My friend Am had previously warned I could not adequately prepare for India. He was right and I’ll explain in a moment. To keep me grounded, my good friend and previous neighbour, Selma, joined me for two weeks. The plan was to spend a week travelling 4 major cities, and then a week at a yoga and mediation ashram in Rishikesh.
I landed in Delhi and was immediately plunged into streets of chaos. Here’s my best to explain the roads here, as it was a unique experience. Visualize the following:
- Roads have painted lanes, so you’d expect there to be two lanes. Of course, you’d be wrong; there are actually as many lanes as needed, depending on the traffic. That means anywhere between 1 and 8 lanes, with cars, buses, scooters (with up to 4 people), motorcycles, tuk-tuks and rickshaws grinding along down the street, sometimes with just inches between them
- Occasionally some travel in the wrong direction, to accelerate their journey, I presume
- Although the police are absent, there are police road blocks placed randomly, as if to simply slow down and annoy drivers
- Potholes are common, accompanied with poorly marked construction signs
- There’s an incessant noise of honking. Unlike North America, honking isn’t only for warning someone, it’s for virtually everything. Honk to say hello, honk to tell someone you’re approaching, honk when you are 50 meters away, honk when you’ve passed someone, honk when you’re happy, honk, honk, honk. It’s a honking orchestra without a conductor
- The roads are lined with small and adjoined street shops, with beautiful colours of fruit and vegetables. There are cafes, street food vendors, peanut vendors, scooter repair shops, clothing and textile shops, mobile phone carriers, etc.
Imagine all the above, and now add street dogs, cows eating piles of garbage, people pushing carts in all directions and pedestrians shouting at each other, and you’ll have a fairly accurate picture. (Note: I didn’t even mention the persistent smog and the putrid smells).
Despite all this, it’s a harmonious chaos. I was quite content to have a private driver and guide to avoid the stress 🙂 Before arriving to India, I contemplated renting a motorcycle, just for the experience. After seeing the road and traffic conditions, I decided that would be a BAD IDEA.
Over 18 million people live in Delhi (that’s half the population in Canada all in one city!) with dozens of amazing tourist attractions. As part of our guided tour, Selma and I had the pleasure of:
- visiting the largest mosque in India, known as Jama Masjid
- being passengers on a rickshaw through the narrow lanes of Old Delhi
- seeing the Red Fort, built in the 17th century and a world heritage site
- seeing Gandhi’s monument
- admiring the Lotus Temple
- visiting Akshardham, a spiritual-cultural campus
The people in Delhi are friendly, and unlike South Africa, I never felt threatened by them. Perhaps it’s because I’m 6 inches taller and 50 pounds heavier than most, but I believe they are actually kind and helpful.
