Harrowing experience

Well it is official now...we are no longer virgins of fear.

Harrowing. Definition: "Extremely distressing; agonizing: a harrowing experience."

Circumstance: middle of Delhi, night, don't know where we are, can't get a cab....wow.

So today started off well. With all of us telling each other that yesterday had been hard, and trying, but that today it was going to be simple. And it was...We ran into a few VERY CLEVER touts at the New Delhi train station....we ALMOST fell for them. I feel like I have seen every trick in the book, and these guys are really something. Then we went to the National Museum (which has on exhibit right now the largest diamond in the world....I was just waiting for bryan to steal it for me....OR NOT!), and to the Delhi gate, which kind of looks like the Arc de Triomphe.

And here it began. We grabed an auto-rikshaw to Ghandi's tomb. That ride was a trip, we went on the high way in a tiny, ricketty, three wheeled vehical....and combated the normal Delhi traffic by squeezing between cars with inches to spare. We arrive at the tomb, and the sun is setting. We decide that we don't feel comfortable entering a park after dark, but by the time we turn around our rikshaw is gone. We literally found ourselves in the middle of Delhi, during late rush hour, walking along a busy road and we couldn't get any one to stop for us.

I don't think I can put into words. But I have been in a bunch of places, in a bunch of circumstances....I almost went into panic attack mode. Out of my comfort zone doesn't even begin to describe it. I know I can't describe it better in words, saying I was lost on a dark, busy street in Delhi may not evoke the fear that I felt...but it is the best I can do.

But here I am, not out there on the road somewhere. Eventually we hailed down a bicycle rikshaw, three of us packed in there (the man should do tour de france, because we was hauling all three of us through the city like it was nothing....man those French got NOTHING on these Indians!)...and made it to the train station. I almost promised that man my first born son.

Chris comes in tonight. Tomorrow we are taking a CAR tour of Delhi (we have decided to spare Chris all the "learning experiences" we have had). And tomorrow night we are catching a night train to Jodhpur.

Delhi has been well....eye openning, to say the least. My anxiety and my lungs (the forcast is STILL smokey/hazy) will thank me :) I hope I didn't tell anyone that I was going on a "vacation"! To RAJASTHAN!