India... and all it's quirks...

Well hello my lovelies

Sorry for such a long post - really should have done it earlier but unfortunately we've not been too well recently, and there's soooooooo much to tell you!

The first thing I think of is that I'm so jealous of the comforts you have! The western loos, no urinals on the street (actually no weeing on the street, certainly not the amount that there is here!), the clean bathrooms without ants or cockroaches, the clean sheets on your beds (and if you don't have that, stop being a lazy arse and change them), the fact that you're not dripping with sweat seconds after showering... although here it is perfectly legitimate to wipe the sweat away with your scarf, they do come in pretty handy...

Ok so India is filthy. Dirty. Scummy. And incredibly poor. There are huge disparities between the 'haves' and the 'have nots'. I know people tell you this, but it's difficult to actually believe it until you see it. There are over a billion people living here in a country 6 times the size of France. It's pretty intense.

Oh anyone interested in the country must read 'Shantaram' - it's a story of an Australian guy who broke out of prison and made India his home while on the run. So well told, and it really captures those small cutural differences and experiences that made India so... Indian. Am reading it at the moment and loving every page.

So... we tried to walk down to see the zoo on Saturday morning, after a delicious meal again. (Also found another rooftop restaurant that was beautiful and friendly, but did delicious steaks for 1.50 quid... I've not had red meat in a long time, it was kind of a special moment)... anyway we were hassled non stop down the road.

'Madam, you want tuk-tuk? Cyclo? Rickshaw? Where you going? Where you from? Lubbly Jubbly.'
or...
'What you want? I got water, toilet paper, cigarettes, lighter, paper... everything. What you want?' (the fact we don't want ANYthing isn't really understood here)...

We ended up being accosted by various people who were trying to steer us to different travel agencies (we needed a map as our photocopied version of the Lonely Planet we'd bought on the cheap in Bangkok didn't really have suitable maps)... in the 2nd tourist office we were herded into, we met Romey and Prince. Lovely lovely guys, they fed us chai (tea), and lunch (various vegetarian food with chapatis and rotis). They also explained to us that we couldn't get up to McLeod Ganj/Dharamsala because the roads/bridges had been washed away during Thursday's downpour, that also saw our flight diverted.

So... we booked up our train tickets with them, and they gave us a free car for that day and the following day, with such a friendly guy, called Cooldeep (not the right spelling!) or KP, to show us around. SO much easier in air conditioning, rather than fighting the non existent public transport system, and being hassled every other minute. Perfect.

So we saw the India Gate (reminded me of another European gate, can't remember which one, will ask Dad) with the inscriptions of people's names who died in various wars. We went into a Sikh temple that was made from marble and stunning. KP (and all the other Indian men we've seen religious buildings with) always make certain marks of respect, and pray, and donate money even when it's not their religion. It's very interesting to watch, but it does make us feel uncomfortable as we don't know whether these are generic Indian gestures or religious gestures, and we simply don't really know what we should do! Anyway that didn't stop us from enjoying this gleaming white building, and the people were certainly very friendly.

We stopped in the National Museum for Contemporary Art and it was HUGE. Only saw one building in the complex and that kept us going for a fair while, until we could absorb no more art. There were some lovely pieces, but you'd really need to go in there on separate days to do it justice.

We drove to Raj Ghat by the Old Fort, where we saw the spot that Ghandi was shot (we think). There is certainly a memorial to him and many people circle the square memorial, paying homage to the man. A beautiful, simple monument, - very peaceful and quiet, - fitting to such a man.

Final stop for the day was the Lodi Gardens which were full of manicured gardens, and also full of mosquitos. So after we'd climbed over the bridge, taken photos of the numerous wild chipmunks here and been bitten enough, we went back.

It was great sightseeing so much in one day, but our day wasn't nearly over! After a very speedy shower and food we met up with Romey and Prince in Piccadelhi - a London themed bar/restaurant that even contained a double decker red bus. Amazing. Pedestrian signs pointed to Covent Garden, Bank and so on. And the food looked delicious. Prince and Romey then took us to a club under a 5 star hotel, called Capitol, and treated us to a brilliant night of luxury (champagne) and dancing. It was so nice to be treated (rare for us travelling) although we did feel a bit scruffy with so many well dressed Indian ladies. And great to see that side of Delhi, as we wouldn't have had the nerve (or knowledge) to go to this place by ourselves. Definitely an experience and much more comfortable with Romey and Prince along too. Prince dutifully delivered us to our hotel at 2am and we crashed out in exhaustion!

But the following day was even more hectic... KP and we visited a gorgeous lotus shaped Bahai Temple that flowers from green manicured lawns, we went shopping in a crafts emporium, KP bought us a delicious lunch - thali - is a big plate with lots of smaller portions, so you eat a small amount of different dishes. Very tasty and very well cooked... until we saw the food again. But more about that later. We saw the Presidential Estate and offices (an aweinspiring, pink palace, that looks vaguely similar to the American Capitol building) and the Mahatma Ghandi museum. Prince had turned up by this point and KP and he were chivving us along in the museum, which was a real shame as I could have happily spent a couple of hours there reading all the information. Might go back when we're in Delhi again.

We managed to lose the boys for most of the night, although collecting our train tickets took 75 minutes and many refusals of food! They are so kind, those boys, though rather exhausting, always talking very loudly on the phone/phones, to each other, to other people... everything in India is loud. Enjoyed an early night of sleeping as we were starting to not feel too well. I started to get an ear infection so started myself on antibiotics but both Haz and I started to get dodgy stomachs too though, Haz with painful cramps.

We managed to drag ourselves out of bed on Monday for our 5 hour train ride to Jaipur, but unfortunately we couldn't eat the free food due to us feeling so sick! It was horrible. I rarely turn down food. Even the thought of it makes me feel rather nauseous. Stumbling around Jaipur we managed to find a hotel with the help of 2 local guys, and slept solidly for 20 hours. With a lot of paracetamol and imodium.

So we woke up yesterday feeling worse for wear but had to get up and out of bed because Romey had organised for a car to come and take us around the city for free(!) All we needed to do was to go into a few shop with the guide, and all would be ok. We had to make the point early on that we couldn't afford the entrance fees to most places, so we saw Jaipur's City Palace, Water Palace and various other buildings from the lovely air conditioned comfort of the car. Perfect.

Old Jaipur is a rose pink colour. It was painted a couple of hundred years ago for the visit of the Prince of Wales (who later became Edward VII) as pink in India is a welcoming colour (and also maybe luck/success - we can't remember) and they've kept it this way ever since. Very funny. Indians are symbolic too. A woman's sari tells people how long she's been married for, a turban's colour and style signifies social status and religion and their animals are symbolic too.
National bird is the peacock, national animal the tiger and national flower the lotus.
Camels are seen as signs of love, elephants are good luck and horses signify power. Fascinating!
Anyway, Old Jaipur is beautiful and very calm on the eye, when you look up and away from the chaos in the streets! It is crazy here! Roads made of mud a lot of the time, rubbish EVERYWHERE, people sleeping on their tuk-tuks, rickshaws and cyclos, on pavements with a blanket around them - basically as soon as the sun goes down they find an empty spot to rest their weary heads. Everywhere.

We saw the Amber Palace which is on top of a hill overlooking Jaipur, and it was stunning. One of the maharajas had 12 wives and 40 concubines, and ended up building them separate apartments. The palace was huge with incredible views and inside the architecture was stunning. So many carvings and painted areas on the walls. They could provide years worth of inspiration for artists. One area was covered with small mirrors which was glittery and very unique for us. India has such a strong identity, - one which we've not seen at all on our travels yet - and it's so interesting to see. It is hot and clammy and filthy, but definitely worth it all when we see places like that.

So another gentle night in Jaipur, only venturing out for some much needed food after not eating for over 24 hours) and a relaxing day today before getting the night train to Udaipur. We've decided to keep the room on as we'll be so hot and grubby we'd like to shower before the train, and also have somewhere nice to chill out before our train tonight.

Also need to find somewhere to eat without chillies - omelette last night had green chillies in it, our cheese sandwich today was covered in pepper, onions and green chillies - really must remember to tell people to not put chillies in it, even if we don't suspect that they would! Not great for our little stomachs...

Ok so must stop this rambling now, very impressed if you've got to all the way down here! Hope you're enjoying the UK and see you soon!!! (home in 19 days, very very strange)...

Lots and lots of love from haz and me xxxxx