New Delhi

July 16, 2009
I'd read the guidebook and the online forums. I'd watched documentaries and talked to people who had been. But nothing prepared me for India. I was greeted by a crush of humanity at the airport, brain-broiling heat, and that smell. The smell of sweat and depth and dust and shit. Car horns tapping out Morse code signaled to auto rickshaws and families on motorcycles. Ariving in India was like time travel on acid, like being inside a video game, a total sensory head fuck.

We swerved and bumped to our hotel in the backpacker ghetto of Paharganj. No matter how much I was expecting it, it still surprised me to see large cows lazily wandering the streets. Our driver almost slammed into a group of pedestrians to avoid one.

Our hotel screwed up our reservation, so John (one of my travel partners) and I set out to find new digs. We eventually found a room nearby and settled in for the night. Holiday Inn it ain't, but it got us off the street for the night.

When we went out for provisions, John and I were wrangled into a conversaton with a hotel tout. While watching Shakira videos on YouTube, we listened to his tales of driving tour buses through the Himalayas, of 7-year-old boy kings, and near-death experiences. Welcome to India!

July 18, 2009
Yesterday was hard. It was hot and jet-laggy and grueling. We tried to fit too much into our first full day here, but it ended all right. You'll see. We spent the morning running errands and heating up with the day. By the time lunch rolled around, sweat was pouring from my body and would continue to do so for the next 12 hours.

For lunch we took an auto rickshaw (a motorcycle fitted with a carriage for passengers) to old colonial Connaught Place. We weren't on the street 30 seconds before the first tout accosted us, insisting we visit the Delhi Tourism Office. (Not to be confused with the India Tourism Office. The Delhi office is a sham company set up to help tourists part with their hard-earned rupees.) Every half block someone else would stop us, telling us about the Delhi Tourism Office. The guy sitting next to us at lunch, the restaurant owner, the shop security guard, the construction worker. "I am not trying to sell you anything, my friend. I'm just trying to help you." I began to think touts would start popping out of manholes and dropping from the sky. Most places I've been touts get a commision for the tourists they bring into a shop or restaurant or "tourist bureau." They'll follow you or lead you to the place where they'll receive their payment. That's why this Delhi scam confused me. I'd read in the guidebook to expect it, but I couldn't figure out which of the 50 touts would get the commision from our visit had we gone to the Delhi Tourism Office. Were they using hand signals or camera phones or super secret spy technology?

Later that night we asked our maitre'd at the restaurant what the system was. His reply: "In some worlds men are paid with money. In others they are paid with 70 virgins." Apparently a mosque in Delhi operates the phony tourist office, and its faithful followers harrass every tourist they see to patronize it. No one person gets the commision, they all do. Mystery busted!

After finding the real government-sponosored India Tourism office, we booked ourselves on an afternoon tour of Old Delhi. On it we visited the Red Fort, the place where Father India Mahatma Ghandi was cremated, and Humayun's tomb. Our tour guide raced around each site, pointing out nothing and providing no information, trailed by 10 tourists fighting off sun stroke. I can't tell you anything about the Red Fort. Ghandi's site was rad for the 30 seconds I saw it. By the time we made it to the last stop, I said to hell with it. I bought an ice cream and napped on the bus (and enjoyed the site as much as anyone else, I think).

Clouds of diesel fumes and ear-piercing honking followed us back to our hotel.Patience wore thin. By the time we made it to the train station to book our onward tickets, the office was closed...or closing actually and not interested in helpng us out.

And then there was dinner.

My pal Paulette used to live on the island closest to mine in Japan. She just so happens to be in Delhi right now, too. Her and her friend met up with us and we all noshed at the United Coffee House, a gaudy 1940s colonial leftover. Beaded curtains hung over the balcony, pastel pinks and greens accented the walls. The table slowly filled with North Indian delicacies: pungeant Christmas-colored tikka masala, bubbling red butter chicken, bright steaming bowls of curry, and golf-ball-sized dumplings, all soaked up by bowls of rice and spongy flaps of naan. As the food began disappearing, so did the noise from the day. I felt cleaner, more relaxed. After a midnight dessert, we closed the place down. We watched the waiters crowd around our paid bill like pirahnas as they calculated how much we'd left as a tip.

Yesterday was hard. It was crowded and hot and tiring and almost too much to handle at times. But there's something about a great meal that dulls the throb of a bad day. A great meal has the power to restore friendships and create new ones. It has the power to equalize and energize. A great meal can make you feel so full, both physically and mentally. More people should sit down together over a table full of food.