Of course we did not only do the shopping in Lucknow which I described yesterday but also did some sightseeing and met friends who live in Lucknow.
When we came out of the hotel to go on our small sightseeing tour, the rickshaw driver, most probably seeing my non-Indian wife, asked us for an exorbitant price of 1000 Rupees to take us the two kilometers from the hotel to the main sights of the city. I immediately told him I would give him 2000 Rupees. He understood and came down on 100 Rupees – a tenth of what he had first offered! I then told him that I would not even go with him if he drove me for free. Instead, we stopped the next rickshaw and agreed on half of the price, 50 Rupees.
Coming out of the hotel, the rickshaw driver had obviously mistaken me for a complete tourist, maybe with Indian roots but living abroad with my foreign wife and our child. This seems to be the impression that many people got because when we reached the Bada Imambara, one of Lucknow’s most popular sights, and I told the guides that we would not need their services, one of them replied ‘Oh, your Hindi is very good!’ Well, I was born in this country, it is my mother tongue, it better be good! I was going to reply but my wife beat me to it with a simple sentence in perfect Hindi: ‘Because we live in India!’ It was nice to see this man’s surprise!
Nevertheless however, I was allowed to pay the fees for Indian citizens at the ticket counter – 50 Rupees – whereas Ramona had to pay for being German: 500 Rupees for her. Just good that Apra is under five and didn’t need to pay anything or we would have needed to discuss about that! Well, if the government can ask for ten times the price, why shouldn’t the rickshaw driver do the same? 🙂
We laughed hard about this all and told these stories to our friends, whom we finally met during our sightseeing tour. It was Manish, one of my oldest school friends, who joined us with his family to show us around their town. I had been in Lucknow many times but never as a tourist and we had a great time especially with Apra and Manish’s young daughter Alisha.
While on the first evening we had eaten in our hotel, we were invited by another friend of mine on Saturday, Avdhesh Nigam. He is a facebook friend who had visited us at the Ashram before, too. His wife cooked great dinner, his son and daughter-in-law joined us and it was wonderful for me to see that the internet has created a friendship like this!
On Sunday we then spent the day with Manish and his family again – adventures at the zoo together with the kids, shopping and then another wonderful dinner. After Manish had come to the Ashram so many times on his trips to Vrindavan and invited me each time to come to Lucknow as well, we were finally there in his home and able to enjoy their hospitality! That’s what we did: enjoyed to the fullest.
This is what was most beautiful about the weekend: we had a holiday, did sightseeing but also met friends, spent time with them and enjoyed the love of their homes!
Here you can see pictures of our long weekend in Lucknow
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