Sunday 30th March

Happy Easter! We had planned to go to church this morning, but suffered from the consequences of Indian helpfulness, again. At the restaurant last night we asked where the nearest CNI (Church of North India) was. After we'd explained what a 'church' was, we were directed to the local Catholic one. No, we explained patiently, C.N.I. Ah yes. In due course we were given an address, fully detailed, even saying 'Opp Modern School'.

It wasn't there. Not even the same road. Not even the same district. Our driver didn't help matters much by asking people for the CNI Church, opposite the modern School, which invariably drew the reply no, there's no church opposite the modern School, with which information he would return. Forget this Modern School, where's the F#!@ing church?! It's not the driver's fault, there wasn't a church anywhere near there (Except for an 'Assemblies of God' one that we didn't fancy).

But why did the man at the hotel say there was? Why did he carefully write down an address that he knew was bogus, knowing that we'd go there and find out he was wrong? Why wouldn't he say he didn't know so we wouldn't waste the entire morning looking for it? All these questions and more are answered very simply. He just didn't want to disappoint us. It's the old Indian thing again, telling you what they think you want to hear. Oh yes, there's a CNI church at Connaught Place. You want an address? Okay, I'll give you an address.¹

It happened when we decided to see what an Indian McDonalds was like yesterday.² Oh yes, next block, we were told cheerfully, until someone politely told us that it's actually 10km South. If anything makes me really angry, it's people wasting our time like this just because they're too embarrassed to say they don't know.

The part of Delhi that our hotel is in is a bit scummy, but around Connaught Place, the main centre of New Delhi, it's very nice. We built ('we' in the 'Britain' sense of the word) and it's very grand. And very expensive. For us, that is, not for your average tourist who marvels at £20 Levi's and £50 suits. There's a Wimpy and lots of expensive restaurants. Yesterday we wandered aimlessly and I bought a Nehru waistcoat, some tapes and a book. I'm basically a pauper now until we reach Madras. The Delhi art gallery was a lot more interesting than Mumbai's, but not air-conditioned, more's the pity.

After the Church palaver we had a fantastic breakfast - eggs, potato, tomato and bacon(!) with unlimited coffee and good toast. This used up our food budget for the day (Rs204!) but it was worth it. After the extravagances of yesterday we decided on a day of sightseeing, so started with India Gate, a 42m high monument with the names of lots of dead people inscribed on it. In the distance you can see the President's house atop a hill with two huge ministry buildings on either side.

We were picked up by an auto-man as we made our way towards it, who offered us a tour of Delhi for Rs60! Bargain. Who can argue? Who can refuse? Anyway, the buildings were built by the British and criticized by Gandhi for mindless extravagance. What about the Moghal buildings, the Taj Mahal? The Parliament building is a monument in itself, a huge round pillared building like an over-sized slice off the tower of Pisa. That area is great, lots of space and green and much nicer than London which is all crammed together. I think that with all the over-population here the space is a precious commodity and only for the very rich.

Safdarjang's Tomb was next, a miniature Taj Mahal - a very ornate waste of space.

The most interesting place was the 'Qutub Minar complex', built by muslims, now a ruined monument. It is bits of Mosques, built using bits of Hindu and Jain temples. The site is dominated by a 72m high tower which is built of red sandstone. Also on the site is the beginning of another tower that was going to be twice as high. Luckily, the madman whose idea that was died before his mother had to suffer the embarrassment of it falling down. Someone would surely have finished it if it were feasible.

We visited a fantastic Marble temple in the shape of a lotus flower which is the place of worship for the local Baha'i followers. This is the religion that believes in the unification of all races and all faiths under one God. It's all World Peace and Cosmic Harmony stuff, which is inevitable but won't work. I think humanity will destroy itself before accepting One People and One Faith. The acoustics inside were amazing, I was tempted to sing but there's a strict silence rule that few people adhere to.

We had an interesting discussion about the Baha'i religion and how sincere it actually is. C. said that God wouldn't send another prophet after Jesus, because he is supposed to be the Final Redeemer. If Mohammed was sent by God, wouldn't he mention Jesus? I'm very liberal about this and said that Mohammed was probably sent to reach the people Jesus didn't. The Baha'i's believe that all are prophets of the same God, that all religions are therefore the same, so why argue?

C. said that they spend too much time worrying about the environment, but they do run schools and believe in one global nation. They are very political as well, but it's like Ken Gnanaraj said, Christianity isn't just about preaching. We need to care for God's creation. But God's going to destroy it anyway. But that doesn't give us the right to destroy it first. There followed more on Islam, about which neither of us knows very much, which led to Hindu-Muslim conflicts, our part in the divide (divide and rule) and I talked far too much because it's all in this 'Great Indian Novel' that I'm reading. I'm not sure how much of it is true, most of it is based on fact, but it sounds pretty feasible to me.

After all, before the Raj it was all just a bunch of kings conquering each other and converting the conquered to whatever religion they happened to be at the time. Us included. Then when Indian Independence loomed large, we pointed out that the Muslims were a minority and all the Hindus would vote for a Hindu government which would restrict the Muslims. So keeping the divide alive. Very cunning. But not very nice.

...

Our auto-driver persuaded us to visit a few Emporiums at which we drank Kashmiri tea and bought nothing. He did this because they give him twenty Rupees for taking us there, regardless of whether we buy anything or not. This is why he could get away with only asking Rs60 for taking us round the city. In one place, I was asking about the quality of a silk scarf that was Rs1,100 and worse than the one I bought in Bangalore. The man got really annoyed when I said I didn't want to buy it (although we warned him as much when we went in, Don't try and sell us stuff coz we don't want it!) and said Goodbye then, then muttered stuff about wasting his time. They just can't accept that we can't buy anything because we can't afford it. They say What piece you like? and How much you pay? pretending to be reasonable until we tell them the answer to both questions and they get offended.

I've just read some stuff in the Rough Guide about carpet merchants in Agra - it says they persuade tourists to buy carpets to export, so they (the companies) can buy them back to sell later, at a profit to both the company and the tourist. But the company rep never shows up and the tourist is left hundreds or thousands of pounds short, although he does have some nice carpets he doesn't want. What Bobbi was trying to do perhaps? I wonder how many people he's duped. Unless he was genuine. I ain't going back to find out.

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I'm going to be very glad to leave the decadence and dishonesty of the North as we begin to head South. The contrast of richness and consumerism here with Tamil Nadu is amazing. Here, it is spend spend spend but there, it's all about earning and saving. I think we've started to lose touch with our original purpose for coming here - not USPG, we lost touch with them ages ago. We came here to connect and join with another people. Up here, everyone seems bent on keeping us separate and it's working.

While we were having breakfast we saw a beggar woman being filmed by some longhair while she tried to get money out of his friend. It occurs to me that we might as well do that, for all she cares, but in Tamil Nadu it was people like her who were inviting us into their homes and giving us coffee, praying with us. Our only consolation is the shock we felt when we saw this, and the knowledge that we wouldn't do that.

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Going back to Jaipur, it is true (more discussions!) that we were right in the middle of a slick operation. The two boys who 'led' us to Bobbi had started with inviting us for coffee so they could talk with us about India and England. Then they asked us about shopping and said they knew a good place where handicapped children worked, like Traidcraft or something. They took us to the office, no-one was there so we went on to the roof to 'see Jaipur'. Which is when Bobbi showed up.

They lied to us about everything. They even took us to a miniature paintings shop. He talked to me about music. They pretended to be our friends. We saw the boy we'd seen that morning outside the shop and he ignored us. It all comes together. How many tourists? They're probably at it while we speak. How do we know who to trust?To be honest, we never really trusted them - knowing they must want something - although the story about the clothes placed had worked. Until we met Bobbi and he started talking about jewels.

Yesterday a kid tried the I've seen you before, you don't remember me? line. With my excellent memory, I didn't and told him not to give me that shit. His next you don't remember me? was a bit less confident and his Hey!'s faded into the distance. What a stupid line. But everyone's at it.

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Oh for the beautiful smile of Miss Shanti (the delightful, exquisite, angelic) and her Sunny-Zip. Oh for Yesu and Jerry and Kumar and Mrs Juliet's chappatis! Oh for my choir of beautiful children singing 'I believe in Jesus' even though most of them aren't Christian! Oh for Ramnad and it's innocence. They think it's backward. Stay backward and pure and Indian and never wear jeans girls! Stay Indian and never become so evil!