Intense

That's the word that I think best sums up my first day. It was bad and it was good, but it was pretty intense the whole way through.

The morning started off fine, with a nice cup of tea at my hotel while I planned out the day's activities. My hotel, Yatri House, is an adequate place located just outside of Connaught Circle. Hopping into an autorickshaw, I told the driver to go to the national museum (see my post below) and agreed to his asking price of 60 rupees (about $1.30 -- once again, see the post below).

After asking a few passerby, he dropped me off in front of the National Art Museum. It seemed a little fishy to me, but it wasn't open for another 15 minutes, so I thought I would take the opportunity to see the nearby India Gate. My little side trip turned into an hour-long detour, as I quickly proceeded to get lost (even though the India Gate is smack dab in the middle of a roundabout).

That actually proved fortuitous, though, as not only did I get to see preparations for the upcoming military parade on Jan. 26th's Republic Day, but I enlisted the help of two high school students to point me in the right direction of the REAL National museum, which was a good 15 minute walk from my original drop-off point.

The museum was nice enough, with some pretty cool statues from 15 hundred years ago, and some very nice paintings from 4 or 500 years ago. All in all, though, everything kind of blended together (I guess all museums tend to have that effect). And the 8 bucks entry was a bit steep (especially for India).

From there, I caught a rickshaw to the Pandara market. Or thought I did, as the driver purposely dropped me off at a different market. I know it was on purpose because he was clearly upset when I refused his "generous" offer of a day's rental. It took me almost half an hour to get to the real market I was looking for, and when I arrived, there was nothing but touristy restaurants. But at this point, my stomach was rumbling so I settled in to the best-looking one of the bunch.

The lunch was decent enough (butter chicken curry), if a bit overpriced. Some stupid driver (not a waiter) plopped his tourist down in the seat across from me (at my table, without asking me). I thought he was a waiter at first. I didn't mind the guy sitting with me, just not being asked. Anyway, he was from Greece and apparently had just missed his plane to another city in Delhi this morning. Or so his travel agent said. But tomorrow would be okay. Or so his travel agent said. The agent was letting him stay for free at his place, and gave him a driver for nothing. Well, for the 268 euros the poor guy paid for his 5-day trip. I didn't have the heart to tell him he might be getting fleeced, especially when he went on and on about how "lucky" he was.

Okay, well, I'm tired, and the manager of the hotel wants to shut off the internet connection, so I'll have to finish this (long) post tomorrow. Good night!