Five tips for your first trip to India

As someone who first visited India from London with no prior experience or knowledge I know how unrelenting that baptism of fire can be. I have the privilege of having an Indian father and direct family contacts within the sub-continent. This did assist me when I hit a problem but, alas, the problems still happened.

To date I have probably spent more than a few years in the subcontinent since my first visit and have travelled a decent chunk of it. With this post I aim to help you on your first trip to my favourite place to travel by giving you information I wish I had on my arrival back in 2017.

Tip 1: Prepare for chaos

There is no way to avoid the relative chaotic nature of the Indian subcontinent. As Europeans we are very much lulled into a false sense of security and order which simply does not exist in other parts of the world.

Some simple examples of the chaos I am referring to are things we take for granted back home:

• Trains and busses do not have organised schedules and pickup points: When we book a train or a bus in Europe (especially western Europe) it is not even a thought that you wont be able to find the pickup location. In India this is often the case. You can expect to see your pickup destination to be something like Aapka Rentwala near Pritam Hotel Library Chowk (Pickup by Cab), Pritam Hotel Library Chowk, Mall Rd, The Mall Road, Mussoorie, Landmark: Aapka Rentwala near Pritam Hotel Library Chowk (Pickup by Cab) (this is a real pickup location from the most recent bus I took).

Further to that, you can expect it to be inaccurate. On the above booking I ended up going to the correct hotel and the cab (mentioned in the pickup point) didn’t. As it got close to my pickup time I felt that something was off as I didn’t see any other travellers waiting there so I went on a walk around the town to hear someone shouting “Paul, is Paul anywhere here?!”. It was my cab driver hunting for me as he was waiting about 500m up the road from where I was instructed to wait.

• Traffic laws are advisory: This is possibly something you have heard already but traffic laws in India might as well be non-existent. They do exist, but (especially in the north) they are rarely enforced. When crossing a road you really do need to ensure you are looking in every direction possible as you genuinely have no clue from which direction a vehicle, cow, horse and cart or otherwise will be coming from.

One thing I will say on this is that people will stop for you in most cases. It is just a matter of getting over that initial mental hurdle of fearing walking out into a chaotic and busy road. Some advice for overcoming the fear is to wait for a group of people to gather at the crossing and then go together.

Tip 2: Buy a filtered water bottle

It is well known that tap water in Asia is not really safe to drink and this is something you should prepare for. There are a number of filter bottles you can buy which will enable you to safely drink water from pretty much anywhere. The main contenders I have seen on the market are from Water to go, Grayl and Lifestraw.

Personally I use the Grayl Geopress bottle as I like being able to filter the water and then use it later. I originally bought a Lifestraw bottle but I found it leaked, a lot. I also used a Water to go bottle for a good 5 years but started finding the need to suck the water out of the bottle to be cumbersome as I wanted to use the filtered water for things like making tea or food.

Of the three I would highly recommend either the Grayl or the Water to go. Lifestraw may have improved their design since I tried them so I wouldn’t write them off. You can find all bottles online very easily by doing a quick search.

Tip 3: Get a Starling, Monzo or Revolut bank card

This tip applies to travelling pretty much anywhere, not just India, to be honest. Getting one of these cards will save you a hell of a lot of money on exchange rates. I personally use Starling but I hear that the other two mentioned offer the same principle which is that the bank will not take a cut of the exchange fee. This means that you can use your normal debit card to withdraw cash from ATMs without your bank ripping you off and taking a chunk of it.

Needless to say, having these cards will not stop the ATM from charging you but you can find some ATMs which do not charge a foreign card fee in India. I know for sure that Bank of Baroda and Punjab National Bank are two which will not charge you to withdraw cash with a European card (this is true as of December 2025).

Tip 4: Get an Indian sim card

An Indian phone number is essential if you want to use apps such as RedBus (for booking busses) and the ConfirmTkt (for booking trains). You can get them at the airport when you land or in most cities. The easiest option is to just get a tourist sim when you land as this will enable you to then use your new Indian number to get a taxi from the airport to your accommodation using an app like Ola (although Uber does work in bigger cities such as Delhi).

Tip 5: Avoid ice, meat, fish & dairy from street vendors

In Europe we are used to extremely sterile and sanitised environments for food processing, especially when it comes to animal produce. In Asia the standards differ greatly, especially when considering street vendors. My initial trip to India is what initially lead to me becoming vegetarian as I became violently unwell with food poisoning from chicken in a Michelin recommended restaurant.

The safest thing to do is to just avoid ice, meat and fish entirely as it simply isn’t worth the risk to consume them. With regard to dairy I would personally steer clear of street vendors unless you have it on good authority that the stall you are visiting is safe. The one item I would say it is safe to deviate this for is chai. When the chai wallah makes the drink they will boil the milk which will essentially sterilise it.

The issue with all this isn’t so much that people are doing anything nefarious with their products. It is simply that it takes years of exposure to build the gut bacteria and immunity which will enable you to consume the bacteria which grows on these products when not kept in the sterile environments we are used to in Europe.

I say this from experience. The difference between my tolerance from 2017 until today is insane. When I go back to the family village now my brother and I will drink shardai (a traditional punjabi drink made with milk, nuts and herbs) with ice from street vendors without any issue whatsoever. If I had that same drink back in 2017 I would have spent two weeks running from my bedroom to the loo.