After a good 20 minutes of walking, we finally stepped outside the first gate. We were greeted by fresh, Indian air. Not at all what I was expecting.
Truthfully, I expected air filled with onions and curry. Even when leaving the second entrance, we were hit with a different smell that was not bad at all!
We stepped onto the street to madness. Try and follow:
We crossed a street FILLED with vehicles to the main sidewalk. But even on that side, the curb was packed full of vehicles.
Our leader decided to take all of our bags to a local hotel for safekeeping, and he needed a volunteer…
It wasn’t until I got in the van with a load of American stuff (not to mention our entire load of supplies) that I realized a couple things. I’m an American who just hopped into a van about to drive a solid 20 minutes through traffic in the middle of the capitol of India with two Indian men who I didn’t know. Slowly everything came together. But before I had a chance to freak out, I breathed, then just said to myself, God’s got you.
Like I said, it took a solid 20 minutes or so to get to the sketchy, alley apartment where we promptly unloaded everything.
Our guide, who I would later find out is one of Tim’s close local friends, decided we should take different means of transportation back to the rest of the group.
So we walked, rushed, and pushed our way through SCORES of people and various means of transportation.
The roads were filled with people trying to get everywhere, and I quickly learned that the horn is everyone’s best friend in India.
Also, the choice to obey stop signs, streetlights, and crossing zones are seemingly optional.
We stopped briefly for my first Indian food experience. I had a spicy, Indian burger-thing. Not bad.
We continued into an underground train system where we flocked to through the gates to get on a packed train to another part of the city.
From that exit we hopped on a three-wheeled auto rickshaw that took us to the market place to meet our group.
But through this adventure, I saw many things that just really took me off guard. There were homeless everywhere, men and women were sprawled on the streets and sidewalks begging for money, and I passed a man whose legs were too swollen for him to move. There were kids and families in need, and so many people running around doing whatever they could to draw my attention. There were entire sidewalks covered in pornographic material. There were people of all backgrounds hurriedly traveling through the streets going every which way. There were uniformed men everywhere with checkpoints and guns of all sorts (FAL, M16, MP5) pointed carefully at each passerby. It was overwhelming, to say the least.
With Christianity being only 1% of the religious population, I couldn’t help but wonder about each person I passed. Through the entire trip back, I easily passed a thousand people in arm’s length. And to think, these people share little to none of what I believe…
After 30 minutes or so, we finally made it to the local market where the girls were busy looking for appropriate outerwear for the upcoming week.
The market was filled with vendors and assorted items. They even had monkeys running around and above the vendors.
After we finished gift and clothes shopping, we all headed to India’s own Dunkin Doughnuts! Everyone got to relax and slow down for a few minutes.
Just fyi, it is at Dunkin that I found out that pretty much all Indian bathrooms smell like curry…
Afterwards, we traveled by underground train (which was super busy and crazy).
After a while, we made it to a different part of New Delhi where we traveled by the bike powered Tuk-Tuks. We traveled in with 2 per vehicle (one guy, one girl to be safe) and went on quite a ride through the city.
We got a little worried as we all lost sight of each other at times, but after awhile we all made it to the same location.
We stopped at this popular, back alley restaurant where we had some amazing food. We had a leg of lamb, Tandoori chicken, pancake-like Roti, and rice.
After we got right back to the Tuk-Tuk rides.
They took us to the train station where we waited for our bags as the cold evening set in.
While we waited, we passed this fenced in area that we later found out was a temple. There was a loud, constant banging sound, like a large bell or gong that Muslims use to keep their gods awake long enough to hear their prayers. There were statues all around the area, and there was a man in religious garb beckoning us toward the temple grounds. The entrance held a large cow statue to which several men prayed to and kissed on their way in or out. Truthfully it felt dark and foreign. The rights, the prayer times, the different procedures for each god… it seemed so mechanical in nature. For where I saw, it was a religion so rehearsed that it was more of a thing to do. I know that’s not the case for many people, but it made me wonder how many people really LIVE what they profess to believe…
Tim showed us the temple so that we could get at least a little glimpse into what they live and believe… And so we did.
We moved to the train station where we waited for our train.
The bathrooms were pretty horrible, so many waited for the train bathroom.
The trains that we were taking are called “Sleeper Trains” because in each section there are different compartments. In each compartment there are 8 bunks/bed for passengers to sleep on.
We were all tired, but after some minor confusion with some locals (we were given the exact space as a family) we all got settled in.
There was a boy who spoke some English (first person to casually interact with me in English). He asked me where I was from and he told me that I looked like number 20 from a Pennsylvania sports team.
The train was pretty sketchy. It felt like we were on a Concentration camp train: bars on the windows, chains holding the beds up, dirty floors, thin materials that made up beds, etc…
There wasn’t much room so I didn’t sleep very well. Thankfully though, I we got at least a little sleep.