From: FHERTZBERG@finabo.abo.fi (Fredrik Hertzberg Lit)
Subject: The people who told me to go south
Organization: Abo Akademi University, Finland
Date: Fri, 2 Oct 1992 15:35:15 GMT
X-News-Reader: VMS NEWS 1.23


H'lo! You wonder how many people told me to go to southern India. 
I got about 150 suggestions on where to go.
Only one or two suggested that I go north, using weak arguments, like
"I've never been to Jaipur myself, but my birthplace is quite near to
it, so I think you should go there". A few people told me to go to
Kashmir, which I would have liked to, but almost everybody told me to
visit Mysore, for instance, which certainly is a good place to be! 
  I read a story in the newspapers about a Japanese female tourist who
got into really big trouble in Delhi. The rickshaw driver wouldn't take her 
where she wanted to go (he had checked out hotels that he knew were full)
 - actually, this is exactly what happened to us, too, and to many others
all over northern India - and then he suggested that she should come over
to his friend's apartment and sleep there. I don't remember exactly when the 
driver suddenly attacked her (I think it was before she even got out of the
rickshaw) and tried to snap her handbag. She wouldn't let go of it so he
started biting her in the face (there were pictures of her in the Delhi
papers) and got assistance from other rickshaw drivers who started hitting
her. Happily some decent people heard her scream for help and thus saved her.
I remember her saying "This kind of thing would never happen in Japan!".
At about the same time, a woman was raped three times during the same night by
three different people!
  When we came to Delhi and got off the bus at Connaught Place we got a
rickshaw at once. We told him that we wanted to go to Roshan Villa Guest House
(near to Holiday Inn), which was supposed to be quite cheap, he told us that
there had been a serious gas leakage there and that they had closed it down
for the moment. We didn't believe him, but he told us that he had been there
the other night with two tourists who were very disappointed when they found
out that it was closed. "Any other place, but not that!" he exclaimed. So we
hastily chose another place. "No, no", he said, "that's too expensive! I can
show you a much better place which is cheaper too!" So he drove us to a place
in a chaotic part of Delhi and I got off the rickshaw to check. It was quite
a nasty place with lots of insects in the toilet and otherwise quite shitty.
So we told him we wanted to go a hotel of our own choice, which happened to be
the Ashoka Hotel. But he wouldn't drive us there. Instead, he drove us to
another strange place, after which my wife started to argue with him. As we
were quite firm with him by now, he actually drove us to Ashoka. When we got
off, we paid him a third of the price his meter indicated as a punishment. He
went mad. 
  In Jaipur, we wanted to sleep at a certain hotel. When we arrived at the
railway station, several rickshaw drivers and taxi drivers told us that they
could drive us there for 20 rupies (it was quite far). As we were extremely
suspicious by now (having been in the north for quite a while), we told them
that we already lived at this particular hotel. Now they suddenly asked for
70 rupies to drive us there. They had been hoping to persuade us to change our
minds about where to stay so they could take us to a commission hotel. 
  In Agra, we got a rickshaw with two drivers (one drove, the other guided)
for only 40 rupies for a whole day of sightseeing there. Having seen T Mahal
and the Fort we decided to go to Fatahpur Sikri. But they told us it was
impossible to go there (that the bus takes many hours, which wasn't true). So
we told them that we would pay them off. I gave the driver 50 rupies, expecting
to get ten rupies back, but suddenly they started to shout: "You think your so
smart; giving us only 50 rupies: you get nothing back!" Man, I thought that he
would have jumped with joy to get full payment for only half a day, but he went
totally nuts! 
  I could wear you out with lots of similar reports from northern India. And
many people had been much more fooled than we had! In southern India we usually
payed about 5-10 rupies to get to a hotel. People helped us there for free. No
fake guides fucked around with us there. 
  And as to prices, the average hotel fare for one night in the south was about
100-150 rupies. The average hotel fare in the north was about 400 rupies. At
the Ashoka hotel, we had to pay 1000 rupies for one night in a room without
windows! 
  The north is certainly overrated in most ways! 
  So thanks again for your advice!
  F Hertzberg.


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