The Journey from Jaisalmer to Bikaner
November 22, 2005
On the bus
This is another story of travelling in India. A quite common one, I bet. Directly speaking, I have got a booking ticket for a night bus from Jaisalmer to Bikaner from a travel agency, 150 Rs. I understand completely that the price of the ticket can vary greatly depending on from whom you obtain the ticket.
The bus departs at 9 pm from Hanuman Travels. So I departed from my hotel at 8 pm directly to the Hanuman Travels in Hanuman Square, Jaisalmer. Once I arrived in the travel office, the guy there, without seeing my ticket, told me that the bus was cancelled, I had to change my tikcet, I had to pay another 50 Rs for a better bus, bla bla bla. Of course I was very suspicious with this scam, as how he knew how much I had paid and how much I had to add more, and moreover, I even had not told him yet where I was going to go. Being cool, pretending not to care so much, I just told him that I didnt care if I couldnt depart. He grabbed my ticket, changed my seat number, added some notes in the bus number column, etc etc. Seeing that I was not so easy, he then offered me a cheaper price of 30 Rs.
No. This guy should be playing something. And he doesnt look like someone authoritative. I didnt care. He asked me where I stayed in Jaisalmer. And once I said the magical name of POLU (the owner of Titanic guesthouse) this guy suddenly be calmed, saying that Polu was his good friend, bla bla bla, and due to this I didnt need to add any more money.
Hmm… a failed scam. But then I was asked to pay 10 Rs to store my luggage in the backside of the bus, which I suspected to be scam also. But after seeing an Indian passenger did pay the charge, I gave him also. I am suspecting that this passenger got his money back and it was only me as a fool foreigner who falls into the scam. But it could be also that everyone has to pay for the storage luggage. Somehow I feel that I’m losing my trust towards people now, after almost 6 weeks in India, experiencing so many scams, games, rip-offs, etc. Suspiciousness towards most people dealing with tourists has made me closing my door towards many people. I do really wish that I can recover soon.
When putting luggage on “top” of a Bus, then there is a Baksheesh charge of about Rs10 if somebody is moving your bag “for” you. But you don’t “have” to put your luggage on the top if you don’t want. Once in Nepal there was a scam where they “insisted” all baggage had to be put on the top, even though the bus was near empty. That was the attempted scam. None of us fell for it (we were all westerners at India/Nepal border), and the man got very angry that he couldn’t cheat us. Your case was genuine,i suspect. If somebody else puts your bag up there for you, then that Rs10 is Baksheesh for his bonus. If you put the bag up yourself, then you don’t need to pay anything. If the bag is just in the back of the bus (back seat area) then usually they don’t charge. I’ve not heard of them people charging you for that before. India is a huge challenge and real testing ground for travel. That’s why i feel lucky that i travelled there early on. I guess it installed a fairly good sense of caution for later travels. Keeping my trust at 50/50. It’s all worth it at the end though isn’t it :). That’s how i view it. Good times rub out the bad times.