Recent content by CityLites

For things that aren't totally overwhelming but still hold some amount of exoticism, I recommend liver. Goat liver/Lamb's liver is a delicacy, eaten throughout India, and is pretty tame if you like liver and onions in the US. As far as the various insects go; I guess if I thought about it...

I find that the most important thing with street food is to know that you have the intestinal flora for it. When I go to India, if it's for less than a week I'll avoid street food at all costs. If it's longer, I'll go out and get stuffed on street stuff; become violently ill and then get...

Yeah, that's the other important thing. You might assume that if you are dealing with someone who is haggling, you'll get ripped off. This is to the contrary. Bargaining is the basic yard stick with which you prevent the rip offs from occurring. If you aren't haggling the price down, you're...

Ahhh, if only it were so easy. When you're Indian most of your meals are Indian cuisine, so it isn't so easy to avoid. However, the strategy of avoiding it altogether is still effective for weight loss :P

I had never seen durian in India, but I've seen plenty of Jackfruit. As far as I can tell, Jackfruit is basically identical to durian, but without the strong objectionable smell. It also, believe it or not, fries up really well to make vegan carnitas. I don't understand why people continue to...

It will absolutely be related to road conditions. An auto-rickshaw is powered by a lawn mower engine on a wire frame, more or less. Basically a go-kart. There is basically no padding, so if you're going a distance you'll want a proper vehicle.

Unfortunately, you mention you aren't interested in haggling over prices. This is going to be an enormous issue. The normal manner of getting a kameez made is to go to the clothier and buy a swatch of cloth, which you haggle over the price of to some extent, and then you go to a tailor, where...

Unfortunately, collateral is not uncommon in Indian protests. If you've ever seen Slumdog Millionaire, that early scene with the purge of the protagonist's slum isn't entirely inaccurate. It appears this was inspired by anti-Immigrant sentiment, which spread from the drunk student to these...

Yeah, as far as looks go, they don't win any beauty pageants. They're basically what a witches nose wants to grow up to be like. A shared trend between acquired tastes tends to be bitterness (i.e. coffee, bitter gourd) or 'funkiness' i.e. cheese, natto).

Hah, I just realized that your name and picture are the same. Anyway, I love daal. I was stuck in Assam for a while and the diet is very low in protein, so Daal was my saving grace.

While I agree that in a climate like India, it's very hard to keep out insects, the mold is alarming. When I checked online, the reviews were slightly above average which does NOT match my experience. By the way, I love the profile picture! Bayleaves?

I think Rajasthan might be more scenic. Assam is mostly rainforest, very humid and moist - possibly not great horse riding climate. Rajasthan is much drier, with firmer soil, and it has a lot more of the typical temples you might want to see in the distance as you ride. Assam is going to be...

IndiGo allowed me to carry a 23kg bag on a Lucknow - Delhi flight and back. However, as mentioned above the only way to be 100% is to check with your specific airline. You don't want to be scrabbling at the airport to reconfigure your baggage between carry on and luggage.

In general, stick to rice vs stuffed paranthas or rotis. The stuffings can add up in calories really fast, and rice generally has a low glycemic index as compared to wheat (Bonus if you want to stay gluten free). While you may be tempted to eat fish to stay healthy, I recommend you stick to...

I was recently here for a wedding; we booked a couple floors of this hotel. I cannot recommend this hotel; I would give it a star and a half. While it is large and the staff are helpful enough, and there is a (small) elevator for this three story hotel, there were small cockroaches and most of...