Watching the Super Bowl at the U.S. embassy in Delhi

Giants fans cheer the victory.

I’m not remotely a football fan, but when I heard they were showing the Super Bowl at the U.S. Embassy in Delhi, I wanted to go. They were showing the game at the American Community Support Association (ACSA) restaurant, but you needed to be a member or a guest of one to come in. So I texted a guy I met once who works at the embassy requesting an invite, and he agreed to sign me in.

Just before 5 am on Monday I stepped through a metal detector, showed the guards my passport, and was on my way to a posh restaurant where the game was playing on a projector.

Out of a Pahar Ganj hotel and into an apartment

Pahar Ganj's Main Bazaar

Last week I moved out of Pahar Ganj and into the upper-middle-class neighborhood of Safdarjung Enclave. I love it. My commute to Asha is now 30 minutes—walking. The neighborhood is comparatively quiet, and no one’s yelling at me, trying to get my attention, or asking me where I’m from.

Pahar Ganj, which is right off the New Delhi Railway Station (a hub for trains out of Delhi) is chock full of backpackers and cheap hotels. It seems to have a bad reputation amongst Delhi residents who don’t live there. The Indian employees at Asha always expressed concern for me staying there. “Is it safe?” “Don’t eat the food there! I heard they don’t use clean water.”

Dealing with Indian men who think foreign women are sluts

So the tough thing about being a solo female traveler in India is that some local men think we're quite promiscuous. That’s according to the 2009 Lonely Planet: “The skimpy clothing and culturally inappropriate behavior of a minority of foreign women appears to have had somewhat of a ripple effect on the perception of foreign women in general.” Of course we can’t say every Indian man thinks this way, but we can certainly say some do. What did this mean for me? A series of uncomfortable situations. (Not quite as uncomfortable as being sexually harassed by two little boys, though.)

Khan (a 1 on the 1-to-5 skeaziness scale)

This is my New Year’s Eve buddy, who saw me walking by myself on the street and opted to join me. Since it was New Year’s, I didn’t discourage him. Khan brought up the subject of casual sex and how attitudes toward it differ in India and the West. He mentioned that he’s 23 and a virgin, and wanted to know my history (I made up stuff). He did suggest a kiss at midnight, and when I said no he tried to kiss my hand, but I pulled away and made clear I was not up for anything. 

How many tries does it take to get on a train in Delhi? Four.

I could not get on the damn train.

 In "Outsourced," NBC’s short-lived series about an American guy who moves to Mumbai to run a call center, there's a scene where the American is going with his colleagues on a train out of the city. Except when the train doors open and everyone rushes out and rushes in, he’s overwhelmed and can’t get on. It takes several attempts before he managed to get on the train.
On Monday, it took me four tries to get on a train. It happened at the Rajiv Chowk station, which is always a mess because it’s a connecting station. The first train stopped, and while I could have squeezed myself on, it was pretty full and I decided to wait for the next train.

Unfortunately, the next train was a shorter one. I, and all the women around me (we were waiting for the ladies’ compartment), rushed down the platform to try to get on; I was crushed among them, and at one point could feel the top half of my body leaning far over where my feet were planted. I thought, “If I fell, would they run over me? Would it be like Wal-Mart on Black Friday?”

IM conversation with my sister after she's read the last post

Jackie: what does 10 rupees equate to?

 me:  20 cents

why

don't judge me

 Jackie:  just wondering

 me: that's breakfast

 that's almost a thums up

WHY?!!??!

Jackie:  because I want to know how much you're getting cheated

 me:  quit being a Judgmental Jackie for once in your life

10 rupees buys a lot here

it just got me 6 momos

PERSPECTIVE MEANS NOTHING HERE!

Paranoid about being cheated in India, Part II

(For Part 1 click here.)
JAIPUR

I was walking briskly through Jaipur’s Pink City when I heard a man frantically call out, “Hello miss! Hello!” I ignored him, because when you’re a tourist walking through a tourist area, lots of people call out to you. But this man followed me more than 100 feet, still calling out. I only stopped when he said, “I just have one question, miss!”

“One question,” I said. He said, “Why do all the tourists just ignore Indians when we try to talk to them?” I said, “Because it has been my experience that when someone calls out to me, they usually wants something from me, and sometimes I don’t feel like giving them anything.” He said, “But do you think all Indians are like this?” I said, “No, but it’s happened enough times that after awhile it gets easier to just not deal with it.”

Paranoid about being cheated in India, Part I

(See Part 2 here)

They say travelers either love or hate India. I’m leaning more on the side of “really like.” But I can tell you what I hate—the notion that I’m being cheated, that I can’t trust what I’m being told, or that someone has a hidden agenda. I hate to admit how much it colors my interactions with locals.

AGRA

I climbed a few stairs to one entrance of the Jama Masjid to be greeted by an old man with a piece of paper. He told me, “Donation for the mosque, for renovation,” and then showed me the paper, which had people’s names, countries, and a monetary amount written down, usually 500 or 1,000 rupees. Confused because my guidebook said nothing about an entrance fee, I dazedly handed him 100 rupees and added my name to the list. As I wandered around the mosque, I started thinking I’d probably been cheated. My realization was confirmed when I left the same way I came and the man was nowhere in sight. I took some comfort in the fact he looked like he really needed the money.