INDIA, part one - very first impressions

So we arrived in India. The first impression is CHAOS. Whatever you thought was ‘too much’ in Thailand or Laos is here multiplied hundred times. People are everywhere and they bother at every corner to buy something to give money or food, to stay at somebody’s hotel, to take this bus or that train or this taxi or that bicycle, depending on where you are. Or they simply want to have a chat ‘hello madam, hello sir, where are you going, which country...’.  It is scary to see all these poor people on the street and no other travelers anywhere near. Henner was too scared to even take his camera out as he fears that somebody will grab it and run away.

First we tried to make our way to Dehra Dun to our first couchsurfing host. Amazed by the traffic rules (no rules at all with any signs and lines seem to have the sole purpose of decorating the city) we sit in the taxi a bit nervous of where we will end up.

After 45 minutes we reach the bus terminal. The first time on India’s streets is a SHOCK (see above). Indian bus station is nothing one would imagine under this word.

Trying to find our way to the ticket office or anything that looks official we were bothered by some guy claiming to have a bus to Dehra Dun. So we followed him into a little street office (very dodgy) and we were explained how much the bus costs, where and when it leaves from. As this was the exact example in our guidebook what not to do (follow some guy who claims there is a bus) we decided to walk around and find the official bus ticket office.

Unfortunately we could not find it and ended up buying a ticket from another a little bit less dodgy looking office for a bus leaving in one hour. Simply we did everything all guidebooks say you should NOT do :-)

Exhausted and shocked by our surrounding we spotted McDonalds. Never ever were we happier in our lives than at this particular moment seeing McDonalds. Little oasis in the middle of chaos.

Having a little quiet place to think we decided not to go to Dehra Dun as it was 7 hour bus ride and we did not really trust our ticket nor the bus nor the guy who sold us the ticket = we were to scared that we will end up somewhere in the middle of nowhere butchered. We didn’t even plan to claim the money back but to quietly disappear however they were looking for us and waiting for us! We made up a little story about our friend being sick and they simply gave us our money back! In western world gesture unheard of.

We ended up in a hostel in New Delhi near the Main Bazaar. Crazy place with even more people bothering you and more shops and more cows and dogs and noise and dirt. 

As we said... first impression of India... (how many times did we say 'crazy'? :-)