Our hotel was located in the neighborhood of Karol Bagh. A lively, colorful community engaged in hard manual labor, enjoying comradeship and cricket, against the backdrop of intense poverty and mind blowing filth!
We wandered aimlessly, enjoying home cooked Indian desserts and the attention of playful children - apparently we were a novelty for the adults too. Not surprisingly, we didn’t see other tourists in this maze of dark alleys and interesting smells. And it seemed all too quickly that we hailed a cycle rickshaw to head back to our hotel for checkout.
We were heading of Delhi to Jaipur. The chaos of this enormous city was overwhelming and the forts and palaces of relatively more peaceful Jaipur were beckoning.
Unfortunately (or fortunately) our flip-flop decision making process didn’t allow for fully booked trains and we found ourselves in a private car with driver Bilu, for the 7 hour journey. Bilu agreed to be with us for the next 4 days as we traveled to Jaipur, then Agra and back to Delhi before heading to Varanasi.
Note: Half the drive time to Jaipur was actually escaping the Delhi traffic. Holy cow! (completely appropriate here.) Im not going to miss the pollution and dust levels that only come with 11 million people jibing for space on roads without lanes , rules or common courtesy.
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