Visa shenanigans & delhi belly in the middle east

so folks a lot has happened since the last time that i blogged. my god... where to begin, right so the last time i blogged i was safe in my mutrah hotel in oman, getting really excited about heading to india and after surviving staying at am omani's house.. well.... so i got a call from wallis late on the tuesday night, her in tears, saying that she was not going to india!! WTF!! well it turns out that sasha had not informed us correctly of our visa requirements, Irish travellers DO need a visa before entry is granted into the country. i had checked this out before and read somewhere that you could get a visa on entry (havent been able to locate the site again funnily enough) so the stress began, i talkd to the kind people at my hotel and they contacted the embassy but it was shut or the day. so i printed the form filled it and waited for morning. headed to the picture place the next morning and then made my way out to the embassy and crossed my fingers... i made a beeline for the only other white person in the place when i had my ticket and he told me he could get his papers for india in a day!! result?? but.. talked to the guy in an office and turns out cos im not a resident of oman i would have to wait a week for the papers to come through! i cried when i heard this and the man with the heart of steel didnt even react! so i stumbled out of the embassy and ran into the white man again who gave me a lift back to my hotel cos he felt so bad for me. so i had a choice.... stay in oman for 3 more days (someone at the hotel could pull some strings to make it happen faster) and spend 200 more on a hotel or head back to bahrain like i was going to adn stay with someone whilst i worked out the visa issues. i went with the cheaper option and ended up back in bahrain where the lovely shane stapleton and family took me in for the week. i am forever in their debt and something pretty from india is headed their way as a thank you.

shane was quite the host whilst i was in the kingdom for the week. but something about their house and he comfort of the compound meant that i was quite the hermit for most of my time! although my second night did happen to coincide with halloween... (cue hilarious drunken holiday
story) wll i hadnt bargained for a halloween party now had i, i was supposed to be in mumbai with wally. but i rolled with it and dressed up as something suitably tasteless.. a prenant chav - with a bloody knife in my belly!! the pics will be up in a while when i remember to bring my cable to the internet cafe!i certainly got a few wierd looks and it was a great chance to meet up with people who thought they had seen the last of me earlier in the month. a cute boy even took my number (but with the belly that seemed suspect!) revisted traders during the week for yummy coctails and headed to a club opening just befoire i left! so on the wednesday under the influence of shane's biast few of indian processes i headed into the embassy to hadn in my passport to speed up the process and make sure they hadnt forgotten me.. they took it and told me to be back the next day in the after noon. so on the thursday with some trepidation i headed in a cab to the embassy area, i needed some cash so the taxi driver took me to a drive thru atm.. and it promptly swallowed my card! my one and only card in the middle east!!! luckily this atm was on he side of a HSBC bank so i ran inside and left my cabbi waiting adn told them my sorry story. well they werent going to give me my card but i through a bitch fit about it not being my fault and i was leaving the country onward and needed my money and the send a technition to check it out and got my card for me... but then they wouldnt give me the blasted thing and had to take my details and check if it was a "red card" fraud or something stupid like that, and then she asked me for my id, which i didnt have cos i was picking it up from the india embassy .. and since the robbery of vegas i dont have a drivers licence... uh oh.. but some pleasding and she gave it to me telling me all the time how many laws and rules she was breaking. then to my surprise 4 other people arrived who had their cards swallowed by the same machine... i quietly backed away when she said that they would have to wait 3 days to get their cards back!!! so onward to the embassy with my fingers crossed that karma wasnt going to do anything further to me.. and to my delight i picked up the passport with visa intact, no problem!!!

the next morning i took a cab to the airport simply enough and made it through all the security without a problem, i was tying to take out money when the problems started agin. the card wouldnt work. i was really scared that the other machine had damaged it or i was over limit. so i spent a long time on the phone to AIB (not the best when you are travelling) and it turned out that a security block had been placed on my card (just for the craic) took that off, got some cash, changed it to rupees and headed for india.. phew!

arrived in mumbai and took an air conditioned taxi into colaba. none of my phones were working (all barred?!) so i couldnt tell wally i had arrived.. uh oh.. so i headed for the place i thyough we had agreed to stay at only o change direction when she finally got through to me. the ride took abouit 2 hours the traffic is awful and it was so hot! mumbai is full of poverty, its difficult to see. the kids on the street, filthy, naked adn hungry lookng. but unfortunatley very quickly ou become accustomed to it.i got my annoyingly lost cabbie to take me to the taj mahal hoteladn i met wallynearby! i have never been so happy to see a family member. this past 5 weeks solo have been a little tough, not gong to lie. we spent our first night at bentlys (cheap and cheerful) adn headed out for some overpriced (and under alcoholic) drinks and dinner. we met simon there (wally in the country for one day finds a fellow traveller!) he had a seriously gay vibe but at the same time was coming on to the walster. he bored me! so i faked being tired and we headed to bed! the next day we headed out to elephanta island to see the caves, the monkies and travel the 120 steps. an hour ferry took us there adn people didnt really stare at us too much. we met a couple of belgium travellers at the caves and had lunch with them. in the evening we headed around a walking tour of mumbai and went to a bollywood type movie in hindi called Fashion! it was a 4 hour EPIC thing, now i feel i speak hindi! after the movie we had a late night meal in cafe leopolds of chicken byriani and butter chicken adn sloped off to bed early. we were up at the craic of night (5am) to get to the airport for our flight to delhi. the cabbie tried (and failed to rip us off) adn instead tried his luck with the pair of us. funnily enough we were married!! i created quite the back stories for us, i was a teacher and maried to paul with 2 kids and wally a photographer with a husband she didnt name, and no kids i dont think! so we got to the airport and got checked in. there was a slight problem at security when they thopught my change purse might be a bomb but we got on the plane and got safely to delhi.... so in delhi now and managed to get this kick ass accomodation with this guesthouse. this family put you up adn take care of your everywhim, including onward train details and a hidden delhi tour. we took the tour this morning at 6am, saw old delhi had curry for brekkie, were talked through hinduism, went to the laundary,saw some traditional homes adn drank from a coconut! that was only today.. tomo we head to the markets and on friday to agra to see the taj... from there its through rajasthan...

stay tuned xxx