Goodbye Delhi, Hello Agra!

Our second day in Delhi started with us thinking we were going to visit the lotus temple but ended up in something completely different. Before going to the lotus temple we wanted to buy our train tickets to jaisalmer, at least that was our thought at the time... as soon as we entered in the tourism shop everything changed, we almost bought all the train tickets for the north of India but we changed our mind at the last minute. Due to the high prices, we were a bit scared that it could be a scam. We decided to go to the train station but it wasn't easy at all, we talked with probably 10 different people and all gave us different information. At the end, based on all informatin, we decided to go to another tourism office. There, we spent a lot of time going through several travel options and ended up buying the train tickets to most of the places in the North except to Agra and Jaipur that we would go with a driver (Mr. Lucky). While the tourism officer was working on our papers Lucky drove us around Delhi, due to the late hour we decided not to go to the lotus temple and went to the places that Mr. Lucky suggested: India Gate, Sikh Temple and Hindu temple. From all of those, the one that touched us the most was the Sikh Temple. It is a place where the energy was different, we could feel the faith of people, we felt peaceful and serene. We had to take off our shoes, cover our heads, wash our hands and feet with holy water and then... Peace! We learned the all Sikh temples provide food and shelter to anyone that shows up, no matter the religion or color. It was nice to be in a place where the religion was so attached to the people, not only Sikh people but all the human beings. That was the highlight of the day.

Time to go back to the hotel, repack and be excited about our next stop in Agra. We are going to meet Mr. Lucky at 7am.

At 7am Mr.Lucky drove us to Agra. We were super excited because we had been only 2 days in Delhi where we had a bunch of adventures, chalenges and learnings which gave us a huge excitement about our next stop.
After 3h30min we arrived in Agra, the niche of Taj mahal. We took advantage of Mr.Lucky contacts to get a cheap room close  to the Taj. After negotiating the room price we said "bye bye" to the driver and scheduled to meet him on the next day to take us to the next stop. By that time we were on our own to explore Agra. We had a walk through the crowded and narrow streets of the city trying to find a place to eat cheap. However, we were still a bit worried about the bacteria in the food and ended up in a restaurant a little over budget. During our walk, we could see that people in Agra are way more relaxed than people in Delhi. People would still approach us and stare at us trying to make a deal but in a less intense way. In addiction, we also noticed that most of the work here is made with ancient techniques, like manually working the steel and selling cooked rice in the middle of the street.

Finally it was time to visit the great Taj Mahal!!! As expected there is a tourist price, here a tourist pays $11.5 and an Indian pays $0.33 but anyway what's $11 when we are talking about a World Wonder?! At least they gave us a bottle of water with the ticket, in India we need water almost as we need air (our record so far was 7.5L in one day).
It's impressive how something with the Taj's greatness was designed in the 17th century. We walked around the gardens taking hundreds of pictures. The beauty of the Taj is more in the outside than the inside, off course it is pretty but you don't have the feeling of how big it is when you are inside. One of the things that touched us the most was the quantity of Indians that asked to take pictures with us. They shyly got closer to us, sometimes they only said "hi" other times they had the courage to humbly ask for a picture. Some of them didn't even have a camera but they were happy to be in a picture with us in our own cell phones... In a picture they would never see again.
With their attitude, we felt what it is to be from a different color/culture and at the same time to be loved and appraised. It's a lesson that we will take for life.
Of course we stayed until the sunset, it was good because as the time went by, people started to leave and we got the chance of taking even better pictures.

Kika & Pedro

Another world!

It's impossible to wait until the end of the week to write another post.. Today was the day where our perpesctive about the world has changed.. we tried to read about Delhi before starting the trip but everything we thought we knew, is different. The colors, the smell, the people..

The day started with us getting out of the hotel having no clue where we were going... turn right?! Left?! "Where do we get a map?" OK let's just walk a bit.. we walked a few steps and a guy starts offering to show us where to get maps and information about Delhi.. we thought it was nice but how does he know we need a map?!?! We started following him but at one point we got suspicious.. maybe because that doesn't happen in our country... suddenly another guy (from Nepal) offered his help as well and took us to the tourism office.. the day had just started but step by step everything was becoming more and more real!

After a long conversation and a great Masala Chai with the tourism guide we went on our first Indian Metro ride... obviously we ended up in a "women only carriage" with a guard screaming saying that Pedro couldn't be there.. other than that, the metro experience went pretty well! To be honest, the metro trains are way more developed than several that we've been before.

Our destination: Red Fort but Delhi is not about the destination, it's the path until the destination.. the metro exit was in the middle of a HUGE bazaar, full of people, everyone looking at us.. are we even in the right place?! If we stop and look at the map people will "attack" us, trying to suggest something or sell something. We just walked! It was a nice and confusing walk. People here in Delhi live in totally different conditions. Now, I think we know how poverty looks like but even going through the poorest neighborhood we've been so far, we never felt unsafe.

When we arrived to the Red Fort we faced what all the tourists in India face: tourist price... for a ticket that costs 60 rups ($1) to Indians, we had to pay 250 rups ($4) I guess it's something we will need to get used to! The fort was ok, we had to seat on the shade several times due to the really really strong sun... during our walk around the fort we had to go to the restrooms, usually going to the restroom is not really an event but this time, Pedro had his first experience with random people asking him to take a picture with themselves.. we also noticed that several people took pictures of us thinking we were not noticing.. we must be really good looking!! (Kidding)

After the fort we were planning to go to the Gandhi museum but the entrance was expensive and the heat was killing us.. we ended up deciding to get a tuk-tuk and visit the area around the hotel! During the LONG tuk-tuk trip, while stuck in traffic we realized that a girl wearing jeans shorts is not so common, 90% of man/women were staring at my awesome legs so we ended up deciding that buying some pants would be a good idea!

At the end we had a great day, full of new experiences and we believe that we learned a lot.

Oh I almost forgot.... A cow hit Pedro on his back!! It was really funny... we also saw other animals on the street like chickens and huge goats! It's a really different place!

We were not supposed to be describing this much but our excitement is telling us to write so we hope you enjoy!

Key words to describe the day:
- People; Noise; Heat; Smell

Have a good night,

Ready for the next day!
Kika & Pedro