Written on October 7, 2008 at 11:59 am by Christine Ka'aloa

Lessons of a first-time Solo Traveler in India

Filed under India, India tips & stays, SOLO TRAVEL {no comments}

Tuesday, Oct 7, 2008: Delhi

Back in the U.S., when I was on the road for MTV, I had a GPS, Hertz rental car, a mobile phone with internet access, a 4-5 star hotel with meal stipends and a support office back home working 24/7 for my minute travel questions. Safe to say, I’ve been spoiled a bit.

Here in India, I’m completely on my own– being far from familiar faces, I’ve no tour guides for help; no shoulder to cry on when things go wrong.

When you’re on your own for the first time in a developing country and you don’t have all the conveniences and safe glass bubble partitions protecting you from the outside world, what do you do?

Here’s some of the lessons I’m learning:

1. Surrendering trust to strangers.

Traveling solo is the quickest way to learn how to make friends out of strangers as locals and fellow travelers are your only option for conversation and advice. While this can feel scary and a dangerous gamble, being a foreigner in foreign country, I am reliant upon them. What alternate choice am I given? In these cases I realize, I also have to utilize good street smarts and rely on my intuition to tell me when something isn’t feeling right.

Unfortunately, I’m occasionally still wide open to being fucked with!

One rickshaw driver (yeah, this is his scrawny chicken leg…) in Varanasi dropped me far from my hotel because I haggled a “local price” and he was not happy about it. My Spidey senses said “something felt wrong” but being foreign to the scramble of crazy back-alley mazes, how could I be certain? I paid the driver and off he went, leaving me in Fuck-you, Goodbye-land!

Sometimes, I take a risk and mistakes and problems are unavoidable. Which brings me to…
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2- Trusting myself

Occasionally, I may fail in my trust of others; this teaches me to be infallible in my trust of self. So I gambled and lost. I might give myself a good cry then I get back on my feet. Figure out a solution! The strongest trust which can’t be broken rests in the knowledge that I’m a survivor and that I WILL find my way out of any problematic solution. Lost? Ask for directions. Wallet stolen? Have friends or family wire money for help.

For every problem, there’s a solution and in each pinch, I trust myself to find it. Only in situations that really test us do we realize how resourceful we’re capable of being.

3- Finding humor in things… even when I’m scared shitless.

HA HA HA!… They say laughter cures, so laugh your ass off! If it doesn’t cure however, I promise one thing; it certainly helps hold the tears back when you feel like crying!

Ever heard the cliche proverb– What doesn’t kill you, only makes you stronger? Cliches are used over and again exactly because they work as profound truth. Everything I survive serves as a lesson to make a more knowledgeable me in the future.

Another consolation: I’ll have a more thrilling travel story to tell friends when I get home!
This is the exact thing I pissedly and heatedly chuckled to myself as I ran from person to person- panicked- asking for directions back to my guesthouse… after that friggin chicken-legged driver left me in the middle of nowhere!

4- The art of stretching the ruppee: meeting other travelers .

Being a traveler abroad is instant glue to forging quick friendships amongst travelers. At hostels and guesthouses, I found many travelers to be in the same budget-backpacking boat as me– excited to share tips and adventures about the foreignness they’re experiencing yet pinching the ruppee and looking to hook up with other budget-minded folks to split costs with! Whether it’s sharing a room, a tour or transportation, many travelers are keen to cutting their expenses in half.

After my first nightmare room in Varanasi, I was out looking for new accommodations at dawn. I met Lee from China (photo below) waiting for a room to open in one of the guesthouses I was looking into. She was traveling alone; I instantly nabbed her with a line that might get the average man slapped: Wanna share a room? Yes, that was my Hello. She gratefully agreed and together, we were able to upgrade to a nice and more spacious room with AC… at half the cost of my single (without AC)!

My new roommate and travel partner for a night, Lee, from China.

5- Sensitivity to other travelers’ budget.

Cheap for you isn’t necessarily “cheap” for others. I got that idea when traveling India, but I momentarily forgot it can apply to fellow travelers. Meeting new folk from around the globe, I’m always excited to talk to a fresh face; it seldom occurs to me that travelers from other countries don’t always share the same definition of ‘budget’ as me .

When I met Lee, she traveling mostly via local bus or train. She even passed on a 100Rs (roughly $2USD) boat ride on the Ganges, though it was something she wanted to do and we’d be splitting the cost of a boat. I had taken the boat ride that morning and didn’t mind a second go. I wanted to nag “But why? It’s sooo cheap!” ;however, she obviously wasn’t in the same situation as me. I learned to hold my expensive tongue.
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6- The world is VERY small.

On my last day in Varanasi I tripped upon a 6’4″ gawk-ward boheme and artsy French boy, Dorian! I told him how I fell in love with this tiny village town in Southern France, Die. I spent a month there several years back to visit a friend teaching English there and to do a short artist residency, but it wasn’t one of those places on the recognizable map. He exclaimed in an exuberant scribbly French accent “Die! Mon Dieu- what a coincidence…that’s where I’m from!”

What a very small big world we live in.
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7- People want to help you.

Being female and traveling alone for the first time can feel scary at every corner, yet there’s a reassurance that you’re never really alone. Perhaps angels are watching over you and they’re in the form of other travelers. I find people admire my “courage” and are more compassionate and protective for my safety, than they would be others.

At the airport I spent time with an older Israeli couple. Doran and his wife were in India to attend a conference in Hyderbad. On the plane, Doran’s wife and I were engrossed in sharing our observations of Indian culture & talked about Rishikesh (they were going there next); I noticed over her shoulder that Doran, like myself was a hobby photographer with a beautiful eye for capturing irony. When I reached Delhi, the couple extended a potential meetup invitation in Rishikesh and a contact number should I get into a tight spot in my travels. In such a short time, this couple had built a firm memory in my heart.

So as I wouldn’t be alone, the couple then hooked me up with another solo traveler they’d met- a young Israeli girl. The Israeli girl asked if I wanted to share an airport cab w/ herself and a French girl she’d just met on the plane. We were all coincidentally going to Paharganj as it happened to turn out.

As I said before, you to learn pick people up along the way. It’s the basic traveler spirit. I shared a pre-paid taxi from Delhi airport to Paharganj with the two girls (above). The 175 Rs cab ride, divided 3 ways, cost us each $1 per person! Score!
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8- ‘On the Road’ in the selfish spirit of Keroac

Wanna know the number one reason to solo travel? Everything is on your own terms when you travel alone. There are no compromises and you get to do what YOU want.

Like life, I enjoy going where the road takes me with a bit of script, here and there; I take what I’m given, sculpt and mold it into what I want. I like when my “accidents” become good coincidences and experiences, when it’s a bit organic and there are elements of surprise which take me deeper into self-discovery.

This made me wonder…

9- What is my travel style: am I traveler or a tourist?

Inside my shared cab to Parharganj, all was alive with travel stories regaling why solo travel was the best way to experience a place, its culture and people. As my fellow gal-solo travelers put it:

“Why pay a tour where they have a someone show me ‘What India is’, when I can meet fellow travelers & locals with whom I can discover and create my own experiences of India ?”

Personally, I’m a little of both. I like traveling with an outline of a plan but I’m not an Itinerary Survivalist! The occasional touristy blanket doesn’t bother me, but a two-week tour of seeing a bleached India and experiencing it through a glass window? Nope, not for me.

If I didn’t want to experience a real India, dirty bedsheets, piss poverty-and-all ( and I’m not saying this is ALL there is to this country), then perhaps I’m better off as an armchair traveler– watching it on TV or reading it in a book– where there are no smells, danger or discomforts involved. For me, experiencing India is living it as real as I can get it, while not letting it get too uncomfortable.

But that’s me.

So let’s hoist up my pants and suck it up! I’m back to Paharganj, staying at $12/night dirty-looking bedsheets #2, Raj’s Cozy Inn Hotel! And secretly still having a both, grand and terrified time!