First time arrival experiences.

sky888

before you go book the pre-paid taxi, it's always a good idea to get the exact change ready

for my trip there, they refused to refund me the balance.. though I am sure they are able to..

__________________
The China Travel and Photography Forum
MyChinaTrips.com

timmy

Ahh, it's that first couple of hours in India that really stick in your mind, isn't it?

Moments before touchdown I could already smell India. When the two Sikh guys seated behind me both exclaimed very loudly "Welcome to India!" there was no doubt we had truly arrived.

It was about 11pm. I waited patiently at Delhi Airport for my bag to arrive on the conveyer belt. It never came. Eventually I realised there was a bunch of bags over the other side which seemed to have arrived by some other means. OK, time to stop panicking.

Upon exiting the immigration area, a guy from my hotel met me as arranged. We exited the terminal and I was confronted by hundreds of people and the sights and sounds and smells of Delhi. It was chaotic. The only thought in my mind was "don't lose him" as I followed my driver. He led me through a carpark and across a dirty road and we eventually arrived at the car.

The road into Delhi had two marked lanes in either direction. There were three lanes of cars squeezed into those two lanes. Meanwhile, with Punjabi music blaring, we screamed along the shoulder at 60kph.

The whole experience was both hair-raising and invigorating, and truly unforgettable.

__________________
View my Photo Gallery from my last two trips.

Dennis-M

The flight was short very short I was preparing every step I was going to make between zurich and Delhi . up on arriving above Delhi huge camp fires became visable , it is then when it started to hit me , This is INDIA! and now I will have to go out and face her , alone unknown and at 03:00 in the night.

I had been putting notes in my handy palmtop for weeks had all directions locations for taxi boot and known Hotels pasted straith from India travel websites. little did I know this was going to be little of help.

Backpak Immigration no problem , but then the gate out of the airport! , there is hardly any way to describe what was going on inside, confussion amazed the heat.

So many people , after having stared at it all for about 30 minutes I approached the taxi stand got my ticket to Delhi City for 250 rps and got underway , I was not going to tell the driver that this was my first time , and soon we were talking broken English.

The driver took me to main Bazaar , but there was Dogs Police and everthing looked closed , I screamed drive on I Do not want to get out here ! , I ended up in Chenna market Area , got a very nasty Hotel room , but ok I was here and had a place to sleep , when looked around in the room my spirit was close to being broken , what a dump , I pulled away the blanket and almost broke out in tears , luckely I brought a sheet with me and started to make up something that I could sleep on , I had dreamed about India for 15 Years and this is what it is ?? I am not sure but being away from home alone and ending up in such a dump , I had never felt so bad.

Eventually I had the best holliday ever and will soon return to India (GW) maybe one has to start from skratch build up experiance learn where not to go, and then use your learned lessons to make you feel better.

__________________
צילום

seventies'hippy

It's nice to read about everyones first time culture shocks on this thread. It's something that I'd missed out on,
For like wonderwomanusa post#7, I was one of the overland arrivals and you gradually adjusted en-route via afghanistan & pakistan and then just walked along that little bit of No-mans land into India,

But of course even that was nothing compared to shimlas appearance,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

bijapuri

1970: looking out of the window of the airplane, just after dusk,onto "Calcutta," it seemed on fire from the thousands of cooking flames as far as the eye could see!

The next day, strolling around in the monsoon muck, I thought a hurricane had passed thru and destroyed the city!

Well, a few days later, Bangalore seemed like heaven with all the orderly, tree-shaded bungalows on St, Marks Rd, where I was to reside for the next 9 months.

hash666

One hot june morning 24 years ago, i think it was 7.20 i came into this world in this holy land ,mother India...since then it has been my home and eventhough i've been to other countries , this is always home...
The bustle in the early morning sun of milkmen going aroud in their cycles, ladies sweeping the front of their houses, the flower vendors , the blare of the mosque calling the faithful to it, the mantras in the temples waking up those who haven't , the buses and autorickshaws speeding away,the smell of curry.... aaaah wat else can i say...

lobo

My first experince wasnt to bad, landed ok, had hand luggage so there was no waiting around and we proceeded to leave dehli airport.
We was meeting a friend there who we hadnt seen for 5 months so i was scanning the mass of people who were waving and shouting at me, .......no one standing out......
Then I hear someone call my name and there is my friend i hadnt seen for 5 months completly different looking!!!
Long hair, beard, tanned and looking...like a vetran. He looked like an american soldier who had been to vietnam fought the war and then decided to stay out there to live!!!!
He looked like he had eaten snake , a real tarzan kind of appearance.
Then onwards to main bazzar and a fantastic trip.....

Will Marks

I arrived in Delhi in 1998, via an eight hour stop-over in Moscow. I’d travelled in Asia, and Africa, but the trip to India was the first one on my own and I was feeling a little nervous. At Moscow airport I started talking to a guy from Uruguay called Tato. He was easily six foot eight, in his late thirties and one of the most naturally ‘shanti shanti’ cool characters I’d met, so I started to feel at ease.

After another long flight on an Aeroflot plane it was a relief just to make it to India. We arrived into a hot April afternoon, and a welcome that wasn’t too overawing. Tato took it like a celebrity on a triumphant homecoming. We shared a cab into Connaught Place, and then went up to Dharamsala together, where a few days later I found myself shaking hands with Dalai Lama. I hung out with Tato for another week before he admitted he was a basketball player, and had just finished almost twenty years as a star of the national team.

So India started as it was to continue – with a continual series of cool people to meet!

Nick-H

One of the pleasures of IndiaMike: stumbling upon a great thread never-before seen!

It's not so long ago ('97) that I arrived in Chennai for the first time, and that wet-heat climate hit me. Every time I go I think, as I get off the plane, it is like India throws her arms around me and gives me a big, wet kiss

(except 2003 --- it was hotter in London that time!)

It's not so long ago that I felt so awkward, foreign and out of place on the street, picked at food served by relatives of friends in London, terrified that food poisoning would be inevitable . Those people are friends now, and I greatly look forward to their food.

Five days time I'll be off again. It's for Six Months this time, living by myself, learning to stand on my own two feet and, Guess What? I feel almost as scared as I did that very first time!

amogasiddhi

okay, okay, cool-wet-grass, calm-blue-ocean, 1 month 6 days to go before my baptism............
i've just managed to pick myself up off the floor after reading all your stories and now mild panic is settin in. Perhaps a drink would be in order, to steady my nerves you understand. I can do it......can't I?
Anyone fancy meeting me at Mumbai Airport on 12th Feb? I'll be the bloke with terror in his eyes.

skell

Nov. 4, 2004. About 10 PM. We landed in Delhi and I had the sudden need to rush to the lavatory - not even off the plane yet. Then, standing in line at immigration, another rush to the bathroom. India style only - I learned quickly! While waiting for luggage - another visit, more practice. Now chewing madly on Pepto Bismal tablets.

For the next 7 weeks, I was fine. Guess it was nerves. Can't wait to go back!

rangss

All I can say about this thread and the posts.

Am jealous of everyone here. I did not have the baptism by fire...damn! I was born here!

Kokopelli...you just gave me an awful stomach cramp!!!

__________________
...and I took the road less travelled.

Nick-H

Maybe there could be a reciprocal thread for those born in India to describe their first experiences of other countries?

jwblack

This is a most interesting thread . May I relate my first encounter with India ? . No jets for me or overland treks , I went the old fashioned way and apart from being seasick I enjoyed it . In the tail end of 1946 I left Southampton on board a converted p & o liner and 6 weeks later after a brief visit to Port Tewfick and a very brief call at Colombo we disembarked at Bombay as was . After a short stay at Kalyan we set off for Secunderabad ( by rail ). At some point in our journey we heard that a new type of bomb had been dropped on Japan . Of course no one knew what the repercussions would be , but shortly after we heard that the war in Japan was over . I believe that the reason for our ship going to Colombo was to disembark us there so that we would be part of the further invasion of Japan . Call it Fate Kismet or what you will , this is how our lives are changed . My first impressions of India were very mixed as you can imagine . On one hand there was the constant evidence of a very hard existence for many people , but on the other hand there was a stoicism that beggars belief . One of your contributors to another thread was commenting on seeing people using their hands to eat with . I cannot see the validity of using this as a yardstick of a persons worth or potential . My point is that on first glance we see things that are foreign to our way of life , but after looking deeper other aspects become evident . I spent about three years in India and was happy to be there . I think my most outstanding feeling was that this is a country of great potential . My best wishes to all , especially the people involved in the the recent disaster Blackeye

Ikuru

kewl stories and a good thread, Im making a bookmark for later...

__________________
http://www.ikuru.se My art.