Major Bakthi died last year, and as one of the consequences his guesthouse is no longer in operation. We walked 300 metres further down the road and stayed at the Basera-hotel,19 ajmer road (0562-363641) for 325 rupees. The room was good value (hot water, Sat-TV), but if you want your laundry clean and dry, take it somewhere else. Also find your own taxi's (we will come back to that later). In Agra we found ourselves a personal rikshaw-driver: Papud. First we paid every trip, later by the day. We paid around Rs 10 for each trip.
The Taj Mahal is unbelievable. Normally once you get to any object you know from pictures, it's always less impressive. On photographs the Eiffel Tower is golden, in reality it's rusty, those kind of things. The Taj is different. It's possible to spend hours looking at it. The colour changes all the time and although there are loads of tourists it's surrounded by a quiet atmosphere. We visited the Taj twice, once just after our arrival at sunset on Friday (free entry on that day). As there wasn't a sunset, but only fog, there weren't many visitors. The Taj rose up from the fog, looking like a castle straight from heaven. A very special experience. On Sunday we visited the Taj in daylight. We had to stand in line this time, with about 500 people in front of us waiting for the security-check. It took about half an hour. Not so bad though, as we left some hours later there were more than 2000 people waiting.
The red Fort cannot be missed, but try to visit Dayal Bagh also. It's a new Hindu temple that is being built in the North of the city. They started building it in 1904. I visited it 15 years ago and compared with that time I didn't have the impression that much progress is made. Visit the marble-workshops next door; there will be someone to show you around for some bakshees.
We had excellent south-Indian thali's at Dasaprakesh in the Meher theatre complex on Gwalior road. Kwality on Taj road was equally good. Buy some cakes and pastry to take away and eat them on the train.
We booked a train to Varanasi. It departs from the station of Tundla some 12 kilometres from Agra. We asked the hotel for a taxi and were taken to a small booking office a couple of blocks away. There we couldn't book a taxi (later, later) but some guy started talking about how much money you could earn by importing gemstones in your homecountry. Most people will recognise the story and we also didn't fall for it. It ended very quickly when I suggested that I would take the stones to Europe and that some weeks later a friend who would come to India would bring the proceeds to him. This was not the scenario the con man had in mind. So he left very quickly. We still had no taxi, and we got the feeling that they tried to put us in a tight timeframe in order to get a ridiculous price for the ride. So we just left, collected our bags at the hotel, took a tuk-tuk to the busstation and took a bus to Tundla.
The train was only two hours late and we killed the time on the platform drinking chai from disposable clay cups. Lots of tea, because it was pretty cold (even by Dutch standards). The ticket cost Rs 816 in 2-tier AC. Next day we arrived in Mughal Sarai Junction, a station some 10 kilometres from Varanasi and took a minibus into town.
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Varanasi; that magical holy city! Take a boatride in the morning and see the worshippers take their bath in the Ganges. Well, forget it; not in December! 8 degrees Celsius is definitely too cold for the average Indian. Instead of bathing the Indians were dressed in blankets and bonnets and shivering around little fires in the middle of the streets. The cremations at the burning ghats were business as usual. Death is a more natural part of life in India than it is in the west; it's still striking to see dead bodies being transported in a rikshaw or on top of a taxi. By the way and as a guideline; rikshaws are Rs 10 from the centre to the railway station.
It's fun to walk in the very narrow streets in the oldest part of town. People built there houses so close together to be able to help each other in case of an attack. The doorways are very low, so that an attacker had to bend down if he wanted to enter the house. This left him very vulnerable.
We stayed at the hotel Barahdari in a very clean double with hot water, ayurvedic soap and fluffy towels (yes) for Rs 385. An amazing variety of food and huge portions are available in the Temple restaurant in Dashaswamedh Road. Everything on the menu was available at very reasonable prices.
We made a day-trip to Sarnath to visit the Buddhist ruins about 10 kilometres from Varanasi. Board a bus for Rs 4 in front of the Varanasi Railway station; it takes about 45 minutes. Sarnath is very peacefull and it's pleasant to spent a couple of hours there. The restoration of the ruins hasn't always been performed brilliantly, but the green surroundings make up for it. The western girl meditating amidst the ruins attracted a lot of attention of the locals. It's not very obvious how the museum selects items for its collection. The ruined statues that are inside look much the same as the statues lying in the dirt outside.
On 17 December at 1800 we took the Ganga Kaveri express to Chennai. 40 hours in the train cost us Rs 1684 in 2-tier AC. The breakfast (toast omelette) isn't bad, but take food to nibble. Also buy some books, 40 hours is long.
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Chennai (the locals still call it Madras) is 2140 kilometres away from and 25 degrees warmer than Varanasi. We walked from the main railway station through a drizzle looking for a hotel in the vicinity of Egmore station. After two days in the train we opted for a bit of luxury and stayed at the New Victoria hotel in Kennet Lane opposite the Egmore railway station for Rs 1400. There is also a lot of choice in the budget category round this neighbourhood.
We took a bath and the rest of the day we walked at random around the city, collected mail at American Express and had an excellent lunch at Aravanaas restaurant in the Shanti theatre complex. Great dosa's and other vegetarian goodies.
At night the monsoon unleashed its final showers. The street in front of the hotel practically changed into a river so we stayed inside and had an excellent meal (one of our best in India) in the restaurant of the hotel. Great Marco Polo Lager on draught too!
After an equally good breakfast we took a auto-rikshaw to the (submerged) busstation. Jumping from dry spot to dry spot and guided by a five-year old entrepreneur we find the bus to Mahabalipuram.
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The road to Mahabalipuram follows the coast. It's a nice one hour trip from Chennai. The village is small and friendly. In the streets we see the first chalk-paintings in front of houses. They are graphic designs reminding you of Esscher and are put there to welcome guests. We feel at home right away.
We stayed at Vinayak cottages in a simple room (but with hot water) for Rs 200. At five in the morning we were woken up by a terrible noise. It sounded as if the local kids had gotten hold of the village soundsystem and were having a go at it before their parents found out. Quick reconnaissance proved that the noise was not coming from the rooms next to us, nor from anywhere else around the hotel. A couple of hours later we found out that we were extremely lucky. The din came from the temple opposite our hotel. This was the special annual festival to guarantee the safe return of the most important temple statue that would go on a journey to Karnataka. Not to worry; the noise would only last another two days, and it would only last from 2 till 4 AM next night. Another experience, another story to tell.
It was Ayappa-time in the south. Ayappa devotees are male, dressed in black and they travel around the countryside in fully packed white cars. The cars are adorned with religious symbols and pictures of saints combined with orange flowers. Ayappa-devotees are running while visiting temples and they yell 'Ayappa' lots of times. They only stop to have their pictures taken. As they are on a holy mission, they don't seem to take the highway code to serious. Every second day there are reports in the papers about ayappa-cars being involved in accidents. Indian Highway Code: if it's bigger it has right of way.
In the evening we ate at the Golden Palate in the Mamalla Bhavan Annexe. They have an outdoor eating area (and aircon inside), nice vegetarian food and very cold Kingfisher. The seaside restaurants are goods for a beer, but for food had to many flies to our liking.
We took a bus to Pondicherry. It doesn't run to its schedule so just turn up and wait. We did for two hours.
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Pondicherry didn't do much to us. It's a town. The architecture still shows that it used to be French. It has a post-office. palace hotel (opposite Amala lodge) rented us a room for Rs 400 and then turned off the Air-conditioning and demanded extra money. Fortunately the only (relatively) bad experience we had we hotels in India. We lectured the owner on the subject of doing honest business. It probably doesn't help, but it makes you feel better and we scared of some other tourists in the process.
We went for dinner in the Rendez-Vous and made the mistake to order French Food. On the bill we found the most hypocrite name for beer we have ever come across: 'liquid bread'.
Ok, not the most brilliant of days, so we decided to leave the next day for Thanjavur.
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After one auto-rikshaw, three busses and four busstations we arrived after five hours in Thanjavur. This was the method: we took a bus to Cuddalore for Rs 4. From there we went to Chidambaran for Rs 15 and then on to Thanjavur for Rs 20,5.
In Thanjavur we stayed at the Hotel Valli for a reasonable Rs 265 (hot water in the mornings). Definitely don't eat your breakfast here; it was lousy. We had dinner in the hotel Parisutham. Bland Indian food aimed at westerners; a pity. |
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