Incredible India!

I've been in India for 24 hours, and it's already living up to expectations.

We got on standby from Geneva to Amsterdam, which was nice since the flight was overbooked. We got the seats next to the emergency exits - extra leg room :) for free :) :) We also got some special seats on the way to Delhi - extra leg room and no one else in our row. Great start to the trip.

This morning we had to get to the hospital to get my rabies shot. I got the prescription from the doctor, went to the little pharmacy in the hospital to buy it and brought it back to be administered. Good thing they read the box before giving it to me - the pharmacy had given me the wrong vaccine! Hmmm... Eventually got the right thing, and it only cost 8 dollars (beats the 300 that it would cost in the States!)

This afternoon we went to a bazaar in Old Delhi and it was incredible - the smells, the people, the clothes, everything - so intense. We spent a couple of hours getting lost in no-mzungu land side streets, trying to avoid getting hit by every kind of vehicle you could imagine. 'Trying' is the key word. I ended up getting sandwiched between two rickshaws going in opposing directions! I escaped with just a few scratches and bicycle grease all over my pants, which thankfully came off with a little African-style scrubbing in the sink at the hotel.

Ended the day with some food in the bazaar. It was a sit-down restaurant but with all the amenities of street food - ie bug in my rice. But hey, protein, right?

All in all, it has been a wonderful first day in India. I'm SO excited for all that the next 4 months have in store for me. Tomorrow we fly to Varanasi, on the Ganges, where we will spend a little under a week before coming back to Delhi to get my second rabies shot. India is a lot how I imagined it to be, but just that much more intense with the smells and the sounds all around. The poverty is shocking, but I think spending a month and a half in Africa before this has softened the blow a little. Africa has also taught me that poverty does not equal misery, and the life all around in Delhi has confirmed that. Although both poverty and misery definitely do exist, they do not automatically go together, and the beauty of this place has really confirmed that.