In New Delhi, day four

If I lived in India I think I'd become a vegetarian. The food here is amazing. Not the dodgy street food, the stuff you get in the posh hotels. It's all fresh vegetables and cooked to perfection. You could say I've eaten well over the past few days. Today I skipped lunch as I was visiting the Red Fort in Old Delhi, an eye-opening experience if ever there was one. I took a cab from the hotel in to the old part of town, the roads were jam-packed with auto rickshaws and bicycle rickshaws and the noise from car horns was deafening. The traffic was awful, snarled up here and there, but soon I found myself at the Red Fort, queuing for a ticket at counter number four (the one for foreigners). I think we have to pay more than the Indians, which is probably understandable. We can afford it, I suppose that's the reasoning behind it.

Yours truly at the Red Fort...

I was given a slip of paper and a blue plastic disc, which I had to insert in the turnstile to gain access to the Fort. Once inside I wandered about, took a few photos and then linked up with my driver. He took me on a short journey to a huge market, bigger than Istanbul's Grand Bazaar and jam-packed with auto rickshaws and bicycle rickshaws. I found myself saying farewell to my driver and hopping aboard a bicycle rickshaw. The man driving it must be so incredibly fit and, let's face it, strong too, what with me sitting in the back after all the dinners I've been eating this week. The ride wasn't smooth, far from it, but it took me along colourful, narrow streets lined with shops selling sarees and wedding outfits, books, musical instruments, pashminas, jewellery, hats, you name it you could buy it here. Absolutely fantastic. We stopped off at a Buddhist temple, photographs were taken, and then we headed towards the Red Fort where I picked up my driver and we battled through the traffic in order to reach the hotel. What a fantastic day. Something good always comes out of something bad, in this case a cancelled meeting led me to the Red Fort. I was in serious danger of coming all this way and simply not seeing anything. My plan for visiting the Taj Mahal was scuppered (and besides it meant a long, long day and I really wasn't up for it to tell you the truth).

Inside the grounds of the Red Fort...

Another structure inside the Red Fort's grounds

After the Red Fort I hailed a rickshaw...

...and risked life and limb on busy roads

I got back to the hotel around 1700hrs, possibly a little later, but I had a few things to do before I hit the restaurant. Because I'd missed lunch I made the most of dinner, having soup and two stabs at the self-service buffet. For dessert I tried carrot fudge. Sounds bad, but believe me it was amazing.

View of Old Delhi from bicycle rickshaw

It's now just past 2300hrs - 2307 to be precise - and I'm up on the 10th floor, in the business centre. I've checked my emails, written a few and now I'm thinking about tomorrow. Tomorrow I fly home and I need to be out of the hotel around 0730, there's a car coming to pick me up. So I've got to settle my bill and head back to Indira Ghandi airport. I will miss India. It's a very special place. I love it's chaos, the strange smells, the honking car horns that carry on through the night, the sounds of a distant train horn, the food, the people, the mad traffic, there's not one element I can truly say I dislike, even those people who hassle me on the street aren't that bad, they're all part of this country's rich culture. And the fact that over the last week I have completely forgotten about Brexit can only be a good thing.

So, it's goodbye India. I hope to return again soon, preferably with my family.

In New Delhi, day three...

I can definitely report that I ate too much today, but if the truth be known I simply don't care, the food's that good here at The Park Hotel in New Delhi. I've told you already about yesterday's meal at the hotel's Fire restaurant and now a little bit about Mist. Alright, I've mentioned already that there's a self-service element to the food and that the Indian dishes are to die for, but today, on arriving around 2030hrs, I discovered that Mist has an a la carte menu too, and by that I mean you can get more than just Indian food. Pizza is on the menu, vegetarian lasagne, stuff like that, so I stuck with the Indian food, but was advised before sitting down to eat that if I purchase a voucher from the front desk (Rs1,300) it's far cheaper than if I simply didn't bother. So I bothered and then decided (who am I kidding, I'd decided long before I reached the restaurant) that I was going to have two helpings, and this time a starter too (chicken soup with a nice chunk of bread). I sat at the back of the restaurant in a kind of gallery area looking down on the main restaurant floor, just me and a bloke with a bald head and a long beard (yes, I think he was English). He'd been working out somewhere as I saw him in the lift earlier and now, still wearing his gym kit, he was sitting down and enjoying the food, like everybody else was, including yours truly.

As I simply can't be bothered to note down the names of all the dishes I sampled, take it from me that I had something from most of the hot bowls displayed, two main courses in other words and rounded off with three Indian sweets. I ordered a bottle of mineral water (still) and got down to the nitty gritty of getting stuck in. I did feel a little piggish afterwards and later quacked my way to the business centre on the hotel's 10th floor where I answered a few emails and started writing this blogpost. Here I am now at just gone 11pm feeling fretful because a meeting I had planned for tomorrow at 3pm has been cancelled, which is good and bad news. Good because it means that I can go to the Taj Mahal, although I'll be honest with you, it's such a faff to get there and back and it costs quite a bit, I don't think I'll bother; perhaps I'll simply visit the Red Fort instead. Decisions, decisions! It's bad news because one of the reasons I came here was to see the company that has cancelled the meeting. Very very annoying on that front, I can tell you. Or I might do absolutely nothing, just get up, have breakfast and loll about all day, but that would be wasteful and I'd end up trying to avoid the hasslers, like the Indian gentleman who starts up a conversation and simply hassles me all day, until I run for cover back at the hotel. He's like the human equivalent of a swarm of midges.

In truth, I'm not sure what to do, but it seems like a right waste of time just sitting here doing nothing, although I did have one good meeting today.

I skulked back to my room, feeling, it has to be said, a little despondent, but when I discovered that Jurassic Park 3 was on the television and I saw the familiar faces of Sam Neill, Laura Dern and that bloke from the movie Fargo, I jumped into bed and watched the last 40 minutes and then fell asleep, waking initially around 0500hrs and then again just after 0800hrs. Breakfast was another food fest and now it's 1212hrs and I should be outside, checking out the Red Fort, but I'm here writing this blogpost in the peace and quiet of the hotel's 10th floor business centre with views across the city. There's an interesting looking park across the street. Better go, but see you all later...