The Streets of Delhi

Wednesday, July 9, 2008, New Delhi, India, (Streets of New Delhi, #1000065). The lecture part of the course is over for this city and we have been doing many sites. The Fulbright organization put us up in five star hotels and takes us around to various cultural sites and event. In most large cities of India you have the influence of Muslim, Hindi, Buddhist and Christians with temples, mosques or churches. New Delhi was Muslim ruled for many years so there are many Mosques. We have toured many. Before, we attended a late night light show at the Red Fort which has a history program that includes the history of Muslim, English and Hindi occupation over thousands of years; we were to attend a market. Now, at this point I had not ventured out to the hart of New Delhi. I only have been out for early morning walks to local sites in the “Embassy” part of town. At this time in the program I have ventured off with other people into the city but not very far. Now we go as a group of 34 and head to a market to get eat. Just crossing the street was one of the scariest things I have done in my life. Here in the streets a car with n six inches of you is normal. The group gets scattered and we begin to break up in to small groups of lost Americans. Some groups more savvy than others. We all were headed to a McDonalds. I was not ready for the third world culture in such a short period of time. It was intense to say the least. I saw, smelled and experience too much in a short period of time. The beggars (children), homeless people sleeping on the streets, the high pressure sales man selling stuff on the streets, watching dogs and humans share dinner out of the garbage can, stepping in human waste, the smell of diesel fumes and curry, stepping over legless people on the street, was all a bit much. By the time I made it to McDonalds, I was exhausted. We scrabbled in to McDonald’s as they had a security guard to keep out the beggars. Everyone order but me as I was worried about the food. I ordered Coke with ice. A big mistake 18 hours later. I forgot that you are not supposed to eat the ice. After 30 minutes to regain my composure, I was ready to go back out to the big bad world of Delhi. Now Fulbright has provided us with a handler so we are not doing this all on are own. Even though we have a handler, it still makes we feel uncomfortable. We broke up into smaller groups and wandered around the market. People get paid to bring tourists to certain stalls. So there are people constantly pressuring you to go to a certain store or stall. The people will walk with you for blocks badgering and hounding. They don’t take know for an answer. For my first dip into third world culture, this was a big step.