A Long, long Day:Leaving for India...and Arriving

November 5, 2008

Isn't it strange that you can start a day leaving your own front door on one side of the world and end it eating curry from a rubble-filled kitchen thousands of miles away on the other side of the planet? And still be running on three hours sleep?This is the story of how Spider Girl and Jeff travelled to India and Nepal.

Well, it was actually our friends' front door that we left behind, and it was two days that felt like one long one that stretched and stretched in a blur of airports but the feeling is much the same.

We flew Air Canada from Vancouver to London Heathrow, departing British Columbia in the early evening and arriving about noon London time. Our plane was overbooked and we are just happy to get on even though our window seats have been usurped and we are stuck in the middle of the plane. After this ten hour flight, we feel pathetically grateful to have booked a Yotel room at Heathrow. The train tunnels from Terminal Three to Terminal Four are lit with a moody blue, and in our ship cabin-sized Yotel room we are greeted with more mood lighting, this time a soft, cocooning pink shade.

The shower is hot. The bed is soft. Somebody is drilling hammering something in the hallway doing renovations until we ask him for the love of all things holy: stop it. After that, all is bliss , and whatever we paid for this tiny room feels worth it, even for the mere four hours we have it.

Our next flight is on Virgin Atlantic to New Delhi, leaving a wintry London around ten o'clock at night and arriving in the sultry smog of Delhi about noon Indian time. Once again, we are seated in the middle of the plane but the little movie-playing screens on the back of the seats in front of us make the long flight more bearable. An ironic feeling to be flying over Afghanistan watching the movie "Sex and the City. Mentally thumbed my nose at the Taleban somewhere below.

As our plane came into the descent over Delhi an announcement came on that they were going to spray insecticide inside the cabin, but hey, not to worry, it's perfectly harmless. Well, except to the bugs---and oh---you better cover your eyes everyone.

And there went two or three crew members marching up and down the aisles, two cans of bug spray in each hand, merrily fumigating us where we sat. I finished sputtering on the fumes, and asked what kind of insects they were spraying for. "Oh, lots of different things! Anything!" came the cheery reply.

And so we arrived in India.

Delhi sweltered under a thick yellow-brown haze and 27 Celsius. The airport seemed relatively quiet compared to what I'd been expecting. No problems with customs or retrieving our bags. But the driver from our pre-booked hotel didn't show up at arrivals, so we shrugged and hired a car from the airport who would take us there for about twelve dollars (500 rupees). It was a good decision.

Riding in this little car with our driver in his crisp white uniform and cap was our first glimpse of India: and we had previouslythought there were adventurous (crazy) drivers in Italy!

We honked and wove our way through a chaotic sea of buzzing, roaring, weaving, erratic traffic: open-sided tuk-tuks with bare-footed drivers, motorcycles carrying sari-clad passengers riding elegantly side-saddle, buses, bicycles, cars sporting dents aplenty all obeying some universal code of the road apparently based on faith in the gods.

At one point we noticed two guys lying on their backs on the dusty, garbage-strewn highway median. They were reading books, and we theorized that they'd made it only halfway across before deciding it was safer to stay there a while.

Our taxi driver displayed a gold-coloured Ganesh elephant head on the dash and bobbed his head to Hindi pop tunes as he navigated his way into the narrow, dusty crowded streets of Karol Bagh, the congested neighbourhood where he eventually found the Rahul Hotel Palace--after asking twice for directions, once from a man carrying crates of chickens on his bicycle.

From our hotel (not so much a Palace really), the steady street sounds of honking horns and distant shouts gradually became a strangely soothing background as we relaxed and napped for five hours. There was no question of going for a relaxing walk around our street as we often do to unwind from a long plane trip in a new place. One, we really felt exhausted and ready to just sleep. Two, it wouldn't be relaxing to go for a walk here. I'll be honest and say that the noise and rubble and general ambience of Karol Bagh was not for the already-disoriented to deal with. It was intimidating .

Around eight in the evening we emerged from our room and used the hotel's free internet to send "we made it here safely" emails to all, and then up to the roof-top restaurant to dine on butter naan bread, spicy masala tea, and a huge bowl of butter chicken. The food was excellent, despite the fact that the open kitchen is literally heaped with rubble. Renovations perhaps, but it looked more like earthquake-recovery.

From the roof we had a good view of the busy street below. We also spied where extra mattresses and pillows were stored in the open air. Dust and pollution made the air feel curiously heavy to breathe.

The staff was friendly, but no, this was not a luxury hotel. On the one hand, our room had a beautiful marble floor and beautiful tasselled curtains; on the other hand it's a good plan to bring your own toilet paper sometimes. And we luckily did.

Lights off at midnight, ending our first day in India.