Delhi-ghtful (New Delhi)

Member Name: whiskmite

Product:	New Delhi
Date:	20/01/09 (257 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Fantastic city, loads to see, great food

Disadvantages: Can be stressful and dirty

New Delhi

Overwhelming, overcrowded, great fun!

For many people, Delhi will be their first experience of India - it was mine. We arrived in Delhi airport at about 4 in the afternoon after flying for more than fourteen hours, with a brief rest in Abu Dhabi. We were tired, and grubby, but excited about embarking on our holiday and seeing India for the first time.

The first thing you will probably have to do is exchange currency. The rupee is a closed currency so you won't be able to get any in advance and will need it to pay your taxi to your hotel! The currency exchange at the airport was fine.

We had heard rumours of unscrupulous taxi and autorickshaw drivers picking up unwary tourists at the airport and taking them for a ride, so to speak. Some of the scams included taking them on an extra long route to the hotel because 'the roads are closed for a festival' or telling them their hotel has burnt down! Because I knew we'd be tired after our long flight, I arranged for our hotel to send a taxi for us. The cost of this was 400 rupees - more than what it is supposed to cost, but for all the hassle it saved us it was money well spent!!

Our first impression of Delhi was that it is chaotic! The drivers seem to drive with their hand permanently on the horn! For someone who has honked while driving a maximum of two of three times in her life, this was an unusual experience! There were no lanes, everyone just drove wherever they want - the drivers in India must have nerves of steel to venture on the road! I wouldn't recommend hiring your own car unless you're incredibly brave.

We were staying just of Paharganj main bazaar which was a busy, crowded and loud bazaar street. Our hotel was less than nice, but we weren't paying very much for it and it was only for two days! After we had freshened up we decided to go out and get some food. I had been reading my guidebook on the flight, and thought that Connaught Place would be a good place to explore, as it was described as a more westernised area, which I thought would be perfect as everything was pretty overwhelming and we were pretty knackered. We jumped in an utoricksahw, told him where we wanted to go, and off we went!

I love autorickshaws - I think they're a great way to get about, and it is so much more fun than travelling by car! I blame this, as well as my general tiredness/doziness for the fact that I wasn't paying attention to where we were going. The driver took us to his brother-in-law's shop and claimed it was on Connaught Place. As it turned out, he wasn't lying, but on the map Connaught Place looked so tiny, and there were no restaurants or bars around! It turned out it was on one of the outer 'rings' of Connaught Place, but we were now a bit frazzled and stressed as well as hungry. We walked for a while and came across a really run down area with lots of children begging which was quite distressing. This was certainly a darker side of Delhi - there is an immense amount of poverty and it is all too easy to see why people living in poverty can just see you as walking wallets full of rupees. I found you need to adopt a certain mindset to deal with this otherwise you spend your holiday crying yourself to sleep (I am a sensitive little soul and this is exactly what I did do when I visited similar places previously) and when you get back you make a donation to a charity that will hopefully improve the situation on a long term basis - especially as I was told repeatedly that no money given to a beggar stays with a beggar. It is still incredibly sad though.

So, our first evening in Delhi started badly, but once we had some food and a good night's sleep, things seemed much better! The next day was spent on a trip to Agra and Fatehpur Sikri, which I won't talk too much about here as it isn't really relevant to Delhi, but during the day our driver suggested a tour of Delhi for the next day, an offer we eagerly took him up on as we had a night train leaving at about 8 o clock in the evening, but had hoped to see some of Delhi's sights.

It meant a fairly early morning, but I think we crammed everything in, and got a nice impression of Delhi over all! We saw the following sights:

- Gandhi's final resting place

Raj Ghat is its name. It is a really quiet little garden with a tomb for the great man. Everyone is incredibly respectful and quiet (which is really noticeable in a city like Delhi, which is so loud!) and it is obvious the affection in which Gandhi is held.

- Mahatma Gandhi museum

So that we could learn more about Gandhi and his ideas. He really was a remarkable man and it is unsurprising how respected he is. You got to see the kind of family he came from, and look at a lot of artifacts from his life. We certainly came out feeling as if we had learned a lot.

- The Baha'i (lotus) temple

This was amazing - like the Sydney opera house of India! A giant white marble lotus blossom in a huge garden. It was incredibly cool and peaceful, as well as being a staggeringly unusual building. It was really quite impressive to look at, and you also got to find out a bit about the Baha'i faith, which I had only heard of when researching the temple before coming to India!

- Humayun's tomb

I found it amazing that this place wasn't more famous - or maybe it was just me who hadn't heard of it before researching my holiday! This place was meant to be the inspiration for Shahjahan's Taj Mahal, and it really does look very similar, and although I feel it lacks the Taj's glistening beauty it is nonetheless an amazing monument.

- Qutb Minar

This is the world's tallest free standing minaret, and is surrounded by nice gardens. We found it a relaxing place to chill out and enjoy the shade of the towers and structures.

- Jama Masjid

The Friday Mosque is quite amazing. It is an incredibly imposing building in red on top of a huge staircase, and it is really quite awe-inspiring! We didn't go in (too much to see and do!) but I am really glad we were able to see it.

A lot of these were interspersed with shops or 'emporiums' and there was a lot of pressure to buy. Even though we asked our driver not to take us to any more, he kept trying! In a way I don't blame him as I know they get commission and it must be incredibly tempting to milk tourists for all they are worth, but it did get frustrating. The people in the shop also had an inflated idea of what I could afford - one suggestion was an enormous Kashmiri rug which looked about three times the size of my tiny sitting room in my London flat! A couple of thousand pounds was the price tag. They just didn't believe that I couldn't afford it.

Our driver was really nice and was a similar age to us, so we did get on well, but he also got a bit offended when we asked to go to a specific place for lunch that we had read about. In the end he 'couldn't' find it and thought it was closed, and we went to a place he knew which was perfectly nice, but I have since found out that it hasn't closed!

All in all, Delhi is a great place to spend a couple of days, and there is plenty to see and do (I certainly don't feel like I have seen/done all of it) but the city can be a stressful place with lots of begging, dirt, dust and pressure from shops and drivers. It would be such a shame to let this put you off though, as a lot of India can be like this, but it is definitely, definitely worthwhile going and getting past this to see all the amazing sights and sounds of this unique country.

Summary: Definitely worth going