DesiTraveller

  People in the trade are already talking about a surge of inbound tourism to India this winter of 2022/2023. The impending fuel shortage in Europe as well as rising inflation makes it not just cold but also unhealthy to hang around there. Likewise, there is the expected rush of ex-pat Indians from abroad, whether NRI, OCI or foreign born confused desis, running away from the recession that is staring them in the face. They too will arrive on Indian shores. Whether long-stay or short, foreigners or OCIs or NRIs, all of them will need some amount of tourism facilities. From fancy expensive hotels in Metro cities to home-stays in rural parts of the country. And for once, we appear to be ready as a country, for this influx. Today, for example, we have international gateway airports in India that provide direct bus services to the interior parts of India, Delhi to Punjab, Bengaluru to everywhere in Karnataka, Hyderabad to different parts of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh are some example...

  Want to drive all over India? FasTag will track whatever motor vehicle you are in (unless you are from the VVIP/VIP categories, which is certainly something that needs to be re-considered. Want to travel by train in India? Reserving online and often across the counter requires some form of identification or the other and then once onboard, yes, you do have to prove your identity  Want to fly across India? Most certainly a digital trail, from booking the ticket through to check-in and often even when making an exit, will track you. Need to withdraw cash or make payments? Unless you carry wads of cash, which shall get you stopped at various checkpoints, or exchange gold for cash (again, very risky) you just left tracks as bright as spotlamps. Have to check into any sort of hotel, guest house, paying guest accomodation? Be prepared to enter and provide a copy of some form of digital ID that will be placed in multiple data-bases. Taking fuel at a filling station? Some have start...

  Destination weddings, or destination functions of any sort, are amongst the biggest evolutions of package tours without the tours. In most cases they comprise of taking a flight plus some other form of transport to a resort or a hotel, attending expensive choreographed functions, and then returning back to base. Getting wasted appears to be, often, one of the core objectives. Trying to imitate a random Hindi movie is another aspirational here. In almost all cases, all that this achieves is travel inside another tube, and food that tastes the same. In addition, your budget is likely to go totally out of shape on basics like drinking water and airport food, because those are not cheap. I have done a few destination weddings, in addition we also live in a second home sometimes in an Indian city which has a lot of destination weddings, so there is a wee bit of experience involved too. Destination weddings abroad are something else again. Here I try to tell readers how a good quality ...