My first trip in CC, Incredible India!

It was around 10:00pm, when Nastya and I reached Jaipur’s Railway station to catch our train to Udaipur. Nastya stands for Anastassiya, my girlfriend. The two of us had a chat when 2 young men aged between 25 and 35 years old came along and started a chat.

The questions asked were never ending: “What’s your name?, How old are you? Where you from? Is she your wife?.... As long as the discussion went on, people started gathering around the two of us. 20mn later, no less than 50 Indians were sitting in semi circle, listening to our adventures. By commodity and for those who were not English speaker, an interpreter Hindi-English was elected by the crowd and translated our tribulations. Incredible India!

Rajasthan: Jaipur, Udaipur

Rajasthan… Ali Baba might have come from India.

Rajasthan was a fantastic state to stay. Water Palace, Palace and snakes’ charmer seemed coming from nowhere. In Jaipur we met a rickshaw driver who became our guide for the day.

Amar the splendid… ,

Amar was the name of our rickshaw driver, met randomly in Jaipur. Tall guy with a bear perfectly maintained. His head was covered by a Kangha. He was wearing a Kara (Silver bracelet). Although he was neither wearing a kacca (short trouser) nor a kirpan (dagger), we guessed him Sikh.

Sikh doesn’t have for philology the English ‘sick’, meaning ‘ill’, or rather it comes from the Sanskrit “disciple”. The Sikhism is one of the numerous Indian religions. Sikhs are gathered in a community of over 20 million of believers, which means less than 2% of the Indian population. Despite of this numerical minority, Sikhs are helpful, honest and well educated.

Everything started in the middle of the 15^th century in Pendjab. In 1469, ‘Nânak’ was born. At the age of 27, this Young Man had had a mystic revelation. There was no Hindi, no Muslim, there was one God only:”The absolute true”. To sum up, the Sikhism took the best of each religion and threw away the dreadful.

The reason behind the Sikhism is that Nânak, this ‘Macgyver’ of religions wished to calm down the tension occurring through the 15^th century and therefore created a hybrid and new religion.

Amar our driver, was monotheist and beyond the fantastic Rajasthan, Amar drove us off the beaten tracks of Jaipur: the pink city.

Uttar Pradesh, Agra, the Taj Mahal or nothing …

The Taj Mahal… Priceless!

The city of Agra was lifeless by itself, but the Taj Mahal (and the Fort). The Taj Mahal was built by Shah Jahan in 1648, when his favorite wife died after delivering her 14^th kid. The construction of this incredible Tomb would have lasted over 20 years and would have cost around $40m. In the time, where 1kg was worth 50 INR, the value of the Taj Mahal would be roughly $13 billon nowadays. Love is priceless!

Delhi ...

Only Delhi

It was onboard a Boeing 777 from India-Airline, that I left home for India. In the plane, my 2 neighbors were a Nepalese from Katmandu, and a Hindi from North of India. I switched my mp3 player on, and on a music written by Mike Jaegger in 1968: “You can’t always get what you want”, I started my tribulations through Asia. But this time, I did get what I wanted.

My plane landed after a flight of just under 5 hours. Delhi Airport was clean and the custom staff efficient. Less than 20 minutes later I was in a rickshaw: direction Woodcastle guest House.

New Delhi is the India’s capital and the second biggest city after Mumbai. With around 12.5 m of people, Delhi ranks 8^th in the most populated cities on earth. It is also one of the oldest cities, as it birth dates several millenniums BC, as the Yamunâ (one of the 7^t sacred rivers) is witness. Even though, historical traces dated from the 6^th century BC only.

Delhi History started with the creation of Indraprastha by the Pândava 1540 years BC, and then it History was written centuries after, by Kings and Maharaja from Indraprastha to Shahjahanabad, who made Delhi a magical city. Magical? Not that much!

My first day in Delhi gave me the opportunity to get a better understanding of the capital. One tells a lot about Delhi: an impressive city, but too noisy and dirty to my taste, and I was far from being impressed.

Delhi doesn’t escape the archetype of big cities in emerging countries; therefore you are deeply moved by the poverty and the awful living condition the population has to cope with day after day. In the afternoon of the first day, Nastya and I met a British couple and we decided to go to the railway statio to book our train tickets. Finding the right railway reservation office was not easy; a lot of travel tours and drivers tried to scam us. With patience we found the main station and booked our tickets to Agra, Udaipur, Mumbai, Goa and Varkala. Our trip from Agra to Jaipur will be done by bus, 3 hours of fun!

The afternoon was cultural and we enjoyed the visit of the Red Fort. The Red Fort is a huge castle started in 1638 and finished in 1648 by Shah Jahan. This fort, with walls’ length over 2km, was the most powerful castle in India during the Mughal domination. The tour continued with Humayun’s Tomb built in the 16^th century by Haji Begum.

Wealth and poverty are very close in India, street boys are begging for coins. Coins! No way! But Ice cream and food: Yes! At least two of them were happy for a while.

Then days went on. India gate, Parliament, Presidential House, National Museum of India… were the main places we visited in Delhi