute viewing of Monsoon Wedding), but still enjoyed a luncheon at the groom's house where most of the guests wore traditional Indian garb and the mendi at Anisha's family's house where the girls covered their hands in intricate henna designs and we all stuffed ourselves on the plates and plates of delicious but indescribable Indian snacks (seriously, even the Indians who had lived in the US had no idea how to explain in English what we were eating most of the time) which were constantly placed in front of us.

On the non-event days, we visited the surprisingly limited sights around Bombay.  The highlight was certainly the cave temples on Elephata Island, filled with fantastic scenes of Shiva in his various forms carved into the stone walls.  Unfortunately, all but one of the scenes had been badly damaged by Portuguese conquerers, who thought the images sacrilegious and used them for target practice.  The one intact scene features a three-faced image representing three Hindu gods: Brahman the Creator, Vishnu the Sustainer, and Shiva the Destroyer.  The Portuguese interpreted the scene as paying homage to the Holy Trinity, and thus spared it.

The wedding itself was held on the waterfront in the majestic Taj Hotel, now infamous as the site of the 26/11 terrorist attack.  Streams of marigolds hung everywhere and the girls could not stop talking about all the beautiful saris and jewelry on display on the guests.  The ceremony was not the somber affair you find at most Western weddings.  The bride and groom sat on a brightly lit and decorated stage, going through a variety of rituals and posing for pictures with family and close friends as everybody else sat/stood around and talked.  The highlights of the wedding for me were certainly the two rounds of massive savory and sweet buffets and the open bar featuring what was certainly the nicest selection selection of liquors I've ever seen available in such a setting, including an 18-year aged Johnny Walk Gold Label... heaven!

Delhi - Dec 13-18

Delhi was, to put it bluntly, disgusting.  Our first two nights in town, we stayed at a guest house in Majnu-ka-Tilla, a small Tibetan enclave a few km north of Old Delhi.  Although pleasantly quiet, the smells wafting into the room at night were so awful that we had difficulty sleeping.  Moving into the center of the city the next day brought slightly improved smells, but much more noise.  From that point on, it became much more difficult to judge the air quality, as Nancy and I both developed hacking coughs and a head/chest cold that have yet to fully disappear.  According to Delhi residents, all the auto-rickshaws and buses were converted to clean natural gas a few years ago and the air quality has dramatically improved as a result, but it was still hands down the most polluted city I've ever seen.

Sickness and air quality aside, I did have a wonderful time in Delhi.  Besides having many more interesting historical sites to visit than Mumbai (see my photos of the Red Fort, India Gate, Hamayun's Tomb, and Lotus Temple, among others), Delhi also gave me the opportunity to reconnect with some friends.  The first, Daniel Tomlinson, has been living in Delhi for about a year, doing rural market assessment for a number of socially-minded businesses.  We had been introduced by a mutual friend as a result of our similar interests in social enterprise and had spoken on the phone a couple times, but it was great to finally meet face to face.  Daniel gave Erica, Nancy and me some great suggestions for sights, restaurants and shops to visit, all of which turned out to be fantastic.  He also mentioned that there was a going to be a meeting of young professionals working in development the next evening, and being that I hadn't been to a DC-style networking happy hour in over two months, there was no way I was going to miss it.  I was a little concerned that Erica and Nancy wouldn't enjoy themselves there and repeatedly assured them that I would not be offended if they decided to go off and do their own thing, but they ended up enjoying themselves and getting lots of good recommendations for our upcoming destinations.  It turned out that the happy hour was organized by Anay Shah, who I had met in DC about 8 months ago at a joint StartingBloc/Net Impact happy hour and been in contact with a couple times after.  When we first met, Anay had been working for USAID in DC for 3-4 years and was looking for an opportunity in the social enterprise space in India, so it was wonderful to reconnect with him in Delhi and get an update 6 months into his prestigious (and highly competitive) fellowship with D.light, an Indian solar lighting company focused on the rural market that seems to be on the verge of really taking off.

The next night, Erica, Nancy and I met up with Gitsy, a friend I knew from DC who had moved back to her native city (Delhi) over the summer.  Despite just getting over a nasty cold, Gitsy was just as warm and energetic as ever and took us to a cute little creperie for dinner, then a stylish bookstore to see a series of Pecha Kucha presentations (20 slides, 20 seconds each) relating to various aspects of books, reading and publishing, and finally a chain coffee shop for a slice of chocolate cake and a sundae to cap the night.  It was a delightful evening, one that felt like it could have taken place in any city in the world.

One final thing I'd like to mention about Delhi is how much easier meeting up with all these people was made by the prepaid SIM card I was able to purchase and use with my iPhone (which I had unlocked in Bangkok).  Although you have to jump through some hoops and provide quite a bit of initial documentation to get a SIM card or phone in India, once you have them, I've found mobile phone service to be incredibly reliable and inexpensive.  Local calls are $0.02/min or less, national calls are $0.03/min or less, calls to the US are under $0.15/min, and texts are $0.02 to send.  Oh, and all incoming calls and texts are free.  Kinda sheds some light on just how badly we get ripped off by Verizon, AT&T, etc. in the US, huh?

Agra - Dec 18-19

By the time we boarded the train for Agra, we were all very much ready to put Delhi behind us and get to a place where the air would be a little more breathable.  Our $8 first-class tickets for the three-hour ride apparently entitled us to a newspaper, bottle of mineral water, tea and biscuits, and a full breakfast--not bad!  On the platform before we boarded, we met Sharon, a friendly girl of Indian descent who had grown up in Tanzania, studied in Goa for four years, and currently lives in the Democratic Republic of Congo coordinating logistics for the UN peace-keeping mission.  When we arrived in Agra, we ran into Sharon again at the prepaid auto-rickshaw booth and invited her to tag along with us to the Lonely Planet-recommended hotel where we had made reservations.  Both the hotel (Hotel Sakura) and Sharon turned out to be great finds, the latter making a pleasant and interesting travel companion for our time in Agra, and the former being not only a good place to stay, but also the source of top-notch recommendations for accommodations in Jaipur and Bundi.  The hotel's proprietor, Ramu, was exceedingly friendly and helpful source of information, providing suggestions for activities, transport and hotels in other cities without ever making us feel pressured to take his recommendations if we expressed preference for an alternative.  Also, after I told him that Erica was the person to talk to about our plans, he proceeded to address her as "Erica-boss" for the remainder of our stay, much to her amusement.

Being that we arrived in Agra in the morning of the one day per week that the Taj Mahal is closed (Friday), we decided to hire a driver through Ramu to take us out to Fatehpur Sikri, a fortified ancient city with a magnificent palace and mosque about an hour's drive from Agra.  The next morning, we left the hotel at 6:30 to go see the most highly anticipated sight of our trip, only for me to discover upon entering the gates that both the batteries and backup batteries I had bought that morning for my camera were defective.  While initially very disappointed not to be able to take pictures of the Taj in the beautiful morning mists, I soon relaxed, consoling myself with the knowledge that my three companions were taking more than enough photos for us all and trying to enjoy the freedom from feeling like I had to be constantly searching for the perfect shot.  I eventually remembered that my iPhone has a built in camera, so I was able to snap a few quick photos of my own before we left.

When we returned from dinner that night, I sat around swapping travel stories and advice with a couple friendly American guys and British girls who were staying at our hotel.  The Americans had just come from the hotel Ramu recommended for us in Jaipur (the owner there had also recommended Hotel Sakura in Agra to them) and got us excited with reports of free wifi in the rooms so we could Skype home without running up the bill at an internet cafe.  When talk eventually turned to our professional vocations and I learned that one of the American guys was a political consultant/strategist from New York, I figured we might know someone in common through the DC scene.  We were both pleasantly surprised when we discovered one acquaintance in common, though it was not at all who I would have initially expected: when he mentioned that he had been working on a congressional campaign in Ohio in 2006, I remembered that one of my friends from summer camp, Rick Barry, had also been working a campaign in Ohio around that time.  Rick and I haven't seen each other since we were about 15, but we kept in touch and he had just emailed me about 2 weeks ago to inquire on my whereabouts and see whether we might be able to get together sometime.  It turned out that not only did this guy know Rick, he had worked with him on an earlier campaign and was the person who had recruited him to come to Ohio in the first place.  I love this small world stuff!

Jaipur - Dec 20-22

We were picked at the train station in Jaipur by Ramu's friend, the proprietor of the 6-months-new Hotel Moon Light Palace.  The hotel turned out to be everything we had hoped (clean, hot water, friendly staff, free wifi) with the exception of the slow and disappointing food at the serene rooftop restaurant.  By the time we finished our lunch it was already after 3pm, and since most of the sights in the town closed at 4:30, we decided to just walk a couple kilometers to the center of town and explore on foot.

After about 5 minutes of walking, we realized it really wasn't a very nice road to walk along, so we agreed to accept a ride from Jhitu, the auto-rickshaw driver who had followed us from the hotel clearly anticipating our change of heart.  Although we initially resisted his attempts to impress himself on us as our guide, the price he offered was barely $1 more than it would have cost us to ride into town and back anyway, so after getting him to promise he wouldn't try to make us stop and look at any shops where he would get a commission, we decided to hire him on to show us the Old Town and Monkey Palace.

When Jhitu dropped us in front of a restaurant we'd chosen as a central point in town based on a map in Nancy's Lonely Planet, it finally clicked for Erica and me that the approach we'd both favored to getting to know new towns on our trips to Southeast Asia--known as the "get dropped in the area with the most Lonely Planet-recommended businesses and walk around" strategy--just isn't well-suited to most of the places we've visited in India.  To start with, sidewalks are frequently obstructed, in disrepair, or non-existent.  Next, trash, animal feces, and open sewers frequently dot the road, and even if you do manage to avoid those, there's still the dust and vehicle fumes for your lungs to contend with.  And even if you do brave all those hazards, the shops and restaurants just aren't very nice.

Anyway, there were a couple nice buildings in Old Town, but being a Sunday afternoon, fewer than half the vendors had their shops open.  We did take a few nice photos of the city at sunset from Monkey Temple (a temple overlooking the city, around which there are many, many monkeys and quite a few pigs).  The highlight of the day (besides the lovely hotel) was dinner at  the original Moti Mahal Deluxe, the restaurant opened by the chef who invented butter chicken.  The butter chicken was indeed the best I have ever tasted and the other dishes were similarly excellent, though the item that generated the most excitement was Nancy's delicious coffee ice cream float, topped with whipped cream and chocolate chips.

The next day, we decided to sleep in and try to catch up on some the sleep we lost by having woken up before 6am each of the last three days (two early trains, plus the Taj Mahal at dawn).   By noon, we were finally ready to go out and do some sightseeing, so we called Jhitu and had him pick us up and drive us 15km to see the Amber Fort, the most impressive of three forts overlooking Jaipur.  On the way back, we stopped for quick photos at a handful of palaces, including one on an island in the middle of a lake, known commonly as the Water Palace.  We also agreed to let Jhitu take us to a few shops, where I got a few tailor shirts and handkerchiefs, Erica some pillowcases, and Nancy some jewelery.

While we were in the jewelery store, we received a text from Rama, the former host-mother of one of Erica's friends, inviting us to dinner at her home.  We eagerly accepted, and a couple hours later found ourselves sharing a simple but tasty meal with Rama, who it was clear was perfectly suited to her role as coordinator of the university home-stay program, and her friend Mary, a visiting dance professor from Southern California who has been studying Bollywood dance and will hopefully soon have an interview Helen Richardson, a famous English-Burmese cabaret dancer who has appeared in over 1,000 Bollywood films.  It was a wonderful cap to our time in Jaipur, providing us with a welcome dose of the warmth and hospitality that we hadn't really felt since the pampering from Anisha's family in Bombay.

Bundi - Dec 22-23

If peace, quiet, and gracious hospitality were what we were hoping for (hint: they were), Bundi more than surpassed any expectations we could have had for it.  There were few vehicles in the streets, and the few verbal enticements to check out their wares from the shopkeepers in the market were far less frequent and insistent than we had become accustomed to at our prior destinations.  The 5-room, family-run guest house where we stayed was another stellar recommendation from Ramu in Agra.  Our primary host, Chintu, bent over backwards to make sure we were happy and comfortable, always showing up whenever we needed anything, sitting and chatting with us when he wasn't otherwise occupied, but never imposing himself when we wanted to be left alone or making us feel pressured to take advice for activities or onward travel plans.  We watched the sun set and enjoyed an excellent and peaceful home-cooked meal from a rooftop table that afforded us a view of local children flying kites from their own roofs, and, in the distance, an ancient palace and fortified wall illuminated by gentle electric lighting and extending along the hillside.  Our food was energetically served to us by Ajay, a thin and friendly boy of about 10, who responded to our thanks for each new plate or glass with an enthusiastic "Welll-come!"

In the morning, we enjoyed a meal of porridge with bananas and honey (quickly becoming our go-to breakfast selection), and walked over to the palace to explore what was essentially the only sight to see within the city itself.  Our extremely thorough tour guide made sure that what was originally pitched as a one-hour tour for 100 Rs stretched to a full two hours so that he could request an additional hour's payment, which we wryly smiled at but did not begrudge given his extensive knowledge of the palace's history and the multitude of murals decorating the walls and ceilings throughout.  After the palace tour, Erica and Nancy went on a short hike along the edge of the fort to see the view from the peak, while I decided to avoid the allergens from the surrounding brush and returned early to our guest house.  The hikers returned to report the view wasn't much improved from what we had seen from the palace, and we spent the remainder of the afternoon and evening relaxing and snacking until we departed to catch our train on the later side of midnight.

Udaipur - Dec 24-25

We knew we would be in good hands in Udaipur ("the most romantic city in the world") when we were greeted at the train station by a barefoot gentle giant of an auto-rickshaw driver.  Okay, we were actually a little intimidated at first, but after he got us to our hotel and gave Erica some pleasant and non-pushy information about cooking classes and the local handicrafts festival, we were glad he'd been the one to push his way up to us when we disembarked.

Our room at the gorgeous-but-reasonably-priced Ganguar Palace Hotel was massive, and enticing scents from the French bakery below encouraged us drop our bags and rush down for some breakfast before retiring for some much needed pre-sightseeing napping/blogging.  The City Place, supposedly the second largest palace in India, was for the most part surprisingly forgettable, apart from some magical views overlooking the city and other nearby palaces.

The next day, we slept in and then went to a private Indian cooking lesson in the home of former champion swimmer who had been recommended by our auto-rickshaw driver and Lonely Planet.  The lesson was observational rather than hands-on, but we still felt like we learned a lot about Indian cooking, including the box of seven spices that can be found in every Indian kitchen: red chili powder, coriander powder, anise seeds, cumin seeds, turmeric, salt, and garam masala (which is usually made up of 17 different spices, but in this case was a home blend of 60 spices from our instructor's organic family farm).  Three hours of sitting, eating and learning?  Sounds like a good afternoon to me!  After the cooking lesson, we spent an hour walking around the handicrafts festival, then picked up our bags from the hotel and rode over to the train station to head back to Delhi and catch a flight to Varanasi.

What's Next

Ok, that gets us up to the present!  I'll be in Varanasi from Dec 26-28, then fly back to Delhi and take a bus to Goa on Dec 29 (waaaay cheaper than a flight by the time I got around to booking it) where we'll meet up with some of Nancy's friends and celebrate New Years at a posh beach resort.  On Jan 1, Erica and Nancy will head back to the US, and I've decided that rather than hang out by myself on the beach in Goa for another week, I've booked some buses and trains to spend a day or two each in Mangalore, Mysore and Bangalore before heading back to Mumbai to catch my flight to Tanzania on the 7th.

I feel like I'm in a good rhythm for traveling right now (and finally feeling mostly healthy again), but I'm very much looking forward to getting to Tanzania and staying in one place for more than a week.  I got an email a few days ago from Alfred, my host in Tanzania, listing some of the projects he has in mind for me at KickStart, including a supply chain assessment and selection and training for a CRM platform for the sales team.  Both are right up my alley and I feel very fortunate to be heading into a work/volunteer situation where I will be able to both contribute existing knowledge and have the opportunity to develop new skills and expertise, all while being exposed to a wildly different life experience.

To those of you who actually read this far: congratulations, I'm surprised and impressed! (Doubly so if you're not a blood relative.)  To everybody: I hope you are having a warm and happy holiday season, surrounded by friends and family every bit as wonderful as mine!