Huynher's Adventure: India -SHOCKED!!!

India was quite an experience for us. I am not sure if you can classify it as culture shock but it was definitely a shock in terms of the cleanliness of the city and the over population of people. There are at least three times as much people, cars, bicycles, motorcycles and even rickshaws on the streets than there are in Toronto. In addition to all of the motorized transports on the roads, there are also cows. Cows are everywhere. Walking in India does not exist. You don’t walk, instead you are dodging people and watching where you step as there are so much garbage and dirt on the streets.

Driving style in India is the same as in Cairo. There are no rules, the honking is twice as much and twice as loud. Honking does not end in India. We still hear the honking in our hotel rooms at 3 in the morning. It’s crazy. I got headaches from these honks. There is no such thing as streets and sidewalks. Cars, people, and cows roam where there is space. There were numerous times when Kenny and I were walking on the road and we would get honked at by the cars and rickshaws. It is their way of telling you to get out of their way. The honking is so loud, I am surprised I haven’t gone deaf yet.

The amount of garbage on the streets is also unbearable. There are so much dirt, garbage, dust and car fumes everywhere. Did I also mention the excessive amount of flies in the city. You would see people sleeping on the streets and the flies are just hanging around their face. I don’t know how they can sleep like that.
The men are constantly spitting. You definitely need to watch where you walk or else you could end up being a spit target. In addition to the garbage and spit on the roads, there are also cow and dog poo everywhere. So imagine the smell on the streets. Every street you go onto, there is a different smell. It is never pleasant. It can either be the smell of poo, rotten food, or just plain nasty overdue garbage.

Sightseeing in India was kind of a pain as well. With the large number of people existing in the city plus the additional non-foreign tourists, every sightseeing area we went too was flooded with people. It was difficult to take a picture of just Kenny and I without other people in it. At every sight-seeing item, we saw people lying on the grass, lying on the floors of the monuments and palaces, people pushing and shoving other people so that they can be first in line. Buying tickets to enter in the monuments was horrendous. There was no concept of line ups. It was just a crowd of people pushing and trying to be the first at the counter. Even if there was a line, people would just bud in front of you and push you to the side. Luckily for us foreigners, they had separate counters for us. So that meant we didn’t have to go through the pushing and shoving to buy our tickets. But that doesn’t mean you are safe from the pushing. Even when you are in the palace, people are still pushing you to the side. They just have to be the first to see everything. They don’t like waiting for you nor do they like to be the last to see it. There was one time when we were in Delhi visiting Ghandi’s museum, Kenny and I was pushed and elbowed so much because people wanted to be the first to see the spot where he was assassinated. It got so unbearable that we just stood to the side and waited for the crowd to leave before we could take pictures and actually enjoy the sight-seeing.

Having lived in a country where line ups and organization exists, it was really difficult for me to adapt to how everything worked in India. In India, it is survival of the fittest. Even at McDonalds, you have to run for a seat. There are just too much people in India and not enough space or resources for them. So they always feel like they have to push their way to be first or else they will end up getting none. It is actually quite sad to see this. You can tell that the population of people is just growing too fast and the resources are not growing fast enough with it. There are homeless people everywhere. Families living under bridges, on the side of the streets under cardboard paper and other materials they can find. They send their children out to beg for money. Most of the time when we are either in a rickshaw or in a cab stuck in traffic, there is always a homeless child knocking on the window or pulling on our arm, begging us for money. Having stayed in India, it really makes me realize how lucky I am to be living in Canada and understand why there are so many Indians that would want to immigrate to Canada. I have a few Indian friends and they have told me that they would never want to go back to India and know I understand why.

Indian people are very very persistent. It never fails that there is always someone trying to sell you something. Once we step outside of the hotel, there is always a couple of men trying to recruit us to their rickshaws or trying to sell us their sightseeing service. At the sight-seeing areas, there are men trying to sell you postcards, horse whips ( I don’t understand why any foreigner would buy this), t-shirts and again their rickshaw services. You tell them “no” and they are still trying to sell the item to you. You say No again, and they are still following you, trying to tell you how you cant miss this great sale. So you say NO politely again, but yet they are still following you and reducing the price ever so low trying to get you to bust out that wallet. At this point, it just gets annoying. You tell them NO but they are persistent. They literally follow you a couple of blocks just to try to sell you their item or better yet, annoy you until you buy it from them. Beggers and street vendors are all the same. They are all persistent on selling you something. There was one time when Kenny and I were walking towards the ticket counter of the Taj Mahal, the tour guides were trying to sell us their guide service. Kenny and I declined, but the guy wouldn’t stop following us. He pestered us about how we needed a guide and how cheap he was. He bugged us up until we officially got through the security entrance of the Taj Mahal. Even when we were inside, I think I still heard him yelling to us about his services. These people don’t know how to back off. Anytime we were on the streets of India, I felt like we were bait for the vultures.

India was the only time I wished I was back at home. With the traffic, the pollution, the noise and the crowds of people everywhere, it got hard to bear. On our last day in India, Kenny and I stayed in our hotel. We couldn’t bear to go outside into the heat and the ruckus of people. It was just too much to handle for us.