When you visit India
Bucket in the shower
Pretty much every shower in an Indian household has a large and a small bucket. For us Europeans that is strange at first. I had no idea what to do with it either. But if you then turn on the water and find that there is almost no water pressure, the bucket combination suddenly becomes interesting: fill the big bucket, skim off with the small water and take a shower yourself with it. This is usually more effective than pressing against the cold shower wall to catch some water from the low-pressure trickle along the wall. If you stay in particularly cheap hotels or with locals, you may well find this shower variant there; sometimes even, although the shower is actually perfectly okay. Old Habits die hard, I think. But don’t worry, most hotels and hostels have wonderfully working showers. Not always warm, but showers and Internet. We needed the Internet to make our nightsmore exciting trying to earn some money on the side by betting on our favorite cricket teams in India. Of course we used only recommended bookies from https://onlinebettingwebsites.in/
Chewing gum instead of change
If you buy something in the small shops or stalls on the street, be it water or a pack of chips or whatever, you may get your change back not in the form of coins, but chewing gum and candy of the same value. You can of course receive banknotes in their usual form of banknotes, but you can get small change in “kind”. I was a bit surprised the first time, but it is quite common.
It’s all about the food
Indians love food. And India loves food: each region has a special dish for which it is known. In such a huge country, it does a lot. So not all Indian food is the same. But the food in India is above all one thing: very, very, very vegetarian-friendly. Since many Hindus are vegetarians, you can easily find vegetarian restaurants across the country. Often the dishes are even vegan or can simply be “veganized”. If you get the chance to visit a local family, go there hungry. They will shower you with delicacies. Because at family get-togethers and parties, everything pretty much always revolves around food. There are worse things I would say.
Delhi Belly
While we’re on the subject of food. Almost everyone I know who has been to India has been haunted by him. I had such stomach problems during my first visit to India that I lost weight drastically. This may sound tempting to some, but constantly running to the toilet, stomach aches, nausea and weakness are anything but nice — and can be very dangerous. So caution is advised. In this post I have put together tips for avoiding and treating “Montezuma’s revenge”.
Arranged marriages
Not to be confused with a forced marriage, which is still widespread, especially in the poorer parts of the country, and of course an absolute absurdity. Many young Indians still rely on the opinion of their parents when choosing a partner — and therefore let them choose the future person. They believe that their parents know best who is good for them. However, that does not mean that you have to marry the first person to come. Rather, the parents see themselves in their role as a kind of humanitarian Tinder. Daughter or son go on one, two or more dates with the person they have chosen and they alone make the decision whether they want to marry that person or not. A dating culture like ours in the West is, however, more and more on the advance, especially in the big cities.
Fascination with blonde people
Yes, even if you are only dark blonde / light brown, that is enough to make you an absolute photo magnet. Many Indians have never seen white people and are fascinated — light skin is considered beautiful, light hair is exotic. That can be flattering, but it can also be quite annoying, especially at tourist attractions where you unintentionally become an attraction yourself. A polite denial of a request for a photo is perfectly fine, as is having a photo taken when you feel like it.
Traffic rules, what is it?
As soon as you leave the airport of a large Indian city in a taxi for the first time, you may get moderate panic attacks with the driving behavior of the Indians. Three cars drive close together on two-lane highways, five motorbikes squeeze and jostle in between, two tuktuks also try their luck, with a bit of bad luck a cow has made itself comfortable in the left lane and there is a traffic jam, occasionally pedestrians cross them Roadway. Communication takes place via the horns — permanently. No matter where I’ve been in the world, nothing beats the traffic chaos in major Indian cities.
