I always marvel when I travel that it isn’t all that difficult to change one’s reality. Here I am! India! Landed three days ago. United Airlines, Newark to Delhi direct, I highly recommend it. Smooth flight, quiet fellow passengers, seats have personal touchscreens for entertainment, and more importantly, power! You can plug in your device for charging. I was relieved to find this because I wanted to at least be able to text home that I’d arrived, and call a local if I needed help.
Speaking of this, I’m thankful for help from others who look out for me! Fulbright sent a driver to pick me up at the airport. It was fantastic because after a long flight you emerge with jetlagged fuzziness. I found myself equally concerned with whether I could still purchase duty-free, as I was with completing an accurate customs form. Then later, there’s the confusing ruckus of countless drivers looking for passengers, holding placards or not, congested by the exit where travelers are also wending their way with loaded luggage carts. As it turns out, I couldn’t find my driver because I was standing in the wrong place, but he found me by looking in this wrong place!
They also prearranged my weeklong stay at lovely Vandana’s Guest House. It’s home away from home for now, run by a warm, helpful family who live here, too. My garden rooftop room with adjoining kitchen which I share with the next door Fulbrighter is perfect because I can stow away my PBJ fixings. Don’t laugh, those sandwiches, which I make and pack for the day as emergency snacks, have proved to be vital in our face-paced quest to complete paperwork as quickly as possible so I can get to the Himalayas in time. Yesterday we didn’t have time for lunch all day, shuttling to and fro in tuktuks from USIEF to University of Delhi where I am affiliated, to Connaught Place for errands, to Archeological Survey of India from whom I’m seeking permission to photograph the interiors of monasteries under its jurisdiction. This glycemically-challenged traveler was happy to think straight after snarfing my PBJ on the run!
Fulbright also offered a ‘Facilitator’ to help with the initial transition. Thank goodness! He has been an enormous guide through Delhi these past two days, fording me through congested traffic, bureaucracy, electronic logistics, and procedures! Yes, i need an ATM machine, Citibank is great. Oh and yes, an Indian SIM card please, micro chip with reception in the Himalayas. Yes, I will definitely take that surge protection power strip with universal plugs!
To top it off, he has been a great conversationalist–interested, approachable, frank. Bustling with vision and ideas. We even discussed caste, a subject often considered delicate and charged in this nation’s changing order.
Today’s largest agenda: complete registration at FRRO, the Foreigners Regional Registration Office. Quite an exercise in following directions. Three copies of this, originals only of that, retrieve this signed form from here, fill out (or ‘fill up’ as Indians say) this form online, etc. One fellow Fulbrighter quipped, carry lots of extra passport photos and copies of your passport, they love them here. Indeed! For example, for a foreigner to get a SIM card, you need to supply both.
Sounds like you are having a good start to your adventure!!
Thank you for sharing.
Great that you have arrived. Beyond loving to hear about your experiences, I find myself taking notes to help me when I come..ie. extra passport photos, etc. (though my trip is a year away.) Looking forward to reading along as you travel through the Himalayas. I know you will have a great journey!