Escaping Delhi by train

Escaping Delhi we made our way to Old Delhi train station to board our first Indian train to Jaipur. The station itself was pretty daunting, the first task was to actually find out which platform the train was to arrive at. After looking at all of the arrival boards we eventually found it scribbled on a random whiteboard (platform 5...wherever that was). On getting to the platform it dawned on us that we were the only Westerners and we stuck out like a sore thumb (or toe). We had a lot of attention especially stares from men as we sat on the platform floor surrounded by our bags. Numerous trains were passing through the station but we had no idea which one was ours and most of the people in the station didn't speak good English. After Trevor pointed at the ticket repeatedly one educated looking local managed to explain what we needed to look out for and that the train may well be late (we now understand India has its own special time, if you ask any Indian person how long something will take it usually equates to one minute...or 1 kilometer, no matter how far).

As the time for our train approached/passed we spotted the only other Westerner in the train station. We decided to approach him (strength in numbers whilst backpacking) and were introduced to Luis from spain who was on a 2 week trip around India and appeared equally as lost as us in the station. When a train came into the station 40 minutes after ours was due we decided it must be the one to Jaipur and hopped on board randomly waving our ticket at people for confirmation.

Sitting in class 2 AC we were in a 4 person berth (2 beds up/2 beds down) with a tiny filthy window allowing a modest view of the outside world. The 6 hour train journey was quite an experience where we started playing cards and talking to a couple of Indian boys (Prem - a 17 year old student & Nitish - a 22 year old graduate). They were great at giving us an insight into many aspects of Indian culture and food recommendations (Gulab Jamun was an excellent tip)! We also experienced train food which was suprisingly good though Sophie nearly blew her head off on what she thought was a green bean but which turned out to be the hottest chilli ever grown in the world (her opinion). When Luis asked the conductor if there was a bin he promptly opened up a window and threw all our rubbish out on the tracks to keep - presumably to keep the toilet waste and people walking along the tracks company! Something we quickly realised from this journey is that Indians are never in a hurry until it comes to getting on/off a mode of transport.....there were people occupying our seats before we had even disembarked.

Jaipur - Room theives

On arriving at Jaipur (the capital of Rajasthan) we had no accommodation booked so jumped in a taxi with Luis to his prebooked hostel (Hotel Vinayak) to see if there was a spare room. Unfortunately there was only one dorm bed free so the hostel staff suggested Luis swap with us so we could take his double room (we still feel guilty Luis...hopefully dinner and beer made up for it).

There were lots of homeless people sleeping on the paths in Jaipur; at one point Sophie was lucky enough to get at eyeful of one mans nether regions...We weren't overly impressed with the city itself; we did a half day tour to see the Amber Fort, Water Palace, Wind Palace and Monkey Temple (we didn't see many monkeys but Sophie was forced into getting a henna tattoo on her arm at a cost of 300IRP plus a donation to the temple - ripped off in our tired state.) However we did manage to avoid the elephant village and Mughal factory which our rickshaw driver was adamant we visit (he was getting commission for this - a common practice tourists have to suffer in India). We also enjoyed our first bit of street food here; a vegetable samosa (10p) that Trevor bought from a stall/hole in the wall whilst Sophie stayed in the Rickshaw to avoid seeing the state of the place it was being made in.

We have since kept in touch with Luis who had a really interesting outlook and a saying we've used a couple of times since "You may have plans for India but India may also have plans for you" - very true Luis!