Scammed in Delhi and Agra

Almost seven days into my trip, I’m tired and already disillusioned: it seems everyone, or almost everyone, I meet here is eager to part me from my money.

In fact, the stories of how I’ve gotten scammed in various ways over the past week offer a fairly comprehensive summary of everything I’ve done in India so far. Almost everything I’ve done has been scammy or scam-adjacent, with a couple notable exceptions.

Hard to blame the locals: poverty is a real thing. Still, it’s not fun to know you paid 10x the regular price for mediocre service.

And it’s of course only my fault. That’s perhaps why I’m a little bitter about it: I wish I was more street smart and better about detecting and preventing these scams.

Scam 1: Delhi, Day 1

I arrived in Delhi totally exhausted from a day+ of travel. I spotted an American-looking guy (in a Cubs hat) leaving the airport, and we split an uber to our nearby hotels. We planned to meet for lunch at a restaurant his wealthy Indian friend had suggested, and which seemed woefully overpriced to me.

On the walk over, a short man began talking to me, saying he wanted to practice his English. When I told him I was heading to Kwality (the overpriced restaurant) to meet a friend, he recommended a different restaurant. I was eager to try the advice of a local, even if I understood something a little fishy was afoot. So, Brandon (the American) and I relocated. The restaurant Ajay recommended was absolutely fine and perhaps a better deal than our original destination. So far, not so horrible.

Next, Ajay recommended we go shopping. This made sense because the sites were mostly closed due to Republic day, a holiday celebrating the founding of the nation of India. I also did want to buy linen pants and a linen shirt. Ajay took us to a fairly empty, touristy clothing bazaar, where I bought a custom-made shirt, pants and pashmina. Definitely overpriced, but things I needed.

From there, things went downhill. Ajay took us to a tea shop, but on realizing we didn’t want to buy tea the proprietor all but kicked us out. He then dragged us back to the clothing shop, saying Brandon needed to buy a headscarf for sightseeing purposes. Brandon did, though on further thought I’m not at all convinced this was necessary.

Ajay then took us to the incredible “Golden Temple” of the Sikhs. This was legitimately really cool: a temple with a gold roof and gold interior, a large reflecting pool, and thronged with thousands of worshippers. I later learned that the temple gives out free food every day, which may explain how packed it was. We participated in several minor rituals like touching our hands to the water in the reflecting pool and eating a mush-like dish out of our hands. I also saw a man climb a flagpole to slowly wrap it in some kind of cloth.

At this point, Ajay took us to a government tourism office to help us book a sightseeing tour for the next day (note that he began by saying this was purely an informational visit, but that pretense dropped away quickly). The price of the tour was $140 for two, which seemed outrageous. I quickly googled the office, and learned it’s not even an official government business — it’s just masquerading as one to scam stupid tourists like myself.

The kicker was when the overly aggressive salesman referred to the cost as “pocket change.” I got up and left.

Back at the hotel, Brandon and I found a suitable tour for $20 bucks (for two people) on getyourguide.

Day 2: Slightly less of a scam

The getyourguide tour of the Delhi old city, Jama Masjid and a couple other sites was great. The old city is so dense, chaotic, and polluted it resembles a bazaar on Tatooine.

The Jama Masjid, a gigantic mosque built of red sandstone, white marble from Rajasthan, and onyx imported from Belgium, was very impressive:

I loved the motif of the scalloped gate, which I was told is the door to Jannah, or heaven.

We also saw the India Gate (kind of like the Arc de Triomphe) and a Mughal stepwell which was used to store water accumulated from rains:

Our tour concluded, our guide took us to a restaurant back near our hotels for lunch. The first warning sign was that this restaurant was in a very touristy area. The second was that they served “continental” (European) food along with Indian food. The third was that they were blasting techno remixes of pop hits and that there was literally a DJ. The fourth was that our guide didn’t sit down to eat with us, but instead waited outside.

I ordered one thing, along with tea. This restaurant still worked since Brandon really wanted non-Indian food, however, and it was preferable to his suggestion that we go to Chili’s (yes, seriously).

Brandon and I then went by ourselves to see Humayan’s tomb, the tomb of the Mughal emperor Humayan which served as inspiration for the Taj Mahal. Going by ourselves was a good idea since it was free minus admission cost, and there were ample plaques to learn from.

Next, we went to a 5-star hotel for drinks, since Brandon seemed to like doing that kind of thing. I learned in the course of these drinks that his favorite book is Green Light, the autobiography of Salesforce’s own Matthew McConaughey. It contains this sterling wisdom (I’m paraphrasing): if something is going well and you enjoy it, keep going!

Thanks Matthew.

Day 3: Fool me twice…

My only plan for Wednesday was to see the Taj Mahal. I was waiting to catch a long-distance Uber ($20, roughly) to Agra when a rickshaw driver approached me. I told him I was going to Agra so I couldn’t use his services (rule violation number 1: never engage when talked to). He said Ubers were dangerous since the cars are low quality, and that there are tolls and tips are expected so the price isn’t as low as it looks. Instead he recommended we go to a government tourism office to get an official taxi!

You’ll note the return of the scam from day 1. Does this “government office” pay people to just hang around and prey on dumb tourists? Answer: almost certainly yes.

However, I, being exhausted, was curious enough to play along. The taxi was going to be $70, so that was a hard no. But they offered me a train ticket for $30 — only twice the regular price, and they said some plausible-sounding bullshit about it being hard to get a ticket day-of. I was also unfamiliar with trains in India and was glad to have the rickshaw driver, Prince, there to help me. So I acquiesced. Besides, the train to Agra is actually quite a bit faster than a car.

Prince then offered to give me a rickshaw tour of the city while we waited for the train. He showed me some interesting sites: the site of Gandhi’s assassination; a muslim shrine; and a large park complete with ruins. Of course, he asked an outrageous price for his services (at least compared to the usual price of a tuk-tuk ride, which is measured in low single-digit dollars). I paid it.

He also connected me with a tour guide for Agra. Though I knew I was still paying a premium, I liked the idea of being picked up at the train station and instantly having a competent guide. This actually ended up being completely necessary since otherwise I wouldn’t have made it to the Taj before it closed. But it was also a rip-off.

The Taj Mahal was, even in my exhausted state, very stunning against the pollution-gray sky:

I then went right to bed and departed for Varanasi the next morning.

Wrapping Up

The story of how I got scammed in Varanasi is partially told in my “Varanasi” blog post, though it has a second part I might go into later. However, for now, I’ll leave you with this: I can’t really blame the locals for trying to extort maximum dinero from a westerner. I should be more strident about resisting, and stop falling into the trap that locals are my friends who I’m able to help. This is my resolution for the coming week in Rajasthan.