Ahoy,
We made it to India. We left Thursday, November 3 at 12:30PM. It was a 12 and half hour flight to shanghai. With a 3 hour layover before a 6 and half hour flight to Delhi. We arrived at 2am November 5, Saturday morning. The day before leaving I had seen news articles about Delhi surpassing Beijing for worst pollution on record. Due to Diwali and garbage burning, among other reasons, it was even smoggy inside the airport. We arrived amongst a large crowd. I guess the middle of the night is a popular time. We got through security and customs without any trouble. We went for the prepaid taxi to get to our hotel. After getting shuffled around a couple taxi drivers, we got 1 willing driver.
He started the drive taking us through a bunch of military complexes. It did not look touristic at all. He stopped in the middle of the road to gesture to us he did not know the way and asked us to call the hotel. Of course, we don't have working phones. He called and got no answer, which I think he must have dialed the wrong number because there were staff waiting for us. He could only say "no English" and ask for more money, speaking to us in Hindi. After we yelled at him gesturing him to drive to our destination as per the prepaid destination, he drove us straight back the way we came, past the airport and directly to our destination. I guess he did know where to go. If you find your taxi driver taking you somewhere suspicious, stick to your guns until he gets you there and don't give him more money. He could have made the same amount of money if he had just taken us to our hotel and gone back for another ride, instead of taking that detour.
It was probably 4:30am when we got to the hotel. The lobby was also smoggy. We slept in a giant hotel room that did not have hot water, which the RRS absolutely loved. We awoke to a smoggy day. "It can't be morning yet, it is still so dark outside..." Running theme.
cautiously agog,
jt
We made it to India. We left Thursday, November 3 at 12:30PM. It was a 12 and half hour flight to shanghai. With a 3 hour layover before a 6 and half hour flight to Delhi. We arrived at 2am November 5, Saturday morning. The day before leaving I had seen news articles about Delhi surpassing Beijing for worst pollution on record. Due to Diwali and garbage burning, among other reasons, it was even smoggy inside the airport. We arrived amongst a large crowd. I guess the middle of the night is a popular time. We got through security and customs without any trouble. We went for the prepaid taxi to get to our hotel. After getting shuffled around a couple taxi drivers, we got 1 willing driver.
He started the drive taking us through a bunch of military complexes. It did not look touristic at all. He stopped in the middle of the road to gesture to us he did not know the way and asked us to call the hotel. Of course, we don't have working phones. He called and got no answer, which I think he must have dialed the wrong number because there were staff waiting for us. He could only say "no English" and ask for more money, speaking to us in Hindi. After we yelled at him gesturing him to drive to our destination as per the prepaid destination, he drove us straight back the way we came, past the airport and directly to our destination. I guess he did know where to go. If you find your taxi driver taking you somewhere suspicious, stick to your guns until he gets you there and don't give him more money. He could have made the same amount of money if he had just taken us to our hotel and gone back for another ride, instead of taking that detour.
It was probably 4:30am when we got to the hotel. The lobby was also smoggy. We slept in a giant hotel room that did not have hot water, which the RRS absolutely loved. We awoke to a smoggy day. "It can't be morning yet, it is still so dark outside..." Running theme.
cautiously agog,
jt
No comments:
Post a Comment