Is Delhi really one of the hardest places in the world to live?
It can’t actually be the most difficult place to live. I mean Afghanistan might be pretty bad…or say Iraq. But 
then wearing a burka might have it’s benefits. If I could not be so easily identified, perhaps I could blend in…or could I? An American friend of m
ine today pointed out the Westerners actually walk different than most Indians. Even in a burka (head to toe black cover of some Muslim women), I could be identified as an outsider. All this to say, people who have lived all over the world say that you can’t get more challenging than living in Delhi, India.
We just do it. We deal. We have many Indian guides, and when we don’t we bulldoze through. We are Americans–that’s what we do. We make it work. We work hard. And if we don’t go insane, we do a pretty damn good job.
These days the sun rises late and sets early, but the temperature is perfect. The dust is black, our buggers are black, the sleep in our eyes is black. Pollution, Rajastani dust, trash burning…
I think I woke up to a drum beating parade this morning. But maybe that was just a dream because it happened last week too.
Someone said that every rule in India is made to be broken, except for the ones that apply to you. It’s true.
If a bribe is what a person pays for a judge to make an unjust judgement that what is it when you are pressured to pay for someones “chai aur panai” (water and tea) in order for them to do their job and do it justly? Extortion. We are the victims. But, they are too. They have been used and abused their whole lives. Now they can only laugh. They laugh in the morning at the park together in Yoga form.
Nothing is quality. Everything will be replaced, in a year or less..perhaps it will only last a day. Water thermos, trash cans, lamps, tables, pots, pans, everything. Buildings will fall down, paint will chip, water will leak, cabinets will fall, what happened to the people who built the Taj Mahal? They knew perfection, they knew equations, they knew precise!
Is it all koas? All? No, not all. For somethings there are rules, there are ways. But where what they are we do not know. Sometimes we bump our heads– Sometimes we smack into a wall like a bird flies into a freshly washed picture window. Sometimes we stub our toes.
Everyone has time. Time for tea, time to argue over ten ruppees for an auto fare, time to ask strangers nosy questions, time to pick one’s nose, time to pee on the side of the road, but no time to throw an empty bottle in a bin. On the road no one has time, cars push bikes, squeeze past buses, bump into autos, knock over a bicycle, hit an old lady. Somepeople yell, shake thier fits and keep on going. On the metro they push, they shove, and then the big fat men sit under the sign that says “Ladies Only.”
Is Delhi really one of the hardest places to live? What can we do learn how to navigate and/or cope in this place? Does it help to have friends to gripe with…or does that just make us into complaining babies?
A Long-Term Foreign Tourist
Ok, so I kind of am a tourist. But, I am a professional tourist–a long-term foreign tourist (LTFT) One of the things that comes with being a LTFT in the capital of India is that you are expected to be a tour guide. I have been to the Taj 4x, the Red fort 3x, Jama Masjid 3x, Humayan’s Tomb 3x, Qitib Minar 3x, and I have taken guests shopping in Delhi’s Bizarres so many times that I cannot count. The worst experiences by far are the ones that involve leading a group of 5 or more white people around. With a group of whities you are a sitting duck. “Madam, Madam, looking free,” “Hello, Hello,” and when you ignore them “what you do not speak?
But the funniest thing about being a LTFT is when you end up being a tour guide to Indians visiting from other parts of the country or even other parts of town. See all of the attention of the gauntlet (peddlers and all) is focused on you, people think that your Indian friends are your guides or are working for you in someway. Yesterday I was taking around Soniya (a Delhi friend of mine), Arun (a guy from Andra), and two American girls. Arun was by far the most excited tourist and had the biggest camera. I was his guide. But later we joked that people must have tought that I was a very rich lady who hired a professional photographer to photograph me and my friends in Old Delhi.
While taking a group of 5 or more whities around is the worst possible tour guide situation for the LTFT, the best possible sinareo is when the LTFT can be enfolded into a brownie dominated group. The trick is Indian clothing and not speaking. Then people think, she is not really a foreigner, she just has a skin disease or she used too much whiting cream and an LTFT is left to enjoy her friends and seeing the sites. I’ve thought about purchacing a burka for such situations.
me tourist nehe ho (I am not a tourist!)
The other day I left Humayan’s Tomb which is a beautiful mausoleum with my dear friend Christin by auto rickshaw. Auto rickshaw drivers in Delhi tend to be clever and rarely go by the set meter, but the guys sitting outside of the historical tourist spots are most devious of all. You ask them how much and they say “just Rs. 200″ when the metered price would only be Rs.50. Then once you are on the way, they try to talk you into going to a cottage emporium so that they will receive commission from the shop keeper. Over and over I find myself saying, “me tourist nehe ho, Delhi me rihate hai. Come karo.” (I am not a tourist, I live in Delhi, come down on your price.) On this particular day, I was very tired, not feeling well, and a bit chilly. Our driver had spent 250 days in America and spoke English well. He wanted to take us to a shop so desperately and he knew that I was “old to Delhi,” so said, “come to this shop with me, you don’t have to buy anything, they will give me Rs.100 and you can keep your Rs.70, I will take you home for free.” While this was somewhat tempting, I am not so Indian enough to go for it. I just wanted to go home. “Bahai, No, I just want to go home. Take me home.”
Later on that same day, Christin and I were leaving the movie theater at CP. It was just after ten thirty and that is late for Delhi. We were looking for a auto-rickshaw again. These guys were asking ridiculous prices. Then one guy agreed to my price, but I looked and there was another man in the back seat. They were both large men. “Who is he?” I asked. “My friend,” he said. “No, No.” I said and we walked away. We were not about to get into a rickshaw with two men we could not beat up. Finally we found a smiling little guy that together we could have beat up. But we didn’t have to beat him up, he smiled and sang songs the whole way to our house where paid him, shook his hand and said, “Thank you.”
