Kate discovers archiving, and the peasants rejoice

Alright, so having 23 posts with big-arsed images on one page was a bit silly. So Kate has learned to archive and older posts can now be found under those conveniently labeled archive links. Go technology.

The India Diaries - Back home

I've been back in Brisbane for 3 full days now and am still marvelling at the blueness of the sky, the lushness of the trees, the calmness of the traffic, and this wonderful thing called 'grass'. I feel so fortunate to be able to call this country and this city home. I want to hold onto this feeling of being grateful for what we have here for as long as I can.

India has certainly given me a greater level of tolerance and patience than I had before I left. I was able to go into the Indooroopilly shopping mall, buy a few t-shirts (the Indian dhobi-wallahs have all but destroyed most of mine) and come out felling serene and un-harried. And during school holidays as well. Before I went away, there is no way I could have gone into the Westfield wasteland without snapping at a store clerk or wanting to shoulder through a pack of giggling teenagers. I didn't realise how short my temper had become until India lengthened it again. And karma works. My new-found patience was rewarded by finding the perfect t-shirt in several colours and a great pair of pants, all very cheap.

It's good to be home in the comfort and oppulence of the west, but I miss India's innocence.

And now for something completely different...

Photos from the PeA pseudo-christmas party at the Belgium Beer Cafe, held on the day before I left for India.


The merry-makers gather...


Contemplate tasty offerings...



Bond with fellow merry-makers...


Before resorting to violence.

Much fun was had by all.

The India Diaries: Almost home

Just a quick post as I sit in the Sydney airport waiting for my flight to Brisbane to be called. I'm a bit sad at how my plans to keep up a travel blog have failed quite miserably. When I felt the need to write, I was generally nowhere near a computer let alone the Internet. Going low-tech hasn't been so bad, and I kinda like curling up with a journal and a pen rather than hacking away at a keyboard in a grimy Internet cafe.

My plan is to put together a digital photo album of sorts with images and my writings. I want to spend the next week before I go back to work to properly solidify the emotion I have felt and impressions I have made over the past month. I hope it all comes out well.

I've been in transit now for just over 36 hours, I think, starting with an overnight train from Jhansi to Delhi before flying out to Mumbai and on to Sydney. I cleared customs in Sydney and stepped outside to see the bluest sky I have seen in a month. Actually, to see the only blue sky I have seen in a month. I will never again complain that Sydney is a dirty place. Never. Its amazing how a few little basics now seem like luxuries. I had a glass of Aussie wine on the plane and I felt like I was drinking amber nectar. It was beautiful. I showered in the Qantas club here in Sydney. I haven't had a hot shower in a month, and a warm shower in 2 weeks. I was getting used to bathing by pouring hot water from a bucket over myself, but I think I can adjust back. It was bliss.

One thing I want to retain is my new found appreciation for those luxuries that I once considered necessities.

One more flight and I'm home!

Nameste-ji

The India Diaries - How to fit 4 foreigners and 14 Indians into a Jeep

So, I left Agra this morning to head to nearby Fatephur Sikra, an 800 year old city and fort. I thought the 2 hour bus ride there was crowded, with several people standing and one family of four sitting on a seat built for no more than 2 Ghandi-sized people. Nah! That was spacious compared to coming back. After a great day of wandering the old city, snacking from the vendors and chai stands as I went, I got to chatting with 2 guys from Mexico who had been trekking in Nepal, and yet another Canadian. So the sign at the bus stop said that there would be a bus back to Agra every half hour from 8am to 6pm. So we settled in for a late lunch and drink at a restaurant right next to the bus stop, thinking we would catch the 6pm bus back. Nope. 8am to 6pm means that the last bus leaves at 5:30pm, and aren't you silly for thinking otherwise. Fortunately, there was a jeep heading that way and we could get on it for only 5 rupee more than the bus would have cost. Sweet. A nice, luxurious (comparatively) jeep all to ourselves for only 20 rupee each. Nup. We were sharing it with 14 other people. There were two guys hanging off the back, one out of the passenger side door, and the driver was almost out the door. I say door, but this thing hadn't had any doors on it for a very long time. Comfortable? No. Scary? Oh god yes. Absolutely great fun? That too. And after almost freezing on the autorickshaw then bus ride that morning, I was nice and toasty squashed between 2 Mexicans, and half buried under their packs.

Off for a few chill-out days around the river in Ocha before heading back up to Delhi and home. I am going to miss this place.

At last! Pictures!

I have finally been able to find a computer which will play nice with my digital camera and has a fast enough connection to upload images. Forgive me if these are a little large. Decent image editing software is a little hard to come by in cyber cafes in India.


The view from my hotel in Mumbai on my first night in India. Yes, it is a slum, but from what I've seen since, it was a slum in the better part of town.


Me at Amber Fort in Jaipur, Rajistan. These guys were serious about their forts and built them big, impossible to attack, and very very luxurious.


Breakfast at the Karni Mata temple in Deshnoke, near Bikaner in Rajistan. Its a beautiful Hindi temple overrun by tens of thousands of storytellers reincarnated as rats. To see a white rat is considered very lucky... I saw two. Oh, and its a temple, so you have to leave your shoes at the gates. Mmmm... rat poo between your toes.






I still can't get used to the celebrity status my whiteness carries here. Everywhere I go, groups of Indians come up to me brandishing cameras. They don't want me to take a picture of them, they want to have their picture taken with me. I usually ask for one of them in return.


An 8 metre high, 2000 year old stone Buddha in the Adjunta tample complex. It's a series of 34 temples carved out of the cliff face and painted. The weight of the work the monks did in this place is absolutely tangible. So powerful.


Christmas day on a camel in the desert north of Jaisalmer.


Inside the Jaisalmer fort. Around 30,000 people still live inside the fort and it was a great place to get lost for a few hours.


Vegetarian thali. The most wonderful meal to order when you have no idea what anything on the menu is. Its assorted veg curries with chipati and roti (breads) and rice. To be eaten with the right hand, which I'm getting quite good at. Food tastes so much better when eaten with your hands.


Monkey and swamii getting cleaned up in the morning on the ghats at Pushka, Rajistan.






An amazing afternoon after stumbling upon a Brahman temple in the middle of Jaipur. A young and very enthusiastic student Brahman priest and yoga teacher took me in and introduced me to his family, his school, and his spirituality. He chanted the sanskrit he was learning. Such a pure and genuine man.

That's all for now. Must get off to bed before an early start to head to Fatepur Sikri in the morning.

An very Indian Christmas and New Years Eve, and why its hard to keep a travel blog when backpacking around India

At last! An internet cafe that isn't closed, without power, or running a 4kbs connection (I'm not kidding). I've pretty much given up on my original plan to keep travel blog going. The time and effort required to find an access point on a regular basis is just not worth it. In keeping with the trend in India, I've decided to take the more labor-intensive but less technologically advanced option of a notebook and pen for my travel diary. I've also wanted to get some of the amazing photos I've been taking up but it just hasn't worked out.

I spent Christmas eve and Christmas day on a camel in the sand dunes of the desert near Jaisalmer. Much much fun, and very fitting of a traditional Christmas, although paneer, dhal, and chipati cooked over a campfire is not really a traditional Christmas lunch, but oh so tasty.

It's New Year's Day today, and I'm in Agra, home of the Taj Mahal. My plan to spend New Year's Eve in Agra didn't pan out due to overbooked hotels and trains, and as it worked out, I'm glad I stayed in Jaipur for the past 5 nights. I've met up with a fellow Canadian who is also traveling alone so we've decided to spend the next week traveling not so alone. I also met up with a British couple who were interested in splurging on an Indian New Year's so we all trooped into a taxi and up to the Le Meridian Hotel in Jaipur for dinner and disco. The place is an absolute palace and certainly not something I could ever hope to afford in the west. For the paltry sum of 2999 rupee per couple (approx AUD90), we had an amazing dinner, all the drinks we could manage, and the pleasure of watching some serious Bollywood dance imitation on the dance floor. So so great. A few amusing and very Indian points:
- The power went off in the entire complex at around "Nine!", and was back on by "Two!" No one seemed to be concerned.
- A lot of Indians don't drink, so the mood was significantly lighter (and more letch-free) than it would be at a similar event in the west.
- At midnight, the four of us non-Indians exchanged the traditional New Year's kisses. We were the only ones to do so and got some odd looks.
- An amazing fireworks show was let off right over our heads. I've never seen a fireworks display launched directly over a group of people. When a tent nearby caught fire, I understood why, but it was very very beautiful.

Agra is so polluted and filthy after the clean air and rural areas of Rajistan, but I just couldn't come all the way to India and not see the Taj.

Only one week left before I head into the post-apocalyptic hell that is Delhi and onwards to the land of Oz. I'll return carrying silks from Jaipur, jewelry from Solupur, kurtas from Pune, and a sense of wonderment at this place where 1 billion people manage to live together in utter chaos, yet somehow find the ability to create small oasises of perfect harmony.