Travel to New Delhi
- The airport of New Delhi : don't go by rickshaw, they are just a little bit cheaper than a normal taxi, but often put you off somewhere next to a far away hotel in the outskirts of New Delhi that you didn't ask for. Before you exit the guarded part of the New Delhi airport you will see on your left (in between the travel agencies) a little desk with the sign "prepaid taxi" (an initiative from the government to fight the taxi-mafia), buy a ticket there (210 rupees during the night), on which the number plate of the taxi that will drive you is written. Give the ticket to the driver when you have arrived to where you wanted to go, safe and easy.- Buying train tickets in New Delhi : finding the state ticket locket is not easy, we had to see through 10 smart Indians who all wanted to take us to their travel agency. The special (and quiet) ticket locket for foreigners is on the first floor of the train station and not on the other side of the street or in Connaugt Place as everyone will try to convince you of.
- Getting cash and exchanging money in New Delhi : on Connaugt Place in the new centre of New Delhi you will find several cash points accepting VISA cards. Citibank has their head office in a big modern building behind the Connaugt Square. The only cash point that I could find that accepted a Cirrus card was at the back side of the train station (go from the front side over the bridge above the tracks). It seems that there are still not many cash points outside the big cities of India. Sometimes you can use your VISA card inside the bank office getting money from the till.
- Internet cafes in New Delhi : in Paharganj, Main Bazaar there is one internet cafe where you can surf on the net with a good connection for only 10 rupees per hour.
- Books : around Connaught Place in the new centre of New Delhi there are a lot of book shops and street stalls selling books in english. Almost all Lonely Planet titles and the Footprint and Rough Guides of India can easily be found. Also a lot of cheap books about India.
- Embassies in New Delhi :
Embassy of Oman (16, Olof Palme Marg, Vasant Vihar, phone no 670215, 674798, 671704, 6140215, 6144798).
- Turkmenistan Airlines in New Delhi : Block N, BMC House, Connaught Middle circle, phone no 3721085, 3721087, cozydeepika@mantraonline.com. There is a flight New Delhi to Asghabat on saturday and sunday, 1140-15.35, 12690 rupees for a one way ticket. I searched up their office in New Delhi since I was hoping that their tickets to Asghabat were as cheap as the ones from Asghabat where you can fly thousands of kilometres for a few euro, it turned out to be a lot more expensive.
- Traveling by public transport, the train from New Delhi to Pushkar (Rajasthan) : a ticket cost about 180 rupees for the 2nd class sleeper, a ticket for the express day train costs 600 rupees. Chains with locks are sold on the perrons of the New Delhi train station, so that you can lock your rucksack to yourself or the train. What in India is called 2nd class we would probably rather see as 3rd class : there are no doors to the coupes and 8 passengers per compartment, not very safe for theft. On the other hand traveling by train in India is probably a lot safer than by bus in terms of risks of accidents.
