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Delhi Highlife
I woke up quite abruptly at 5am with my grumpy old room mate switching the full lights on, pulling back the curtains and shifting my legs over as he sat down on my bed! The cheek! This is not to mention the 3 times I woke up between 3am and 4am when he was making loud phone calls! I had made my mind up, this man was officially a total c**k! I tried to continue sleeping but the funny thing was he went back to sleep at 7am so why get up and wake me up at bloody 5am when we still have another 6 hours left on the train!
Anyway I snoozed on and off and read my guide book and made some plans for Delhi but the worst part of the journey was when it was coming up to the expected time of arrival in Delhi 11am and the hotel was calling me saying their driver was waiting for me, it was hard to explain to them that the train, and therefore I, would be late but I had no idea how late because there was no way I could know how far we were from arriving even if I knew where on earth we were. From then it still took another 2 hours to arrive and then there was the task of finding the driver as I kept getting calls saying different places he would be waiting which didn't make sense to me as I had no idea where anything was. To cut the story short I spent another hour lugging my bags around markets and on several cycle rickshaws until the driver from the hotel and I finally found each other, turns out he was waiting in the car park across the road from the station but the hotel called with directions to the chandni chowk market entrance grrrrr. So I got in the big black shiney a/c (air conditioned) car which had a furry carpeted floor and two leather armchairs in the back and a screen between me and the driver. I have to explain at this point that I had not previously booked my hotel for my return to Delhi and thought I'd treat myself so I booked a boutique hotel for two nights on the outskirts of New Delhi called 'Te New Delhi' so this is the car they provided to pick me up! We drove along then the driver asked if I was thirsty and I said yes hoping we could stop for a bottle of water but he stopped at a roadside stall selling sugar cane lemon water which he returned with after two minutes and passed it to me through my window in a glass. It was a little awkward because (a) I didn't want to drink it because I had no idea where the water came from and I did not want to spend the next few days in bed, I'd been lucky so far and (b) It tasted like seawater with a hint of lemon, boke! I took a couple of sips reluctantly to be plight and handed back the practically full glass and said it's a little too salty for me, he then disappeared and returned with a fresh glass of plain water which I still had no idea if it would kill me but I had to drink it all!
After driving like a maniac though Delhi towards the outskirts and what I guess was the businessy areas we arrived at the hotel. The car drove right up into a small carpeted parking lot underneath the hotel and my bags were taken care of as I was ushered through to an elevator inside and up to the reception area where I was told to have a seat and a welcome drink was presented to me. I filled out the necessary paperwork (passport/visa number and arrival/onward destination info as usual in hotels here) and was then showed up to my room. My room was amazing! I don't know if its because I have been used to pokey little hotels and tourist hippy places with a chilled out vibe but my suite (called the naturally suite) tops them all for the wow factor and would have paid a bomb for this at home. My favourite bit is the shower with two shower heads I might add and speakers in the that hook up to the tv so as soon as I got in I popped a music channel on the telly and had a wee dance in the shower :-)
I pretty much spent the rest of the afternoon in my awesome hotel room playing with the aircon and tv and exploring the mini bar (you'd think I'd never seen a decent hotel never mind worked in one!) but I did head out late afternoon (it's very entertaining watching the doorman in his indian uniform run to get the door for me and I have tried to catch him off guard several times but he's too fast) to explore the area (Nehru place) which I found just around the corner with a cineplex including all the junk food I could ever want (McDonalds, Subway, Dominos etc) I bought some drinks and snack to out in my fridge as the hotel was expensive compared to street prices and then back to the hotel to enjoy my plasma tv. A little later I had my first cocktail in India in the hotel lounge and had some journal time (blog updating) and then had dinner in the restaurant. I ordered a tandoori chicken burger which was beautifully presented with flowers and patterns written in a spicy sauce around my plate and had a glass of red wine, although the wine was oh so good, I probably should have remembered that wine for some reason is not very popular in india and extrememly expensive even by western standards and what I paid for one glass could have bought me 3 Thalis in Rajasthan (about £6)! I then retired to my room to cosy up in my comfy bed (first duvet in almost 3 weeks!) and watched charlies angels on Indian HBO with a cup of herb tea and went to sleep to get a good nights rest before my last full-day in Delhi.
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Guy Ingerson Glad to see your enjoying yourself mr. Been reading the blogs off and on. Good times :). Looking forward to Thailand ones!