What characterizes India? Horns!

After a few days in India, with numerous impressions and cultural revelations one thing is definitely for sure: The Indian traffic is undoubtedly nuts. Alone the fact that the majority of all trucks encourage to use “Horn Please” or “Blow horn” as written on the back of the vehicle is an enormous contrast to the Danish culture. When we first arrived, we found the horns offensive since we are used to being in danger or doing something wrongly when horns are necessary. The reality is strictly the opposite. Honking in Indian traffic culture is a way to let someone know you are present to avoid any accident and actually (weirdly enough) seems to be a friendly thing and the “noise” is now slightly comforting. We have developed acceptance and understanding for Indian ways throughout the last couple of days. 

Chaotic traffic culture

Today we lie at the pool and think: what makes this different from the culture we have been used to if you were to close your eyes. The answer is simply the excessive use of horns – the constant sound of Indians making their way through the melting pot. One would supposedly assume that you could easily escape the noise. You simply cannot. Yet our general impression is that road rage is not a known term (as we see it in Denmark). This is either because there are simply no rules to obey or the fact that many Indians possess modesty and never express anger in public. Even when they have to pay road tax every 30 minutes to drive on a highway.

Traffic chaos – this picture emphasizes the fact that rules are non-existent in Indian traffic with the whole family on one motorcycle

Visiting a wonder

Either way, we visited a little humble building built by a Muslim to his wife. The minimalistic building is also (joke aside) one the world’s seven wonders. Nothing less than the essential Taj Mahal, which was truly magnificent and as gigantic as the expectation. Our guide knew plenty of tricks for photographing and even sang for us to make the whole thing even more authentic. The whole place was extremely remote and the transportation was by electrical vehicles within one-kilometer radius to keep the place clean. Even though the air is like most of Indian cities - covered by a thick layer of smog that gives low visibility further into the distance.

Abandoned city

As we travelled further north we had several hours on the main highway (which is an exaggeration) of what we would consider a dreadful quality. Poor infrastructure is a hindrance for a lot of transport in India, which we can only confirm by today's experience.

We then visited an old abandoned city, Fatehpur Sikri that was pointed out by our Indian guide, Tanveer since the attraction was not the average place to find. The place was very remote and in a large scale. The architecture was beautiful and built by Akbar, who is considered the mightiest Mughal in Indian history. It was an overwhelmingly beautiful construction, even though the heat was immense.  

Even though the old abandoned city and Taj Mahal were distinctively different, one similarity caught our eye. Before we were able to get to the actual attraction, we had to go a long way. In Denmark, we are used to exploiting tourist attractions and leading the visitors to it by signs. In India, it works the opposite way. If we had not hired a guide, we would not have been able to find our way to the monuments. This we think reflects the way all traffic works. No system. As explained earlier, the horns are used for many things including signaling a turn. The roads are not divided into lanes, and there are no guidelines of where and when to drive.

Written by Anton, Ian & Thomas 2.L