Jet Lag

The Emirates Airlines serves a good variety of tasty food, at least on these long hauls, and even provided a late night cheese pizza...that was about 10am in California.  The flight attendants were gracious, (the women are the ones seen in advertising wearing the red headpiece with the beige scarf), and I believe have been recruited from all over the world.  In-flight movies, TV, audiobooks, radio, and albums are all available on an ICE touch screen personal computer... I had a middle seat, but was in an exit row, so had plenty of leg room.  The leg from Dubai to Delhi was short enough, and I was tired enough that the middle seat in a non-exit row was tolerable.  I watched a couple of episodes of an Emirates documentary on the expansion of the Dubai airport.

 

 

 

This part of Delhi, Paharganj, is known for its cheap (and I mean cheap) hotels, the bustling market scene, and the never ending stream of humanity (on foot, auto-rickshaw, bicycle rickshaw, motorcycle, and automobile). The streets are very narrow with all of the above moving in both directions on either side of the street, the car horn the most persistent noise rising above the general din of movement. 

 

 



 There are a lot of western looking people, young and older, in this hotel, Vivek, on a street called the Main Bazaar.  I can hear all the horns and motorcycle exhaust passing below my second story window.  I may have made a mistake going for cheap.  The shower is a head next to the toilet and a drain in the floor.  The bed has only a muslin cloth over the mattress and there was a heavier throw of some kind.  I slept in my sleeping back liner with the throw over me, and did ok. 

 

As I had discovered at home, the Indian Railway makes it very difficult to make reservations.  The hotel travel desk tried to get me the ticket I wanted from here to Agra, but all trains were full.  I had already planned to have a driver for the trip from Agra to Jaipur, and this guy convinced me to just have a driver take me to Agra.  We also added an extra destination, Pushkar, a center for Hindu worship and pilgrimage.  The rest of the itinerary remains the same.  He also said I could get more done with my own driver here in Delhi, which I tried and agree.  Given the traffic and the driving style...lanes don't matter, pedestrians don't matter...only the horn matters, I decided to use one of his guys, so that I would only have to get used to one person's driving instead of a series of taxi and rickshaw drivers.  I saw a lot and will post pictures later.