It wasn’t new to me honking car horns is the number one national pastime in India. The superfluous noise making should, or probably did already, inspire a conductor to make a symphony. However I wouldn’t have thought the yearning for attention was so excessive. In extreme moments it feels like a horde of extremely loud wasps is following me wherever I go. In more quiet times it just seems I’m in the middle of a pond full of angry ducks, who are vigorously quacking at each other. I’m happy to be in India.
Yesterday I arrived in Delhi. The airport looked brand new and conspicuously clean. When I was squeezing my hand luggage into my backpack, spreading out some belongings over a few seats, a cleaner, leaning on his broom, looked at me from a distance. I was uncertain if this was out of fear for me dropping some rubbish on the floor or maybe hoping I would do exactly that. Probably though, he wondered why foreigners always bring so much useless stuff along.
However, please, allow me to defend myself. During my travels in the Middle East I had an eighty-five liter backpack, the one I have now only has space for thirty-five liters of things I cannot live without. In other words: I used to travel with 245 percent more luggage. I met a girl from Canada in Moscow, her bag is only one third the size of mine. It makes me wonder how she manages. I witnessed her profound love for walking, which might be very healthy, unless all the inhaled car fumes kill you first. There are no hard feelings because she introduced me to a few wonderful Indian dishes and knows how to make coffee.
Today we experienced a little bit of Indian bureaucracy attempting to buy train tickets at the train station. The tourist offices couldn’t sell anymore, because they had reached their quota. An Israeli complained to a sales clerk: “This is no logic.” The reply came quick and left him baffled: “There is no logic here.” Someone coming to India looking for logical logic will probably be disillusioned. Although Indian variations on logic are interesting and I hope to find many of them. “The Shelton Hotel” is a fine example. It worked on me, until I actually saw their restaurant where we wanted to have a bite just for the fun of it.
The practices of the Shelton kitchen were shielded by the dirtiest rags I had ever seen. It made wonder what was running the place. It wouldn’t surprise me if this was where the directors of “Ratatouille” got their inspiration.
As I write this I’m on a roof terrace and a girl has just sat down on an opposite table. She is wearing a black shirt that propagates in pink letters: “Great Kisser”, I think that the pink heart underneath this bald statement is meant to convince everyone of this truth. I’m just happy I finally saw someone who buys that crap and actually wears it. (To any reader who has these kind of t-shirts too: No, it’s not me, it’s you.) There’s probably no need to mention she was American.
The thing is that I don’t see many tourists here and I hope that there will be more in the rest of India. I might become a little lonely if not. Or maybe I should buy a “Great Kisser” t-shirt too.
As I write this I notice that I have written about things that might not seem very beautiful, but let me comfort you, the combination of these moments does make me smile.
Now I’m off to Agra to see the Taj-Mahal at sunrise.
Click here for an overview of all posts about my time in India
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1 reacties:
Dear Garfield,
The same sober self in India because if you want to get what you want you have to be like this. Have much fun in no- logic- country. Perhaps though they know much better than we what logic is. Looking forward to more, much love from Andrea
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