Mandawa - unexpected

Patricia, Agus decided to rent a car with a driver to do a 14 day trip through Rajasthan and invited me to join them. After the quite exhausting way from Rishikesh to Delhi I feared the street- and traffic conditions would continue the same way. Luckily the streets were a bit better and there was less chaos on the streets, so we reached Mandawa after a 5 hour drive. We had no information about this place, so we were positively surprised when we found a nice old palace there which had even remodelated into a great hotel. Of course we did not want to spend a lot of money to stay there, but at least we had a Chai and enjoyed exploring the palace and taking photos.
When we left, we popped into several weddings on the streets and even got invited to one. As we were falling asleep while walking we decided to leave out this opportunity and hope for an other chance somewhere else, as it is wedding season in India right now ;)

Traffic

Having received notice from my Spanish friends Patricia and Agus, Jan and I decided to hire a Indian taxi back to Delhi, as there was no train ticket available for me anymore. Who would expect to learn so much about the Indian culture in just one day!!! The trip started with a 1km walk through Laxman Jhula, crossing the pedestrians bridge packed with Indian tourists taking photos, resting cows, slightly aggressive monkeys and honking motorbikes. The taxi did not wait for us at a place near by -- which would be logical, I imagine it was because the taxi was actually a private car with an illegal driver ;) -- but we carried all out luggage up a hill and found the rather broken car with a driver who spoke 5 words of English. We where told, that the shortest road to Delhi was blocked because of a festival and thus had to pay more for the extra kilometers going on the alternative route. Anyhow the driver still toke the original track -- hoping we might not find out -- and of course we ended up in a jam of cars and frenetic hooting. The Indians are very creative when it comes to driving and of course everybody is excluded from the principal of trust as hardly no one actually seems to know the traffic rules. Our driver followed the example of some other cars and opened a second lane on our side… the third lane followed soon after, just next to the road, crossing front yards, chasing pedestrians of into the herbs ;) The whole game ended up in some kind of Ruggby constellation, 5 lanes of cars (on a 2 lane road) facing each other and no chance to move. We stopped the engine, left the car to stretch our feet and see more of this hopelessly stuck mountain of steel. The good thing is that Indians are very used to waiting and don´t get upset when someone cuts their way or plays the kamikaze game with them -- the one who moves to the side in order to avoid a frontal crash looses...

After an hour or so things started moving again under permanent hooting and cars fighting for every centimeter. When we reached traveling speed again (+/-50 km/h), our driver tried to recover the lost time by overtaking in (a not existing) third lane and hoping for the good will of the other traffic-participants. In middle of this we saw hopelessly overloaded trucks, tractors which lifted their front wheels when accelerating due to the over-weight of the hangers, motorbikes with whole families and from time to time a fruit stand in the middle of the chaos with a guy standing in front of it smiling and trusting that the drivers would see him early enough. Our driver was chewing tobacco and after spitting the red mass out of the window he needed both hands in order to lift the damaged side-window. Grabbing the steering wheel I toke care that the car stayed in track meanwhile. We actually touched the corner-stone once when the driver was looking somewhere else, but by then I already had stopped fearing for my life and started believing in my good Karma, which would keep me from having a car-accident in India.

Did anybody of you actually see a "ghost driver"? ...well, I have seen no less than 5 heading into the wrong direction on a kind of highway ;)

When we reached Delhi we had to show our driver the way to our Hotel, as he only knew the way to the airport… By asking auto-rickshah drivers and following our orientation we finally found the place after a 9 hour trip… Of course the driver tried to make us pay much more, but this could not lower our happiness to having a shower and some sleep before Jan and I would continue our ways in different directions.

Visiting the Beatles Ashram

Today we decided to to some local tourism by foot. After a porridge and Yak-cheese- sandwich for breakfast Jan and I went to hear a lecture held by a quite famous Yogi. I want to share some quotes with you I heard there ;)


"Most of the things we worry about never happen"

"Don´t be afraid of love"

"The ego does not exist, it is an illusion invented by our mind, separating us from each other. Uniqueness exists, separation does not"


Together with Alex (UK) and Maxim (Swiss) we decided to visit the ruins of the Ashram where the "Beatles" used to meditate and do Yoga. Jan turned out to be a very good guide, we found the ruins after a long walk and entered through a hole in the wall somewhere at the beginning of the jungle. I had underestimated the size of this Ashram -- it is a huge complex with several buildings, like a resort -- and got a bit sad when I saw what had become of a once very shiny and special place after it closed. Jan told us, that the Indian army actually destroyed the infrastructures in there in order to make sure nobody would occupy this place and try to live there. Anyhow, we felt like "Indiana Jones" exploring the buildings and observing monkeys in the trees surrounding.

On our way back we were followed by 2 street dogs and a horse -- once you touch / carece a street dog it becomes your pet -- and passed by several cows hungry for intellectual food like news papers and posters. I was told, that in the jungle near by actually live tigers (sometimes killing a cow or a dog which went too far form the village), of course I would love to see one, but I guess I would not like it so much if he loved to see me too ;)

Rishikesh - Laxman Jhula

My swiss travel maid and I got of the train in Haridwar, found the bus-terminal ignoring all the miss-information by business-oriented taxi- and auto-rickshah-drivers. After a safe ride -- in India the traffic works based on the right of the stronger, buses and trucks are the kings of the road, followed by big cars, small cars, auto-rickshahs and motor-bikes. Bicycles and pedestrians basically have no rights and get honked of the street by the constant hooting and very close overtaking-maneuvers.
The northern part of the town called Laxman Jhula (bridge named after the god Laxman) welcomed us with an impressive view over the Ganges and a hanging pedestrian bridge shaken by heavy wind. In India "pedestrian" includes cows, apes and motorbikes, so you have to be careful when you cross ;)
After waking up my old friend Jan (who has been staying here for some weeks already), we had breakfast and went to have a bath in the Ganges, which is still clean up hear. We did the ritual the Hindus do - putting the head under water for 7 times, making a wish - and let us being blessed by the cold river. Finally I had the chance to clam down, arrive with all my wits and relax...


PS. I have changed the settings of the blog so that everybody should be able to post comments now. If you want to be notified when ever I published a new post, please click on the "follow" button on the top right. Finally I had the chance to uploaded some photos to give you a visual impression too ;)

The concept of doing things anti-cyclicly

Some of you probably have heard about my hypothesis of anti-cyclical movement. As the name implies, the idea is to do things differently or at a different moment as the great mass in order to avoid long cues, traffic jams and frustration. Having said this I must tell you that it is a very bad idea wanting to buy a train-ticket and doing some sight seeing on a saturday in Delhi. I have never seen and sensed such a high density of people around me -- Delhi has 12,5 million inhabitants and a population-density of 11000 persons per square kilometre, that is almost 4 times more as in Vienna. The 4 km Auto-Ricksha ride (I have been told that the real Rickshas are the bicycles with 3 wheels and no engine) toke me more than an hour and I ended up walking the last 2 km between goats, cows and masses of people …of course all this with the characteristic smell I described earlier and a constant concert of cars hooting and bicycles ringing their bells. There comes the point where one has to choose between running amok or accepting the circumstances as they are and appreciating more they way things work in Europe.
After 2 hours of cue for my second train-ticket -- only 3 counters out of nine were actually open, as most of the officials were busy drinking chai and smoking peddles -- I fought my way through to the biggest mosque of India, the "Jama Masjid". Inside the huge square of this remarkable building I toke a little rest before I decided to head back to my friend´s house in order to be on time to take the night-train to the north. Generously I had calculated 5 hours for this 2 trips of less than 10 km each and I almost lost the train due to the total traffic-collapse in the city. Finally I reached the Old-Delhi train-station and sat down on the seat assigned to me to take a deep breath, relieved that I was about to leave this hopelessly overcrowded city.
Little by lithely everything calmed down while the Masuri-Express was leaving behind Delhi. Sharing the 6 bed-cabin with a young swiss guy, a tibetan philologist and 3 rather uneducated Indians I ended up in a very interesting late-night-talk with the two internationals while the 3 locals created the atmosphere with a symphony of eruptions, farts and snoring… ;)

Indian flexibility

Right after my first blog-entry I talked to the Indian friend of a friend of a friend in order to meet for a drink before I was supposed to catch a train to the north. After a few drinks at a very classy place with my friend making me the generous offer to go out to 3 different come-togethers and stay at the house of her family I decided to dump the train-ticket and stay for one more day in Delhi and get a glimpse in to the high society sub culture.
The contrast, from walking on overcrowded, muddy streets with this undefinable organic smell mixed with strong pollution, to a clean and air-conditioned private car with a personal driver could not have been bigger. I switched between those two worlds without warning and had a hard time believing that both coexisted at the same time and at such a little distance from each other.
The first event was a private party among successful business-men at a private house. I had very interesting conversations and left with the impression, that more and more people dedicate their efforts on making money for it´s own sake rather than actually creating something which would be actually of use. According to what I was told, India has a strongly growing economy thanks to a huge and very young population (demographic pyramid), cheap labor and a quite unregulated market. People who are successful in India are normally incredibly successful due to the huge market.
The driver then brought us to a recently built shopping mall containing a high class gay club. I had a great time observing the crowd posing in their fancy design looks and trying to sell themselves as a dream come true for any person who would have the chance to get near them. In this a bit relaxed atmosphere with almost all people interpreting a role I started wandering about who was supposed be the audience ;)
The third place was the poshest place I have set a foot into so far. Just in order to enter the parking lot of this hotel we had to pass a security check-point searching for bombs in the car. At the entrance of the club I was asked to pay 3000 Rupees (50 euro) for entrance, as my friend unfortunately could not reach the owner of the club. I was not willing to spend the budget for maybe a week of back-pack-traveling in India just to enter one club, so we were about to leave, when the owner got back to my friend and let us in. When we crossed the front yard of the club seeing several Ferraris, Lamborginis and Bentleys, I somehow understood, why the people at the entrance treated us as inferior… Our value as persons had been reduced to the price of our clothes. As we left, the average IQ of this place must have dropped considerably ;)

Good morning India!!!

It toke me almost 3 years, but here comes another adventure, another outbreak and my third blog... this time my intention is to write in English only so you have the chance to practice and of course me too! Feel free to comment in the language you feel most comfortable in ;)

I am writing these lines already from New Delhi in my attempt to soften the cultural shock by conquering the city little by little. After a few hours of sleep due to my late night arrival in a very foggy and smoggy atmosphere I followed my friend Jan´s advice to get up early and buy a train-ticket to the north. It needs a strong will to actually make it there as many people on the street seam to have the objective to distract you and make you walk just the opposite direction of where you actually wanted to go ;) Some were quite inventive trying to make me not find the tourist office inside the train station, but with Tyrolean stubbornness I found the place and bought the ticket for the night train to Rishikesh.

Now I will go outside and get some image material and have my first meal in this country. To be continued...