darjeeling narendra modis note googly has sent tourists into a tizzy from hill towns of gangtok and darjeeling to the sunkissed beaches of mandarmani puri and goa tourists from bengal are struck with notes aplenty but hardly any moneywe had carried cash in rs 500 and rs 1000 denominations as handling large 1000 denominations as handling large amounts of cash in 100rupee denominations gets bulky i have dumped plans to buy woollens darjeeling tea and souvenirs as shops have stopped accepting the rs 500 and rs 1000 notes but how do we make the payment to our hotel is what i cannot fathom said lakhi talukdar who is also worrying about how she will undertake the return journey with only top hotels and restaurants in the town accepting plastic money most tourists are in a quandary hotels too are unable to fathom what to do some began accepting rs 500 and rs 1000 notes by late afternoon we cannot penalize customers for no fault of theirs we are hoping banks will exchange the money when they reopen said kamal banerjee manager of hotel sonar bangla other hotels like marvel international were refusing flying passengers but were giving concession to regular clientsin gangtok too tourists could not hire vehicles because of the cash crunchbarap namgyal bhutia vicepresident of travel agents association of sikkim taas said operators had been advised to accept notes from tourists this is because small travel agents dont have cardswipe machines tourists are also averse to paying transaction charges on card payments he reasonedpoushali biswas a resident of bally who is vacationing in goa with her parents had the shock of her life when she realized the rs 20000 in cash she had in her bag was of no use what made the situation worse was that she had to stay in goa for two more days before boarding her flight back home and she had only rs 330 with her in change i got the news from one of my friends around 930pm i immediately ran out of the hotel and tried to get change i asked at the hotel counter the shops outside the hotel two liquor shops and a curio shop but managed to change just rs 1000 she said