India experience

Well the one of best trips so far was definitely my trip to India. I went on training / travel trip on august 2007 to New Delhi.

I think you need at least 2 weeks to feel the spirit a bit. First week is just a total shock. Everything is different and you just watch the reality with mouth wide open :-) After some time you get used to it a bit and explore more and more. The longest stay i would suggest is 3 maybe 4 weeks. After some time you get tired with smog/heat etc.

The best time to go is August/October and May/June i guess. There is no rain and temperature is not so bad. August was still hot to be honest. I was not used to it after living in Dublin for 1.5 so first days felt like in the oven. There is AC almost everywhere so its not bad in the buildings. But on the other hand going out and in over and over will give you sore throat and cold very fast. Metro was the coldest place in India ;-)

Also trips by train can be chilly so dont forget to take some warmer sweat shirt or something. Hat is also a good idea as AC fan over your head will give you cold if you sit there for 2 hours :-)

I was afraid of mosquitoes but i did not see even one! so mosquito nets should not be necessary if you are in cities most of the time.

Another good idea is to take some vaccinations. Even that its not so bad when it comes to mosquitoes you can find some crawling bugs in the hotel or some monkeys/dogs. Getting bitten could be risky i guess. Fortunately nothing happened to me :-))

Best place was Qtab Minar i guess. Very very impressing place. Also Taj Mahal was great but maybe i was expecting something more spectacular i dont know. Size and atmosphere is comparable to Vatican City i guess. Did not throw me on my knees but still a place to be, thats for sure.

A definite culture shock was Delhi itself. Photos dont give full idea as sometimes i felt a bit ashamed to take pictures. Dont know maybe my mistake. Jama Masjid area and Chandni Chowk are great. Best to walk around i guess. It will take a lot of time but its safe and you cant get lost anyway.

Auto-rickshaw or regular rickshaw will take you where you want in a few minutes. Sometimes it might be good to establish the price before you go but you wont be ripped off too much i guess. Just say you are there for 2 weeks already ;-)

The annoying thing was people bothering me all the time to ge somewhere and buy something in the shop they recommend. There are many people hired for this kind of job. They will come and start telling you that they want to practice English or just have nothing to do or whatever and offer you shoving some places for shopping. In general "thank you im fine" a few times is enough. No one was ever unpleasent nor aggressive. To be honest i was very pleased with people and culture. They are very friendly and opened. I myself was not going out late as i had so much to learn in my java course but some people did and their feeling was the same. Delhi is a safe place even et night.

Shopping

Well that was the hardest thing for me :-) Its just almost impossible to find a shop with fixed prices. So whatever you like it will take an hour to establish price and but something. If you dont want to buy, it will take even longer for the shopkeeper to accept the rejection :-) But its still a bit of fun if you do it right. Never ask for thing you really like first, go to 4 places first to really have some idea of what is worth what etc. Easy shopping does not happen there.

I guess for Europeans its a bit hard and some people feel bad that they paid 3 times more than it was worth it but thats the market. If you are willing to pay 50e for something worth 20 no one will stop you. I think best way is to take it slow and leave shopping for last days when you have better idea how does it all work.

Guides

Another thing is trips to Agra etc. If you book taxi (day of driving around with guide is like 50-100E depending where and how you book). Service was very good, take you where you want and make sure you are happy. I was really happy with it. The only thing is that they will take you to some 'museums' of stone work or carpets etc. If you dont want to buy any just dont agree to go as it will take forever to get out ;-) hehe still funny experience. Actually carpets were really nice, just dont have house for them ;-)

Food

Well i was very cautious. Many people had upset of stomach during the stay. Mostly because of suspicious takeaways etc. In general if you eat in restaurants that look clean and you order vegetarian food you should be ok. Meat is not very popular so you cant be so sure about freshness of it. So best way is eat what others eat ;-) I liked vegetarian noodles the best! really nice! I dont like spicy food so i was also eating a lot of mild dishes mostly with rice or noodles. Oh and chinese as well :-) The only problem was i was afraid of fruit. Dont buy if you cant peal it :-) In general the same drill like in Africa, drinks, water, beer etc has to be opened in front of you so you dont get any regular unboiled water.

Traffic and Noise

If you think living next to a busy street is bad in europe try sleeping in Delhi hotel like that! hehe dogs will keep you up second half of night and traffic wont let you sllep till 23. Traffic itself is a ride of your life in India! Have not seen such thing. I thought Roma was bad and Croatia and Serbia was very reckless as well. Nothing beats Delhi drivers! You can try to take a look on you-tube maybe you can see some cool avis. It will not give the real experience though. Everyone is going everywhere in the same time. Cars go on both lanes no matter which direction and horn is used every 10 seconds as a 'im here device'. There is no road rage so much as total freedom of driving expression! :-)))

Its a place for every true born rally driver :-) Comparing to Europe they are really good driver i guess. Most of us would just faint after 10 minutes of driving like that. People running everywhere cars turning in opposite directions bikes, rickshaw, cows you name it! its all there :-)