Namaste!

Amazing.

I actually woke up around 4 local time today and couldn't fall asleep again until 5:50 - 10 minutes before the alarm went off. We snoozed a 'little' and were down in the breakfast room by 7:40. As we were being picked up at 8, I decided that I was not up for rushing the eating and therefore declined breakfast. I did not take into account India (in)efficiency. Making a long wait short, we were picked up 9:30. It did give me a chance to catch up on some sleep, and Susanne went for a walk with the camera. Apparently, today is the day to arrive in India. Every car was booked out, the reason for us having to wait, and when we finally did get fetched it was in the private 4x4 Toyota Qualis. That was interesting. We were among the "bigger" for once and enjoyed the benefits.  When we arrived at the travel information office our car was not yet ready, so we were brought to a nice Indian breakfast place. Then we walked back to the office to find our driver. The walk was nice, I think Susanne enjoyed it even more than me, getting a more 'hands on' feeling than seeing everything through a window. We were introduced to our driver when we came back, he is nice and his English is reasonably good. Like so many others here, he is very attentative and always looking for ways to take care of us and please us. While it feels wrong having a 'servant' like that, it also comes as natural that it feels like an offence to suggest that we would actually be OK carrying our luggage inside ourselves. I tend to be reminded of the class/caste differences of old, at least when going to the more touristy spots. We go in the main entrance, he vanishes somewhere around the back. Today I guess it is just a matter of economy with him staying on a pretty low budget and doing the less fancy options when it comes to food and sleep, but yeah, I cant help getting the feeling that I am being treated like a master, and that the workers should only be seen when doing something useful. Still, he is insisting that this is how it should be, and he has been doing these tours for 15 years so I guess he has found something he likes. Of course, when we are eating local food he doesent vanish anywhere, and we are accepted more as "one of them" than "one of those".
After clearing the initial traffic in New Delhi city center, things calmed down somewhat when we hit the motorway. Of course, here the speeds are completely different that those inside the city, and 2-lane roads are still anywhere from 2 to 5 vehicles wide at any given point in time. It was interesting noting that the industrial area (offices, not factories) was very modern and well kept. There were even green plants along the middle of the motorway, and water trucks were doing their best at feeding them. Most of the plants were still brown though, and I cant imagine that the usage of all that water comes cheap here. What I've seen so far of India is a range of bad priorities actually. There are so many buildings here, but one ends up with the feeling that they are from a time long past and that the current inhabitants are only squatting in an abandoned civilization. Very few are making an attempt at maintaining anything, to the point of structural collapse. Then the ruins are just left in place, slowly being eaten away by scavengers needing bricks or other materials to improve their own dwelling.

Roads are in a similar state of disrepair, especially once we hit Rajastan. The worst Norwegian construction zone is still far better than the best road here. Our little Tata Indica is constantly bottoming out on its shock absorbers even at low speeds, but its seats are surprisingly good at absorbing what the undercarriage can not. I must say that our little vehicle is actually amazingly robust compared to my expectations towards the brand. While the jeeps (they are everywhere, little licence-produced Wranglers) overtake us on the rougher patches, we are still able to keep a good pace. We did run into a couple of problems though. First we ran into a close road. Someone had simply buildt a brickwall across the road. We turned and burned and found a new path to our destination. Then our oil-cap broke and it took some time to replace it in the "little" village we were in. Quite a bit later a tire went flat. It was dark then, but my MagLite 3D came into good use.

When we set out this morning our plan was to do a stop-and-look in Pacheri (Midway Arawali Resorts Touris Complex, 160km from New Delhi and on the boarder of Rajasthan) and then drive to Bikaner. We got to the Midway place, but due to the mentioned problems, as well as getting a late start, our driver meekly asked if we would be angry at him if we maybe decided to stop at
Mandawa for the night and go the rest of the way to Bikaner after a local guided tour in the morning. Of course we did not have a problem with that and we made the arrangements with the tourist office. He said it was 75km to drive, but that was still a good two hours on the roads here. When we arrived sometime past 8, we found it to be a truly amazing hotel taken out of any Indian saga. Heritage Mandawa, Mandawa, Jhunjhunu district, Shekhawati. Its a little Palace in its own right!

Thats all Ill add this time, I need some sleep before breakfast at 8 and tour at 9 in the morning.
Also, I would like to extend my most heartfelt thank-yous to my beloved mom and dad for bailing me out of our little moneyproblem. Awesome parents ftw!

Our car!