Those who heard about our desire to set off as wild travelers to India and Nepal invariably expressed condolences and looked with an enthusiastic gaze, as at the conquerors of Antarctica. They recalled the exhausting Indian heat, infections, total fraud, robbers, Nepalese partisans, and God knows what else. We decided to check the rumors. This took very little time. Here are universal recommendations on how to find out what awaits you in uncharted lands and how to prepare for it. The first thing to do is to ask acquaintances who have been THERE. In our case, this did not help, because none were found.
Then we plunged into the Internet and found very useful resources. I will not give the full list: you can choose the necessary thing yourself by setting a search in Yandex or Yahoo. If you are too lazy to dig into the network, go first to www.travel.ru. This is not just a site for booking tickets and tour packages. It is a whole portal with weather forecasts in different corners of the world, news, photo reports, and a forum.
But the most informative was the hitchhikers' forum. There you can ask any questions about various countries and will certainly get a lot of answers, recommendations, and addresses. Remember this site: www.avp.travel.ru. If you know English, we recommend visiting www.travel-library.com. Here travelers' stories about their adventures are conveniently structured by country. Not for prudes, but for lovers of exoticism – the forum on the website of car dealer and traveler Sergei Vinsky: www.awd.ru. Here any most risky questions are allowed: about the rules in brothels of third world countries and the prices of hashish in Goa. Alas, we failed to find any more or less decent tourist resource in Ukrnet.
• Today, to organize a trip to mysterious India, it is not necessary to beat the thresholds of search engines. It is enough to go to the page http://www.impalatravel.com/asia/india and choose the tour you are interested in. “Impala Travel” offers tours to India for every taste: it can be a sightseeing or health tour, a trip for beach holiday, or an esoteric journey.
Actually, one could limit oneself to the information from the Internet. But I strongly recommend also taking with you on the road a guidebook on the country you have chosen. Today they are sold in great numbers, and it is not easy to choose a worthy one. Yes, probably, and should not. For free travelers all over the world for the most part prefer guidebooks from the Lonely Planet publishing house. Here there is information about literally everything, and really of practical value and very detailed. Therefore, wherever you are with such a guidebook, you will always find out what interesting things can be seen in the city, which hotel is better to stay in, and in which restaurant the chance of getting poisoned is less. For a whole month I carried a thick tome about India in my backpack and by the end of the journey literally wore it out from frequent use.
As for all sorts of infections, malaria, etc. For those whose journey through India will be at least from Delhi and above on the map, this is not relevant. Nepal is even more comfortable for travel, and no infection is found there. We, of course, took some medicines, but in principle Indian pharmaceuticals are quite developed, pharmacies are literally on every step. The main thing is to be able to explain yourself to the seller. However, all our pills returned to their homeland unpacked. If you absolutely want to get vaccinated against something, I recommend first visiting the polyclinic at the October Hospital in Kiev.
Those who have experience of the painful obtaining (and more often not obtaining) of a visa for traveling to European countries, rejoice: in Asia you will be greeted with open arms. You will get a Nepalese visa in 10 minutes at the border itself. The Indian one is issued without problems at the Indian Embassy, located in Kiev near the Kurenevsky market. No invitations or recommendation letters: you paid $40, filled out a form, and the next day you collect your passport with a visa.
The cheapest way is to fly on a Boeing of “Turkmen National Airlines” named after the great Turkmenbashi. A round-trip ticket – $497. Also cheap are “Uzbek Airlines” – $499. But they have an inconvenient connection. If you want to support the domestic carrier, “Aerosvit” will deliver you there and back for $530. However, airline prices have a tendency to change often, alas, not in the direction of decreasing.
Those who are used to traveling under the supervision of a tour operator, I dare to reassure: when going to India, there is no need to use the services of domestic tourism professionals. Everything is simple: if in many tourist countries our tour operators buy hotel rooms with significant discounts, then in India you will not save anything on this: hotels are on every corner and extremely cheap. You can order any excursion on the spot by going to the office of a travel agency, of which there are no fewer than hotels. India and Nepal are very hospitable, touristically developed countries, and for little money you will get any service – just have time to choose from the numerous offers.
Naturally, the issue of safety is important. I dare to assure: these two countries are no more dangerous than our own homeland. Legends about the unprecedented dishonesty of the local population turned out to be a myth. Having considerable experience of wild travels in Turkey, I can testify: India and Nepal are no less comfortable for a traveler, although the level of local tourism service has not yet reached the Turkish one.
But ordinary Indians are far more honest than the nice Turks. Obviously, it is all a matter of religion and culture. If Islam and Christian traditions prevail in Turkey, then in India, respectively, it is Hinduism and Buddhism. And in these religions, an important place is given to the teaching of karma, which can be seriously damaged by a single unrighteous act, after which one will suffer for one's entire life in the next incarnation. This does not mean that you can leave your suitcases unattended or not watch your wallet. Nevertheless, by the end of the trip I had already stopped checking the change and no longer bargained: firstly, because I had learned to read the maximum permissible price on the label, and secondly, bargaining for a product that is already extremely cheap is pointless. However, this rule does not always apply in tourist centers.
Indians are the very embodiment of cordiality, wisdom, and an unhurried, dignified desire to please. In large cities, many speak English, and traders are very fond of Slavs. As one of the souvenir sellers admitted, "if a Russian wants something, they won't balk at the price." Alas, in the Indian perception, Ukrainian tourists fall into the category of Russians.
To be continued.