are maps useless?

whatsilliness

talking to someone who has stayed in india extensively several times--- he said maps of cities are absolutely useless, and streetnames dont exist

is this true? are city maps completely useless for India?

ChrisJ

I wouldn't go as far to say useless - sometimes vague perhaps!

The good thing is the locals and certainly the rickshaw guys will understand if you ask.

I would suggest looking for landmarks near to where you want to go. You can't really go wrong from there.

Have a good trip!

Chris.

byronic

In many ways, maps are useless...

Maps are 2 dimensional things in a 3 dimensional world, and most of the time India is a 4th dimensional kind of world…

Maps are useful in the sense that you can see that Delhi is “here” and Agra is “over there”. For city use, I would say that a map is pretty useless. Short distances on the map can be deceptive in real time. For example, ten blocks “rickshaw distance” through Old Delhi could take you an hour, where as ten blocks driving though South Delhi could take you two minutes.

When in India there is never a lack for people to help you find your way. So your need of a city map to actually guide yourself isn’t necessary. You can have a map to orientate yourself though, and that is always fun and mentally useful. Let’s say you are in NYC and want to go to the UN building. All you have to do is, get a cab and tell the cabbie to take you to the UN building. It’s the same with India. If you know how to ask for directions, you don’t need a map in NYC, and the same goes for India.

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machadinha

My take on it: What you need to understand is the maps are vague approximations of the actual situation on the ground. The LP maps for instance are based on official tourist board or even better maps so it doesn't change a thing, I never found a map of Delhi that was more comprehensive than that of LP.

So you arrive there, map in hand, a picture of a neatly overseeable world, with all the streetnames conveniently in English too! What they forgot to tell you is there's a zillion winding alleys inbetween that no one ever cared to note down. Moreover those English street names are usually known by their actual names in whatever local language prevails where you stay. Moreover most streets won't be signposted and if they are not in any script you know. To top it all off and as noted above, renaming of streets is the order of the day; to compound the problem often locals will call a street by its old name which is not in your guidebook.

Now to the art of asking your way: To an Indian it is far more rude to tell you they don't know or they don't understand you than to tell you whatever they seem fit. This may seem strange but I grew up in a culture where a good story always beat the savage truth so I can understand where they're coming from. Anyway what you do is ask as many people as you can what you want to know, then take the golden mean of their varied answers and hope for the best. Needless to say the process leaves plenty of room for errors, if you ever watched Weekend Millionaires or what's it called you'll know that 90 out of 100 people may well be wrong.

Never wave a map in front of people, not even taxi drivers, either, as it will just confuse them. People know their city by heart (and more often than not just the areas they frequent) and don't have a mental picture of the overall layout; again I sympathize because this is the way I get around at home. I usually know my friend's houses but not their addresses. They say it's a man/woman thing as to the way we orientate but it's leading too far here and anyway it doesn't necessarily pertain to the question at hand.

Anyway to cut all the crap: bring maps (or buy them locally) but don't rely on them like you might at home, and don't expect others to understand them. To ask your way around and as noted above, it's usually better to ask for some nearby landmark, and don't expect wonders of that even. It's not that annoying that it will usually lead to major problems however, although you may well find yourself in a "situation" occasionally, or just getting tired wanting to get the f**k back to your hotel.

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crvlvr

mostly useless.. but it depends on what you are trying to find on it

True. But, if you are trying to locate a residence, forget about it.

Things will look easier on the map. The moment you look up you will be confronted with confusion. You well planned routed will be thwarted by road blocks due to construction/celebration./and everything else you cannot possibly iimagine, one way streets, missing street signs, additional streets that are not on the map, streets that have been re-named, street signs on local languages that you may not be able to read, and so on...