I have some advice for potential tourists trying to plan a trip to India. Personally I recommend using the lonely planet guidebook, as follows: first make a note of all the interesting places it mentions, then don't go to any of them.
The problem is that tourism destroys what originally enchanted the first visitors (at least in India). The buildings remain, but when the atmosphere is gone you are merely led like sheep around empty creations of stone and brick. Even the Taj Mahal isn't that impressive, while its not insignificant don't beat yourself up if you miss it. What is it to stand in the same place and take the same photo as the previous million people. Then there is the hassle, the cheating, the cost... driven by tourist money and Indian culture. This hassle is worse the more tourists there are, and depending on your disposition it can be tiring. Whatever you may read, if its in the lonely planet, then it is most definitely not "little known", "largely undiscovered" or "unaltered". You don't 'explore' anywhere by following a book... you wont find a cheap India (easily) in these places. For food well you can have your pizza, pasta, Japanese, Israeli, German. The choice is yours. My only doubt in this rant is that if you want to try real Indian food... well Indian people are quite keen on Chinese food!
The worst example so far is of course the golden triangle. The level of shit is high here, and a great proportion of the Indian people you meet here will be too. This isn't racist, these are only the people who have come to make money; its business, no holds barred. And that folks is the end of all that is reasonable...
Agra, short for aggravation, isn't really that interesting. Before you arrive you might at first be surprised by the endless smoke stacks from the brick kilns which make up the horizon of UP and Rajastan. This local industry also ensures pollution never falls below legal limits. The cheating is strong in this one, and despite the prepaid autos they have found a new way to scam, dropping you short of your destination. It might seem an obvious trick, but in all my time trusting auto drivers while getting dropped off in strange and unknown places, they have not cheated me. Once you have agreed a price, they generally do their job. This time, its just stupid, why drive the first 5km but not the last 0.8km. He tried the bullshit "buy your drinks here, no more drink stands near the Taj", but I barely notice this behaviour any more, its normal. For anyone who feels peckish after the Taj I can recommend the government restaurant for bland and overpriced food... note this cynicism doesn't extend to all governments though. Karnataka govt. tourism (from the lovely south) has provided me with Rs22 dosa and Gujarat govt. tourism a clean and tidy room in a beautiful mountain tourist spot for Rs400.
Jaipur isn't much better, but here some of the local behaviour at least gives much amusement, my favourite example being the calculator price. Sometimes even for Indians a price is just too bullshit to say, so out comes the calculator. It's comic how clearly they have just communicated their intent to defraud somehow. After reaching the "ok I tell you good price" instead of just saying it they have to pick up a standard desk calculator and poke in the number. I can only hope it would pain them to say this level of bullshit in their own tongue. Do they think the ownership for this figure is then relocated to an electronic device. I don't think any of the reasonable excuses, confidentiality or intelligibility, can really apply. This is just Incredible India. Another small refreshment in the hot day is the slight grammatical misuse of "You like tuktuk". To which the answer is simple: "No". Or my amusement at how fast the 'guide' scurried away after his "you can't enter Amber Fort without guide" was met by "I report you".
The scams just don't stop. It's not the first time I have heard an auto driver say "Price per person", but it is followed by my rebuttal, heavy on the F word. In short I explain that this isn't how it works in India. People will always lie, in tourist places. In other places I well know that the Indian style of giving directions and time keeping isn't what we are used to, and you can't resent it. But in tourist places it will be a lie. No more true than with private buses, they know you don't want to arrive in a place at night, so will tell you something else
So you may already know I can be an angry person, but in all of these dealings I have restraint (have some belief!). Learning how to not let these nasty little parasites bother you is essential to enjoy living here! But one Delhi auto driver received a full lecture involving several conjugations of the F word. I hope he understood the subtlety, but I wasn't in a state to translate to international English. The bus from Jaipur began the encounter, which in private bus style dropped us by a busy road in the middle of nowhere late at night, throwing us to the wolves as it were. The first wolf quoted Rs250 to take us to the stop, less than 3km away. This attempted fraud for what could be a Rs50 daytime or Rs80 nighttime journey in a city where using the meter (even cheaper) is a legal requirement sent me over the edge. I devoted a full two minutes to shouting in his face about trying to cheat foreigners before choosing a new auto.
Do you really want to go to India? If you have money to burn I'm sure a booked tour can actually make for a fairly pleasant experience with many western luxuries (some toilets even have paper). Otherwise, how about you don't go to the iron pyrite triangle
No comments:
Post a Comment