I fell in love with India. I tried to go without pre-conceived notions, but that was hard. It was worse than I expected, it was better than I expected.
India is a jarring juxtaposition of splendor and squalor. You'll have a luxury hotel that was the palace of the Rajah of Something-or-the-Other right next to a slum that is actually a garbage heap. You'll see beauty and you'll see horror.
We saw dead bodies lying on the sidewalks. I asked what happened with the bodies and was told that the police come by and kick the bodies three times. If there's no response, they call for a dead-wagon. It might not be a dead body, though....just someone wrapped up in a blanket sleeping on the sidewalk. Whole families live on the sidewalk. Walk by in the mornings and people are bathing.....they pour cups of water over themselves pretty much fully dressed. They're cooking, they're tending to their kids. Life goes on.
Cows do wander around the streets. I was told that there are so many cows not necessarily because they are "holy" as I had always heard, but because people move in from the city, bring their cow with them and then can't feed them, so they turn them loose.
You can actually "taste" the air in the cities. You can definitely "see" it. Everything is covered with a layer of dust made up of stuff you don't even want to think about. A deep breath will make you cough, especially in Delhi.
Traffic lanes and signs are mere "suggestions", none of which are heeded. I think all tuk-tuk drivers are immediately escorted into heaven when they die, because they have scared the devil out of more people than all the preachers, priests, imams, and rabbis in history have accomplished. If there's room for three tuk-tuks to fit in between two cars, five tuk-tuks will be there. As they say that there are no atheists in foxholes......there are none riding in tuk-tuks.
Indian people are among the friendliest in the world, I think. They are somewhat reserved, probably because of the population crush, but if you smile at one and say "hello", you will be rewarded with a thousand-watt smile and a friendly greeting. Service is unbelievably good. Waiters, hotel staff, drivers.........they are there to really make sure you are comfortable. I know a lot of it is because they're hoping for a good tip, but here in the U.S., those same people are also hoping for the tips but a lot of time aren't interested in earning them.
A lot of the former "royalty" are really struggling these days. We were at some fort and an elderly man was pointed out to us as the Rajah of ________, whose family had owned the fort. He was getting into a less-than-new Toyota Corolla with about six members of his party. It looked like a clown car at the circus. Very few royal palaces are residences any more. Most are hotels. They may still be owned by the family, but the palace has to pay for itself. There are a few grand high poobahs left, though. The Rajah who owned the hotel we stayed in in Mumbai had an entire floor that was just for him, even though he almost never came to town.
We visited a Hare Krishna temple, where we were treated like honored guests. Luckily, we got there in time to take photos, because it was almost time for the Gods to have lunch, and that had to be covered by a curtain.
Every temple we went in, someone was eager to show us around and tell us about their beliefs. We were "blessed" at every temple.
I hope some day to go back to India. There's so much to see and experience.
And the food. Oh, the food!
