Dear readers:
The truth is I am totally terrified. I think people believe I am strong, but actually I am much weaker than it seems. Don´t expect this to be my best blog entry. I really need to experience some catharsis.
I got to New Delhi yesterday. I came out here out of an impulse, honestly, with very little money. I couldn´t stand staying in Europe, unemployed, in the middle of the crisis. I decided to come here because it´s cheaper, while I wait for a miracle and find a job as a translator, writer or a street cleaner. (Or well, I can also wait for many of you to subscribe, I only have 4 subscribers. This was the advertising spot of the day).
Anyway, I arrived in New Delhi at 3 a.m. after a twelve-hour trip, all the way from Munich to Moscow. I had to run in the Moscow airport. I missed the bunch of people from my flight who were also connecting to another flight because I really needed to go to the bathroom. In other words, I was going to shit on my pants and it took so long to land in Moscow that I couldn´t release the security seat belt. It was probably the longest landing in history. When I went back, I assume I went the wrong way, because I had to wait in line with a whole bunch of Vietnamese and go through security again. I almost missed the flight, but oh well, I made it.
When I arrived in New Delhi I had no other choice but just lying down on the floor to sleep in the airport. New Delhi is well known for its rape rate so it is not advisable for a woman to wonder around by herself at night. Therefore, just like that, I had to wait for the sun to appear to protect me and I fell half asleep, hugging my backpack, just in case. I was suddenly awaken by a guy who ran over me with a little cart. He came in a flight from I don’t know where; the sign he was holding had the name of a city I had never heard of before.
By the time I got out of the airport it was already 6:30 a.m. and it was brutally hot. A temperature push that tried to take me back inside.
I had the hostel address, but nothing else. I kind of had an idea how to get there, but that didn’t work. Addresses here really don’t mean anything for a foreigner. This is karmic revenge for living in Costa Rica, where the streets have no name.
I felt brave enough to take a taxi. There was a police taxi stand outside and that made me feel comfortable.
Everything you`ve heard about traffic in India is true, or ten times worse. The guy was literally about to kill himself. They don’t stop honking their horns. It is sort of a sonic driving, more than visual, because I think they don’t even know where they are going. It reminded me of the first scene of India in “Eat.Pray.Love”, when the protagonist arrives. However, I have to say comparisons are odious and I hate that movie. I barely eat; I don´t see myself praying that much (although I should) and I don’t think I`ll find love around here.
When I finally arrived to the hostel, it turned out to be inside a market. I asked for directions and it was a dark narrow alley, where barely one person can walk at the time (later I discovered a cow would fit as well). I almost felt my pants getting wet: I was scared to death. There was a crowd around me in the middle of a Thursday morning. Motorcycles, moto-taxis,
bicycles, rickshaws (or however you write it). Its chaotic. Imagine Mercado Borbón, only ten times worse. There was shit every two meters in the alley, I still don´t know if it was either human or animal. It could have been mine as well. I was really scared. If it didn’t happen on the plane to Moscow, this could have been a good moment. To make things worse, I got my period on the exact day I was coming to India. Great!
I arrived at the hostel, which ended up being a pigsty managed by smileless men. I was told check in wasn´t until noon, but that I could rest in a room. They probably saw my horror face. The room was spartan, to call it somehow. A fan on the roof, a bathroom across the hall, where shit was coming out of every angle of the toilet, and yet I was so exhausted I lay down and fell asleep.
At noon they assigned me a "better" room. Curtains cover the trashy view between which there is the T.V and the window (yes, there`s TV, but I have no idea whether it works). To make things worse, the window is broken and people peak through it once in a while, so I try to stay away from it.
I tried to sleep, but I couldn´t. I had a nervous breakdown . A real nervous breakdown. I felt I wasn’t strong enough to do this. I`ve lived in Mozambique for six months and I ´ve traveled around Africa, even by myself. This, however, surpasses me. Especially when I realize there is a 12 hour time difference between home in Costa Rica and New Delhi. I am completely alone on the other side of the world. This is really the other side of the world. Literally.
What intimidates me the most is the huge amount of men on the streets. It´s as if there were almost no women and it scares me not knowing how to act. For example, I didn´t know it´s not well seen to see a woman smoking. In fact, up to this moment, I haven’t seen anyone smoking.
I guess here there are too many possibilities to die that you don´t want to add cancer to your list. And there I was, smoking around the market, or the bazaar, or whatever they call it. Me and my brilliant ideas.
I tried to calm down and started reading about India, to inform myself. Yeah, I stupidly didn’t take the time to read something before. The more I read, the more scared I got. This place is like a different planet. And I am clueless. I have no idea how you reserve trains, or buses, or anything. Everything is so complicated. I feel I can´t trust anyone, because hostels try to get your money for everything. In fact, when I read some comments on the web, to me it feels like they are somehow altered. At least my hostel isn’t AT ALL like any of the things I read on the Internet. From the description to the comments the hypothetical customers made, everything is a lie. I mean, I feel like I can´t even trust what people around me tell me, which makes me feel scarily alone.
By the time it was 7 pm, I was already looking for flights to go back to Costa Rica and trying to borrow money. I was hysterical. Truly hysterical. I felt like I truly couldn´t keep on going, like I couldn’t keep on going alone, not any more. I’ve gone through many things alone. I have never felt so much the need of having someone, specially a man, next to me. I was, in that moment, the living image of loneliness, here in this shitty bunkhouse, on the other side of the world, hysterical.
I started talking to every single person I ran into on Facebook and Skype. My brother, my mother, my aunt, my ex coworkers, my friend Johannes in Austria, my friend Sandra in Spain, Priyanka, an Indian friend I met in Berlin…at the end I threw a tantrum in 3 different continents.
Up to last night, I was convinced I was going back to Costa Rica. I was also convinced I was NEVER EVER in my life going to travel by myself again. I was going to stay there again, kneeling upon the truth, upon my destiny for being a woman: no matter how liberal you are, being a girl does not allow you to make all your dreams come true. Being a man is a lot easier, and I don’t only say this because of the fact they can always open all the relish jars they want. You can´t make all your dreams come true, even less when you write. I looked back into my past and came to a conclusion: it was all my terrible fourth grade math teacher`s fault. Since then I`ve hated numbers, which closed any possibility to go into a more lucrative profession and left me with a bunch of useless letters that do not make any good to anyone.
This morning I woke up and swore I wasn´t going out until I could get my ticket to go back home. But I was hungry. I hadn’t eaten much the day before, only a few cookies, and I can´t go out at night. Besides, I didn’t trust unpackaged food at all and the menu here in the market is not really varied.
So I had to go out either I wanted or not. I got ready, making an effort on looking as decent as I could. I took all my valuables with me and left with a lock on my small backpack, asphyxiating, because I tied the straps very tightly. I made my way through a hall (this bazaar is like a maze) and guess what? I ran into a cow lying down in the middle of the way. The truth is it made me laugh, because it was just there, relaxed, enlighten by a sun ray. I have never in my life wanted so much to be a cow.
I turned around, because here the cow has priority, and ventured through a different hall until I got to a pretty decent restaurant where I sat down to have some coffee. I tried to eat a sandwich but I didn’t feel like eating. And suddenly, I realized there were three other foreign women sitting by themselves in the restaurant. They were just there, reading calmly.
So I slapped myself: no. I am not going back. I am not a coward. I might not be strong enough, but I have to give it a try. I`ve dreamed with coming to India all my life. If I go back to Costa Rica now, chances are that I will never be able to come around here again. Besides that, I spent days in Berlin waiting for my visa to India, without leaving the hostel, eating only sandwiches to spend as little money as possible. I already bought the ticket, so I have to finish what I started. I have to admit that every time I see a couple traveling together I feel like crying because I feel so lonely and because I envy that girl so much for having someone that takes care of her and travels with her around the world. Oh well, that`s the way it is. This is my set of cards, and after all, I am very lucky.
So here I am. I am scared, very scared. I think I have never been so scared in my whole life.
But I swallow it with my cup of coffee and today I will go out to the street, I will take the metro wagon for women (one of the very few advantages that you can enjoy here, taking into account how CROWDED the wagons for men can get) and I will go see the red fort and the largest mosque in India. If this were easy, India would be full of women like me, traveling,
and the wagons for women would be the ones completely full. No, it`s not easy. But I am not the first one, nor the last woman that comes to India all by herself.
I don´t know if I am going to be able to write every week as I had thought. On the way I have to plan the trip, look for hostels, trains, planes and learn, over all, how to live in this culture. Besides, I have to keep on looking for a job. I get a couple of articles once in a while, but I make very little from those. However, hunger never saw bad bread.
This is the worst entry, estethically speaking. It has common places everywhere, repetitions, no analogies…I usually write like this first and then I fix things here and there, but oh well, think of this as a verbal diarrhea, catharsis or whichever better word you guys can call it.
So people, for now, the protagonist of the book is still in the novel.
The bamboo horse has started rocking.
P.D: while I was finishing writing this, I realized there was a mouse running on my bed :p
Do you like the way I write? Do you want On the bamboo rocking horse to be written? Do you think that being a writer is a respected profession, just like any other? So please, please share this text in your social networks or, if you feel like doing positive karma points today, click on the buttons on the right side and subscribe yourself, or give me whatever you think is fair for my work. Just imagine that you invited me a coffee.Thank you for reading! :)
The truth is I am totally terrified. I think people believe I am strong, but actually I am much weaker than it seems. Don´t expect this to be my best blog entry. I really need to experience some catharsis.
I got to New Delhi yesterday. I came out here out of an impulse, honestly, with very little money. I couldn´t stand staying in Europe, unemployed, in the middle of the crisis. I decided to come here because it´s cheaper, while I wait for a miracle and find a job as a translator, writer or a street cleaner. (Or well, I can also wait for many of you to subscribe, I only have 4 subscribers. This was the advertising spot of the day).
Anyway, I arrived in New Delhi at 3 a.m. after a twelve-hour trip, all the way from Munich to Moscow. I had to run in the Moscow airport. I missed the bunch of people from my flight who were also connecting to another flight because I really needed to go to the bathroom. In other words, I was going to shit on my pants and it took so long to land in Moscow that I couldn´t release the security seat belt. It was probably the longest landing in history. When I went back, I assume I went the wrong way, because I had to wait in line with a whole bunch of Vietnamese and go through security again. I almost missed the flight, but oh well, I made it.
When I arrived in New Delhi I had no other choice but just lying down on the floor to sleep in the airport. New Delhi is well known for its rape rate so it is not advisable for a woman to wonder around by herself at night. Therefore, just like that, I had to wait for the sun to appear to protect me and I fell half asleep, hugging my backpack, just in case. I was suddenly awaken by a guy who ran over me with a little cart. He came in a flight from I don’t know where; the sign he was holding had the name of a city I had never heard of before.
By the time I got out of the airport it was already 6:30 a.m. and it was brutally hot. A temperature push that tried to take me back inside.
I had the hostel address, but nothing else. I kind of had an idea how to get there, but that didn’t work. Addresses here really don’t mean anything for a foreigner. This is karmic revenge for living in Costa Rica, where the streets have no name.
I felt brave enough to take a taxi. There was a police taxi stand outside and that made me feel comfortable.
Everything you`ve heard about traffic in India is true, or ten times worse. The guy was literally about to kill himself. They don’t stop honking their horns. It is sort of a sonic driving, more than visual, because I think they don’t even know where they are going. It reminded me of the first scene of India in “Eat.Pray.Love”, when the protagonist arrives. However, I have to say comparisons are odious and I hate that movie. I barely eat; I don´t see myself praying that much (although I should) and I don’t think I`ll find love around here.
When I finally arrived to the hostel, it turned out to be inside a market. I asked for directions and it was a dark narrow alley, where barely one person can walk at the time (later I discovered a cow would fit as well). I almost felt my pants getting wet: I was scared to death. There was a crowd around me in the middle of a Thursday morning. Motorcycles, moto-taxis,
bicycles, rickshaws (or however you write it). Its chaotic. Imagine Mercado Borbón, only ten times worse. There was shit every two meters in the alley, I still don´t know if it was either human or animal. It could have been mine as well. I was really scared. If it didn’t happen on the plane to Moscow, this could have been a good moment. To make things worse, I got my period on the exact day I was coming to India. Great!
I arrived at the hostel, which ended up being a pigsty managed by smileless men. I was told check in wasn´t until noon, but that I could rest in a room. They probably saw my horror face. The room was spartan, to call it somehow. A fan on the roof, a bathroom across the hall, where shit was coming out of every angle of the toilet, and yet I was so exhausted I lay down and fell asleep.
At noon they assigned me a "better" room. Curtains cover the trashy view between which there is the T.V and the window (yes, there`s TV, but I have no idea whether it works). To make things worse, the window is broken and people peak through it once in a while, so I try to stay away from it.
I tried to sleep, but I couldn´t. I had a nervous breakdown . A real nervous breakdown. I felt I wasn’t strong enough to do this. I`ve lived in Mozambique for six months and I ´ve traveled around Africa, even by myself. This, however, surpasses me. Especially when I realize there is a 12 hour time difference between home in Costa Rica and New Delhi. I am completely alone on the other side of the world. This is really the other side of the world. Literally.
What intimidates me the most is the huge amount of men on the streets. It´s as if there were almost no women and it scares me not knowing how to act. For example, I didn´t know it´s not well seen to see a woman smoking. In fact, up to this moment, I haven’t seen anyone smoking.
I guess here there are too many possibilities to die that you don´t want to add cancer to your list. And there I was, smoking around the market, or the bazaar, or whatever they call it. Me and my brilliant ideas.
I tried to calm down and started reading about India, to inform myself. Yeah, I stupidly didn’t take the time to read something before. The more I read, the more scared I got. This place is like a different planet. And I am clueless. I have no idea how you reserve trains, or buses, or anything. Everything is so complicated. I feel I can´t trust anyone, because hostels try to get your money for everything. In fact, when I read some comments on the web, to me it feels like they are somehow altered. At least my hostel isn’t AT ALL like any of the things I read on the Internet. From the description to the comments the hypothetical customers made, everything is a lie. I mean, I feel like I can´t even trust what people around me tell me, which makes me feel scarily alone.
By the time it was 7 pm, I was already looking for flights to go back to Costa Rica and trying to borrow money. I was hysterical. Truly hysterical. I felt like I truly couldn´t keep on going, like I couldn’t keep on going alone, not any more. I’ve gone through many things alone. I have never felt so much the need of having someone, specially a man, next to me. I was, in that moment, the living image of loneliness, here in this shitty bunkhouse, on the other side of the world, hysterical.
I started talking to every single person I ran into on Facebook and Skype. My brother, my mother, my aunt, my ex coworkers, my friend Johannes in Austria, my friend Sandra in Spain, Priyanka, an Indian friend I met in Berlin…at the end I threw a tantrum in 3 different continents.
Up to last night, I was convinced I was going back to Costa Rica. I was also convinced I was NEVER EVER in my life going to travel by myself again. I was going to stay there again, kneeling upon the truth, upon my destiny for being a woman: no matter how liberal you are, being a girl does not allow you to make all your dreams come true. Being a man is a lot easier, and I don’t only say this because of the fact they can always open all the relish jars they want. You can´t make all your dreams come true, even less when you write. I looked back into my past and came to a conclusion: it was all my terrible fourth grade math teacher`s fault. Since then I`ve hated numbers, which closed any possibility to go into a more lucrative profession and left me with a bunch of useless letters that do not make any good to anyone.
This morning I woke up and swore I wasn´t going out until I could get my ticket to go back home. But I was hungry. I hadn’t eaten much the day before, only a few cookies, and I can´t go out at night. Besides, I didn’t trust unpackaged food at all and the menu here in the market is not really varied.
So I had to go out either I wanted or not. I got ready, making an effort on looking as decent as I could. I took all my valuables with me and left with a lock on my small backpack, asphyxiating, because I tied the straps very tightly. I made my way through a hall (this bazaar is like a maze) and guess what? I ran into a cow lying down in the middle of the way. The truth is it made me laugh, because it was just there, relaxed, enlighten by a sun ray. I have never in my life wanted so much to be a cow.
I turned around, because here the cow has priority, and ventured through a different hall until I got to a pretty decent restaurant where I sat down to have some coffee. I tried to eat a sandwich but I didn’t feel like eating. And suddenly, I realized there were three other foreign women sitting by themselves in the restaurant. They were just there, reading calmly.
So I slapped myself: no. I am not going back. I am not a coward. I might not be strong enough, but I have to give it a try. I`ve dreamed with coming to India all my life. If I go back to Costa Rica now, chances are that I will never be able to come around here again. Besides that, I spent days in Berlin waiting for my visa to India, without leaving the hostel, eating only sandwiches to spend as little money as possible. I already bought the ticket, so I have to finish what I started. I have to admit that every time I see a couple traveling together I feel like crying because I feel so lonely and because I envy that girl so much for having someone that takes care of her and travels with her around the world. Oh well, that`s the way it is. This is my set of cards, and after all, I am very lucky.
So here I am. I am scared, very scared. I think I have never been so scared in my whole life.
But I swallow it with my cup of coffee and today I will go out to the street, I will take the metro wagon for women (one of the very few advantages that you can enjoy here, taking into account how CROWDED the wagons for men can get) and I will go see the red fort and the largest mosque in India. If this were easy, India would be full of women like me, traveling,
and the wagons for women would be the ones completely full. No, it`s not easy. But I am not the first one, nor the last woman that comes to India all by herself.
I don´t know if I am going to be able to write every week as I had thought. On the way I have to plan the trip, look for hostels, trains, planes and learn, over all, how to live in this culture. Besides, I have to keep on looking for a job. I get a couple of articles once in a while, but I make very little from those. However, hunger never saw bad bread.
This is the worst entry, estethically speaking. It has common places everywhere, repetitions, no analogies…I usually write like this first and then I fix things here and there, but oh well, think of this as a verbal diarrhea, catharsis or whichever better word you guys can call it.
So people, for now, the protagonist of the book is still in the novel.
The bamboo horse has started rocking.
P.D: while I was finishing writing this, I realized there was a mouse running on my bed :p
