Day 13 - Old Delhi

What a day! I met my tour group for the Intrepid Adventure tour of North India last night. There are 12 of us, from many countries, and 2 leaders (one trainee) - so it is a nice number. We all are in India for the first time, and most on their own, although there are 2 couples. We attempted to learn each others names, then went for dinner in a nice restaurant (had my first beer in 2 weeks!)

In the morning we crammed our way onto a local bus for the ride to the Jame Masjid mosque. The mosque was amazing, built of pinkish stone with ornate towers and domes. We carried our shoes heel to heel, and padded across the cool stone of the large couryard. Some of the guys, feeling energetic, climbed the hundreds of steps to the top of the tallest tower for amazing views across Old Delhi (they promised to let ussee the pictures!).



Above: Jame Masjid mosque

After leaving the mosque we wove our way through the grubby backstreets, with power cables tangled above us like spiderwebs, until we reached the spice market. We stopped off on the way for chai from a street chai wallah (the cheapest and most delicious chai I've had yet!). After exploring the bustling and fragrant spice stalls, we took a crazy (suicidal) rikshaw ride to the train station. Many near misses with bikes/cows/automobiles.



Above: The chai man, rickshaws, delhi streets and spice market

The underground in Delhi is like another world, you decend on escalators from dusty, load streets, to pristine, echoing halls. The underground train system is very new (it was only built last year) and many local people are still wary of it - this was most evident in the people who approached the escalator gingerly, paused to watch the revolving stairs appear from nowhere, then lost their nerve and scurried away.

We then visited a sikh temple. Covering our heads and removing our shoes, we went inside and sat in the main area, and listened awhile to the chanting from the holy book. Hannah, our leader, told us a bit about Sikhism and the temple we were in. Next we visited the temples kitchens, where a group of men and women were making chipattis. There were a bunch of ladies sitting round a low, square table, rolling dough into flat disks and laughing and chatting. Another group were baking the dough and flicking the finished hot bread into waiting baskets. Some of us sat with the ladies and helped them roll out a few chipattis. My attempts were somewhat squarish, but passed the test and were baked, though I gave up after the fifth try with no improvement. The people in the temple were friendly and welcoming, which was a nice difference from the short-tempered men in the muslim mosque.



Above Left: The baking of the chipattis Above right: Me (far right) and Nicole rolling the dough

Lastly we went to connaught place, an upmarket shopping area, for lunch in the coffee house. The food was very yummy, but we were running late so ate quickly and rushed back out to the station to catch the tube back to the hotel.

We were due to catch a 6 o'clock train from old Delhi station. The jouney was to be a 19 hr, overnight, to Jaisalmer, far to the west. The train came quickly, and we hopped aboard and settled in to our booths. For a few hours we chatted away, watching the countryside crawl by. As we went further west the land flattened out into level, sparce scrubland, and the women's sari's became brighter and brighter. We eventually unfolded the beds at about 9, and crawled into our regulation sheets for a night of sleep disturbed by the load coming and goings, of people embarking and disembarking throughout the night.