The Meaning of Pizza (Day 32 of the World Trip)

06.10.2019

Yesterday evening we arrived in Dehradun and actually did nothing except for dinner :D Our apartment is booked through AirBnB and is called "The Glass House". Although there are no house numbers, we found the building quite easily thanks to its glass facade. Yay! :)

On the ground floor of the building there is a fashion store, above that an Indian family lives, and there is a shop for solar panels. Above that is a banquet room, for example, used for weddings, and then, on the third floor (depending on how you count :p), there are 10 hotel-like apartments with a bed, nightstand, and bathroom. There is even a caretaker who welcomed us and always keeps everything clean and well, yeah.

The only downside was the location. The apartment is outside the city center and there is really nothing except residential buildings and a few small shops and restaurants - although "restaurants" is already a euphemism ;-) There are street kitchens and two "real" restaurants, which mostly offer Indian food. And well, I (and I think Jonas too) simply didn't feel like having Indian food anymore :(

In the end, we went to an Indian restaurant where I ordered noodles with tomato sauce. Something Western^^ Unfortunately, I then realized that Indian tomato sauce is not the same as Western tomato sauce. It was super spicy :D And of course there were onions in it... tzz :D I ate a few forks full, the rest we took with us for the next day ;-)

Today was a pure chill-out day. We wrote all the blog entries for the Har Ki Dun Trek and selected photos. We only left the room to go shopping at the supermarket, which was super relaxed. It was also a temperature shock from below 10°C to almost 30°C :O

Oh, there's still a side story: yesterday evening a guy approached us on the street who just wanted to talk. I ignored him and he tried directly to make me feel guilty "hey. I'm black and you're white. But we're both normal people. You can talk to me." I still ignored him, so he tried with Jonas ;-) He at least answered him, so Naveen accompanied us for a while.

He kept repeating that he just wanted to talk and I explained to him that we had had bad experiences with that, that in the end they always ask for money. Naveen assured us that he didn't intend to do that. He has rich parents, a credit card, and he is studying math, physics, and chemistry at the university. But he asked for Jonas' number in case we wanted to do something together the next day. They exchanged numbers and that same evening Naveen called continuously via video chat until Jonas answered on the 10th try. At the latest then Jonas also found the whole thing a bit strange. And today, well today Naveen called more often and wrote to Jonas, urging him to meet up. When Jonas canceled the meeting, he still didn't give up and continued trying to call us. Really weird... Jonas has now blocked him on WhatsApp ;-)

The highlight of the day was when we tried to order pizza again like the night before. Since our apartment is so remote, not all delivery services deliver to us. Plus, it's Sunday and it's a week full of holidays... :( Yesterday we gave up and went to the restaurant but today we would persist.

While I was talking to my family on the phone, the unbelievable happened!!! After several attempts, it actually worked! Jonas ordered two pizzas to our apartment through an app!!! :O

Now we just had to wait. You could track the delivery live on your phone and always see how far the driver was. When there were only a few minutes left until arrival, Jonas went down to the street just to be safe. The delivery guy had already called us before and since he only spoke Hindi, Jonas wasn't sure if the communication had really worked... I continued talking to my family, eagerly awaiting and hopeful, and when Jonas later came back to the room with the pizzas, I jumped up and hugged him in relief. Our pizza! Finally!

The story of the delivery itself was also funny, with Jonas talking on the phone again with the delivery guy who only spoke Hindi. Jonas explained that he was the only white person outside and apparently the delivery guy then gave the phone to a passerby who understood English to translate. I would have loved to be there :D :D And I'm so proud of Jonas for persisting and fighting for this pizza. He really is the best <3

By the way, the pizza was okay. The first few slices were delicious. It felt like heaven :O Then unfortunately came the thick layer of cheese, which slightly clouded the taste, but whatever. We were culinary back in Europe :p