Dad lands in India: Steve

The trip begins as Dad comes out to meet Kristina and I for a tour of Delhi and Agra. We pick him up from the airport and head straight for some Indian education. First lesson, “King Fisher”, India’s most popular beer... We took him to have a beer and food for a proper Indian welcome. Of course I get sick and end up puking for an hour. Not sure what it was but, Dad was fine.
The next day it’s a tour of Delhi, a city full of temples, museums and monuments, we managed to see one.  We made it through the Red Fort and that was about it. We also visited a friend Nikil at his work to get a tour of one of the top radio stations which was very cool. I would have liked to see more temples but, it’s very difficult to get around in Delhi with the traffic and dense smog, it drains you fast and I was not feeling good from the night before. Next morning it’s up at 5am to catch the train to Agra and see the Taj Mahal.

Catching the train was an adventure. I did not anticipate a line at 6am but I was wrong. We arrived to a sea of hundreds of people fighting to get tickets. The line got ugly but I managed to wade my self to the front and purchase the wrong class of tickets. “I said first class” rang out my lips for the next hour or so. We went to get on the train and quickly learned I had purchased general seat tickets. This would mean hanging out the train door with the masses instead of sitting in our own air conditioned seats. We stole some empty AC seats and managed to purchase an upgrade. This did not come easy either as you can imagine we were not the only ones. When we arrived we easily found a guide, bought return tickets and set on our way. First stop, McDonalds, you should have seen the look on our guide’s face. The issue was my stomach was still having singing to me and McDonalds was the safest option. After that, the Taj. We walked around for 3+ hours and took all the standard Taj pictures. The place is amazing.

Once leaving the Taj, we were rather tiried and opted to take it easy the rest of the day. We saw how the craftsmen made the marble inlays in the Taj and how they make rugs and jewelry. Then we saw a coffee shop and dinner. Getting back to Dehli was another adventure involving an hour late train and the world’s slowest rickshaw ride….

Now it’s time to get started on the real Chutney adventure….. Goa.