Remembering the Warm Welcome
Around 0630 we step off our chic 777 and proceed through the slick new Terminal 3 of Indira gahndi airport. A clever trick but a bit unfair: Ebru takes a few snaps with our new compact camera under the illusion that she’s actually going to enjoy what’s comeing next…
In Pahar Ganj we exit our aiport transfer cab and after the ritual ‘beg’ ("You pay for transport to hotel. You can pay me tip now.") and the adjoining complaint ("Oh, sir, minimum driver tip in India is 100Rupees"), not the 10 rupees I have handed over, we make our way into the undergrowth of Delhi’s number 1 port of call for newly arrived travellers.
It’s coming back to me now as we pass the open-air piss-cubicle to the right of our narrow, covered alleyway and take in the lingering stink along with the thick aromas of burned incenses and sour milk. ‘Yup, just as I remember it’ I silently chuckle to myself – a subconscious attempt to stave the fear of actually having to stay here again.
A few coughing and spitting indiviuals on, left into an adjoining alleyway and past a spindly, white-bearded old man in his 2x1m bedroom cubicle we arrive at the New King hotel we booked ahead of coming. I’m not expecting anything fancy, but for 400 Rupees (250 more than my previous average nighly rate in India) I was expecting something almost… nice. The reception room looks like a dusty, derelict office building with black marble counter-top and finishings. A stoned-looking Punjabi peers across asking if we need a room. After offering our booking receipts and passports for the mandatory signing-in he asks us about our plans in India and proceeds to try enlighten us about why everything we have planned is a bad idea and and won’t work out – "India has changed, my friend…"
What a cock!
The room is just as on the Interner photograph. Only without the shiny veneer that a flash and colour enhanced digital images deliver. The walls have grease-marks and chipped paint. The floor has limescale where the water from the en-suite (hehehehe) has spashed over underneath the disintegrating door. A far cry from normal standards but I’ve had worse. And aside from electricity and running water we have a WINDOW to the open air!
I look at Ebru. Ebru’s suitably impressed. She’s tip-toeing around and trying not to touch anything. The next few days will be interesting.
After a long midday nap, we take an afternoon stroll to Connaught Place, the circular "shopping arena" off PaharGanj, which I gather must be quite an attraction because most touts and rickshaw drivers are asking if we want to go there. We take the journey on foot, down the littered main station road. On the sidewalk we pass a malnourished sleeping/comatose man, contorted, his gown draped op over his top end, his bottom ends completely exposed. We walk the circle of connnaught place. It’s a building site. Maybe a scrap yard? We are left relatively in peace but I do get hijacked by a man selling head massagers; I refuse the offer but he chases after us relentlessly and when he has me cornered, he sets his device upon my scalp. I don’t know if I’m more overcome by the pleasantness of the scalp massage or the dread of how many scalps it must have met before mine. Ebru decides on McDonalds for dinner – I don’t blame her. It’s crowded. We order a Paneer and a Veg Burger and find a seat next to a nice middle-aged Indian couple, and have a pleasant talk about business, travel, India, then we say our good-byes and we leave.
We grab a couple of Quarts of beer at the wine shop the Indian man told us about in McD’s and return to our room in P.G. We drink and talk, study the maps and guides. It’s nice but there’s an uneasiness in the air and I know what it is: Ebru fears that the rest of India will be like this… or worse. And I fear that I know the hardest part is only likely to begin soon and I’m not so confident anymore whether I can or want to overcome it again.