India 2006 6th February Part 2

My driver was waiting outside all this while of panicked roaming in the airport. I make my way outside into the cool night air and meet Hari - my driver for the next 2 days. He is a pleasant young man who speaks excellent English and we make small talk as I wait for him to load the car. Soon we're on our way into the heart of Delhi!

The traffic is crazy, we wend our way through extremely congested streets at 8:30pm - Hari assures me this is normal peak hour traffic - and I gasp in disbelief... Traffic in India follows no rules except for the rule of the horn. The louder one manages to get the thing, the more room you get on the road! The drive takes a while and halfway into the journey I start worrying that Hari might turn out to be an evil murderer who's going to get me into a lonely deserted street in Delhi ( don't think that's possible with the amount of people around!) and kill me. I have read too many new reports of backpackers, especially single females, getting taken away to somewhere quiet and murdered. My hand closes around my little tiny swiss army knife, you know, those that fit on a keychain, and I feel just a bit safer. ;)

We pull into an alleyway, then another, then another and my fear grows. Finally Hari stops the car and points to his right. There is a small little walkway and he says - your accommodation is THAT way. I look. Hmmmm... oh well, it's India and I'm knackered, I'll go anyway. My "Deluxe" room turns out to be a little room with a little table and a MASSIVE 4-poster carved wooden bed with a thin mattress. It is an amazing room - something I didn't expect to see in that little apartment in a little suburb somewhere in the middle of Delhi!! Hari shows me all the facilities - hot water, AWESOME! and then gives me the key to lock myself into my room and leaves me. WE make an arrangement to leave early in the morning about 4am to go to the ISKCON New Delhi temple for a visit.

So I am left to revel in my majestic looking four poster bed, take lots of pictures and then write in my diary until sleep claims me.