Thursday, October 17, 2002

Planned
So it's all set. Plans were made and I reserved our hotel rooms. I'm so excited! Our first night we'll be staying in Delhi, right by the New Delhi train station, north of Paharganj. Hotel Ajanta. 500Rs. for a double room. We'll be staying there Friday night after flying into Delhi and exploring the city. Then Saturday (Carla's birthday) we'll take a train to Agra, where the Taj Mahal is located. The place we're going to stay at sounds so fantastic. Here's the Rough Guide to India review:
Taj Ganj Area
Hotel Sheela, East Gate
Easily the best budget hotel in Taj Ganj: secluded, impeccably clean rooms only 200m fromt eh Taj (inside the "no pollution zone"), ranged around a lovely little garden, the air-cooled options are larger and only slightly more expensive. Dependably hygenic restaurant and friendly Alsatian dog called Tiger add to it's charm.

Doesn't it sounds great?! And I called and talked to a guy there who was super nice. We got each double room for only 250Rs. Also, because Agra is such a tourist place, everything is such a tourist trap for foreigners. It's rediculous, but not worth not going over. The guy was so nice, he informed us to not tell the Rikshaw drivers where we'll be staying because he doesn't give them commission and they won't take us there. Instead we have to trick them and just say the East Gate of the Taj. Plus, I feel very happy going to this place because it will have dependable food. There has been a scam in the past, where some restaurants in Agra will deliberately make you sick, then they'll reccomend a doctor, and one you go to the doctor, they will charge you hundreds of dollars to your insurance in some scan, making a big nightmare. I guess everyone has scamming connections in Agra. We have to be very careful with everything we do. Also, Delhi is supposed to be a very unsafe city, so I think the idea of staying in groups at all time and not going very far afterdark will be taken very seriously. The other good thing is that Sunday when we come back from Agra we have a free dinner and place to stay! Asha, our South Asian Civ teacher for the past three weeks, lives in Delhi and has invited all eight of us to her home to stay for the night. It's going to be so much fun. And we'll get to meet her 3year old son and see Chankyapuri, a nice neighborhood (or so I've heard) in Delhi.
I'm so excited for this adventure! Especially the train ride back, which will be a great way to see a lot of the country. We got tickets for the express train, so it's only 26 hours. We'll leave at 3pm on Monday and get into Pune at 5pm on Tuesday. Also, the train was only about 470Rs! As opposed to the 6,000Rs we spent on a one way plane ticket to Delhi.

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