– ODO- 10234 – 10388km
– Location- Singori, India
– Weather- 20-32 degrees, headwind in the morning
How India Could Keep More Tourists
A moment ago while I was sitting starting my lunch a young man came to sit opposite me and began chatting to me. As he left he gave me a piece of advice “Be aware in India. Some people are laughing at you”. While my overarching feeling of traveling, living and working remotely from this country has been positive the level of understanding of my motivation for the trip is often apparent. In a lot of ways I’m glad I took the journey now. Not when I first cycled to across Europe when I was 17. I’m a little more sure of myself now than then.
It reminded me of a few stories I’ve heard along the way. The first was a young man who’d arrived in India for the first time and managed to make it – via the metro – to within 5 minutes walk of his hotel. When walking along a public overpass a “security guard” stopped him and said more and more angrily that he needed to go to get a ticket first. The man even shouted until he went and had bus tickets bought for him at a high premium.
A young couple arrived at the airport for the first time and left without booking a taxi. In India, you can’t enter the terminal again once you leave. I only knew not to do this because of an online video I’d watched before. They were picked up by an unofficial cab which not only charged 10x the real fair but also told them that their hotel was closed (a lie) and took them to a travel agency that tried to pressure them into prebooking their entire trip with them then and there with a private driver. They’d already planned to fly and stay in hostels which is perfectly normal.
These characters, like me, still saw visiting India overall as a positive experience. But I know another not mentioned here who will never come back.
I understand entirely we are all guests in this country. But I feel like most tourists are a positive influence and this lack of respect just makes me sad. If you’re Indian or a fellow tourist and you see this happening, please help!