3 weeks backpacking India: Delhi transition to Rishikesh

From Jaipur I took a train to go to Delhi to stay one night to go to Rishikesh the following day. This is what I did in Delhi.

The train journey.

In my train journey I was lucky to sit next to a lady Software Engineer; she was very nice and open to chat, so I could ask things about India, work wise, tech things, etc.

She told me that the ratio of male and females in tech is 60%/40% so it is very high in comparison that I know in Europe and USA, which is great.

Travel was good, but I realized that my new phone (4 days old, Lenovo K3 Note) was not working quite well and I stopped and I couldn’t switch it on as power button stopped to work, so it sucked as I had to use map to reach Vodafone shop to get my SIM card and even worse to by the shop which I bought it to claim for a new one. At the end I could switch it on, due the phone show in the screen a virtual button to switch it on when you connect to the power.

The day in Delhi

With my phone running, I was able to go to Vodafone shop and the shop where I bought the phone.

When I step out of the train (Delhi S Rohilla) I decided to walk until Vodafone shop; I was carrying all my things and with rickshaw had been faster but not a lot as the traffic in Delhi is crazy.

In the Vodafone shop I got back my Indian mobile line, whose service were turned on a few hours later I got the new SIM card and provide again passport and visa photocopy.

After I walked from there to the shop where I bought the phone. The shop assistance told me that he couldn’t give me a new phone even though was faulty from manufacturing and I had to go to Lenovo customer service to authorise the replacement.

Then I went to Lenovo customer service in Delhi; they redirected me to the technical service which was two streets near there. The identified as a manufacturing issue and give me a paper to get a new one from the shop. However I had to give the phone and everything, moment when I realised that to keep the box and carried in my backpack was a good decision.

I went back to the shop with the paper and the shop told me that I had to wait for the confirmation that I probably had to return back the following day; it’s quite embarrassing when you said him that I was going to do all of that but he had to confirm that I would get a new phone in the same day, so I replied that and I insisted that it was going to be the last day in Delhi and I may not go back, to make pressure.

At the end after almost an hour waiting in the shop, which was very small, just a short corridor, and very crowded; he decided to give me one back without the confirmation taking copy of my passport and contact details in case that he go some issues with the confirmation.

With my new phone and the Indian line working with the data services I managed to cache the Delhi map in the phone and be able to go to Shadipur metro station to meet Savion, the local who was going to host me in the night.

Due Savion was working and we agreed to meet in the metro station close to his home in the evening at 21 hours, I decided to walk to there and to stop in a coffeeshop or similar which had Wi-Fi, however those are very limited, probably a few Starbucks and none of them was in that way.

I couldn’t find any coffeeshop with Wi-Fi and I reached the Shadipur metro station around 18 hours; I sent a message him that I was going to stay in a coffeeshop until the 21 hours, but he replied me that his friends were going to pick me up from the station.

Their friends picked me up with a motorbike, so I experimented to travel on it in, with 3 people on top and my two backpacks, one of them big size.

Night

After I got into Savion’s flat, meanwhile we were waiting for him I was setting up again all the things in my phone.

He arrived and we were catching up meanwhile their friends cooked rice with curry; we had a dinner and I had to go to sleep, I was very tired, because I didn’t sleep too much the previous night and after all my day going around.

Conclusions

India is very bureaucratic country; I’m not use to having to go to customer service if I buy a device from a shop in the street and the device doesn’t work 4 days later.

If you buy some device from a shop in India, keep the box at least until you leave the country; it may be useful if there is a manufacturing issue which you may realise after a few days after you’ve bought it.

Please drop a comment if you have any question.