The other face of India

A beautiful and so diverse country of India is a big hit among adventure seeking travellers and free minded backpackers. The journey into the land of peace or a spiritual haven as I like to call it, could, however, turn into a nightmare.

When I heard the horrific story of a girl raped on a bus in Delhi, I suddenly realized that this could have been me. Now I know how reckless I have been during my travels. The danger multiplies if you are travelling alone and happen to be white (it sounds harsh, but it is true - you grab a lot more attention and what is more, locals think you are the rich American uncle from Bollywood movies) or a female (white and blond at the same time is the worst case scenario).

I was really lucky and fortunately nothing serious happened to me. On the contrary, I ended up with amazing experiences, life long friendships and the urge to visit the incredible India again. But next time I am going to be much more careful…

Travelling

When I first wrote down my itinerary, I had not realized that India was such a big country with such a slow transportation. That is right, you can hardly see half of the country in six weeks! So in the middle of my trip I decided to change my return flight to a later date, and I have definitely never come to regret it.

The easiest way of travelling across India is to go by trains; it is cheap, reasonably fast (well, at least some of the connections...) and you can get almost anywhere. However, if you are planning to visit any of the mountain destinations, you will probably need to take a bus due to the lack of railway links. The best and safest way, therefore, is to take a private bus. Even though a private bus is usually ten times more expensive than a government one - which means that the ticket cost increases from 2 pounds to more than 15 at times (indeed, a small price to pay for your safety!) but they do tend to be faster, more comfortable and have an AC (can save your butt, literally, when going up North.) I never had too much problem buying tickets from any travel office in the city.

People were still staring at me on private buses but at least I had an allocated seat and there were also more women present (at least my mind was at peace).

When I was leaving Chandigarh, I was feeling adventurous and told to myself that I am no spoiled tourist who requires a comfortable bus. So I sat on the first government night (!) bus. Wrong!

My destination was Manali. Regardless of the intense cold (and obviously no AC and windows which you could barely close), I soon realized that I was the only woman left in the vehicle. As a precaution I sat in the front, right behind the driver but as it later turned out, it still was not enough. When the bus hit serpentines and my neighbour kept getting closer to me, I just figured he was doing so due to the hideous road. But when he covered himself with the blanket and put his hands underneath it, I started to get suspicious. I still thought that the blanket was shaking due to the poor road surface, but when I smelt his body fluids I stopped pretending that nothing is happening. I wanted to scream, I wanted to cry, I wanted to run away… but all I could do was to push him away (and open the window). There was not much I could do anyway because I was too afraid of ending up harassed by the whole bus and dumped somewhere on the way. After hearing that sad news of the Delhi gang rape incident, I think I did the right thing of not drawing any attention to myself. I was lucky and reached Manali in the morning without any further incidents. But now I know that I would not be taking the government bus again, especially when travelling alone and most definitely, not the night one.


Hotels

Fortunately, I found a nice hotel in Manali and made some really good friends there. So I suppose I could say, in a very, very odd way, that the bus trip was worth it.

It is not always this easy to find a good hotel in India though. In fact, if you are a backpacker going from place to place without booking anything in advance, you should avoid reaching your destination at night. Seems pretty obvious, however sometimes you could end up stranded on a station for hours or missing your connection, which will result in reaching your destination later than anticipated.

My next trip was to Shimla which I reached after 9 pm due to unforeseen circumstances. What greeted me was nothing more than a dark, quiet and empty town. When I reached the bus stand, I was tempted to follow the first guy who claimed to know a good hotel. I thought to myself that I can either trust him or wander around an alien town on my own, having no clue as to where any hotels are. I believe there are still good people in this planet so decided to think positively. I followed the man all the way to the Upper Mall Road through stairs and dark corridors, until I was totally exhausted from carrying my backpack, and quite frankly my own legs too. We reached a hotel, which seemed alright at the first glance but when the owner showed me couple of rooms I felt really uncomfortable. The double beds had cushion hearts over them and the red curtains gave me the creeps.

“Would you like an Indian boyfriend, madam?”

“What??” I stared at the hotel owner in absolute amazement and quickly stroke my face with left hand so that my wedding ring was on display.

“No thanks, I am married!” I am not. Just one of my safety precautions…

I stayed in the hotel. There was nowhere else to go.

“You know, you are really pretty,” he continued as I pushed him out of my doors.

‘Oh just shut up’, I thought to myself, ‘I am locking the door and leaving the first thing in the morning…’

Well, the morning after was quite ‘interesting’ too. I got the worst wake up call ever. It was before 6 am when I heard people in the room above me having very loud sex (would not be surprised if it was the hotel owner himself!) and I must admit I had never heard anything more unsettling. I left the hotel immediately.

Of course not all the strangers want to use you and not all the hoteliers are freaks. One of the best things which happened to me during my trip was meeting all those great people with warm hearts and sincere desire to help others.

I left Shimla after three days. Next destination: Kasauli. I read somewhere in a tourist brochure that this is a great destination for holiday seekers looking for peace and tranquillity. This was exactly what I needed!

I reached Kasauli during the day (I had learnt my lesson!) and started looking for a hotel immediately. Prices for a room begun from thousand rupees, whereas in any other town I had never have to pay more than 400. I went from place to place to check the room rates but soon realized something odd about this town; there were no backpackers and in fact there were no beggars on the street (there is just one street really). I also saw many well off Indian couples and a white girl.

When I crossed the market for third time, the girl came to me and invited me for chai. She introduced me to Rajesh, a friend of hers. Esther was a couchsurfer from Holland, and the only reason she visited the town was because she had a ‘couch’ to stay on. As they explained to me, Kasauli is a favourite holiday destination for young Indian families. And that is why it is so incredibly expensive so no backpackers wish to come here. Make sense now! As I talked to my new friend Esther, Rajesh was busy making calls. After he finished, he turned to me:

“So how much could you pay for a room?”

“I guess around 500 most?” I replied.

I am not sure if his facial expression was more that of amusement or of pity, but after a while he replied:

“I got a room for you. For free.”

Obviously, I was surprised, but more than anything, suspicious. Men do like to take advantage of the other half everywhere and not only in India. If Esther would not be sitting with us, I would run away in that instance. But because she trusted him and they both looked genuinely nice people, I tried my luck. Rajesh runs couple of hotels in the town, and as I later found out, one of his regular guests was also my close friend from Chandigarh. World is such a small place :)

Drugs

However, sometimes you run out of your luck and people you think you can trust will prove you wrong.

In a colourful, but also one of the dirtiest cities, Varanasi, I stayed in a small hotel near Shivala Ghat. Because I was in the city during the off-season, there were not that many tourists and certainly not that many festivities going on.

The hotel had a tiny roof top restaurant where I sometimes dined. There were never any other guests but I did not mind that. One night, it was after sunset, I came there again. I could not help not to notice a young man with curly black hair sitting at one of the tables while rolling his cigarette.

He looked up, still thoroughly moving the paper between his fingers, and said:

“Good evening madam. Please, have a seat.”

I did.

He introduced himself as Ahmad, the owner of the hotel.

“Aren’t you quite young to own a hotel?” I asked.

“No, this is my second hotel actually.”

He came from a well off Muslim family who had always lived in Varanasi. But because he was such a busy man (a term I am not sure Indians completely understand) his uncle took care of the guests in his absence.

Ahmad finished rolling and asked me if I wanted one. I politely refused. He put the cigarette on the table next to the plate, and started rolling another one. This time not with tobacco, but with marihuana leaves.

“Have you tried Varanasi special lassi? It’s our great speciality, everyone’s drinking it here.”

I had never heard about it…

He did mention there was a little bit of marihuana in the drink, but I assumed that could not be too much to harm me. I ordered it – surprisingly it was the most expensive item on the menu- and since I was thirsty, finished the drink quite quickly.

“Are you alright?”

I was surprised with Ahmad’s question. Sure, why I would not be? When he asked third time, I realized it was time for me to return to my room.

“We could go for a walk if you would like. And tomorrow I can take you to see the university.”

No thanks, I’m just going to lock myself in the room, I thought. His intentions were now clear to me and they were definitely not honest ones. Soon I excused myself and left for my room, locked the door, used the bathroom and suddenly... it hit me! I was flying, hallucinating, had panic attacks and tachycardia. I was really hot in one minute and then I felt my feet cramping from cold. How was I supposed to know that Varanasi lassi is actually bhang (marihuana cooked in milk which makes a strong drug). I was drugged for more than 48 hours and it was the scariest thing in my life.

I heard many stories about girls being drugged in India. Obviously, it is quite easy. They just need a little bit of your trust and you are theirs!

People

Trust is hard to earn, as we say in the Western world. In India however, trust is either there from the beginning, or it is not. If people want to deceive you, you will quickly learn to recognize their intentions and stop talking to them after a minute. I realized how much easier (and safer) it was to trust women. As far as I am concern, they cannot sexually harass me. This is also why I accepted help from a lady in uniform guarding the gate of Taj Mahal.

My visit to Agra was really brief; couple of hours for visiting the mosque would be more than enough, I thought. I had only enough cash for that one day, assuming I would find an ATM at the train station. I was wrong. The machine was nowhere to be seen and rikshamen already surrounded me. I could just take a shot of Taj Mahal from outside of the gates, I thought to myself. Who wants to pay 750 Rsp anyway! (For an Indian national it is 25 rupees...) I reached the gates but still could not see the great building. I asked a female guard where the best spot to take pictures from outside the complex was.

“You have to go inside if you want to see Taj Mahal. You can’t see it from out here. Why don’t you buy the ticket and go inside?”

I explained that I am here only for a few hours, and it is a lot of money to spend and anyway, I even do not have that much cash on me. She pulled out her wallet without any hesitation, took out the money and hand it to me.

I stared at her in absolute shock: “No, I can’t take it madam…”

My refusal was unsuccessful. Shraddha, as I later found out her name, bought me the ticket and without knowing how, I was already passing the entrance.

Taj Mahal was magnificent, obviously. Except I was more overwhelmed with Shraddha’s good heart and her wish to help me. I did not really need the money and I certainly did not wanted to take it from a young Indian woman. Afterwards I invited her for chai and we exchanged emails. I told her I will pay her back.

“I am a woman, you are a woman. What is the difference? We are exactly the same. We need to help each other,” she said.

Shraddha’s words have echoed in my head ever since. We are the same. White, black, the rich or a beggar; the difference between people is not in the nationality nor in the status, it is our heart and kindness what makes us different.