Location Update

We're arrived yesterday afternoon in Lakshma Jhula/Ram Jhula/Rishikesh, which is the yoga capital of the world. We don't have wireless access where we're staying, so I probably won't be updating the blog too often. Of the notable things that have happened here, a young beggar girl mocked me and I watched a cow poop on the street.

It is beautiful here. If I had more time at this internet cafe, I'd go into detail but I can't. Also, I just read that the Phillies won the world series. I'm sad I'm not there to celebrate. Feel free to drop me some info on how Philly is responding.

Jamey's Blog

Make sure to check out his blog too. He goes into more for his reasons for this trip.

www.veganbetweenyourlegs.com

I, er, have, uh, nothing to do with his latest post...

Festival of Lights

Diwali was great. Before the evening Diwali prayers commenced, Cara, Mario (our Austrian friend from the Ashram), and I decided to take a walk around town in hopes of seeing the monks before they make their way to the evening prayer. Besides getting harrassed by a Eunuch, a person who looks like a man dressed in women's clothes that is considered to have no sex, when we left the ashram for a mid-day stroll, our walk around town was amazing. Haridwar is known to be a spiritual city, as it is home to numerous temples and ashrams. When we exited the ashram, the street was litterally littered with men (and some women) in orange robes. It looked like a picture out of National Geographic -- they were walking in the street, sitting on the steps to a temple, everywhere (including on the side of the road squatting to pee, I think we might have seen at least 10 men doing this). I didn't bring my camera with me but Cara did, so hopefully she will be able to post some of the pictures on her flickr site when she gets the chance.

As for the evening, we started with a prayer where we blessed and lit 500 mini candles (Diwali falls on the new moon so the candles are to light the way for lord Ram's return from exile), which were really mini clay bowls filled with ghee and wick, and placed them around the entire Ashram. We then lit a couple fireworks and sparklers then went to eat. Our Diwali meal was officially the first meal I've eaten in India that I did not like. The meal consisted of mainly sweets and a styrofoam like cracker to scoop up the main entree, a vegetable dish, which was the only part of the meal I did liked. The rest of the evening was then spent setting off fireworks and sparklers. I'll upload pictures of the night, as people from the Ashram gave Cara, Jamey, and I traditional Indian clothes to wear for the festival. I'll let you be the judge of how we look.

Happy Diwali Tuesday

Today is Diwali. I woke up at 7am for Yoga, drank some tea, took a shower, ate and am now listening to a marching band that just entered the Ashram. Later I plan to light some fireworks and sparklers.

How's your Tuesday?

(Feel free to leave your hateful comments below)

Hippie in training?

Things are extremely laid-back and relaxing here at the Ashram. I skipped the 4:30 morning prayer and instead woke up for the 7am yoga class. After sitting around for a while, laughing at one of the dogs who has been leashed up for unknown reasons (there are two and they usually run around the place freely) and eating breakfast/lunch I went down to the Ganges with Cara, Jamey, and our new Austrian friend, Mario. We swam for a bit (Jamey watched because he claimed that one of us needs to stay healthy and take care of the others if we catch a disease from the Ganges. How un-Hindi of him...) and then spent the rest of the day laying out in the sun while Mario sang sweet-nothings in our ears, er, I mean he sang us Hindi songs.

The ashram is great. There is a loose "schedule" for the day, which includes morning prayer (puja), morning yoga, tea, more tea, breakfast/lunch, 4 hours of nothing, tea, a class, tea, tea, dinner, prayer, tea, sleep AND best of all, everything is optional. I mainly partake in the tea and the meals.

In case you were wondering how we got to an Ashram, being that yoga is one of the last things I would be known for, Cara is interested in yoga and actually plans on getting certified in February at an Ashram in Kerala.

Going with the Flow of the Ganges

Of the many things we were told about India, one of them was to not expect things to go according to plan. They haven't. Yesterday, we left Navneet and Priya's apartment expecting to catch a night bus to Dharmsala but ended up scratching the Dharmsala/McLeod Ganj idea, due to time constrictions, and instead took a night bus to Haridwar.

The great thing is that when you allow yourself to go with the flow, amazing things occur. In the night bus Jamey sat next to a young man, Prantik, who it turned out was traveling with his two other friends Abhinab and Devandra, to Haridwar and Rishikish. The bus arrived in Haridwar at 4am and we had no plan for our morning and no address for the Ashram we were planning to eventually go to. We ended up spending the morning with the three guys. We went to the river with them for morning prayer, which is when people bathe in the Ganges to purify themselves. They explained to us a lot about the rituals, and showed us to the temples. We ended up spending the entire morning with all three of them, six hours altogether. So far, that morning has been my favorite experience since it was all such a matter of chance that we even met them.

(The picture is, from L o R, Abhinab, Devandra, and Prantik)

I'm currently sitting in a yoga Ashram outside of Haridwar. I wintessed a prayer session this evening and, word has it, that I will probably be woken up for one anytime between 4:00 - 5:00 am. It should all be worth it though, as I spent a good hour lying on the roof looking at the stars from under my blanket, smelling the smoke of the campfire in the distance. For the time being, I can't ask for more.

That is all for now. I've accepted that I don't have the time to report on everything that happens, so I've chosen to keep my posts reletively short.

Off to the Himalayas!

We are leaving for McLeod Ganj, Haridwar, and Rishikish tonight. There is a good chance that we will be out of range of internet, so please don't worry if you do not hear from me much in the next 2 or 3 weeks. Once again, I'll post stories and pics when i get a chance (but don't hold your breath).

I <3 New York (traffic)

As a bicyclist, I've never looked fondly upon New York traffic. After three and a half years of commuting from Brooklyn to Midtown, I would still find myself uncontrollably yelling insults at anyone who wrongs me. Well, I had never ridden in Delhi before. I have a tendency to get the most random songs stuck in my head. Every time I do something crazy, I've started to sing "Ave Maria" except instead of actually singing "Ave Maria" I replace those words with "Holy Be-jesus". Here, let's take a break. Hum the tune of "Ave Maria" but say "holy be-jesus". Kind of fun, right? Right.

Anyways, that song was going through my head during the entire ride. Delhi traffic is crazy. CRAZY. We made it safely to our new Couchsurfing hosts, Navneet and Priya, who live in South Delhi -- but not without lots of nervous laughter and stares from men. At one point, we were riding beside a man who was trailing a refrigerator on his bike.

Surprisingly, cars were reletively nice to us -- as in they yielded to us and didn't try to force us off of the road. So, if any of you Indian drivers are reading this, thank you. Oh, and if you Indian drivers are reading this, please stop staring at me, too.

I will post pictures soon. Until then, check out my flikr site here

First off, I apologize for my lack of posts but I have been more concerned with experiencing Delhi than I have been with writing about Delhi.

The adjustment to India has, thus far, been an easy one thanks in most part to our hosts, Umang and Shiwani whom we found through Couchsurfing.com. We are staying outside of Delhi in a suburb called Gorgaon, which has been referred to as India first upper-middle class neighborhood. In the past 10 years, the area has been developed from largely uninhabited country side and forest to housing communities, shopping malls and office buildings that host numerous US call centers. The area is spread out with lots of open road and the roads are crowded with cars, trucks, cyclists, and animals. As I read in many books before arriving, it is not unusual to find cows in the middle of the road. And while I have only encountered a cow in the middle of the road once, they are found along the side of the road along with a number of stray dogs, pigs, and the occasional donkey.

We are starting to slowly get the hang of the rules of the Indian road. People drive on the left hand side of the road and the main rule to live by is that the biggest car has the right of way. We had not rode our bikes until last night when Umang brought us around the colony and the surrounding area. As we were on small roads with no cars, it was a good way to acclimate ourselves to seeing the area by bicycle and to dealing with stray dogs. Our travel doctor warned us of rabies and since India is crowded with stray dogs, we have been worrying that cycling past dogs may cause them to chase after us. While we were still in the colony, we were confronted with our first two barking strays -- our first reaction was to try and out bike them but Umang slowed down, put out a friendly hand and the dogs immediately became our friends. They ended up running beside us the rest of the night and we acted as their pack, guarding them whenever we bicycled past empty lots guarded by other stray dogs.

Yesterday was the first day that I truely dealt with any type of culture shock. I visited Old Delhi with a new friend I made name Subhashani. We hired a private driver for the day, which cost less than $20 (!) and she showed me around Old Delhi. She was the perfect tour guide, as she is not only a fun free spirit to be around but she has a deep knowledge of Indian history, so she was able to explain everything that we saw. We visited Red Fort, which we reached by metro, since the area was too crowded to reach by car. The metro exit was lined with crippled beggars suffering from polio and the streets were narrow and crowded. It was a 10 minute walk from the metro to red fort. The streets were extremely crowded and narrow, so we spent our time dodging people. As we neared Red Fort itself, people began to hassle us again to buy their goods. This didn't let up until we entered the fort itself. There were two lines for tickets, one for Foreigners and one for Indians. The entry price for Indians was 50 Rupees, while the price for foreigners was 250 Rupees! While in the fort, I was happy to have a break from being constantly bombarded by beggars. That break did not last long -- while no one was pushing me to give them money or to buy their goods, I was not able to escape the constant stare of Indians who had either never or rarely seen a white person. I'd like to think that it's flattering to have people stare at you but it is really annoying after a couple hours of it happening. After getting a bite of street food to try and slowly adjust my stomach to Indian street cuisine, we made our way back to our driver.

The next stop was Lohdi Gardens, which was the perfect end to our crazy day. The gardens were a perfect break from Delhi. With trees, the sound of wild life, and fresh air, it is easy to forget that you are in a busy city. We walked around the gardens, visited some tombs and then set back to our car, which brought us home. All in all, another adventurous day in Delhi.

Stay posted for past and future adventures. As mentioned in my last post, i wrote a lot more on a different computer and shall have it posted shortly, i hope.

All the best,

Bon

India!

Dear All,

I wrote out three days worth of adventures in Delhi, however, my USB stick doesn't fit into the computer I am currently working on, so my travel adventures will still be a little delayed.

All-in-all things are going well. Please stay tuned for updates!