Off to India

We bought a used India guide book in the Kat. Another traveler gave me some advice I like- she said “don’t try to understand India, or you’ll go nuts, just go with the flow”. So thats my plan, go with the flow and kill em with kindness. We’ve decided to take the bus to Varanasi. We get on the overnight bus in Kat and find it to be the least luxurious bus we’ve been on...ever. Its painted like all the other buses, in a Partridge Family/Hippie style colors with “good luck” painted on every side and hindi or buddha gods on it. The seats are school bus bench style with little padding. No A/C but the windows open. It takes nearly two hours to get out of Kat because they stop everywhere. Our packs are in a back compartment which is fastened with a little peice of wire. I’m not so happy about that. We eventually make it to the “highway” but its pitch black out and we can only see the silhouette of the landscape when a lightning strike flashes. We can feel that the road is a steep descent thats very twisty, when other vehicles are encountered the bus slows to a crawl so they can pass each other. Its probably better that we don’t see what we are driving on! The road is full of potholes and the ride is a rough go. We make stops through the night and the men jump off the bus (there are only 3 women) and take a whiz- but I never see a bathroom for women. I doze off a couple times only to be jerked awake by a pothole or the slamming of the brakes. Steve sleeps a little...At 0630 we arrive to the last stop, which is a couple km’s from the border crossing at Sunali. As we pull into the station, a guy is chasing the bus and yelling something. The bus stops and the running guy climbs on the side of the bus and is trying to slide open our window- seems that he is calling dibs on us and yelling it to the other tuk tuk drivers. I ignore him. I get off the bus and go to the back to find our bags still in the compartment- I am so relieved. The crazy yelling tuk tuk man is trying to negotiate a ride for us. He is asking far too much (150rps) and we know that. Another driver comes up and says “I’ll take you for 50rps” and we go off with him. Tuk tuks are ok around the city, but down a road for a few km’s and they are just annoying- we need to catch the bus in India! We finally make it to a hotel we’ve been directed to and get our ticket finalized. The hotel guy will meet us on the other side of the border and get us on the bus. The bus is leaving later than we thought and we have time to use the squatter and eat some toast at the hotel. There is a water leak somewhere which has made a lake in the hotel where Steve sees a boy taking a pee...sanitary.
We get through customs with no problems- as we are leaving the checkpoint a man is taken to a small room off to the side and is being beaten. We get out of there. Our hotel guy gets us to the bus and introduces us to the ticket checker. He warns us “Do NOT talk to anybody, do NOT give money to anybody, the only person who needs to see your ticket is this man” and off he goes. The bus is not crowded. Its a crappy bus. But you can sit in a row with 3 seats which gives us more space. Two israeli and one japanese guy are on the bus too. The staring has begun. Its like they just can’t help it! The man sitting in front of us keeps turning around and looking at me- I finally stuff my daybag between the seats. Now, I assumed the road to Varanasi would be a highway but its far from it. Its a crowded road with people, rickshaws, and COWS all over the place. The cows just lay in the middle of the road. We seldom drove through nonpopulated areas! Just people and people and more people. I swear I couldn’t look out the window for more than five minutes without seeing someone peeeing on a wall, peeing in a gutter, peeing in a canal, squatting on the side of the road! The bus becomes full and we have to share our three seater- the bonus for me is that I always get the window to prevent any groping. Its hot/humid and its crowded. We cannot leave our seats or else we won’t have one anymore. Steve gets off the bus to pee but with no washroom I stay on and keep the seat safe. We finally arrive to Varanasi and its 7pm. We have been on these buses for 24hours! We are hungry, exhausted, sweaty, dirty, overheated, and in a new city/new country, and don’t know how to get to our hotel. Also, Steve is still bitchy about coming to India and has litterally said to me “I can’t wait to say I told you so.” This is basically a recipe for disaster. A rickshaw driver begins the negotiations with us. We agree on a ride to the old city for 50rps. I said “For Both” and he agrees. Ok, we get in the rickshaw and the Japanese guy gets in the front. We are all stuffed in there with our packs but before we leave some man is sticking himself in there giving us his card and telling us to “just come look at my place” etc etc. I am sweating and have packs on me and we kindly say no thank you but he is persistant and won’t leave us alone. Finally I just say “leave us alone, we are tired and want to go” he gets all mad and storms off. We make a mistake here, we havn’t renegotiated the price since the Japanese dude has jumped on- or rather the Japanese guy hasn’t sorted out his fare. We finally get near the old city (we find out later the rickshaw could have gone much further but he didn’t) and get out. Steve offers him 60rps for us (the 50 we agreed on and a little tip) he says “NO! Its 150rps! 50 each!” Steve said we agreed on 50rps for us two (meaning me and him) he is arguing saying “NO! Its 150!!” I can understand that the Japanese guy needs to pay, but we had a price for us. This is the EXACT scam Brandi warned us about- thats why I made sure it was 50 for both when we got on. The argument goes on and on. My kill em with kindness plan goes out the window. I didn’t yell, but it was a bitchy assertive voice and I couldn’t hold back “This is why people hate India. Because of people like you- trying to rip us off!” Steve and the rickshaw man look at me- the argument has ceased. Steve puts the money on the seat and we walk away. I swear I have a split personality and she is mean- I just have to fast for 24 hours, not sleep, be covered in sweat, be day one menstruating, and get mad- then out she comes. The guy was a scammer, I think he knew we would fight back so he stopped way before the boundary for rickshaws and we ended up walking a really far distance anyway. We are trying to find the Shanti House we are planning to stay at and it turns out the Japanese guy is dead weight. So Steve is all mad that he is tagging along and we are about to lose the Amazing Race because of it. I tell him to chill out. Then, a boy asks where we are going. Steve says Shanti House and the boy says he can take us there- for 200rps!!! We are following him through a maze of streets and its dark and there are cows and stray dogs and men. Steve offered the kid 10rps and they continue to negotiate while we walk. I think this is a poor tactic. We must set prices before doing anything with anyone- otherwise we are giving them the advantage. They have more control. The kid gets us to Shanti house and Steve offers him 30rps. And, like the rickshaw driver he says no and won’t take the money. Steve likes it when they do that, he says take it or leave it...he takes it. Let me give you a perspective of money here. For us to buy a bottle of Pepsi in a restaruant it costs 12rps. This is a restaurant and tourist price. So, 30rps to walk with us for less than 10 mins is not too bad! There is a room for us, the Japanese says he doesn’t like it and leaves...Steve was happy for that. We have a ceiling fan but no window so its muggy but ok. Not too bad for $3 CAN/night. We shower and go up to the rooftop restaruant. We see other travelers! Yay! We meet some druggy hippy types and share butter chicken, naan, and rice! It takes over an hour to come but its worth the wait! We sleep like logs.