I have made it to Thursday night here. I would have to say now I have experienced many different things in India. One of those things is that things often break here and it may take a while to fix. It is 6:00 pm here and the plumber has not been yet. I am guessing we may see him tomorrow at the earliest since it will be getting dark soon.
India is not the cleanest place I have been. So it did not bother me too much to go out today without being able to shower. I think this is why I find some humor in this sign.
Maybe in my next guest blog I will post a picture of the trash all over below this sign and across the street.
The next thing that I have noticed here besides the trash is the amount of motorbikes. I see more Honda motorbikes here in one day than I have seen in my life time in the U.S. Here is a picture of a very small portion of the amount we see everyday.
Here is my guess of the ways people get around here :
by car - 1%
by walking - 10%
by bus - 15%
by rickshaw - 25%
by motorbike - 49%
Here motor bikes are as good as cars. You can even carry "laptop" computers. This is a picture of one of the three we have seen since I have been here. The other two were the PC and this one is the monitor.
In the U.S., usually it does not matter where you are from for the cost of admissions for something. Here Overseas
visitors are required to pay more...like yesterday when we were at
Dakshina Chitra.
One of the things we did yesterday at
Dakshina Chitra was watch a folk dance. Here is a picture of the peacock putting a lei over my mom's head during the folk dance.
I have not looked too hard, but yesterday was the first day I have seen chain
restaurants here that we have in the U.S. We had a snack when we were at the mall at Subway. Then we ate at Pizza Hut last night. The total for the four of us to eat supper last night was 509 rupees. This is equal to about $12.75. This was for two medium pizzas, eight slices of garlic bread, and two liters of bottled water.
5 comments:
I saw that "Clean and Green" sign one day on ECR but it was too late for me to whip out my camera. I couldn't believe the irony of that sign.
Being Indian, I used to wonder too about the different rates for foreigners and for Indians. Apparently, the reason - which I discovered in random conversations within internet groups because the bureaucracy doesn't see any need to explain its actions - is because the Indian government subsidizes the entrance rate for all Indians at these places. This is because without subsidies only the richest Indians could afford to see the Taj Mahal, the National Museum, the National Gallery or any other major attraction. Since foreign governments don't subsidize their citizens, the government decided to charge them the full cost of the entrance. Hence the so-called "white tax".
Unfortunately, the differential rate is applied disproportionately against those who appear "foreign" as many visiting second-generation Indians for example simply pay the subsidized "Indian" rate without being questioned. Also, as far as I know, these rates are not supposed to be applied by private institutions unless people are paying in foreign exchange. They are only supposed to be levied at government-run museums, historic monuments, etc., and for train and air travel which the government subsidizes. What's the solution? I don't know. I still support the idea of a subsidy though so that all major tourist attractions are easily accessible to the majority of Indian citizens, many of whom are too poor to even afford the subsidized rates.
---Sharmishtha
Glad to see you are having fun and Julie let you blog again. Thanks for including pictures this time. Can't wait to see more pictures when you get home... Enjoy your last few days.
Becky
Where's the elephant?
Was that a picture of the Hell's Angels motorcycle gang there? They are world renown apparently.
Carrie
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