Hard-core-sightseeing in slow mode

24th May

On the list of today’s sights was Delhi’s Nr. one attraction, the Red Fort; The India Gate, which is about 5 times bigger then the Triumpfpforte in Innsbruck; the astonishing beautiful Humayun’s Tomb which resembles the Taj Mahal; The lotus-like Bahai’s Temple which was designed by the same architect as the Opera House in Sydney and is open for prayers to all religions in a very peaceful atmosphere; Mahatma Gandhi’s grave, his living house and the Gandhi-Smriti-Museum. This sounds quite a lot (it IS), and the only way to be able to enjoy it (which I did) with now 40°C, was to move very slowly and, of course, drink lots of water. The funny bit of this tour was the understanding that for the Indian tourists visiting these sites, I myself was a tiny attraction as well. Those Indians, who often come from areas where hardly any tourists ever go, made it their hobby to take pictures from western visitors. So I ended up being on at least 30 pictures with shy smiling men, children, women or whole families.

From the sad side of this country, today I have seen one man begging with a deep open wound in his lower leg and a couple of kids trying to sell stuff at the traffic lights. One of them I gave a Tyrolean bio-apple that I still had in my backpack which he happily took over.
At the end of the day, Sanjay, my friendly driver, helped me to get a sim card for my mobile phone and internet connection. This took about 1 ½ hours, as the photos needed had to have a white background, the pen a black colour and, well, because everything just takes longer here in Asia. So now I am sorted with an Indian phone number but the internet does not work and I have to go back tomorrow (which probably will take another hour). But that’s ok as I haven’t really expected it to be working straight away anyways.