Travel Tips
» Beggars
We tipped beggars 2-5 rupees. Everyone makes his/her own decisions about beggars.
We gave to the elderly and infirm, and occasionally to families. But watch out
for a scam--we saw old men rading crutches among themselves...there was a different
man sitting outside the restaurant with crutches in front of him every time
we walked by. Beware of women who trade babies for the same reason. Bottom line
suggestion: I would rarely give beggars 100 rupees....big sums of money are
best given to reliable charities. I'd stick with 2-5 rupees, unless you really
believe this is a special case. If you start giving 10 rupee notes, you will
be mobbed by beggars. With 2-5 rupees, you won't. (I know that we are talking
the difference between 15 cents (5 rupees) and 30 cents (10 rupees). Its just
that for indians, the 10 rupees will go much further and is akin to giving a
homeles person $5 instead of spare change. Givng more than 10 rupees to beggars
marks you as a mark. (REMEMBER, I am writing after a trip in 1996. If you are
reading this post in 1998, check the current rate of conversion!!!)
» Guide Books
Read Lonely Planet. It's the Bible and will answer a lot of your questions.
Buy (and bring with you) either Lonely Planet Guide or the india Handbook (by
Footprint Handbooks, published in US by Passport Books). in prep for our trip,
we read several guidebooks and these two were the most useful to us (and most
accurate, in our personal opinion). You can find the Lonely Planet in most bookstores.
The india Handbook is harder to find--we found it in a travel store. The india
Handbook is updated each fall (so the 1998 book will be sold in the fall of
1997). Some stores will try to sell you the 1997 book, so check carefully to
be sure you are getting the 1998 one. The Lonely Planet, considered the "bible"
for india travel by many, is also updated regularly. Both have detailed hotel
and restaurant descriptions. Maps in india Handbook of particular cities were
better, but Lonely Planet had more detailed hotel descriptions. Husband brought
LP; I brought india Handbook. We also found the Lonely Planet map of india (a
thin paperback book) and Hindi phrasebook to be useful.
» The Black Market
I wouldn't use the black market for two reasons. One friend used the black market
and thought he was watching the exchange very carefully. But, he ended up with
a large wad of paper cut to the exact size of 100 rupee notes, wrapped in a
few 100 rupee notes. indian thieves and con-men are very well-practiced, just
like the men running con games on the streets in New York. The other reason
is more practical. We have heard of some corrupt police officers masquerading
as black marketeers. After you make the transaction, they threaten to arrest
you (and put you in an indian jail) unless you pay A VERY VERY LARGE fine right
now to the officer. These fines can run into the thousands of dollars.
» Busses
BTW, did you avoid busses? Not totally, but don't recommend them unless you
want to test your karmas. Avoidable, if you take a train or spend the bucks
and hire a car.
» Clothing
Shorts, are they a big no-no for a travelling westerner? Better to wear long
pants? OK in south. Probably not in North, especially Muslim areas or rural
areas. Wear light cotton trousers instead. Buy there, and don't pay too much
... 300 rupees max for stuff like this; indians pay way less, but what can ya
do. How cold was the north at night, how hot waa the south during the day? IOW,
what did you pack in terms of clothing?
Bring about a week's worth of sox and undies, one-two pair shorts, two-three
long pants, and around five shirts. include a decent outift in case you hit
a nice place (nice Dockers and a nice shirt with collar are fine). You can also
buy stuff there -- kurtas, lungis. etc.
» Health Issues
As I said, we enjoyed our trip to india, and believe we enjoyed it more because
we were careful re health and safety. My view was that when I had only a few
weeks in india, I didn't want to spend one day sick, since there was so much
to see in india. So, I was very careful about health issues. Remember: if you
get sick, you won't have access to the kind of top-notch medicine and health
care we have access to in America. This post focusses on health issues .
» Water
Bottled water should have a hard plastic seal that you have to break when you
unscrew the top. We stayed away from bottles with ONLY cellophane seals / Bisleri,
Bailey's, and Yes are major brands of bottled water. (Either Bailey's or Yes
has both the hard plastic seal and a cellophane wrapper).
We paid 12-15 rupees a bottle (36-45 cents American) when we bought it on the
street or at the train station. You can probably bargain it down for less but
we didn't want to mess around when it came to water. We also used iodine if
we had any doubts (iodine tablets now come with another tablet that removes
the bad taste and odor. You may want to visit the CDC's bulletin board--I learned
that you had to leave the iodine in for a period of several hours, not just
20 minutes). DON'T DRinK THE WATER IF IT SMELLS BAD. On our last day in Delhi,
we were given a bottle of "Voltic," an obvious copy of "Volvic."
I should have known something was up when the label said unusual things like
"good for infant formula."
» 'Ganja' and 'Charas'
Ganja and charas are names for what we know as marijauna, and it is plentiful
in india; it doesn't take much effort to get it. Particularly in the Gharwal
Himalayan area of india, there is very little law enforcement and large areas
of land upon which to grow the sacred weed. A cab driver, to show me the prevalance
of ganja, aksed me for a couple of bucks and came back with a finger of hashish
that would probably worth over a hundred bucks these days.
The chances are getting caught are slim, but there have been busts in the Goa
area, a famous hippie hangout from the 60s, and the descriptions of the indian
jails were enough to influence me to throw out my cab driver's gift. Another
time in my life, I would have cried over the plentitude of available cheap dope!
» Guides
Guides are useful for the early part of the trip, to give you inside information,
and to open doors not ordinarily open to tourists. I know of a fellow who entered
the Golden ShivaTemple in Varanasi, strictly forbidden to non-Hindus, via the
cunning of his guide. I used a guide for the first few weeks of my trip, then
relied upon my own capacity to get around, once I knew how things 'worked' in
india.
You will be bombarded just about every day you're a tourist in a city by people
wanting to be your personal guide, which can be annoying. If they're really
creative, or have a really juicy offer of special access, it may be worth it
to take a chance, but otherwise, learn quickly how to so 'no!' strongly and
definitively. Many a so-called guide are touts working for a souvenir shop.
I had one guy follow me up to the cave of Ramana Ashram, thinking that we made
some kind of non-verbal commitment for his guidance. in any case, no money flowed
out of pockets to that opportunist.
» Hotels
These are a few notes about hotels and restaurants in india in places my husband
and I visitied in Oct-Dec 1996 (rupee was 33 to the US dollar then). To put
in context my india hotel recommendations: we went to india on a nylon rope,
not a shoestring, and not a steel cable. We stayed in middle-class type hotels.
Rule 1: You should make reservations in advance, especially in Delhi,
Madras, Bombay, and Calcutta. Unlike US, you usually don't have to guarantee
with credit card, so you can reserve 2 or 3 places in case the 1st one is a
dump. When we were travelling to smaller cities, we made reservations a few
days in advance. You can make long distance calls from any of the "STD"
booths around town. (in fact, to save money, use the booths. Hotels will charge
you a surcharge for making long-distance calls, especially international ones.)
in Delhi-Madras-Bombay, we had trouble finding good rooms if we hadn't made
reservations 1-2 weeks in advance.
Rule 2: in North, you want a "geyser," meaning that the hotel
room has an individual hot water heater. You won't find this in the South. It
may take a while to get hot water running in your room in the South; you may
want to just take cold showers to spare the waste of water.
Rule 3: in the South, you want a ceiling fan. When the power is cut,
the hotel's generator generally will not run the air conditioners, but will
run the ceiling fans. This is a big deal: we got stuck in one hotel without
a ceiling fan and they often shut off the central air. (The exception is that
when you are in a "luxury" hotel, the generator will run the a/c.
By luxury, I mean the Taj, Oberoi, Sheraton,etc class hotels.)
Rule 4: Make reservations in advance for your first night in india. Do
not arrive without a reservation, as you will get ripped off by the taxi wallahs.
It happened to very good friends of ours.
Rule 5: Buy (and bring with you) either Lonely Planet Guide or the india
Handbook (by Footprint Handbooks, published in US by Passport Books). in prep
for our trip, we read several guidebooks and these two were the most useful
to us (and most accurate, in our personal opinion). You can find the Lonely
Planet in most bookstores. The india Handbook is harder to find--we found it
in a travel store. The india Handbook is updated each fall (so the 1998 book
will be sold in the fall of 1997). Some stores will try to sell you the 1997
book, so check carefully to be sure you are getting the 1998 one. The Lonely
Planet, considered the "bible" for india travel by many, is also updated
regularly. Both have detailed hotel and restaurant descriptions. Maps in india
Handbook of particular cities were better, but Lonely Planet had more detailed
hotel descriptions. Husband brought LP; I brought india Handbook. We also found
the Lonely Planet map of india (a thin paperback book) and Hindi phrasebook
to be useful.
» Inter-City Travel
Did you take trains or fly between cities?
Flew mostly, and hired a car -- check LP for rates; you gotta negotiate, but
it's better than trains in places (e.g. getting to Tiruvannamali). OTOH, take
a train a couple times at least, and in the country, don't get air-con -- feel
and smell the air and sights. Kozhikode to Cochin was great.
Trains: did you go first class (AC, 1 - 2 bunks per compartment, etc),or did
you rough it a bit?
Why do anything less than first class -- it will get very old. I don't like
to sleep on trains.
Any travel that was more than eight hours by car or train led me to choose to
fly between cities. indian Airlines, despite a bad reputation, seemed to work
out quite well.
I booked several multi-day taxi rides, one through the Himalayas, and one through
southeast Tamil Nadu (Madras-Mahabalipurum-Pondicherry-Tiruvanamalai). It worked
out quite well, though more expensive than the train, but gave me control to
take pictures, stop along the roadside, meet the locals, etc.
» Language
They like it if you try. Learn to say a few words in the local language (like
"please" "thank you", "yes" , "no" ,
"this tastes very good") and it will help a lot.
BTW, I forgot to mention the usefulness of a phrasebook -- The Lonely Planet
Hindi/Urdu Phrasebook fits easily in shirt pocket) in Hindi/Urdu is good for
North. "Yes", "no", "thanks", "please",
"excuse me" and "how much?" are all good to know, and don't
forget "Challo" (in North) for "go away" (good for obnoxious
panhandlers). LP also has phrasebooks for Bengali and Sri Lanka (presumably
some in Tamil for the latter). You won't need much, as everyone wants to practice
English on you anyway. BTW, Hindi is way easier to pick up than Tamil et. al.
as the phonemes are totally different -- in Tiruvannamalai, an ashram guard
and I amused each other for about five minutes trying fruitlesly just to learn
each other's names ("Okay, almost... Jim Butler." "Ghad-yeim
Abhoat-lyar?" "That's better...")
» Luggage
How did you pack - suitcase, backpack, what is the best kind of luggage situation
for moving around to various places in india?
Backpack/duffel
Buy a soft travel trunk with high volume capacity from Eagle Creek, worht the
investment.
» Money/Travellers
Checks
In our trip (Oct-Dec 96), we found ATMs in the major cities: Delhi, Bombay,
Madras, Bangalore. We did not see ATMs in smaller cities, like Mysore and Cochin/Ernakulum.
We only used the ATMs in Delhi and Madras for Visa cash advances. We did not
try to get cash out of bank accounts. So, I don't know how well this works.
( I used a Bank of America in Bombay to do this wth no problem, though only
a $200.00 per day limit).
Money, did you use travellers cheques, transfer into rupees or is the good 'ol
US greenback a good door opener?
Take: an ATM card like a Visa; nice to have in case you run out. I brought 1/2
in American Express traveller's checks; 1/4 in Thomas Cook; 1/4 in Ben Franklin's
(plus a couple 20's). Don't use black market-- easy to get ripped off. Ben's
are good in a pinch (bank takes nothing else), OR to buy large quantities of
good like art for gifts (gets you discount; they'll know how to get a good black
rate, you will not). Also I used three of my Ben's for charity -
» Stopping On
The Way
This is an opportune moment for my traveling strategy rant. Try and do a layover
in Europe en route to india if you can, if you fly that route (same would apply
in Hawaii, maybe). Breaking up the trip can save your getting sick when you
get there -- very stressful to travel like that. It is so worth is not to get
to Delhi wiped, and usually you can do one leg of trip laid over for little
or nada extra. If you can't do that, you will almost certainly have around 7
hours in Frankfurt, so get a day room at the Sheraton (right in the airport;
pre-reserve it) and sleep for a couple hours; I did and it made a giant difference.
I'm not a hardass yogi type, and /or lack the bounce of my 20's, so this was
a nice thing to do. Costs like $100+ for the room, but it's not like you can
sleep in that Ikea-like airport otherwise.
I spent a week in Switzerland with my wife before I made my way to india. I
did it non-stop on the way back, and it was the longest day of my life. I couldn't
imagine having to deal with india after arriving from such a long flight.
» Tipping
We tipped the porters 10-20 rupees per bag. We gave the "room boy"
who brought us soda and room service items 5-10 rupees a trip (10-20 rupees
in nicer hotels, like Sheraton, Taj, Oberoi). Don't ever tip with a 100 rupee
note--get smaller denomination notes at the hotel front desk and from banks.
You will be "marked" for the rest of your stay in that city if you
tip hotel staff with 100 rupee notes.
Check the restaurant bill: some add on a surcharge [service fee], so you don't
need to tip. We gave a waiter a 20 rupee tip when he found a table for us at
an especially-crowded restaurant. (I will say this, having waited tables ourselves
in College, we tipped 15 percent on bills. We didn't go by the custom of just
leaving loose change on the table. I don't begrudge waiters their tips in the
US and I'm not going to start doing so when I go to another country. But, this
was a personal decision.)
» Safety/Security/Scams
In response to some of the questions I've received, here are some safety tips
for india: You will enjoy india, but you should keep your eyes open. We really
enjoyed our trip, but we were careful. We found that people who did not enjoy
india didn't observe basic health/safety principles and/or were unprepared for
the realities of a third-world country. india is a beautiful place, and you
will enjoy it even more if you are prepared. By way of background, my husband
was in india in Oct-Dec 1996 and I joined him for Dec 1996. The first thing
I learned was act like you are in New York City, regardless of where you are
in india: small town, big town, its all New York . This will save you a lot
of headaches. For example, we met several people who had put their bags down
in train stations "for just a moment," only to have them stolen. Would
they do put their bags down on the New York City subway?
» Weather
We were in Karnataka in early December: warm during the day. in the evening,
I wore a windbreaker. My husband is from Michigan, and so he didn't need a windbreaker.
Weather in Kerala in December: it feels like July in the U.S: 90 degrees Fahrenheit.
Its even hotter at other times during the year. People carry umbrellas to ward
off the sun. Bring sunblock & insect repellant; you cannot get them in india
at reasonable prices, if at all.
Rain wasn't so bad when I was in south, from Nov 11 to 26 and then again from
12/7 to around 12/20. Rains hit in between 11/26 and 12/7. But it was a light
and late monsoon. Should be weird again with El Nino... India is hotter and
more humid than you can possibly imagine. You do not need anything more than
a windbreaker or a heavy long shirt, unless you're going into the Himalayas.
You just have to learn to adjust to the weather - always have lots of water
with you.
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