Hi everyone, Where are we? Have we fallen into the black hole of Calcutta? Well almost - but we'll get back to that. We'll do this chronologically for now.
Well we left Brisvegus on Monday, with a scheduled 3 3/4 hour stopover in Singapore.
Sash was keen to have a look outside the airport so we jumped in a cab that took us on a two hour tour. Went on the Singapore flyer (their massive sky wheel) which gave us a great look over the city, port and the Marina Bay Sands Hotel (Sasha says "building disguised as a boat"). It's incredible! We had a very quick stop in China town and arrived back in good time for our flight.
Our final leg to India seemed to take forever after our plane had a fault before takeoff and we needed a new plane! So 3 hours later we were on our way and arrived in Delhi after midnight (5 am Bris time). I asked Sasha what she thought of Singapore and she said it wasn't as different as she thought it was going to be. I thought to myself, " hang onto your seat baby - India is like another planet!" So after we passed throuh Indian immigration & customs, changed some money in the airport and got a pre-paid taxi voucher - I hesitated. "C'mon mum" - Sasha pulled me "let's go!". "But I'm not sure I'm ready!", I said. I had to collect myself to face the chaos outside the westernised confines of the airport. And then we stepped out & passed the masses of hussling taxi drivers and low fog of night to our ancient black and yellow ambassador taxi.
The driver was nice, did the compulsory suggestion of taking us to another hotel other than the one we'd booked but didn't push the issue, and we had a nice conversation in broken Hindi. A few people had said, "oh India would have changed a lot since you we're there in the 1990's". But on that half hour taxi ride I saw a scene that was just like India I found 20 years ago. Very different to Australia, lots of people living and working on the edge. Buildings being built a little bit lop sided, lots of mangy stray dogs etc etc. I felt gripped by sadness. Just that realisation that many people's lives in the world really are difficult. We are so very fortunate to have been born and live in Australia at this time.
So, we got to our hotel - a very basic room with bathroom near New Delhi railway station ($10 per night for the 2 of us). This is the hotel I stayed in 20 years ago so came back here for old time sake. We had a few hours sleep and headed out for breakfast across the little lane way. Again I wanted to go to the same cafe I had my first meal in India 20 years ago (note for later - terrible mistake). It looked the same but this time only sold South Indian food - lovely yummy uttapam with cold chutney & hot chai.
We had a day of doing practical things like using the Indan metro & heading back to the airport to get a SIM card for our phone. Had a fantastic meal of curry in the rooftop restaurant of our hotel that night. It looks down to the hustling hussling beeping crazy street.
Next morning, disaster struck (well it felt like disaster that in the way things do when you are sick) DELHI BELLY! First Sash, then me and both of us vomited for 24 hours. We think it might have been the cold chutney on our fist day that may well have had local water in it. So we've now recovered but are still a bit weak and haven't been able to venture from our room for the past two days. We felt a bit sad, homesick and had a fair dose of culture shock which I now remember does happen when so out of our comfort zone. Luckily there is now technology and can email & Skype home for some contact and support).
We missed our train trip to Varanasi. So will see if we can head down to the Taj Mahal for a day trip tomorrow instead as the trains are pretty booked up for a few weeks in advance to most places.
Now, I'm new to this blogging so I'll try & post some photos and video. Sorry, I'm a bit of a rambler, (as many people know) so I apologise for the boring detail in my blog. I hope Sash will write some entries also as she has some pretty good insights with her fresh eyes.
