I feel rather lazy and perhaps a little guilty that I have not yet made a blog entry chronicling the epic journey we took around North India, but it has been a crazy week! I will tell more about the week some other time. I am devoting right now to an epic blog for an epic trip.
I said that I did not want to share too much of my trip as I was going because it was a personal experience, and that it was. It was completely empowering to be six young women traveling India alone. We met some wonderful characters, had some wild experiences, and I have to say I learned a lot about myself and all the rest of the ladies in the group.
Day 1: Marathi Exam, hours in the train station, pleasant surprise at 2nd class sleeping compartments, 25 hours on a train.
Day 2: Continuation of the 25 hours on a train, a bunch of wrestlers end up seated across from us, they appear rather predatory, and a 12 year old boy comes to our rescue. He is followed by his attractive 20 something cousin. Arrival in Delhi, strange man tries to lead us down an unlit back alley, turns out our hotel is down said alley. It seems creepy.
Day 3: The hotel has a lovely breakfast menu. Sightseeing in Delhi. I don’t feel well and go back to the room.
Day 4: Head cold has turned into something bigger. I go on a search for a doctor, and end up in a hospital that caters to foreigners, particularly Israelis. They try to keep me overnight, I opt for extensive tests and a follow-up phone call. I have officially had blood drawn in a developing country. See what the red cross has to say about that.
Day 5: Early morning train to Agra and the Taj Mahal. I hate Agra. It may officially be the ass-crack of the universe. The Taj Mahal definitely lived up to its “wonder of the world” title, though it could be improved with the elimination of so many young Indian preators wanting “just one snap, just one photo” with a white person.
Day 6: The train ride from Hell back to Delhi. Then waiting in the train station, then another train to Chandigarh with an entire girls’ basketball team who had just won a tournament in Rajasthan. I must have shook each of their hands twice. One told us that we would be in her heart forever. Then we got on a bus to Kumar Hatti, perhaps the smallest town in Himachal. Addy’s mom’s boyfriend Surinder took us in.
Day 7: What happens un Kumar Hatti stays in Kumar Hatti Lets just say the view from his terrace is to die for. A valley in the Himalayas, as green as can be for as far as the eye can see.
Day 8 and Day 9: More of what happens in Kumar Hatti stays in Kumar Hatti.
Day 10: We arrive Banjar after a 7 hour bus ride where my bag is atop the bus but not tied down. Good thing I did not know till we got there. We meet Anju’s friend Raj who owns a guest house and restaurant, and he takes us to meet his baby Sven. Yes Sven. Their house is amazing and Sven is adorable.
Day 11: We take a hike in the Himalayas. Now how many people can say they have done that? I really cannot say enough about the Himalayas. I will have to tell you verbally my true feelings. Come evening, Elizabeth gets accidentally engaged. What else is new, huh?
Day 12: We try to leave Banjar for Manali, and Elizabeth’s fiancé is really not into that idea. Finally we get a private taxi with a 19 year old driver named Rohit who plays Hindi techno all the way to Manali. We are stopped by police road blocks tree times. Addy gets nervous. Once in Manali we meet one of Raj’s friends, and The Captain. He feeds us at his restaurant and takes us to his nightclub.
Day 13: Shopping in Manali is pretty great. We also go on a walk through one of the most beautiful forests I have ever been in. It compares to the Redwood Forest. On the way back from this walk (lead by the Captain) we may have spotted some wild marijuana. I guess that is what you get in Manali.
Come afternoon we board a bus for Amritsar. It is a 15 hour bus ride. Within the first twenty minutes, Elizabeth drops her phone out of the window.
Day 14: Still on the bus. There is a dust family in front of us who smell, and the aisles are filled with lots of men, one of whom spent the night leaning against Haley. We arrive in Amritsar, sleep deprived and with full bladders, and could really have ended up nowhere better than the golden temple. We got free food, several lessons on Sikhism, and clean feet (you have to wash them before you enter.) Plus to whole temple is beautiful and golden. Becca and I pass out in the train station, and I meet Shelly, a Ta Kwon Do master attending cosmetology school. She now texts me regularly. We board a train to Jaipur. On the train we meet three Sikh boys who first mistake me for the teacher fo the group, and then one of them proceeds to hit on me.
Day 15: Disembark train in Jaipur, walk to a kick-ass hotel (the Hotel Pearl Palace) which accomidates us in their family room that looks more like it should belong to a Moghul king’s harem. The hotel has a giant peacock structure on the top. We spent the afternoon browsing the old city, and in the evening meet up with one of Becca’s high school friends, Charlie, and his friend Dan, who are studying in Jaipur, and we make an American evening of it. Somewhere along the way we pick up Alex, a student who is doing semester at sea. He added phrases like “bum diggity” and “its not really tight, but its like tiiight” to the conversation.
Day 16: Becca, Haley and I are burned out from so much traveling. We go to a park, then get some lunch then to a movie with Charlie. Everyone else does touristy things. Then we board a night train to Udaipur City.
Day 17: I wake up to Elizabeth tugging on my arm saying “um…I think this is our stop”. By the time we are all awake, there is no one else on the train. We find a restaurant, and then a hotel, and then we just sort of play around walking through the city. It is really touristy, but fun. The one thing I hate about Udaipur: expensive food, and not enough of it. We watch the sun set over the Floating Palace.
Day 18: We encounter some elephants on the street, and their trainers offer us a ride. Then we tour a palace (they are all starting to look the same) and then go for lunch.
Becca makes a friend, and he too mistakes me for the teacher of the group. The girls give me the nick name “Auntie” I want to die. Come 9pm, we head for the train station. I sleep better on a train than anywhere else now.
Day 19: Wake up in Mumbai. The Captain has come home to visit his sister in Mumbai, and he picks us up at the train station and we go to his house for food and conversation. Then his brother in law arranges for our bus home, and he takes us to get the bus. It is two hours late. The bus drops us off on the outskirts of Pune at 11:30pm. I arrive homw at 12:01
Of course there is a lot more to add to each of these stories. I started out writing terribly detailed accounts, but a.) it is too much work and b.) it is not the same as me telling you. In Pune I have had time to acclimate and time to reflect, but this trip really was a one-of-a-kind experience where I could not process everything as fast as it happens. There are also so many little stories that happened along the way, and of course a girl has to have some secrets.
October 29, 2008 at 2:23 am |
I’m excited to have you tell me these stories in person.