Don't Want to Say Goodbye (Dec 17 - 18)

I have to say it again... what a great bed! We had an excellent nap and I just relaxed for the rest of the afternoon.



Brad headed out to check out the Indian Rail Museum (and pick up some mementos for my dad). He noticed that even though the Hyatt is quite luxurious within the compound, it's interesting that right outside the gates is a shanty town of tents. The Hyatt is quite expensive for India. We were paying 10 to 30 rupees per hour for internet cafes, in the hotel it costs 500 rupees per hour! I think that's just a tad outrageous!

After two months of relative roughing it across India, the Hyatt is wonderful and complete luxury but, at the same time, you feel like you're slamming head on into "high maintenance" without your Gucci bag and eyelash curler! Maybe it's reverse culture shock?

We headed down into the hotel for dinner and treated ourselves to Japanese. Dinner was excellent and our cook was quite attentive and entertaining. We had two women at our table, one of which was wearing the biggest rock on her finger that I'd ever seen in real life. They were demanding and rude and continually telling the cook how to do this and that. At one point he asked us if we were in a hurry (we were there first) because he wanted to serve them and get them out of the way. We said, no... we're Canadian!

We arranged for a late checkout with the front desk and, after a wonderful sleep, headed out into Delhi to find a reasonable internet cafe.
Blogging, packing, eating... we were definitely winding down... we're really going home... say it isn't so!!

After dinner we took a cab to the airport. Our flight doesn't leave until 2:30 am but sitting around here or there is still sitting around so we headed out around 9 pm or so. Our cab driver was Punjabi and quite friendly. He has two children that he has placed in private school because they are getting a better education. He felt we had generated good fortune by our visit to the Golden Temple, simply by visiting!

You know, I don't think I've ever encountered a single airport that was designed to be really helpful for travelers. The designers can't see the flaws because they are too close to it (or maybe they don't really care). The India airport - there is no Alitalia counter. We discerned that many of the airlines don't actually have permanent counter space, they just pop into one or two a couple of hours before their flight. Makes sense. Save space. But, for international travelers who are not aware, it's a bit confusing. We asked three different people where the desk was and got three different answers. Also, you have to have your bags xrayed and tie wrapped before checking in. This is also something that you just have to figure out by paying attention to what other people are doing. Ah well, I guess it's a good thing we were there so early!

Security is pretty tight at the airport. You can't even enter the terminal if you don't have a ticket. There are soldiers at every entrance checking tickets and passports against a "no fly" list. Serious business!

When the Alitalia counter opens we check in. Our attendant is a trainee so it takes a bit longer but (maybe because she is a trainee) we manage to get our requested exit aisle on both flight segments. Bonus!

We go to the gate and wait... again.