The highs and lows of Chennai

I arrived in Chennai yesterday from lovely Sri Lanka for my long stint of lone traveling around the world. Chennai is just as crazy as Mumbai. I guess most of the large Indian cities are similar – roads packed with vehicles honking horns, people everywhere; crammed into backstreets, sleeping under sheets or just on the side of the road. Unlike Mumbai, Chennai didn’t appear to have much by the way of pavements, so I spent most of my time walking through the filth & dodging tuk-tuks, motorbikes and buses in the road.

I stayed in the very simple Paradise Guest house in Triplicane, very close to the main tourist office and a string of cheap but highly rated hotels including the Broadlands and Comfort. Far from being a Paradise, the room was very drab, lacking the promised air conditioning (just a noisy ceiling fan), any bed linen and a window which one could close. I guess for 300 rupees a night (around £4) you get what you pay for! As there is no restaurant at the Paradise, I had dinner in the Comfort restaurant/bar on the roof which was very reasonably priced and tasty.

The next day, I decided to go for a little walk around Chennai to see the sights. The moment I stepped foot onto Quaide Milleth Salai, the main street, a guy came up to me – hello sir, how are you today. Fine I replied. Mistake number 1. Where are you from sir? England I replied. Mistake number 2. Where are you going sir? To the beach I replied. Mistake number 3. I simply should have ignored the first how are you, but carrying on replying was suicide. That was it – he followed me all along the street trying to convince me that his taxi tour was the best and that he knew all the best shops in which I could by silk. No amount’s of ‘no thanks’. I’m good for silk thanks could shake him.

After about 10 minutes of ignoring him, he started to get annoyed and started shouting stuff at me like ‘why you ignore me, you are scared of me aren’t you.’ I quickly ducked into the tourist office but after I came out he was still there, waiting for me. This time he tried a different tactic. Sir, I am a student, I study tourists. I only want to talk with you. What do you like about chennai? I’d like to be left alone by you. I replied! Finally he got the message and buggered off.

I joined the official Chennai coach tour from the government tourist office which was great fun. I met a swiss couple in their late 50s who had been to india loads. They seemed not to mind the hassle, so we had good fun walking through the markets and seeing the odd triangle shaped temples. As soon as we arrived on the beach however, the couple headed their own way and the hassling started again. I had a man follow me trying to sell me shells and a little girl follow me holding out her palm and pointing to her mouth.

I arrived back at the hotel exhausted. It really is such hard work and such a shame that westerners get harrassed like this. Thankfully, Just as I was starting to feel really down about the place, I met a young fella from Germany who I shared a beer or two with. Like the swiss couple, he’d been travelling for 6 weeks so was used to all the hassle by now, but was still great to just talk to someone!

Off to Delhi this evening. Wonder if that will be any better…