India
/The furthest east I had previously ever been was Turkey. That was until January ‘19 where a last minute invite from a colleague at Amazon led me to New Delhi, India for a wedding. As I would be travelling alone, to a part of the world I’d never been before, I was a little apprehensive to say the least. I had many a warning from friends who had been to Delhi before revolving around what to eat and drink (and most importantly what not to), safety in taxis as well as my GP telling me horror stories about all the different diseases I need to be vaccinated for while visiting, non of which eased my mind prior to this trip.
Having said all of that, I got on my Virgin flight from Heathrow, put my seat back and tray table in their up-right positions and relaxed for the 9 hour journey with my camera in tow and looked at it as a great opportunity to photograph part of the world I’d never seen before. Most importantly I would get to experience an Indian wedding which I heard were a little special.
9 hours later I arrived in Delhi and was lucky enough to meet up with some other solo travellers (and friends of the groom) at the airport and jumped in an Uber destined for Greater Kailash, New Delhi, which gave me my first experience of Indian roads. Wow. What a truly terrifying ordeal. No seat belts, 5ish cars a breast of a two lane road, constant (and I mean constant) use of the horn for reasons I still don’t fully understand and weaving in and out of traffic at a dangerous pace with no regard for other drivers, motorcyclists or pedestrians. Alas, we arrived unharmed at the Airbnb 45 minutes later where we met with the rest of the group. There were 7 of us, all friends of the groom who travelled alone with many of us not knowing each other prior to the trip, so made for a really great time getting to know everyone and exploring India together.
From this point on, we had an insight into the crazy and wonderful world of an Indian wedding. Spanning over multiple days with multiple ceremonies, plenty of guests and even more delicious food. On arrival to the groom’s parents apartment for our first activity of the trip, we were confronted with a choreography team and had to learn a number of dance routines to be performed the following day (on-stage in-front of ~200 people!!). This I was not prepared for, given that my last experience of dancing was at the Borderline Night Club in Soho after too many drinks which also required a very different level of skill/consciousness. We ploughed on though and after around 6 hours of rehearsals and instruction followed by another couple of hours the following morning we had our routines somewhat engrained in our minds with the nerves of an impending live performance lingering for the majority of the day! I’m happy to report however that the performance went far better than expected and the audience were very supportive to the group of inexperienced foreigners stumbling around on stage, albeit with big smiles on our faces (I hear that there is video evidence of this somewhere…).
The remaining days were spent doing a little sight seeing (thankfully one of our group was originally from Delhi and spoke Hindi which helped a great deal with getting around and planning our time while there, so we were all super grateful for her help) along with more ceremonies, processions through the streets of Delhi with the groom commandeering a horse accompanied by the loudest brass/percussion band i’ve ever heard, ending with the wedding itself in the impressive Taj Ambassador Hotel. The array of colours on show at an Indian wedding are truly impressive, which I hope I have done justice to with the following photoset.
All in all, I had a great time in India and I am certainly glad I decided to go despite my fears, of which many were ill-placed (the driving however was still one of the most terrifying experiences I’ve ever had, summed up by hitting a speed bump at around 60MPH in a 7 seater at 3:30am after the wedding, physically lifting the car off the ground and throwing myself and Ville (our Finnish friend in the group) into the ceiling of the car which could have very well broken each of our necks (no seat belts, remember), thankfully however we survived with only mild aches the following day). That being said, I would still recommend to anyone to go and experience the sights and experiences of India for themselves if not only for the food!
I hope you enjoy the following images and that it inspires some of you to visit this interesting country for yourself. Let me know what you think of some of my favourite shots in the comments below and be sure to like and share this post to help a Brother out!
Jack.
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