On the plane, somewhere north of Iran I think.
Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.5
Thursday, January 13, 2011
The next phase has begun
Welcome to Europe. We have arrived in turkey. It is so nice. People are happy, its clean, there seems to be a mosque for every 2 people and you can find a donner kebab shop about every 50m or less in the old part of Istanbul. What more could you want. Did I already mention its clean.
On the plane, somewhere north of Iran I think.
On the plane, somewhere north of Iran I think.
Final thoughts on India
Will we go again? Probably not.
Are we glad we went? Yes but nowhere near as happy as we were to leave. It was an experience we are happy to have had although not a pleasant one.
Would we recommend you to go there for a holiday? NO. Not unless you want to see extremes of poverty and wealth side by side amongst filth and human waste and people that don't appear to give a damn about anyone or thing except themselves and their immediate family. At least that is the feeling we get from being out amongst it on the streets. Although not entirely true as we did meet some nice hotel / hostel owners and we saw happy people going about their business. Unfortunately it was only the crooked ones that ever approached us.
Are we glad we went? Yes but nowhere near as happy as we were to leave. It was an experience we are happy to have had although not a pleasant one.
Would we recommend you to go there for a holiday? NO. Not unless you want to see extremes of poverty and wealth side by side amongst filth and human waste and people that don't appear to give a damn about anyone or thing except themselves and their immediate family. At least that is the feeling we get from being out amongst it on the streets. Although not entirely true as we did meet some nice hotel / hostel owners and we saw happy people going about their business. Unfortunately it was only the crooked ones that ever approached us.
Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.5
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
We were so excited
Yay finally leaving India. Not.
We had ticket problems at the airport and the unhelpful staff simply refused to call the ticket issuer for verification of a valid ticket.
I am feeling too drained by the experience to write the whole story but so far Turkish airlines is living up to their reputation.
Maybe we will leave tomorrow or next day. In the mean while its gunna be curry for breakfast, lunch and dinner again which ain't so bad.
On a happier note, it seems like we are not the only ones to hang lights on Araucaria trees.
We had ticket problems at the airport and the unhelpful staff simply refused to call the ticket issuer for verification of a valid ticket.
I am feeling too drained by the experience to write the whole story but so far Turkish airlines is living up to their reputation.
Maybe we will leave tomorrow or next day. In the mean while its gunna be curry for breakfast, lunch and dinner again which ain't so bad.
On a happier note, it seems like we are not the only ones to hang lights on Araucaria trees.
Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.5
Friday, January 7, 2011
Fog n train
It's hard for us to believe but when the fog comes down it destroys the train service.
It's 9:56 in the morning and we are on the train. It was supposed to be a 2 hour express train journey beginning at 8:25pm. We already knew it was delayed by about 1 1/2 hours so left the hotel at 9pm this gave time to get to the station and find the platform and position of our carriage.
After arriving at the station we saw it was 1 more hour late so Sharon happily waited inside while I went exploring. I kept regularly checking the arrival board and our train kept being delayed more. Every hour it was moved another hour. At 11pm the restaurant seemed to close so we moved to the platform to wait. It was quite cold and the humidity of the fog made it harder to keep warm. I kept checking the board and the arrival time kept moving. At about 2 am the board was saying something like 2:45. I went to the office to get some better information. I had the time table so if I know what time the train had actually departed each station as well as where it was now I can work it out for myself. After gathering the relevant info I made a guess of 4am, nothing like their 2:45. After informing our newfound friends that were in the same situation we got a bit more settled for the wait. At about 3:30 am I went to check station departure times again. After some quick calculating I revised the estimate to extremely close to 5:30am. Sharon was quite cold, it was about 5 degrees, so went to the warmth of the waiting room. At about 4:40 she came back and the train indicators on the platform started showing our train number, the excitement was building. The train arrived at 5:10am. Finally we were on the thing, and only almost 9 hours late. Why the hell the rail people couldn't do a proper estimate beats me but if they had we could have gone back to the hotel for a bit of sleep instead of constantly feeling on edge that the train was almost here. Well, we are in the outskirts of Delhi. And only deprived of sleep, there is one lady I met who will miss her 11:45 flight.
It's 9:56 in the morning and we are on the train. It was supposed to be a 2 hour express train journey beginning at 8:25pm. We already knew it was delayed by about 1 1/2 hours so left the hotel at 9pm this gave time to get to the station and find the platform and position of our carriage.
After arriving at the station we saw it was 1 more hour late so Sharon happily waited inside while I went exploring. I kept regularly checking the arrival board and our train kept being delayed more. Every hour it was moved another hour. At 11pm the restaurant seemed to close so we moved to the platform to wait. It was quite cold and the humidity of the fog made it harder to keep warm. I kept checking the board and the arrival time kept moving. At about 2 am the board was saying something like 2:45. I went to the office to get some better information. I had the time table so if I know what time the train had actually departed each station as well as where it was now I can work it out for myself. After gathering the relevant info I made a guess of 4am, nothing like their 2:45. After informing our newfound friends that were in the same situation we got a bit more settled for the wait. At about 3:30 am I went to check station departure times again. After some quick calculating I revised the estimate to extremely close to 5:30am. Sharon was quite cold, it was about 5 degrees, so went to the warmth of the waiting room. At about 4:40 she came back and the train indicators on the platform started showing our train number, the excitement was building. The train arrived at 5:10am. Finally we were on the thing, and only almost 9 hours late. Why the hell the rail people couldn't do a proper estimate beats me but if they had we could have gone back to the hotel for a bit of sleep instead of constantly feeling on edge that the train was almost here. Well, we are in the outskirts of Delhi. And only deprived of sleep, there is one lady I met who will miss her 11:45 flight.
Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.5
Thursday, January 6, 2011
A lazy day, then!
We had a lazy day at the hotel researching the next destination. After a late lunch we decided to go out and check out a shopping mall on the other side of town. We took a tuk tuk there without incident although a bull almost collected us on his way across the road.
We went into the mall and found a shop quite like kmart called the big bazaar. It was quite a refreshing experience for India being in a proper style mall and being able to browse without being constantly bombarded by sales pitches.
In the queue at the register two young guys tried to push in while we were talking with the guy in front of us, I told them in no uncertain terms that they were pushing in and they moved back. About 1 minute later one of them came in front again and his mate passed him the shopping. Once again they were told and grudgingly moved back. Then it was our turn at the register. The screen showed 159, I gave 200, he gave back 40, I was waiting for the extra 1 and he tried to palm the receipt. I got it and checked. The total was actually 139. I couldn't believe it. He tried to rip us for 21 rupees. His excuse was then that it was the price of the bag. When I disputed this he decided the game was up and made a separate receipt for the bag and gave the correct change.
After that we went to the mall next door for window shopping.
When we walked out to go home we were approached by two keen tuk tuk drivers. After agreement from the first guy on the price they indicated that they wanted to stop at shopping on the way, "no buy, only look". The answer was no, we started to walk toward other drivers and the second guy hastily agreed no shopping. When we started off he indicated he knew where our hotel was. On the way we took a turn that we thought was wrong, sure enough we arrived outside the wrong place. Obviously he thought we needed a hotel and was after commission. I made him get out of the tuk tuk to indicate to me where he thought I was supposed to go, he realised we knew where we were going and took us to the correct place.
We must realy look like a couple of suckers for so many people to keep trying this stuff on, but it is a good feeling to see the look in their faces when they know they've been caught out.
We went into the mall and found a shop quite like kmart called the big bazaar. It was quite a refreshing experience for India being in a proper style mall and being able to browse without being constantly bombarded by sales pitches.
In the queue at the register two young guys tried to push in while we were talking with the guy in front of us, I told them in no uncertain terms that they were pushing in and they moved back. About 1 minute later one of them came in front again and his mate passed him the shopping. Once again they were told and grudgingly moved back. Then it was our turn at the register. The screen showed 159, I gave 200, he gave back 40, I was waiting for the extra 1 and he tried to palm the receipt. I got it and checked. The total was actually 139. I couldn't believe it. He tried to rip us for 21 rupees. His excuse was then that it was the price of the bag. When I disputed this he decided the game was up and made a separate receipt for the bag and gave the correct change.
After that we went to the mall next door for window shopping.
When we walked out to go home we were approached by two keen tuk tuk drivers. After agreement from the first guy on the price they indicated that they wanted to stop at shopping on the way, "no buy, only look". The answer was no, we started to walk toward other drivers and the second guy hastily agreed no shopping. When we started off he indicated he knew where our hotel was. On the way we took a turn that we thought was wrong, sure enough we arrived outside the wrong place. Obviously he thought we needed a hotel and was after commission. I made him get out of the tuk tuk to indicate to me where he thought I was supposed to go, he realised we knew where we were going and took us to the correct place.
We must realy look like a couple of suckers for so many people to keep trying this stuff on, but it is a good feeling to see the look in their faces when they know they've been caught out.
Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.5
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
Saturday, January 1, 2011
Nahargarh Fort - Tiger Fort
We had a bit of a sleep in and late breakfast then our hotel organised a good tuk tuk driver to take us to the tiger fort. I am not sure the age of the fort structure. The palace within the fort, Madhavendra palace, was built a little less than 200 years ago. It is quite a nice place, 2 stories with 9 apartments. The layout and rooms are all quite basic with built in shelves. There is painting on the walls, roof and floor, there is not a lot of sculpting but the effect of the paint makes it look like there is. The sad thing is that the visitors deface the walls and throw rubbish around.
Basically we had a great day in a fantastically scenic spot.
**********
Happy New Year
**********
Basically we had a great day in a fantastically scenic spot.
**********
Happy New Year
**********
Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.5
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)