We made our way to the local metro station to catch a ride to Old Delhi. This metro was unlike anything I have ever experienced. If you have seen the videos of the metros in Japan where they are shoving people into the train car so the doors can close, that is what it was like. We had to wait in line to get crammed into the train. So, yes it was horrifying. You are getting shoved from every direction because everyone is trying to get on. Once we got off, we made our way to a Sikh temple. As soon as we got off the metro, it started to look more what I pictured India to be like. There was a lot more trash, if you can believe that, beggars everywhere, absolutely filthy, and people sleeping all over the streets. On our way to the temple, we went though this very narrow street. The only reason why I mention this, is because the electrical wiring was absolutely crazy. If there was an electrical fire, the whole place would blow up. (see pictures below)
When we got to the temple, we had to take off our shoes and socks to enter. The inside of the temple was "clean," but we had to walk on the street to get inside, which was worse than walking inside Pavlovs barefoot, so beyond nasty. However, before we entered, we were able to wash our feet. To be honest, I felt very uncomfortable in the temple. In every country I have visited thus far, you are not allowed to visit inside a mosque while they are praying and certainly not allowed to take pictures. All the tourists were walking around, taking photos, and entering into where they were praying to take photos. I felt very disrespectful entering there. After all, I wouldn't want a bunch of Indian tourists walking into my church in Columbia, SC and taking photos of me, that is for sure. Anyway, we walked through the whole temple and saw that they made food for the people; however, everyone helped out, it was like a family. You helped prepare, cook, and clean before and after. You would think that this would be where the beggars would just come to eat every meal, but they didn't. This was because, since it was like a family and everyone helped out, the beggars do not tend to help and would just become dependent on the food and take it for granted (sounds similar to what I witness back home).
After we left the temple, we made our way to Jama Masjid, the largest mosque in India. It was pretty amazing; however, we didn't get to spend much time there because it was almost time for prayer. Even at the mosque, there were people sleeping and trash all over the outside. Some of the surrounding neighborhoods of the mosque were the slums. Our guide really didn't want us to go there because it is very dangerous. Often times tourists want to go in there to witness the sheer poverty, but the locals feel that it is really disrespectful and most tourists get mugged or robbed if they try. I personally already felt unsafe walking these nasty streets, I didn't really want to up the annie. Sorry. As we were leaving the temple, this young guy was following us for about 10 minutes. I had my eye on him because I thought he was trying to rob one of us. Once we crossed a big intersection, the girls pointed out that he was touching himself while looking at the girls. About 7 feet away from us, he was standing, facing us and looking at the girls, rubbing his crotch. I was absolutely disgusted by this. Once we all started to stare at him, he quickly left. The girls afterwards had told me that they were warned that that would happen. One of the girls had a guy try to grab her, but she was quickly able to move out of the way. This and the terrible toilet facilities are why I could not imagine being a female and backpacking. More power to em.
We eventually made our way, via metro, to a more restaurant and shopping area of Old Delhi. It was actually worse than where we previously were, except for the nice shops (like LG, Nike, etc.) and food places. The sidewalks were all destroyed, beggars everywhere, and traffic was awful. There is no pause for pedestrians to cross. The way you cross the street in Delhi is you wait for a large group to build up then all walk at once, so the cars have to stop or they would hit like 20 people. Smart, but terrible that this is the way. The area was built in a nice circle, with all the establishments built into this white structure with nice pillars between the archways. In the corners, you could see the brown spray where people had gone to the bathroom, this was at every single pillar. At the bottom you could tell there was this small pile.... It makes me want to vomit having to rethink it.
The tour ended here, and we all split up to explore and find food. The young people stuck together, and we attempted to find some good Indian food. A beggar followed us for, no lie, about twenty minutes. He looked absolutely disgusting. We gave up on saying no and just ignored him. We finally had to dip into a store with a guard before he would go away. And this is supposed to be part of the capital of one of the world's rising powers??
After we ate lunch, which was amazing eventhough it was vegitarin, we went to the park in the middle of the circle. Terrible decision; it was actually mine. Of course, all the local people feed off us, asking us if we wanted food, coffee, massage, peanuts, etc. Of course they only targeted us; after we said no, they wouldn't bother any of the locals. The locals would watch, shake their heads, and laugh at our reactions. We eventually left after we had had enough and tried to take a tuk tuk back to the hotel. Our guide told us that it would cost us no more than 80 rupees (not even $2); however, we could only fit three at a time, so we split up. The Norwegian girls were able to get one just perfectly, of course our attempt was a very different story.
We tried multiple tuk tuks. All of them wanted 200 rupees; I kept telling them that we had just taken one here a couple hours ago for 70, so they brought it down to 130. We still wouldn't bite. After about 20 attempts, a local came up to me and said that the price I was asking for was right, but all these guys are going to scam us because we are white and to just take the metro. So we took his advice, and of course got lost in that hell hole of a metro station. There wasn't a map in the place and the information guy spoke very broken English. We eventually got back to our metro stop, after about 30 minutes of getting on the wrong train, and going the wrong direction. Once we got off, we figured we could easily catch a rickshaw back to the hotel, it was only a ten minute walk there this morning. Each rickshaw driver was trying to get us for 50 rupees. I tried to bargain and ask for 15, they would say "okay no problem," then once we got in, they would say 50, so I made sure that me and the other girl got off fast. Eventually, this one guy took us to the side and we thought he could help us. (this is not a lie) All these people started coming over to us and where their lips come together it was dark red. I was trying to tell the guy 15 rupees, so I went for my pocket to pull out a 10 when all those guys started to get really close to us. Once they opened their mouths, i saw they had a couple teeth in their heads and their teeth and gums were covered in blood. They all started to come at me at once, and we were kind of trapped behind all the rickshaws. I had never been so freaked out in my life, it was like something out of a zombie apocalypse movie. I thought there were going to bite me and give me AIDS or something, so I yelled "GET THE F*** AWAY FROM ME!" They were all truly startled, and at that moment, I grabbed the girl and we got the hell outa there. We got to the next rickshaw driver and he asked for 20 rupees; we hopped in and never looked back. It wasn't the fact that I thought I might get beat up that scared me, it was just that there were about 5-7 of them, they all had bleeding mouths, were yelling at us, and all coming at us at once. Trying to describe what happened, does not do justice, you truly had to be there to feel the chills that were sprinting down my spine.
So, yeah, I'm not that big of a fan of Delhi. I have heard that Delhi is the worst city in India. I could never believe that a capital of a country could be on the brink of social collapse. Let's just say, the city has unique character. Like I say, anything is possible. I have proved that time and time again. I cannot wait to be in Jaipur tomorrow and never look back. I have no clue what to except in Jaipur, but I have heard good things; only time will tell.
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