hello and welcome to the edges of earth, my name is Brock. today I want to discuss
the pros and the cons of being a backpacker in India. so I've been
travelling in the north for about nine months now. I feel pretty comfortable
walking around the city and even in villages. now before I start talking. I
want you to be aware that I absolutely love India. it is at the top of my list
out of many countries that I have traveled to. and just because I'm
discussing cons, does not mean I dislike India. I love India. so let's first dive
right into the cons. let's begin. so as you know, there's a lot of garbage in
India. the water and the land is quite dirty.
so the general culture in India is that if you buy something you drink, it you
eat it, and after you're done, you simply throw the garbage on the ground. and
that's basically the normal culture. and then later that evening, or the next
morning, someone comes along and sweeps the ground. but the problem with this
culture is that the wind blows things into the water or away from the sweeping
area and it goes wherever it wants. and so, everywhere you go, every piece of
land, every water that you will visit, you will find tons and tons of garbage
inside. in fact, I remember standing on different bridges throughout India, and
just in a few moments that I was on bridges,
I would watch people bring garbage, heaps, bags and bags of garbage, and they'd walk
to the middle of the bridge and just throw it over. and watch it all fall and
spread out all over. it either floats everywhere, or it finally sinks to the
bottom - depending on the type of garbage. and this was just person after person
after person just throwing it right into the river. so unfortunately
garbage is a problem. that's a downside to traveling here. you're going to come
across so much garbage. now there's a lot of animals in the streets. dogs, cows,
goats, and a lot of them just wander the streets and urinate everywhere and do
their business in the streets. and people also do the same. you'd be shocked to see
how many people walk into the corner or just pull it out, and go right on the
street - right where everybody walks. and unfortunately because of that the
streets are quite dirty when you walk. so that is a thing that is not really
prevalent in many other countries. as a backpacker, obviously I love to travel,
and I love to travel to different villages or towns or cities, and
sometimes people are just too curious. I love the curiosity of the people, but
sometimes it's too much. I want to travel from point A to point B, but
unfortunately, so many people will stop me that it is almost impossible for me
to get to my destination. and if you reject them and say 'no, no, no, I have
to go'. then they will sometimes feel like you are disrespecting them. so there's
this weird balance of wanting to say hello, and being kind, and giving them
some time to talk to you, but you also have plans and you have to be somewhere
and do something, or explore somewhere, and you cannot stop and talk to every
single person. so you unfortunately have to reject so many people, because so many
people want to talk. and it's just impossible to talk to everyone. so you
will make some people happy by talking to them but you're going to reject so
many of them, and unfortunately now they do not like you. some of the questions
that people ask are really weird. and it's not just one or two questions that
I've been asked. this is a consistent...this is a consistent thing in India. many
people will meet you "oh hello. what is your name? where are you from? how old are
you? what is your mother's name? what kind of job does your father have?" so these
are just weird questions that you would not really ask. it's a different culture,
I understand. so be aware that when you meet new people they will almost always
ask you these strange, sometimes personal questions. it's equivalent to me
asking you "how much do you weigh?" after meeting you 20 seconds ago. it's a very
repulsive question. and many of the questions that Indian people will ask to
you are going to be also repulsive. it's like too private. within 20 seconds people
want to know if you're married. people want to know what your sister's name is.
oh please show me a picture of your sister. like, why do you want to see a
picture of my sister? like...no! the selfie culture here is insane. everybody wants a
selfie. people will always come up to you and make an excuse.. "what is your name?
where are you from?" just to have this moment of friendship and then they will
take out their camera and they will push their cheek almost against yours and
then take a selfie with you without even asking permission or even knowing who
you are.. and you don't know who they are. you feel like an animal at a zoo. it
really is weird. in our culture, the only time I would want to take a photo with
someone is if I really know someone, and we are friends.
'hey, let's take a photo and remember this day, this moment." but for them, it's just
like: you know foreigner so I'm going to take a picture with you so I can share
it on social media and share this with all of my friends. from our perspective
it's a really really weird thing. and it happens 25 times a day. and they don't
just take 1 photo they will take 100 selfies with you and when you say "no. I'm
finished". they will pull your arm back in and they will make you take more photos.
and it's this process is very repulsive, again. and just not something that most
foreigners like. so, that is the thing that you will come across, a lot.
sometimes you're walking from point A to point B and someone tries to be really
really friendly to you "and come to my house for tea or a meal" or something and
if you have a little free time you kind of do this. but, sometimes it's a little
bit weird because now they will take out their phone and talk to all of their
friends call so many friends and say "hey I'm with a foreigner. Hey, I'm with a
foreigner!" they will take you to their house and then many people see you and
everybody wants to take a photo of you. and you just feel like nothing but a
piece of meat. and animal. a dog on a chain, just so he can walk around and
show you off, and every time they ask "oh, how do you know him..?" "oh, he's my friend. he's
my friend.." and that's what they'll say. it's just
really weird so this is a con to me. I see from their perspective maybe they're
trying to be friendly but but from our perspective we feel like an animal. a dog
on a leash. and like a new puppy that you're trying to show off to all of your
friends. cheating in India is unimaginable. you buy some drinks and
some food the total is 200 rupees you give them 500 but you get 250 back,
instead of 300. and they say "oh thank you. finished" when you look at the change you
realize you were cheated by 50 rupees. and you say "where's the remainder of my
money?" they'll say "oh, sorry sorry. I forgot. I forgot! you're right. let me
go and get that for you.." and then they will go out and hand you the correct
amount of money. but how did you know how much money to give me if you didn't know
that you were cheating me? this happens so many times. and I will go on a limb to
say in the tourist areas about 50% of the shops will cheat you.
50%. and that's huge! outside of the tourist areas, villages, other places,
it's about an 80/20 rule. 80% is honest 20%
cheats. know the prices. count it. and make sure you're not getting cheated. rickshaw
drivers will come across the street just to get you to go into their taxi. they
don't do that for local people. why? because they know if they can get a
foreigner in their rickshaw, their tuk tuk, they're going to cheat you. and
that's a lot of money for them. basically anyone who is approaching you for
business, chances are they're going to try to cheat you. so just reject them.
stay away. if you want business, go to someone and ask for their business. I
always ask the local prices to local people before I make a purchase so I
know what the correct price is. and I know if they're cheating me or not. and
if they're cheating, I just walk away. and then they will come back and say "no. no.
no. lower price, lower price!" nope. you cheat me once, no business. I will go to
your competitor and talk to him. there's been examples where I lived in an area
for a month and I went to a shop to buy something. he cheated me. so I went to his
neighbor to buy the same thing and every day I would go to his neighbor. I would
walk past and look at this man and know you're a cheater, and I will do business
with this man over here. and so every day he realized how much business he lost
from me, because he cheated me once. so the difficulties to getting a SIM card, a
local SIM, card is very difficult in this country. you're a foreigner so you must
be dangerous, so we must take extra precaution. there's three major companies.
Gio, Airtel, and Vodafone. Gio, if you're a foreigner you cannot
register an account. I asked the company, they said 'no it's forbidden'.
Airtel you can, as long as you're a house owner. so I walked in, tried to get a SIM
card, they say 'yeah no problem. fill out tons of paperwork'. and one of the
questions was 'what is the home address in your home country?' well, I don't have
an address because I don't own a house. I live out of a backpack and I travel
the world. he says oh sorry you don't own a house you cannot get a SIM card. so
that was out of the question. I never went into Vodafone, so I'm not
sure. on a couple of occasions I've had friends who went and got a SIM card from
their own account and just simply gave it to me. so hopefully you make a couple
friends who can do that for you. it is a difficult thing to acquire a SIM card if
you want to do it yourself. transportation difficulties. so
transportation can take you anywhere in the country. far, near, it's everywhere.
rickshaws are everywhere, buses are everywhere, trains are everywhere, planes
to get from point A to point B is generally an easy smooth process. but to
be able to get a ticket is another story. so as a foreigner I've tried to get a
train ticket and, you know, you try to go to
the train station but you can't get a local price they'll charge you 150 rupees.
I say "ah the local price is 50 rupees to go from here to here" and they say "no, no, no.
150, 150." and so if you don't pay that they refuse your business. they say "nope.
sorry." we will not give you the local price.
you must pay 150. so then you take a rickshaw to go to the train station. you
get to the train station. you wait in line 20 minutes. everybody's cutting in
front of you, and pushing and pushing. finally get up there she says "oh no sir,
you're at the wrong window. go to that window." so then you walk over wait in
another line for 20 minutes the woman keeps looking at you looking at you.
finally when you get up she says "nope. sorry. you're a foreigner. I cannot sell
you a ticket. you have to go to a completely different train station." so
then you walk outside "oh sorry sir that train station is 300 rupees to take you
there". when the locals say no it's only about 50 or 60. you see, so, the whole
process is unbelievably difficult to to buy a train ticket. you should be able to
just walk up, give them cash, they give you a ticket. done. it's so easy! but the
big concern is safety they gotta get your information to make sure India is
safe. but, the reality is, that paperwork isn't going to do much about
safety. all I can say is try to get a local person to help you get a train
ticket one two three days in advance if you plan on going a far distance. if
you're going a short distance, buy a general ticket, hop on, and go. usually you
can find the train station in the bus station on Google Maps. rickshaws are a
bit different. there's a lot of what's called ride shares. now you can take a
personal rickshaw, almost anywhere within a city. they will charge you more because
you're a foreigner, a lot more. and there's also shared rickshaws. but those
are difficult because of the language barrier, and plus you don't know where to
search for them, because there's no real label on a map. but assuming you know a
couple words in Hindi, and you know where the rickshaws generally hang out, yeah,
just get on, do a share all the way to the destination you want to go. just know
the price before you get in. never get in and go because they will demand a much
higher price. and they will force you to pay that price. so always ask the price
before you go. and what's even better is ask local people who are standing around
there, who know the local price, so the rickshaw driver cannot cheat you.
Wi-Fi is sometimes difficult to find. sometimes you go to hotels and you pay a
premium and stay at a nice hotel. but their internet is terrible.
usually the Wi-Fi can be fast, it's just, the hotel just wants to be cheap and say
'yes we have Wi-Fi, but it's really not very fast'. there have been a few times
where I stayed at hotels and the Wi-Fi was great. incredibly fast. but it really
is a rare thing. it could be because I don't really generally travel to the
tourist areas. I kind of stay outside of the tourist areas, and that could be one
of the reasons why it's a bit difficult. most people do not have Wi-Fi
connections in their house. they rely on their mobile phone. and the last one I
want to discuss is food cleanliness. if you're from a western country, you
basically know the standards. in this country, the standards are significantly
lower than the West - both in a regular restaurant and on the street. in the
regular restaurant things are usually much better. you usually don't have to
worry at all about cleanliness. but sometimes it's concerning if you can see
them behind in the kitchen. but generally it's pretty safe. street food, I mean, you'll
watch food exposed, flies everywhere. they'll cook the food put it out. flies
are walking all over the food. and then when you walk up and want to buy
that thing, they will just give you the food that has been sitting there for 25
minutes. swat at the flies to make them leave, give you the food that has been
sitting there collecting dust from all the cars that are going by. so the
concept of keeping food clean is a little bit different here than what we
would expect back home. so enough about the cons, let's talk about the pros. first
I just want to say the people of this country are generally awesome. people are
so friendly, so hospitable, so curious, and so helpful. so many times I've been
offered to go into someone's house or stay at their house so I did not have to
pay hotel charges. or eat a meal at their house so I didn't have to go to a
restaurant. or invited in someone's house to have tea. so many times after you
become a friend for a day or two, people help you buy a ticket to a different
city. a different town and, without them telling you, they already paid for it in
advance they just want you to get on and go. and when you try to give them money,
they refuse. so people will actually give you so much time, they will help you,
and in some instances, they give you money. people in general are very
friendly. the landscapes in this country are amazing. just take a train anywhere.
looking out the window of the train between point A and point B, is you
awesome. you see some very beautiful scenery. there's also many tourist places
that you can go that are just mind-blowingly beautiful. again I
usually stay away from those areas but they exist. sometimes the architecture is
amazing, sometimes the landscape is amazing. there's a lot of cool things to
see in this country. one of the main reasons I traveled here is to understand
the culture of the people. so in this country there's so many different
cultures and so many different types of people. it is awesome. people think very
different here. people do very different things in this country. sometimes can be
very weird from our perspective. but to me that's why I travel here. I came here
to be a part of this. to understand it. to witness it. and so for me, it's amazing. I
love understanding more about the Indian culture. transportation is quite
accessible. sometimes getting to the transportation or understanding where
the transportation is, in the first place, is a bit difficult. but once you find it,
once you get a seat, transportation is usually pretty smooth.
English in this country is quite prevalent. I was actually shocked when I
came here. whether you're in a big city, a small town, even a small village, you'd be
surprised how many people will randomly approach you and they will start
speaking to you in English. sometimes it's choppy English sometimes it's quite
impressive. as a traveler it's very very helpful because I've been in countries
where English is not a thing and it is difficult. you rely on body language and
a lot of smiles to get you from here to there. but in India it's it's not
difficult at all. I've had elderly men talk to me for a long time in English.
and I've had little children who came up to my hip and they were speaking great
English similar to a child in my own country. so it really makes it easy to to
travel this country. food, hospitality, and transportation, is
generally inexpensive. in fact it's one of the cheapest countries I've ever
traveled in. just to give you an example I went to a four star hotel and
restaurant and eating with 3 people, the bill came to about 750 rupees. if you
buy general train tickets they're generally super cheap. and sleeping in a
hotel from a Western perspective it can be super cheap as well. so that is a big
plus to backpacking this country, is you don't have to spend a lot of money.
especially when you travel like a local. and the last big pro of this country is
the length of a visa. this is different for everyone. I'm an American so,
fortunately, I have the ability to get a 10 year visa in this country. and I don't
think there's a lot of other countries who have that option. so I feel very very
fortunate that I can stay in this country and travel in this country for
quite a long time. India does make it pretty easy to get
inside. so that is a big plus as a traveler. so that's it, that's pretty much
the big ones for me, as a backpacker. I hope that if you're interested in coming
to this country, this kind of gives you a little bit of information, and it helps
you a little bit. if you've been in India and you're a traveler, feel free to
comment below and let me know some of the things that I missed. I would love to
hear from you. write as many comments as you want. I hope you all have a great day.
thank you all for watching. and remember, your time is running out,
start living! take care.