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India! Paneer and bollywood, mixed with the 'scent'! We arrived at the airport and after general nosy interrogation at immigration, we were in Delhi! On the way to the hotel, Claire saw her first elephants on the road...2 giant arses ambling along the outside lane holding up traffic. The hotel was nice, Claire did good research and picked one without rats or leaky roofs!
In the afternoon, the face stuffing began! We stayed in Karol Bagh, which has many restaurants and street stalls...turn left and we had our first paneer tikka at a street corner food stall. Then we wandered through the street stalls selling slippers, shoes, jeans, T-shirts (anything and everything).
We took the rickshaw in the rain to the Red Fort, built by the Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan. We then walked through Chandni Chowk, an adjacent area of markets, shops and houses, to the Jama Masjid Mosque, the largest mosque in India. Claire was made to dress up in a long bright pink flowery gown to cover up her arms..and this made her hugely popular with the kids inside who followed her calling out 'auntie! auntie!'.
This whole area of Delhi was built during the Mughal Empire by Shah Jahan when he moved his capital from Agra. It is now known as Old Delhi and has a lot of charm. We came out of the mosque and walking through the market, Nishal was offered pimple cream by a young boy, shouting after him! This was the way business was done here! We also saw a parade in celebration of Diwali, with many different Hindu gods and godesses being driven around the streets on open air trucks and live bands following.
After wandering around for a while, Claire realised it was past 7pm and she was the only female out and about, and so we quickly made our way back home. The next day we began our tour of Rajasthan bright and early!
On our return a week later, we met up with Naomi and co. for dinner at Connaught Place. The last day was spent shopping in Palika Bazaar and eating loads of street food. We also went to India Gate in the evening and chilled out in the park before heading for our final meal in Delhi!
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