Kashmir Kidnappings and Awesome Alliterations

I, being the wonderfully open and politically correct person that I am, will be the first to tell you that you can't judge a big group of people based on only a few interactions. But I will also be the first to tell you that every Indian in Delhi is out to get you. And by "out to get you" I mean "out to get me".

Before I left for India, I was told by numerous people that I needed to be on "code yellow", which basically just means being wary. Very wery. I nodded and told them "of course, of course. I know how to take care of myself" while I was think "paranoid people. I'll bet you'll tell me to wear a tinfoil crown to confuse Soviet spies with, too".

Little did I know that what's called paranoia in Canada is called "survival technique" in India.

I learned this the hard way, right away.

When I got off the plane, had gotten a hold of my luggage, and gotten through customs, I went immediately to the pre-paid taxi booth and paid Rs. 300 (around $7.50 CDN) for a taxi to Lhasa House, the hotel I'd made a reservation for over the internet. I had been told to, whatever I did, not go to the taxi drivers outside, who would scam me and take me for a ride (in more ways than one), so I felt only safe with my pre-paid taxis, which are controlled by the gov't and can't charge you any more than what you already paid at the airport.

So, still in the airport, pre-paid taxi ticket in hand, and feeling relatively safe, I started following the signs that said "pre-paid taxi". Before I even got to the first sign, a man came up to me and said,

"Pre-paid taxi, madam?"

I nodded and showed him my ticket. He nodded/shook/wobbled his head, gestured for me to follow him, and headed off.

In the OPPOSITE direction of the signs.

I protested, saying that the signs were that way, but he said that the signs pointed that way, but really, the cars were this way.

This is where warning bells should have been going off in my head. Should have.

But then, much younger, naiver, and stupidder than I am now, I figured that in India they probably just did things differently. They weren't as organized as we First Worlders are.

Little did I know that all of this was very organized. Very organized indeed.

After my first (and I think most harrowing) Indian car ride, which I find as scary and stupid as Russian roulette, I was told that my taxi driver couldn't find my hotel because I hadn't written down its block number. He took me to a travel agent's which, now that I think about it, was suspiciously open past midnight, where we could use the travel agent's phone and knowledge of the area.

Big mistake.

There, the man, who seemed terribly kind at the time (the time being specifically midnight-in-a-foreign-country-all-alone-after-37-hours-of-being-awake 'oclock), phoned my hotel and they told me that they'd accidentally double-booked my room. He then kindly phoned all of the other hotels, which all said that they were full. He even phoned up the train to Shimla, and they told me that there wasn't anything free for the next five days. Apparently there was a big "conference" going on in Delhi, and all of the hotels in the city were full. Just the other day, he'd had to send a Finnish couple to a hotel that cost $400 US a night because everything else was booked.

Near tears, I asked him if there was anywhere I could go nearby. He said the only place he could think of was Kashmir. (Remember that list of all the places I shouldn't go to that you gave me, Meggy? Well, Kashmir's on that list.)

To give those of you who think of Kashmir the place as Cashmere the fabric, let me illuminate you to the situation of Kashmir. In 1947 India became freed from British rule, but since many Hindus and Muslims wanted very different things, they split India into Hindu India and Muslim Pakistan. During that time there were mass migrations of Hindus from Pakistan to India and Muslims from India to Pakistan, and there was untold violence on both sides. However, the states of this former British colony near the borders were given the choice to which nation they'd give their allegiance. The head of the state of Kashmir couldn't decide, and while he dawdled, Muslims attacked from the West, and India responded by sending in reinforcements. There have been near constant skirmishes along the international border that neither country recognizes and full fledged wars in Kashmir ever since.

This was where the travel agent wanted to send me.

I said, "Isn't it violent there?"

He said, "Nope"

I said, "OK."