Final Post - Mar. 12 - Delhi, India

Sunday, March 12 :: Delhi, India :: 0km today / 5740km total

Well this is it. My last day in South Asia. I'm all set for the long planerides home, and took it quite easy today, taking in the last bit of India for... a long time, at least. I'm happy and ready to be coming home, but at the same time I'm also very sad to be leaving here. It really has been an incredible experience, and I think I'll really start to miss the Subcontinent in about a month or two. Three months ago I came to the Subcontinent thinking I knew a bit about the cultures here, but there is so much to absorb that I leave knowing that I only scratched the surface. I know that I'm in for major culture shock when I get home - last year I suffered culture shock coming home from 2 months in SE Asia, and this trip has certainly been a far deeper experience. I may have to go camp out on Gerrard St. East for a while! But Gerrard East ("Little India" in Toronto, for those that don't know) bears only a superficial relation to what you experience in India or Pakistan. Even the food in the restaurants there is quite different from the average meal you'd have here.

I thought I'd put down some of my final thoughts and impressions of the three countries I've travelled through, while I'm here and the memories are still vivid.

Nepal: A fantastic country with a gentle, friendly people. If they can get past their civil war and banditry I'd love to come back and do the Annapurna Circuit (at least!). Exotic Kathmandu was my favourite large city of this trip. Sandwiched in the middle of my trip, it was nice to go to a country where women had a close-to-equal status with men, at least compared to India and Pakistan.

Pakistan: A country you have to be careful in, especially female travellers, but once you understand and adapt to the culture, a wonderful place to travel - all in all my favourite country of this trip. Other travellers that I've met over the years - male and female - have consistently given Pakistan a good review, second only to Iran in many cases. For those unwilling to adapt or "When-in-Rome" it, Pakistan is a bad bad place to go. Pakistanis think of the Karakoram Highway as the 8th Wonder of the World, and I have to agree with them - I have never cycled a more spectacular road, passing through scenery that you can scarcely believe exists. I want to finish the KKH - Gilgit (Pakistan) to Kashgar (China). Not next year, but in a few years.

India: I can't put one finger or description on India, because it is far too diverse. Apart from being large and geographically varied, India is a dramatic mix of religions, history, cultures, and people. Thats what mades India so exciting. Even at the relatively slow pace of a bicycle, things were constantly changing around me as I travelled through. In terms of sightseeing India definitely shines in terms of buildings and monuments - its the rare country that can compete with India's wealth of manmade historical sites. Yes, travelling India is tough, I've never travelled through a country that offered so many headaches, and at times it got to me, as you can probably tell from this blog. But thats part of the whirlwind of India, and also part of travelling for 3 months straight. You can't be chipper and happy all the time. If you were to ask me if I would recommend India to travel to, there would be no simple answer, and I would have different answers for different people - for some people the Himalaya would be great, for others Goa, for others the Cosmopolitan, progressive cities of Delhi or Bombay, for others the Buddhist environs of Darjeeling, for others the Mughal history of Rajasthan, for others the quieter, easygoing states of Gujarat, Maharastra, or Kerala... when I look back on it, for me, really, it was all incredible.

Bye from Delhi!

Mar. 11 - Delhi, India

Saturday, March 11 :: Delhi, India :: 0km today / 5740km total

Another shopping day. I stayed near my hotel, there are enough shops in my district to keep you shopping for about 5 months.

I disassembled and boxed up the bike today, which was sad, because it really means my trip is coming to an end.

Mar. 10 - Delhi, India

Friday, March 10 :: Delhi, India :: 0km today / 5740km total

Went to the Jama Masjid (India's largest mosque), the Red Fort, and the Gandhi Memorial/Museum today. The first two were uninspiring, after seeing many similar buildings in the past 3 months. Gandhi was cremated at a park now called "Raj Ghat" (Ghat of the Ruler/King), I'm not sure he would have preferred to be linked to the concept of a king, in fact I know he would rebel against it and demand a namechange. Why they don't change the name of the park is beyond me. They could name the place something more along his lines like "Ghat of the People", or "Truth Ghat".

The Gandhi Museum was great, but disturbingly unattended, in contrast to Delhi's other tourist attractions. I mean, Gandhi IS India, he has to be India's most well-known and respected man. Every Indian banknote has Gandhi on it - every denomination - and no other people represented. The museum was very moving, with items and pictures from his life interspersed with his simple, direct speeches concerning his philosophies about truth and nonviolence. I've read his biography so much of what I saw was quite familiar to me. A detailed map showed his Salt March through Gujarat - I could pick out towns on the route that I had cycled through, and one or two that I slept in. This type of thing made the experience that much more personal - I've felt the same landscape and climate, ate the same food, met the same people. They actually had the bullets on display that "took baba-ji away from us". Very sad.

After that it was more shopping, oh joy. It rained today, and the road through the backpacker's district was all sludge - there are many cows in Delhi - so you can imagine...

Mar. 9 - Delhi, India

Thursday, March 9 :: Delhi, India :: 0km today / 5740km total

All admin and shopping today: bikebox, haircut, gifts, etc. Delhi is a shopper's paradise. Good food, too.

Mar. 8 - night train to Delhi, India

Wednesday, March 8 :: night train to Delhi, India :: 1km today / 5740km total

Things were very quiet in Varanasi today - a strike had been called to protest the bombings, and almost everything is closed other than the hotels. I've seen similar days like this in Nepal and Pakistan, and I'm not sure how closing businesses helps against terrorism or political adversaries. If I were a terrorist I'd be laughing at the Indians/Nepalese/Pakistanis for holding a strike - its exactly the kind of notoreity and effect that terrorists want, isn't it? Correct me if I'm wrong. There are many, many people living day-to-day in South Asia, and I think they're the ones that are hurt most by silliness like this... the very poor who need people like me walking down the street, buying their oranges, drinks, internet, etc.

Maybe its a good thing that I didn't stray far from my hotel, because I started to feel terrible (again). Each successive sickness that I've had this trip seems to be less and less acute, though - maybe my body is building up faecal coliform/e. coli resistance (not exactly something to boast, or that you want your body to have to do). I could probably drink from the Don River when I get back to Toronto! Yay.

My train was scheduled for 6:45 p.m., and I expected a full-on security presence at the station. I was, after all, taking the exact same scheduled train that was bombed yesterday. I suppose with a name of "Shiv Ganga" (Shiva - the patron God of Varanasi, and "Ganga" - the name for the Ganges) it was an obvious bombing target. But, everything went smoothly, and I rolled into Delhi early the next morning.

Mar. 7 - Varanasi, India

Tuesday, March 7 :: Varanasi, India :: 0km today / 5739km total

Before arriving in Varanasi I had decided to stay in a midrange hotel near the train station, to get away from the Old City's touts and crime. So it was a long early morning rickshaw drive through jam-packed streets down to the ghats.

Varanasi is Hinduism's most religious city, as I understand it. It is the city of Shiva, and where many Hindus come to die. The Ganges River is lined with ghats (steps leading down to the river) where people pray, wash clothes, bathe, and hold funerals. I decided to "walk the ghats", from one end to the other, to observe the human spectacle. I came across one funeral of a particularly holy man, so holy that his body did not need to be burned to cleanse it - the body went straight into the river (in a box). Nearby were goldpanners sifting through the riverside mud and ash - reminiscent of the Yukon, except that the source of gold in the Ganges in Varanasi has nothing to do with geology.

It was getting hot, damn hot, thank-god-i'm-not-cycling hot, and I melted my way back to my hotel district, straight over to a neighbouring 5-star's swimming pool. Ahhhhhhh. After a few hours I meandered my way back to my hotel, and around 4 p.m. went to my room to relax a bit before dinner...

During a movie on HBO, around 6:20 p.m., there was a loud bang coming from the direction of the railway station, and it made my room shake. I figured there was some confusion in the station, some trains had bumped, no biggie. I mean, this is India, Safe and Sound India. After the movie was over I was flipping channels and saw that something big was going on, although I couldn't decipher the Hindi, so I kept flipping. CNN India is in English, and it turned out the bang was a bomb, one of a few co-ordinated bombs that went off around Varanasi. One bomb was in an important Hindu Temple, another at the train station, and a few others were found that didn't go off. As I was watching, a report stated that the train station bomb happened inside a train, the Shiv Ganga Express. Hmmmm. Why is that name vaguely familiar? OH MY GOD. My insides froze over as I reached over to my money pouch, and pulled out my train ticket for tomorrow:

08/03/06
6:45 p.m.
Varanasi to Delhi
Shiv Ganga Express

Pretty crazy, eh? Ya. It took a bit of time to shake that one off, but I got up and went out to the street to get to an Internet cafe. As I was walking along there was a loud bang that scared the crap out of me and had me ducking into a corner, but the Indians laughed and pointed to a wedding that was proceeding onwards, hell or high water. They were letting off small fireworks. Most shops had closed up, and I had to retreat to the expensive internet and food at the hotels. Its probably a good thing not to be on the streets tonight, anyways - things could get crazy. There is already talk of this being a Pakistani-based terrorist bombing, and Hindus have a history of violent blind revenge (in 2002 a train fire which killed 59 Hindu pilgrims inspired the massacre of around 2000 Muslims, although it has later been shown that the fire was accidental). I hope the local Muslims are smart enough to stay inside.

Mar. 6 - Varanasi, India

Monday, March 6 :: Varanasi, India :: 6km today / 5739km total

I woke up early but completely unmotivated to go to war against the drivers and the heat. After 20 minutes of contimplation I decided it was ok not to ride to Varanasi, and that I was happy with that. So here in Lucknow, essentially, my bike trip ends. I quickly grabbed a train ticket (for tonight) and took it easy for the rest of the day. Now, for the first time this trip, I was not forcing myself to eat, and it made for a pleasant, relaxing day. Nothing really of interest to report, and I arrived in Varanasi around 1 a.m.

Mar. 5 - Lucknow, India

Sunday, March 5 :: Lucknow, India :: 3km today / 5733km total

In the morning I went over to the Bara Imambara, a complex containing a mosque, tomb, and labyrinth. Really it was the labyrinth I was after, and had brought along pen and paper in case it was as tough as rumoured to be. I've been fascinated by mazes and labyrinths since I was young, so was terribly excited about this. I made a beeline through the complex for the labyrinth, ascended the stairs, and began my way through it. Unfortunately I had the 4-level complex figured out in about 10 minutes, what a disappointment! There were 3 big factors that made the labyrinth too easy to nagivate:

i) the labyrinth was very narrow and long, not squarish
ii) along the long sides, at extremely frequent intervals, were windows overlooking either the outer grounds (on one side) or the large inner hall of the complex - this gave far too frequent points of reference - you couldn't get lost
iii) easiest of all, there were long central corridors running down most levels, from one end to the other.

So, pen did not touch paper and I left feeling a bit cheated - the descriptions I had read "tourists without guides will get lost", "built to confound enemy soldiers", etc., had greatly overdramatized it. All they had to do was block up some parts of the long inner corridors and outer windows, and the labyrinth would become a... labyrinth... oh well. My cat Twiggy would have had no problem figuring her way out (she's a smart kitty, but still...).

I left Bara Imambara at 10 a.m. and had a quick decision to make... to bike or not to bike today. It was already quite hot, and Lucknow is a decent city... I'll start the 2-day, 275km ride to Varanasi very early tomorrow morning. I wasn't overly fond of my hotel, though (mosquitos), so packed and moved over to the train station district. There was a nice midrange hotel that I had my eye on, but they had raised their prices... my pretend-I'm-a-Lonely-Planet-guide-author tactic worked this time (success rate around 40%), and they bent over backwards for me (reduced rate, etc). I don't try this tactic often, maybe 3-4 times this trip, only at more pricey places as a quick means to get near to the "local" rate.

After booking my final train ticket from Varanasi to Delhi (3 nights from tonight), I ate ate ate, internet'd, and will focus on eating again, tonight. I'm still feeling very low on energy, and I think my body needs a longish vacation from cycling to recover from the beating it's taken over the past 3 months. Well, a break from the bike won't be hard to accomplish in late-winter Canada. Starting tomorrow, my final week in the Subcontinent should consist of 2 full cycling days, 1 sightseeing day in Varanasi, and 4 days in Delhi to pack/bike box/shop/sightsee.