darling darjeeling

Tues Nov 29 – Thursday Dec 1

Our train got in at 8am but it was a three hour drive in a jeep with eight other people (plus the driver) to get to our destination. 

We arrived in the cozy little mountain city of Darjeeling with a full day still ahead of us.  I just loved this city right from the start.  It was fairly cool this far north.  Everything seems different here.  The people look really different, they dress really different and there’s just a really unique feel about the place.  Every little shop is selling all kinds of fantastic knitted things.     

We took the Toy Train that evening.  It’s just a small train that goes around the city.  Unfortunately it was super over cast and cloudy so we couldn’t really see much outside the immediate city but it was still really fun.  It’s a really quaint place.  The brightly painting buildings speckle all over the hills. 

There are a lot Tibetan Refugees in Darjeeling.  There are tons of Tibetan restaurants.  Darjeeling is famous for it’s tea plantations so every second shop sells “world famous tea.”  I almost wished I was a tea drinker! 

N felt really lousy in the morning so I went off wandering on my own.  I decided to set off in a direction that we hadn’t yet explore and ended up way outside of the city.  I did find the zoo so I went and checked that out.  Among other things, they had a very friendly bear, some tigers and a bunch of red pandas.  Then it was still about an hour and a half walk back, up hill.  I really got my work out that day!

In the afternoon we went up Tiger Hill to try and get a view of the big mountains but again the weather was bad so we couldn’t really  see much. 

The shops all close fairly early, just as it’s getting dark because the shop keepers pack up all their merchandise and carry it come with them each night.  They use these straps which they lift using their foreheads.  It’s really insanely impressive how much they lift this way.  Anyways as a result there’s not much to do in the evening.  So we decided to go out to a movie.  And there just happened to be a really nice little coffee shop outside the theatre that we sat at while we waited for our show to start.  It was a really lovely little date before we head off.  

We had to leave this morning so we thought we’d try and get one more shot at seeing the famous Himalayas.  We left for Tiger Hill at 4:30 am!  Everyone goes that early to see the sunset.  It’s totally packed!  There are about two hundred people standing out in the chilly dark morning anxiously waiting for the sun.  It was nice but I’m not sure if it was worth the sleep deprivation.  We stayed way longer than most people hoping that the clouds would lift and sure enough after almost everyone else had left the clouds dissipated and there they were!  We could see just a tiny little tip of Mt. Everest.  And Mt. Khangchendozonga WOW!  It’s enormous!  It’s the worlds third largest peak standing at 8598 meters high.  By comparison Mt. Everest is 8848 m high.  It seems to just shoot up out of the hills way above everything else.  It was really impressive.  We were so thrilled that we actually got to see it before we left!  That was really amazing! 

Tomorrow evening around 6pm we will arrive in Vijayawada.  We are all jitters and excitement.  We are really looking forward to meeting the Ebenezer family and settling into a permanent place after being on the go for these past weeks.  We look forward to getting to work!

hindu holy city

Sat Nov 26-Mon Nov 28

We flew out from Khajuraho in the late afternoon and arrive in Varanasi around 3pm.   We thought our flight was in the morning…but it was delayed several hours.   

In Hinduism the number seven is very important.  There are seven holy cities and seven holy rivers.  Varanasi is one of these cities and Ganges are one of these rivers. 

We had been forewarned of the touts in Varanasi before we got there and I was glad for that because pretty much from the time we landed it felt like a constant bartering battle.  The area that our hotel was located in had all these little tiny winding streets.  The buildings go up about seven stories and the lane is so narrow N could reach his arms across and touch the walls on either side, in most places.  It is a claustrophobics WORST nightmare, it feels like being in a maze.  Oh and did I mention that I’m claustrophobic?!  Haha so unfortunately this greatly detracted from my personal enjoyment of the city since by the time we got to the hotel I was hyperventilating.  Once we got out of there and got out to the Ganges and got to experience the city a bit more it’s really interesting. 

It’s not my favorite place we’ve been but I think it’s a major destination for good reason.  It’s a really interesting place! 

Every night at 6pm on one of the main Ghats (which we think just means stairs down to the river) they perform the ganga aarti ceremony.  It last about an hour.  It was quite interesting. There are bells ringing throughout the entire thing and seven holy men dressed in orange sing om  chants and wave incense and candles etc.  It seemed like it was very meaningful to the worshipers there.  We went to it both nights.  Once we saw it from a boat and once we went right up on the ghat.  From the boat you can light a little candle in floating flower.  From what I understood people do it sort of the way that you might wish upon a star if you are superstitious.  Mine got sucked under the boat right away. 

Varanasi had some really fun shopping too. They had all these fixed price scarf shops with really beautiful things for really reasonable prices.  I like so much when you don’t have to negotiate and you get great deals! 

We went again for a boat ride in the morning.  You can see the Ghat’s where they do the cremations (photos are prohibited).  The river is a really central part of the Hindu faith.  As I understand it, being cremated here allows a person to reach moksha or liberation and escape the cycle of reincarnation. 

I always thought that they burned the bodies out on the water but they don’t they just drench it in the Ganges water before it’s burned.  And someone told us that babies prior to 8months old are believed to be without sin so they are not cremated they are just floated down the river. We are pretty sure we saw one.  And we also saw a few cremations.  If no one told you what it was it just looks like a bon fire.  Thankfully you can’t see anything gory or anything. Considering how public the cremation is it’s done really discreetly and respectfully.  We saw lots of men and women with shaved heads, in Varanasi.  When we asked about it, someone told us that it was done by the immediate family of the deceased. 

There’s a lot to learn! 

The Ganges were much bigger than N was expecting.  The city of Varanasi looks really pretty from the water, all lit up at night. 

We had a really cool answer to prayer on our way out of the city. 

We caught a rickshaw to the train station.  We were told it should not take more than half an hour to get there and had allotted just over forty-five minutes to get there.  Our rickshaw driver seemed in no hurry at all.  Which, in our experience, is a bit out of character for a rickshaw driver.  He stopped for gas, twice.  He stopped and chatted with friends a couple of times pulling right over on the side of the road and turning off the rickshaw.  And at one point he stopped to purchase a wreath of flowers.  We were trying to be patient but were also feel a bit nervous that we were going to be late.  About a half an hour in we realized that it was more like a 45 min to an hour drive to the station.  And that despite our rushing the driver we were not making good time.  I started praying like crazy that somehow God would intervene.  We had a lot of trouble even booking these tickets and I was not sure what would happen if we missed this train.  It was a long trip through the night ahead of us, it wasn’t going to work to try and grab a last minute seat. Unknown to me, the night before N and been praying that God would reveal himself to him in a very tangible way.  I began to feel reassured that things would work out, even though I had no sense of how.  We finally got to the train station.  We jumped out and were running around madly trying to find our platform.  The train was due to depart 15 minutes prior to our arrival.  We were really late!  I was pretty sure my legs were going to give out under the weight of my enormous pack as we tore up the steps.  We finally get where we need to be and there’s no train.  I begin to loose heart.  N asks an official about the train.  And our train is two hours late. 

In all the train trips we’ve taken we’ve never had a train even be more than five minutes late.  In fact I’ve never even heard other tourists comment on it before.  The trains here seem to run pretty much like clock work.  It was truly blessing.  I think these kinds of stories are never as meaningful second hand.  To read it maybe it doesn’t sound like that big a deal.  For N and I though this was a very moving experience.  It was a very power answer to prayer.  We really felt that God was making himself known to us in a very obvious way.  And we were extremely grateful!  Grateful, not only to have caught our train but also to have caught such a clear glimpse of the power and tender care of our God. 

blush a little

We arrived early in Khajuraho because when we headed out Wed Nov 23 (to catch a bus, to catch a train, run like crazy, to catch a train, to catch a bus) this guy pulls up in a really nice SUV and tells us that he lives in Khajuraho and that he’s going home.  It wasn’t really going to cost us very much extra money and it was about a million times more convenient, so against our better judgment we went for it.  Unfortunately as it was not really the smartest thing to do and we knew that neither one of us could relax and just trust the driver (who turned out to be a professional tourist driver for a big company in Delhi).  So it was a pretty tense six hour drive there.  Fortunately it all turned out for the best, we got there safely with no glitches.  The driver was very keen to drink whiskey with us and lend us his motorcycle to drive out and seem some waterfalls that are supposed to be very impressive but we politely decline.

Thursday Nov 24 – Fri Nov 25

We wandered around and checked out the temples.  There are three main sections with about half a dozen temples at each.  The temples look very similar but the sculptures on them vary slightly.  The images were not actually as explicit as we had expected, which was kind of nice.  Regardless of the content, the carvings are really amazing!  They are some of the finest temple are in the world, listed as a World Heritage Site.  We thought they were really worth the trip.  Each temple is dedicated to a different Hindu god.  And we were not totally sure that we understood this correctly but we were told that they were built to bring pleasure to the gods, to sort of appease them.  Although we should probably look into the truth behind that, a bit more. 

The city itself has a really laidback rural atmosphere. It was really enjoyable to wander the streets and do a bit of shopping.  Although the fact that their main tourist attracts are erotic temples some of the souvenirs also made us blush a little.

We met an older guy named Warren and his friend Ramkishore (sp?), who works at one of the tourist shops, while we were searching for the perfect pair of alibaba pants.  Warren was a very interesting guy.  He’s 77 and permanently lives in Seattle but for the last 17 years has spent the majority of his time in Khajuraho which he really considers home.  We sat and chatted with them for several hours eating peanuts and drinking many cups of masala tea. Ramkishore really wanted us come to his home for lunch.  And so because our flight was leaving early the next morning we agreed to have lunch at 9:30am the following morning (Sat Nov 26).  It was seriously the best food we’ve had since we got here.  His two daughters and his wife cooked us up a real feast!  We sat in their little one bedroom home, on their one bed.  Then the oldest daughter, who is 17, did henna all up my arm. It was a really amazing experience! 

Saturday Nov 26 – Happy Birthday to my Mommy! 

charger

Phone conversation 10 am - this morning (Wed Nov 23)

“Dad!  You’ll never guess what just happened to us!”

“[laughs] You got chased by a tiger.” He jokes. 

“Yes!” 

“Really?”

“Yes!”

I just had to tell somebody as soon as we got back!  I was SO happy to be alive!

It was absolutely insane!  For sure the single scariest thing that has ever happened, to either of us, in our entire lives! 

People talk about those moments where your life flashes before your eyes.  All at once I was having one of those moments.  I was certain the moment I caught sight of this beast coming towards us, that this was the end. 

So what happened…

We set out on a safari in Bandhavgarh National Park at 5:45am – the park gates open at 6:15am.  We were joined by a guy named Mark from Holland. Going with a bit of a group decreased the price because you pay per vehicle not per person to enter the park. He had been here for two weeks and on nine such safari’s without seeing a single tiger!  Having discovered this news I was not very hopefully of spotting a wild cat today.  And especially after our first experience I just didn’t want to get my hopes up and then be disappointed again. 

This was a much nicer trip to begin with than the other.  Mark photographs European Birds as a hobby gone wild, he says.  He had some pretty swanky camera equipment. 

We’ve been driving along in a gypsy (an open top jeep with room for six passengers on benches in the back) for about an hour and a half.  The morning is quite cool and the road extremely bumpy.  We’d all settled in and are enjoying a beautiful drive through the jungle.  We’d seen some deer and a few peacocks. 

Blurry short off the back of the gypsy as we
made our escape from the tiger!

All of the sudden a tigress charges out of the bushes, at the gypsy! 

She saw us long before we saw her.  The driver speeds past her and she cools down on the road. 

Then, as the rest of us our catching our breath, the driver slams into reverse.  We all squawk at him to stop and stay put.  He nearly hit the cat!  She gets scared and runs into the bush.  At first I thought we’d lost her but then I can see her looking out at us from the bushes. 

She lay there just within eyesight for a few minutes.  She was just gorgeous.    Her eyes were large and yellow.  It was hard to read her body language.  For a time, she seemed calm. 

I lower the camera. I wanted to look at her plainly, with my naked eye.  I look right into her stunning sunshine eyes.  And at that moment she’d had enough, of being watched.  We locked eyes and then she came right at us again!  (Although if you ask N the tigress was looking right into his eyes at that moment-I guess only she knows.)
It was as though I could feel all this immense beasts power rushing right at me!  Ugh!  It was so terrifying!

Tigress - Bandhavgarh National Park, India - Nov 23

The driver had turned off the car, for whatever reason. I guess tigers are normally okay with being watched.  The driver panicked and scrambled to get the car started again, as she ran at us growling.  He sped away, it seemed just in time.  My heart stopped.  I pretty much was holding my breath for this entire time. 

She was within about two meters of the vehicle!  And clearly not happy! 

At this point she crossed the road and I got some decent snaps of her.

I wanted to maintain my distance, at this point.  She was clearly feeling we had invaded her territory.  The driver, on the other hand, was going to get us our money’s worth out of this safari.  And he didn’t understand enough English to catch our protests.  So he followed after her.  She went into the bush on the other side of the road and we continued to drive on.  It seemed we’d lost her.  Then she came out of the bush behind us just walking.  We drove on watching her.  When the driver slowed down so we could see her a bit closer she started chasing the car again!  He just slammed on it at this point we were going at least 50-60 km/hr, on this sketchy pothole-filled half pavement mostly dirt road.  The tiger was having no trouble keeping up with us.  Now that she’d given us a good enough scare to keep us going, she let us loose her. 

By the time we got to the gate we were all shaking and panting.  Everyone, including the driver and the guide, was just petrified! 

When we encountered some Indian tourists about a half hour later one of the guys translated, for us, that the driver said he would never go down that way again.  He was pretty shaken up.  He told these guys he’d never been charged like that before. 

This was definitely unusual behaviour for a tiger.  From what I understand Tigers are typically solitary.  They have their own territory. 

Mark says, that some of the territorial males get called Chargers because they’re known for charging vehicles, like that.  The guide knew that this female didn’t have any young to be protecting. So it’s not typical for a female to come at a vehicle like this.  The males are about a half size again, bigger than the females.  I can’t imagine one of them coming after you like this. 

It was the craziest thing we’ve ever experienced! 

I thank God on two accounts!  It was fantastic to see such a powerful majestic beast!  And I feel and even more intense sense of awe to get to tell about it! 

Truly a memory we will never forget!

day in mumbai

We spent one more day in Mumbai with N's sister and co.

We took a tour of the city. 

We went to some gardens in the middle of the city. 

Saw some beaches surrounding the city. 

We took, a civil engineering wonder, this massive bridges from the mainland to an off island. Were we went and checked out some of the Bollywood Stars homes. We were surprised by how unimpressive and unguarded most of them were.

We went to a Jane Temple.

And we went to the Taj Mahal Hotel where there were terrorist attacks in 2008.  President Obama stayed there on his visit to India.  It’s apparently “the hotel” to go to if you’re a hotshot coming to India.  We had some very expensive coffee’s there (even by at home standards). 

We saw where they do mass hand-was laundry.  That was quite impressive. 

We checked out the slum that “Slumdog Millionaire” was filmed in, Dharavi Slum. Although we could, unfortunately, not go into it.  We may try again, on our way home we leave through Mumbai.  A few interesting notes paraphrased out of the Lonely Planet (793). Sixty percent of Mumbai’s population lives in shanty towns or slums.  Dharvi is the largest slum in the country. Though it may look a devastating mess from the outside inside life is surprisingly “normal.”  Dwellers pay rent and most houses have kitchens and electricity.  You can see satellite dishes on many of the structures.  Building materials ranger from flimsy corrugated-iron to more permanent concrete.  And this I found really interesting-many of these families have lived here for generations even if they work white-collar jobs they choose to stay.  It’s the neighborhood they grew up in.  I always find this kind of information really fascinating.  As a foreigner from the outside, something can look so terrible and upsetting.  The reality is that people survive, live and enjoy life in wildly diverse circumstances. 

According to the LP Mumbiakers had mixed feelings about the stereotypes expressed by the hit movie.  And understandably so if this was your home, and you felt safe and at peace here.  I wouldn’t want my neighborhood portrayed as a pit of despair to the rest of the world, either.  At the same time it’s upsetting to walk along the street and see a girl who is clearly still a teenager trying to quite the baby on her hip.  And watching her sooth him by picking up a dirty plastic bag off the street and giving it to him to suck on. 

I think this is why it is important to travel.  It is one thing to watch a stirring movie.  It’s another thing to interact and witness first hand real lives of people. Witnessing poverty like this first hand is really upsetting.  We continue to struggle with how not only to respond but how to cope.  It makes you want to have nothing.  It makes you want not live where you do with the luxuries you have.  It make you feel guilty to your very core.  Sick to your stomached that you happened to be dealt the hand of cards you got, because they didn’t. 

We had dinner all together on the hotel roof top, overlooking the city, that night.  It was great to get to catch up with our sister over these past two days.  To chat and to laugh.  N's sister hates sad ‘good byes’.  She reminded us that, like this trip, you never know when or where you’ll get the chance to connect with loved ones.   So instead of being sad at our parting I look forward to our next exciting meeting abroad. 

It was so wonderful to be together.  And as always hard to say good bye. 

Then N and I caught a 17hr train to Bandhavgarh National Park

a reunion in mumbai

We had an excellent four days in Goa.  (Let me clairify) As we were just lazing around on the beach I didn’t really have much to blog about.   There are great little restaurants all along the beach.  You can find a wide variety in cuisine: including western, Israeli and Italian.  And when the staff aren’t trying to sell you weed you really get quite good service.  It’s kind a of a little hippy hub, in many ways.  You don’t have to walk far to find a bong for sale, a purse with mushrooms stitched onto it or a place that will put in dreadlocks for you!  Many people seem to just come to Goa to work for the high season (which is just beginning) and then return home for the low season.  Not many of the people we met working in Goa were actually from there.  And many of the tourists seem to live there for the entire high season.  It’s not all young people.  Authentic hippies are not hard to find…they have not aged well.  Leathery skin and unkempt hair are in abundance. 

I really enjoyed the laidback vibe and the easy going energy.  Although I must say if you’re looking to experience authentic Indian culture, I don’t think it’s on your list of places to go. 

Some hilarious highlights: 

In the ever so conservatively dressed boarders of India, Goa stands distinct.  The lack of clothing was really quite shocking! 

We saw our first ever male g-string proudly marching down the beach. 

And an very old man, with waist length long grey hair and beard, standing in the middle of the beach retying his white sarong.  It is strange, in the first place, how many men wear sarongs in Goa.  And in the second place that, he was wearing nothing at all beneath the this sheer fabric!  And thirdly that he opened widely and really took his time about retying his wrap!  Bah!  My eyes are burning!!!!  Bahaha!

Aside from the expose…Goa was really great!  We just loved it and are looking forward to passing through on our way home again. 

We took a ten hour train trip from Goa up to Mumbai. We arrived late in the evening around 9pm.  Anja, Ureshnie (her very close friend) and Auntie Shama (sp? -Ureshnie’s Mom) arrive shortly after Midnight from South Africa.  We met them at a lovely hotel (which Anja spoiled us with!) 

We stayed up for a few hours being excited to see one another and catching up! 

Then we started our day early and went to check out this fantastic city.  I really like Mumbai.  It seems to me like the Manhattan of India.  It feels quite different from the rest of the country we’ve experience so far.  It’s fairly crowded and bustling as would be expected of a major centre but it’s quite different in many ways.  It was British in it’s early colonial roots, I think, and that seems to give the architecture a really different look. 

We took, an hour-long, ferry over to the Elephanta Caves.  Which is sort of a temple dug into the rock.  It’s an ancient Hindu Temple primarily dedicated to Lord Shiva.  The carvings were very cool!  It’s quite neat to see!

Then we checked out the city and did a bit of street shopping.  It’s great shopping!  There are little booths with treasures all a long the side walk.  It’s cramped but at least out of traffic!   They have everything!  We will do our purchasing on our way back through Mumbai on the way home though, so we don’t have to carry it with us for our whole trip. 

We finished off the evening with an excellent dinner and then went back to our hotel to hang out. 

It’s been just SO wonderful to get to see Anja so unexpectedly soon!  We feel very blessed to get to steal this time together! 

Tomorrow we plan to take a tour of the city and check out the sights.

N and I leave for Bandhavgarh National Park around 9p tomorrow night.  Again hoping to catch a glimpse of those famous wild cats!!!

 (will post pictures later)

goin' to goa

Wednesday Nov 16 2011

Actually we’re already in Goa, at this point, it just didn’t sound as catchy. 

We’ve decided to revise our itinerary a bit.  Our camel tour is quite a ways from where we are and makes the train ride to Mumbai, where we will visit Anja, almost 24 hours.  Which was fine until we started talking to other travelers who were really not recommending it.  Not making it appealing enough to make it endure that grueling train ride.  I’m still not certain that we won’t regret missing out on this experience.

We talked about some options and just sort of randomly decided to fly down and check out some beach.  We’ll trained to Jaipur  and spent a day there.  It’s not a bad city we didn’t make it up to see the fort that everyone recommends as it’s a bit of drive, which was unfortunate.  Then flew to Goa, with Spice Jet airlines (love that name). We’re feeling a little tuckered out - the excitement of India is proving a bit wearing on first time visitors. 

It might be the beach...but it's still India!

I just wanted to rub it in a little bit, for our loved ones back home, that while the flakes fly there, we’re enjoying sandy beaches getting our tan on. 

While this might not have been the most efficient little detour we could have taken we’re glad we made it.  It’s really great here.  The last province we were in, Rajasthan, is called the desert province and we found this kind of strange because we thought it had a lot of green and was relatively lush.  Now that we’re in the south it makes amore sense. 

We’re in Northern Goa, in a town called Arambol.  It’s about an hour and half drive from the airport, we just took a taxi.  It’s very touristy here but surprisingly noncommercial feeling, considering.  It’s kind of a “hippy” community.  We get the impression people come and stay here for long periods of time. 

It’s super hot!  As in sweat always dripping down your back hot.  We have trouble ever finding out the exact temperature. 

Arambol Beach

Goa feels a world away from inland India.  It’s not exactly a profound cultural experience but for us it’s a welcome break from our first week in the bustling city.  We stayed in an ordinary hotel last night but tonight we’re going to look into staying in a hut. 

Last night at sunset a bunch of cattle wandered a long the beach, this was just hilarious to me, as just a little reminder that it’s still India.

We’ll be here for about four days. 

tigerless

Monday Nov 14 2011

We caught a passenger train from Agra to Sawai Madhopur around 7 pm Saturday night.  It being a passenger train seems to mean that destination and platform are not posted anywhere, because it stops at every stop.  So, we had no idea which train to catch or where to wait.  It was a bit of a panic for about half an hour trying to find someone who knew anything.  We eventually did get on a train that had some people going to where we were headed but it was hard to relax until we actually got there and got to our hotel.  We arrived at about 1:30am in the morning and it took the hotel driver quite a while to find us, again I was trying to stay come as the few tourists there were, are disappearing.  We were sort of being surrounded by men all saying things we couldn’t understand and I was getting extremely nervous when the driver did finally arrive.  I couldn’t understand for quite a while that he was in fact specifically there for us so he just sort of added to the small crowd closing in an speaking loudly to us.  

Eventually we got to our hotel just outside Ranthambore National Park.  The staff are extremely friendly.  Our room kind of looks like a prison cell.  With high white walls and only a bed in it. Not even a garbage can.  It does have pillows, which is a nice touch but N and I affectionately call them decorative rocks.  There is not bedding but the mattress covers are clean. There is no washroom attached to our room, just a communal hole down the hole.  It’s a nice hole though fairly clean.  I’m finally getting the hang of using them, which is nice, I thought I never would.  I’m not complaining, for $6/night you can’t really.  This is what I was expecting most of our hotels to be like in India so it’s been a treat to have a little nicer. 

We went on a drive up to see Ranthambore Fort in the morning with a guy we met from the hotel.  The fort was fairly different from others we’d seen so far. Unfortunately we could not really find any information on when it was build and for whom but it was still cool to wander around. 

This guy we met, Nigel is a British but has lived in Israel for the last 20 years.  Like all travelers we encounter in India he is a seasoned travelers with lots of excellent stories and good tips.  When we talk to travelers here N and I feel like we’ve never been anywhere!  And I feel like an extremely inexperienced green traveler doing everything wrong.  Many Europeans we’ve bumped into take their 3-5 weeks holiday and take off, often alone, on some great adventure abroad.  They’ve been everywhere!  As silly as I feel about myself when engaging with these fellow travelers I do really enjoy the conversation.  Some of these people have really seen the world and they are very knowledgeable.  Canadians really do not get out much compared to the Europeans and they just take for granted that everyone has been these things. 

Sambar Deer

The Tiger Safari, which is what we came here for, was extremely disappointing.  You crowd onto this noisy pack canter, which is basically like a bus crossed with a jeep.  The vehicle itself is about as stealth as a raging party in a library.  I don’t’ think I’ve ever heard such a loud vehicle, in my life.  Right from the beginning I was pretty much certain that we were not going to see any tigers.  If they didn’t hear the canter itself coming the tourists would certainly encouraging it to turn the other way.  Everyone shouting at the top of their lungs taking flash photos, ugh it was really annoying.  The guide just yelling at us all in unintelligible English about the deer we kept seeing.   We thought they looked quite similar to the deer at home. There were plenty of peacocks but they wouldn’t stop for a picture of peacocks.  I was quite disappointed about that as I’ve never had the chance to see them in the wild.  We’d heard really good things about this park so we were surprised by our experience but I would really not recommend it to anyone.  Maybe it’s become much more commercialized.  We were also charged much more than was expected. And the long and short of the story is we saw no tigers.  I shouldn’t have gotten my hopes up, I guess.  Hopefully we will see them at one of the other game parks we go to. 

breathtaking!

It's just breathtaking!
The Taj Mahal is a must see!  Add this one to your bucket list's, my friends!

Taj Mahal (east side view)

I’ve never been somewhere with so many tourists!  And all around you people are gasping and saying, “ wow, it’s even more beautiful in real life.”  Everyone is shocked by how in awe they are with something that they wondered would feel ordinary up close.  It’s just huge!  I took some photos at a distance so that you can see the scale of the people walking on it like tiny ants.  

I wasn’t feeling so great on our way to the Taj and after we left it hit.  And by it I mean my nasty traveler’s sick that haunts me everywhere I go.  Seriously my body hates leaving home!  Or it may also have been the “Indian Breakfast” that N bought us from a sketchy street vendour.  The tastiness it always so tempting!  So I’m still not feeling awesome but pushing through. 

We check out our first bizarre today.  All the tourists have this fantastic flowing Indian style pants.  I have never seen anyone Indian wearing them but they’re really great!  I did not find them in the bizarre but it was an exciting, though hectic experience.    It’s sort of just random little booths set up along a busy street with no obvious division between shopper and traffic and cattle.  I got suckered into buying some fantastic leather shoes.  The salesmen said I was very beautiful, what could I do!  I had to buy!  Haha the shoes were very beautiful too so it was a win-win for us both.  The rickshaw took us to the wrong side of the city because he did not understand us when we told him our hotel name.  Which meant a very long hot ride in very bad traffic.  It’s much hotter in Agra than it has been anywhere else.  Neither of us was really feeling fantastic by the time we got out of the fumy heat.  On a random note though I do really  love being in the streets because the traffic here has a life of its own. I don’t know how it runs so smoothly and so chaotically at the same time!  My favorite are the motorcycles with a family of five all squashed onto them.  I love watching the women in their sari’s elegantly perched on the back of these crazy bikes.  The bright fabric cheerfully fluttering in the wind as the zoom past. 

We are off, now, to catch a train to Sawai Madhopur where we go Ranthambore National Park.  Unfortunately we will arrive there at 1am.  Hopefully I can sleep on the train. 

I am super excited to, hopefully, see our first tigers!  

sipping chai gazing at the taj

Friday Nov 11 2011  9:00 pm

Another thing to add to my list of unexpected positives about India, is how easily we seem to be able to get internet! I’m finding it really wonderful to still feel connected to home. And being able to share my travel reflections with loved ones makes the hard stuff feel more bearable and the cool stuff feel more awesome!


This is what I dreamed India would be! I am in LOVE with Agra!

Only a three hour train ride here which I really enjoyed. We got a very interesting view of the country as we hustled by.
The trains are, well, they are hard to explain to someone who has not experienced them. They are cramped. The stations certainly make up for any lack of foul odours we’ve encountered in other places. Actually they are much better than I expected they would be. Although I have not yet had to use the ladies room and I hear that is an experience all to itself.

Back to Agra. A rickshaw from the hotel was arranged to pick us up. There’s a lot of scamming at these big tourist destinations. Apparently, drivers will often take you to a more expensive hotel, than the one you booked and make up some story. They get commission from the hotel expensive hotel for bringing people. We’re a bit suspicious that this is what happened to us in Delhi. Although if that was the case it was a very elaborate ploy indeed! So Jamir from Saniya Palace Hotel came to get us. He’s really great! He is super chatty in fairly good English. He has given us the best service we’ve had since we arrived in India!

The view of the Taj Mahal from the roof of Saniya Palace Hotel restaurant

Our hotel is really wonderful! Agra is super touristy. It’s sort of strange for the two of us to see so many travelers, much less so many which people! It’s the least expensive we’ve stayed in so far. Which seems stunning because we have a fantastic view of the Taj Mahal from the roof top restaurant. It’s so quant! And has a really diverse and tasty menu. (Minus my first order the lack of chicken, chicken burger. I should really know by now to always order local food when you travel and not attempt to get something homey. It’s always so tempting.) There are beautiful flowers, Christmas lights and with tidy little tables. Half of the tables even have little sort of roves over them. The rooms are nice clean. Also very small, as in the door nearly touches the bed when it opens and there is no room for bedside table beside the bed. And the toilet is right next to the shower (with no curtain) so when you shower the whole bathroom (“room” being used extremely loosely here) is soaked. And no toilet paper is provided with the room. So, it’s nothing fancy but I can sip delicious masala (chai) tea from the roof top and gaze out at the Taj Mahal. And really does it get much cooler than that? (I realize at this point that the travel guide has been my main source of literature and my writing is beginning to reflect that…but now if you ever come to Agra you know.)

So we booked Jamir to take us to the other sights of Agra (As a side note just to truly express how impressed we were N paid him more than twice the price he had bartered him down for - those of you who know how N spends money will know how truly pleased we were! Haha!): Agra Fort and Baby Taj (Itimad-Ub-Daula). Agra Fort is very impressive.

On a hugely over-sharing note, at the fort I used my first [for lack of a proper name] hole-in-the-floor-toilet! I was really proud of myself! “I’m a big girl now!”

A quick history lesson I have gleaned from the LP-for those of you like me who are not up on the history of India. Agra Fort is from roughly the same period as the Taj, in fact the Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan would have lived in it while he was building the Taj. It was originally constructed by his grandfather and then he did some additions, as well. The construction of the Taj Mahal (translates to Crown Palace-a name given by the British) in 1631 as a memorial to the death of his second (and I assume favorite) wife of four, Mumtaz Mahal. She died giving birth to their fourteenth child! It took 20 000 laborers twenty two years to finish! Sadly the emperor’s son had him imprisoned shortly after it was finished and he only got to see his beauty from the Agra Fort prison for the rest of his days. Then he was put in a tomb with his beloved wife who it was built for. It’s kind of a tragic romance, if you ask me. The Taj seems like a doubly romantic, to me (again no one but me is telling this fairy tale version) memorial because Baby Taj was built in 1622 as a tomb for Mumtaz Mahal’s (the wife) grandfather. In my version the emperors wife loved her grandfather dearly and often enjoyed the beautiful marble inlaid tomb where her beloved grandfather was lain. So that’s my happily ever after history lesson.

Baby Taj - Itimad-Ud-Daulah

Baby Taj is on my list of must sees! It’s amazing! These intricately carved semi precious stones inlaid into marble. It’s so intricate! I was blown away. It’s not that big but as Jamir put it, “graphically much more impressive.” We shall see after we visit the big Taj tomorrow.

I can’t wait to get up close and into the Taj Mahal tomorrow!

I can hardly believe we’ve only been here for just one day. It’s just so great. Then again as N and I were laughing I guess I am kind of an all or nothing girl.

delhi

Last night we arrived in Delhi.  (Population 12.8 Million- Area 1483 Sq km)

It seemed like a paradise after Amritsar!  Big freeways with organized traffic, markings on the road, traffic lights and the cars even use signal lights!  Unlike the chaotic mayhem of the streets of Amritsar where everyone just goes where is most convenient driving whatever they can as fast as they can.  We were thrilled with the quite of the night here! 

We had booked a hotel in advance, from Amritsar, because the LP said that Delhi was a busy place and sometimes hard to find a room.  That was all arranged.  We arrived quite late at night and had the best bartering experience ever when we negotiated for a cab.  We had paid Rs 500 to get from the hotel in Amritsar to the (The exchange rate is $1-Rs50).  He said Rs 400, N said Rs 300 ad it’s settled!  I love Delhi already, so hassle free – or so I think!

 So our very friendly driver gets almost to our hotel and the only road to access it is blocked off, for no known reason.  It’s likely barricaded for the festival tomorrow, which we didn’t know was happening.  The hotel neglected to mention this when I booked it!  So anyways we can not get to the hotel.  And so the driver takes us to the very cheerful/chatty but not especially helpful tourist office.  Where after hearing all about the “real India” and how we need to redirect our trip he finally tells us Delhi is very expensive right now with this birthday and we will have to pay more so he sends us to this random area called Market Street and says instead of continuing to make phone calls there we should have the driver just pull up in front of random places and ask if they have room.  It is now 1:30am and we have been at the tourist office for around 45min on the phone with hotel after hotel that does not have room or is barricaded off from the road.  And it’s night so the metro isn’t running and we can’t walk in because it is “not recommended.” 

Fortunately after driving down some very sketchy allies we pull up in front of a quite nice looking place called The Danish Resort.  It’s a lot more than we were hoping to spend but it’s still definitely affordable!  Hurray!

This hotel is pretty swanky!  It’s all glammed-out.   Our last hotel we had to use sleeping bags on the beds and it should more appropriately have been called a backpackers as you did not get towels or fresh bedding and were only allotted a small role of TP.  Here we have all the luxuries including a flat screen TV (to watch all the Bollywood you could ever dream of!), air conditioning, two fans, even air-freshener’s.  It’s really beautiful with leather furniture.  I was in tears I was so taken a back!

And we both even mostly slept through the night! 

It feels like we’ve been here forever but I know it’s really only been three full days.  Although I still don’t feel like we’ve gotten much of a sense of the country. 

Nov 11 2011 6am

We’ve kind of done the luxury tour of Delhi.  There was nothing that we especially wanted to see here.  And our fancy hotel is out in this random area where there is not easily accessible transportation. 

On a side note it’s, actually, really bizarre the lack of geographical divisions for different economic classes.  We didn’t realize it was something we took for granted at home, until it didn’t seem to occur in the same way here.  It’s like super glamorous looking compared to anything else we’ve seen.  It looks like a nice hotel at home.  The room has faux leather coaches and class top coffee table.  A gigantic bed with white linens, satin curtains and a spacious on suite bathroom.  It’s lovely!  Then you step outside the hotel onto a crowed back alley street filled with animal excrement and other mysterious puddles. There are pigs, goats and I even saw a cow.  Chickens resting on top of the warm hoods of vehicles.  We went on a short walk to a tour agency and children were running up to us begging for money a young mother with a baby on her hip who was wearing only a tiny t-shirt (no diaper).  We have commented several times how strange it is to have it all mixed together.  There are no divisions of this is a ritzy area this is a total slum.  I mean to some extent yes but not like we’re used to.  The poverty is literally right there in front of us.  It’s upsetting because I think as North Americans we find it much easier to separate ourselves and send our money.  N and I are really at a loss for how to respond to this new reality.  Does giving out hand outs do anything but make us feel better.  Is there something more meaningful or significant we can do to care for these orphans and widows. 

So anyways, at a loss for how to explore Delhi we ended up arranging a “tour” through the hotel.  This consisted of an unenthusiastic cab-driver, trucking us around the “monuments” of Delhi.   So he would drive to this and that and let us out and wait for us to come back.  We spent the day powering through the highlights of this diverse city.  It’s not going on my favorites list but it definitely has some cool sights. 

So we checked out:

Red Fort (1638-1648 AD) – From the Mughal reign.  It’s huge and quite impressive.  N was really thrilled with its grandeur. 

Raj Ghat - Ghandi Memorial where he was cremated.  It has a beautiful gardens surrounding it. 

India Gate – has all the names of the soldiers who fell fighting for the British WWI.  There names are all written on it. 

Government Buildings

Humayun’s Tomb (mid 16^th century) – LP said this was a must see and we would totally agree.  It was enormous and just stunningly beautiful.  Another fantastic example of early Mughal architecture

Qutb-Minar (end of the 12^th century) diameter of 14.32m at the base and 2.75m at the top.  It stands 72.5m high.  It is the highest stone tower in India.  Our driver told us you can no longer go up it because, “people walk up and jump down.”  However we really enjoyed the ruins from the ground. 

We ate butter chicken for the first time, in India!  And are shocked but pleased to report it tastes the same only even more delicious!  This was a wonderful discovery. 

There were probably some other good ones we missed out on but by the time we got through these we were pretty exhausted.  

Like the Gandhi Smriti memorial where Mahatma Gandhi was shot dead by a Hindu zealot in 1948

As we weren’t really enthralled with Delhi we’ve decided to head to Agra earlier.  We will catch a train there at 9am.  It’s only about a three hour journey.  I’m a little nervous for my first train experience I’ve heard many stories, none of them overly positive.  Then again I’m beginning to feel, a bit, like I can take on anything!  Besides we’re spending the next two weeks traveling all by train so I better just settle in and decide to love them! 

Apparently the Taj Ma Hal is closed on Fridays so we’ll have to wait to get in until tomorrow but Agra is supposed to have a lot of other gems that tourists often miss because they only a lot a day to see the Taj.  So we’re looking forward to that!  

In India - Total Culture Shock!

Wednesday Nov 9/11

I'm fairly confident what we are experiencing is the definition of culture shock. 

Street view in Amritsar India 

We have officially spent a full day in India. Most of it has been spent recovering from jetlag aka sleeping. So now I am, unfortunately, wide awake in the middle of the night.

We haven’t got out to see much of the country yet. However, our brief experiences in here have been overwhelming. It’s a whole lot of new for the sleep-deprived traveler to digest. Sleep will be essential for coping with what we will encounter in India. I am now feeling fully justified in being anxious about the unknown and concerned that I would be able to acclimate. This is a lot to take in.

In the Delhi International Airport, which is very nice and includes duty-free stores like Channel, there were two little birds inside the building. They looked like prairie chickens running around and through the seats as we were waiting to board our flight. The presence of the birds was odd but what was even more strange was that no one seemed to care, at all.

We are currently in Amritsar, home of the Golden Temple. It is a city about the same population as Edmonton and couldn’t be more different. You can see the tips of the Sikh temple from the roof of our hotel, but I am looking forward to seeing it close up.

My initial impression upon arriving in India was, “this place is a Hell-hole! I want to go home!” When the cabbie parked in front of our hotel he had to avoid soggy trash piles like one avoids letting a passenger out in a puddle after a storm. People had warned me that it was dirty; I had seen pictures but truthfully it’s shocking that people can survive in this kind of filth. And it’s totally normal here. In some places, it looks like they built the roads through a landfill.

There are dogs everywhere. The first pair, we saw when we arrived, were still joined after a little baby-making activity; disturbing. We probably saw over a dozen stray dogs on our cab ride to the hotel.

(Do not read this paragraph if you are sensitive to graphic images or animal violence, like me.)

On a tragic note, there is a dog that appears to have just been attacked or given birth, dying in the alley outside our window as I write this. It has been wailing since we arrived. This has been extremely disturbing to me as there is nothing at all that I can do but check on her and watch her slowly leave this world.

The proprietor of the dingy Grace Hotel, where we are staying, came to barter the price of our room wearing only a blanket. A blanket that while it did cover the rather ample top half of him barely accommodated the more sensitive regions of his lower quarters with a shabby fringe.

Thursday Nov 10/11Now that I have slept, nearly a full day, I am feeling better about being here.

Here are some things that are unexpectedly nice about India:

- our hotels have both had sit-down-western-style flush toilets and hot showers

- it does not smell that bad

- we can quite easily live both of us for under $30/day. (It’s been a bit more expensive than the guidebook projected because apparently it is a Sikh guru’s birthday today)

- transportation is easy to find

- the airports are not difficult to navigate

- people are nicer than I had anticipated

The Golden Temple - Amritsar, India

The Golden Temple

Wow!  This temple complex was so worth our horrible stay in Amritsar. The Golden Temple is a Sikh holy site.  One man told us it was more like the Vatican to the Catholics than Mecca to a Muslim because their pilgrimage is not mandatory for salvation.

All around the temple are marble walls and beautiful big towers. Then in the center of a large pool is the relatively small temple itself. According to the Lonely Planet guidebook it is made of 750 kg of gilded gold. We went early in the morning so that we could see the sunrise reflecting off of it.  The sight is stunning. It is quite an oasis, removed from the insanity of the streets outside its walls. It gives it a sense of holiness, so set apart from the city and everyday life. Volunteers clean the site continually; it sparkles. Your bare feet do not even get dirty.

All are welcome, but you must take off your shoes off and wear a headscarf to enter. It did not occur to me when we read the scarf note in the Linley Planet that meant men too; N had borrowed an orange bandana that looks hilarious on him. It made for some handsome photos.

We knew we could not wear our shoes but being hesitant to leave our Birkenstocks at the door we put them in N’s pack. When we were in line to see the Golden Temple itself, we were hauled out because the zipper on the pack and loosened to reveal our stashed shoes. Bringing shoes into the temple is strictly forbidden. We thought they just were not supposed to be on your feet. They were very patient and forgiving of our mistakes, throughout our visit though and still let us come back in once we’d left the shoes outside.

It made me reminisce about my family trip to the Vatican as a teenager when I was corralled off with the other scantily clad women until Mom found enough sweaters to make me decent enough to enter.

The inside of the Golden Temple was not anything special to us. We were the only white tourists there, for most of the morning. And we seemed to be something of an attraction ourselves. Beyond the normal pointing, staring and laughing that we are getting in the street, in the Temple people bombarded us wanting to take our photo. I did not like this at all and found it very strange.

The temple has a free kitchen where anyone can go to enjoy a meal. One of the aims of this is to unify people from all walks of life. They feed 60-80 000 people a day. Everyone sits on the floor together in long lines with your plate in front of you. We were given both a yellow and a brown spicy soup with routi bread and a cup of hot water.  They gave you as much as you wanted. N and I were shocked at how tasty the meal was considering the masses they serve.

We now have a cell phone so were able to contact our parents at home. It was a little bit challenging to get set up without an Indian address here. Now I don’t feel quite so far away. The Internet here is sporadic, and it makes me feel out of touch.