I still need to write more about the trip back to Australia and then India again but meanwhile here are two photo albums:
So we had a meeting cancelled at the last minute and this meant that we could potentially head back to Australia a day or so early. Now for me it mattered not what country I was in since I wasn't heading home yet anyway, but my colleague had the opportunity to get back to his family early so we were going for it.
Originally we were supposed to head back the night before. Becuase of some schedule changes we'd had the travel agent change our flight to two nights later. We made the mistake of first trying to have the hotel travel director change our reservation to get out that night. This is at about 2PM and the flight out takes off at midnight. We gave our tickets to him and he said he'd be in touch within the hour.
About an hour and fifteen minutes later I headed to the front desk to find out what the story was. I was told that our Bangkok to Melbourne leg was confirmed but that we would need to head to the airport and get on the waiting list for the Delhi to Bangkok leg. We asked what our chances were and were told that we'd just have to take our chances. At this point we woke our travel agent. He got back to us with the same answer. He told us that this was the time to try whatever we could at the airport and also that there was an Indian Airlines flight leaving about an hour after ours was scheduled to leave. If Thai couldn't get us on their flight they might be able to get us on the Indian flight.
We checked out of the hotel about 9PM with the caveat that we might be back to sleep in the rooms we'd paid for. The drive to the airport was about half an hour so we were there a good two and a half hours before the flight. We were able to get on the waiting list and were told that at 11PM they'd call the flight and start to give seats to people on the waiting list. We were numbers 25 and 26 or so. At 11:15PM they started to take people from the waiting list. A few minutes later they called us over and told us that we had no chance of getting on the flight. We inquired about Indian Airlines and were told that we should go stand by their counters and someone from Thai would be over to see what they could do. It should be noted that earlier in the week an Air India flight had been called back to the airport as they forgot a part of the plane on the runway. What interests me is where they dumped the fuel since from what I recall most long journey airplanes take off with more fuel than they can safely land with. Normally this would require them to dump the fuel over a body of water but I am not sure the Delhi airport has a body of water handy.
Anyway, this was Indian Airlines and not Air India. Funnily being last on the waiting list on Thai put us first on the waiting list on Indian. We were able to get on the plane and it seemed that everyone on the Thai waiting list was able to get a seat. That said, the flight was totally full. The plane was an old one from the 70s or so. The seats were incredibly close together. A curtain rod was screwed to one of the divider walls for people to hand their jackets on wire hangers. The flight to Thailand wasn't too long and the food wasn't terrible.
The flight from Bangkok to Melbourne actually included an hour-long stop in Sydney. We had to deplane and walk around the duty free area for an hour. That wouldn't have been too bad if the shops were actually open. The really nice thing about the Thai flight was that it was quite empty and I was able to grab a full 5-seat middle section for myself. That gave me about 8 feet of room to stretch out over the seats and go to sleep.
New Delhi felt quite a bit different than Mumbai though I think that it mostly stems from the hotel not being in the center of a shantytown. The Trident Hilton Gurgaon is a pretty incredible place. There are huge reflection pools both at the entrance and in the courtyard that the windows of the rooms face. The reflection pools are set up so that around the edge the water flows down a two-foot incline to give a smooth waterfall effect. In the center of the pool at the entrance a few flames burn at night which are reflected in the pool to give a beautiful effect.
doors at the entrance are so massive that the doorman opens one and allows the momentum of it to keep swinging open and slowly begin to close while he walks to the other door to open it for you as well. The reflection pool in the central courtyard, which is a huge reflection pool and has no 'yard', starts at the ground level for the rooms then flows down towards the swimming pool in the center. This will be much clearer once I figure out a good way to get my pictures up.
Gurgaon is a town to the southwest of Delhi. It appears to be a fast-growing industrial area with lots of call centers, development centers and malls. Everywhere you look there are new buildings going There have been lots of articles about the huge numbers of malls being built all over the country. We were in the DLF City Center mall. Although it is more crowded than the malls in the US or most of those in Israel many of the usual suspects are present. Pizza Hut, Ruby Tuesday, Subway, American Tourister, Benetton and of course Tommy Hilfiger. Now I was quite surprised to see Tommy Hilfiger considering that to my knowledge the designer had made some remarks about his clothing having been designed for upper class white people. Looking into it deeper he either never said it or refuted it very well. Of course there were plenty of shops selling cellphones, electronics, saris and other local clothing and yards of cloth.
We decided to eat in an Indian restaurant that one of our colleagues had suggested from her previous trip. We ordered some garlic naan (a flat bread), some jasmine rice, two mains, an appetizer and drinks. The whole bill came to abour Rs 640 or about USD $14. In comparison at the hotel, albeit a Hilton, breakfast for one is about the same amount. Dinner quite a bit more.
Interestingly the malls have stands selling sweet corn. It comes in cups and you can order it with different flavourings. Didn't get a chance to try it out this time but will at some time in the future. We did stop at McDonalds for an ice cream. No beef on the menu and some interesting curries in edible rectangular bread bowls.