Elizabeth Gilbert’s memoir Eat, Pray, Love, and the film with Julia Roberts that followed, sent a whole generation off in search of good food, a quieter mind and a little romance, with India as the “pray” chapter. A volunteer trip offers its own version of all three: food you will dream about long after you leave, places of faith that welcome you in, and friendships that make it hard to go home.
Eat: from street stalls to family kitchens
Food is the fastest way into Indian life. In Delhi, try golgappe and aloo tikki from a chaat stall, a hot samosa with tamarind chutney, and the stuffed, deep-fried parathas of Paranthe Wali Gali in Old Delhi. Momos, the Tibetan dumplings, are sold on almost every corner. In Jaipur, start the day like a local with a pyaaz kachori, a flaky onion-filled pastry, and cool off later with a lassi.
Day to day, you eat vegetarian home-style food: dal, a vegetable curry, rice and fresh roti. In Jaipur you can even live with a host family and eat at their table. Keep an antacid handy for your first week, and read our guide to eight dishes to try in Delhi and Jaipur.
Pray: places of faith that welcome everyone
You don’t need to be religious to feel the pull of India’s places of worship, and most of them welcome visitors of any faith. In Delhi, start with these:
- Gurudwara Bangla Sahib, near Connaught Place: a Sikh temple with a golden dome and a sacred pool. Its langar serves free meals to anyone who comes, and visitors are welcome to help in the kitchen, rolling chapatis or serving food. Cover your head and leave your shoes at the entrance.
- Akshardham: a vast Hindu temple complex of carved pink sandstone and white marble, opened in 2005, with a water and light show in the evening. Phones and cameras have to be left outside.
- The Lotus Temple: a Bahá’í house of worship shaped like a lotus flower, open to people of every religion for silent prayer, and close to our hostel in South Delhi.
- Hazrat Nizamuddin Dargah: the shrine of a 14th-century Sufi saint, where qawwali singers perform in the evenings, especially on Thursdays.
Our Hindi and culture week includes a temple day at Akshardham and the Birla Mandir. Further afield, the Golden Temple in Amritsar and the evening Ganga Aarti on the riverbank in Varanasi are two of the most moving sights in India, and both are on our weekend trips.
India is also the home of yoga. Drop-in classes run in Delhi’s parks and studios, and Rishikesh, in the Himalayan foothills about six hours from Delhi, is the place for a weekend of yoga and meditation beside the Ganges. Your coordinator can help you plan the trip.
Love: the people you meet
When volunteers get home, it is the people they talk about. It might be the child who won’t let go of your hand at the end of the day, the teacher who insists you stay for chai, or the friends from other countries you explore India with at weekends. Turn up every day, be patient, say yes to invitations, and you will leave with friendships that last. Read what past volunteers say in their reviews.
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