INCREDIBLE INDIA | India

andy
Dec 7, 2017
4 min read

It's all incredible

Indian's marketing slogan is "Incredible India", oh well, it is true......., but let me summarize the "Incredible India" we have experienced in the last 4,5 weeks we travelled there .

4,5 weeks in India definitely felt like 6~7 weeks, much longer than what it was. Maybe it was because we mainly stayed 2~3 days at each location, saw so many things and could not timely digest all the impressions we had. But it also felt so long as everything you do in India takes time ....... loooooong train rides 24h instead of 20h, ...... looooong bus rides 10 h instead of 5h, ....loooooong bollywood movies 😂, ....... loooooong theater or holy performance which continuously shows the same things over and over, ....... conversations strech on and on for simple things..... and yes i have not mentioned that a normal wedding ceremony takes at least 3 days.

Anyway if you ever travel in India be patient and bring tiiiime.....

Oh yes and don't forget, always have an eye on the floor otherwise you step in holy shit like it happened to me twice,😂.

No other country in the world i have travelled so far has so much controversy at once, maybe this makes India so incredible.

For example, the way they treat animals is impressive. It is a quite animal friendly country because of religion and their principles of reincarnation in Hinduism. There are also a lot of vegan and vegetarian people and it is probably the best country to find a huge variety in such cusines. The Western World can definitely learn something from India on that point.

On the other hand, their strong believes are also kind of strange. Our tour giude in Varanasi told us that the Ganga "the Holy River", "the Mother" is pure (like clean) and was also certified by western scientists. Well it doesn't take a lot to see the difference.... and what kind of science did these guys study?

This brings me to a point which made me continously sad on the whole trip in India. Pollution; it is incredible too. The smog, airpollution in Dehli was 295 on PM 2,5, luckily we just stayed for some hours. Everywhere you look, you see rubbish, waste and what not. Well, take a look at these 3 pictures or maybe it is just the angle you look at these.

(click to enlarge)

The pollution is massive and in my opinion they have zero waste management. After living 9 years in China, I thought China is worse but actually China is not bad at all, at least on the surface, while India is just on a waaaaaay other level. I confronted a lot of Indian's with this massive problem and maybe i was too harsh to them, cause on environmental issues i have no mercy. They told me that the Indian government already brought up an environmental initiative plan 5 years ago, where they bring together different actions. One important item is that they teach kids in school how to behave and how to handle routine environmental friendly actions. However, until the kids grow up and actually understand and learn how it works it takes another loooooong tiiiiime, probably 20 years or looooonger.

Look at these 2 pictures i took in Mumbai (Bombay) from the Mithi river . At the time i was just shocked and could not believe my eyes.

The diversity of people:

It is unbelievable how many tuk tuk driver or sales men harass you and try to cheat you on anything in India. Of course it is a common thing in Aisa, don't tell me, but it is just sooo "incredibly" intense here in India.

But on the other hand, we also met so many interesting and nice people. Some are quite helpful, like when Giulia fell off the bicycle in Hampi (she tried to show off, well it clearly worked 😂), people immediately stopped to helps us out with first aid kits from their motorbikes.

Also Vikas, a guy from Mumbai we met in Jaisalmer, without even really knowing us, he booked us tickets and paid everything in advance. I could only pay him back via a German friend Matthias (I used to study with him) who lives in India since many years. Thanks again here..

In India, especially in the North it could happen that you see a "Eunuch", walking on the street who blesses people in exchange for a bit of money. Some Indians even believe they are genderless; to me, they just look like men dressed up in Indian lady clothes trying to make a living. But these Eunuch are well accepted in India, some Indians pay a lot to receive a blessing (touch on the body and some word) from them. This is again also related to religion as Shiva is non gender, so a "Eunuch" fits best. At the end of our India trip we also had this saying that if you ask something to 7 different Indians you will get 10 different opinions.

The incredible food.

What to say, we just love the Indian cuisine, the diversity is huge, but in the end it is always something with curry, rice, curd or one of the indians breads loke roti, paratha and nan. Quite gravy based and well maybe not the healthiest one in terms of digestion and getting enough vitamins out of it. And so incredibly good that i even got food poisoning from my very last meal in India.

Incredible admission fees.

Oh, I almost forgot, isn't it incredible that foreigners pay 10~15 times higher entrance fees than locals? The Kings palace for example charges 500 rupees just for foreigners ~ 0 for locals.

Have you ever heard all these incredibly funny Indian slogans?

Maybe makes baby!

Don't worry, chicken curry no hurry!

Or Ali Babas funny sayings (our camel guide in Jaisalmer)

Camel college half knowledge.

Why not Coconut!

Today is today, tomorrow is tomorrow!

Well, so that´s it. Yes, India is incredible indeed. The feeling when you travel in India is incredibly intense and diverse. We had a great time in India but we are also incredibly happy to move on.... Myanmar is next.

Oh by the way , I now also understand why my Indian investment fund, which I invested in 2008 didn't make any profit....... because it takes tiiiiiime.

p.s . This post also took a looooong time to put together just to be in line with Indian timings you know!