howdy,
just thought i would write about how excellently EXCELLENT india is as a destination. we've had such a lovely time thus far (more so as we've got further north), i cant beleive i was so worried about it before i left. Today we've had an excellent time walking up the cloudy himalayas with two amazing israeli friends we made on our INSANE 10 hour government bus ride from manali to daramsala (they helped us tie our bags to the roof with some random old rope...), went straight to an hour class where we helped teach a group of tibetan refugee monks english, to two INSANE hours of pain filled yoga, watching lovely and heartwrenching documentaries on attempts by tibetans to flee to india, night-time visits to temples, lovely vegetarian tibetan foods, agressive haggling over posters of the dali lama (50 rupees... and he wouldnt budge!), and elicit feeling trips to the alcohol shops to buy a single bottle of beer.
yikes, internet cafe is closing again, this whole town is dead by 9 and entirely shut by 10... our hotel even has an 11pm curfew!
lots of love to you all
xoxoxoxooxox
Wednesday 26 August 2009
Tuesday 25 August 2009
mcleod ganj-ing it up
hello lads,
we are currently in the refugee tibetan capital Mcleod ganj again up in the green green mountains, mostly surrounded by clouds, but occasionally clearing so you can see the whole valley. Its amazing up here, not as beautiful as some other hilly places we've been but the tibetan exile culture makes this place really amazing. There's tibetan temples filled with tibetan people in excellent tibetan monk clothes.. tibetan language courses, tibetan food, tibetan healing etc etc etc.
We've been cooking tibetan food and been visiting this amazing charity in the evenings which is educating both tourists and the tibetan refugees that live here. We watched tibetan movies and ate momos with them yesterday, and i went and helped teach some of the monks english this afternoon. I wandered into this funny little room from a huge rainstorm full of male and female monks in blood red robes huddled in small circles with their 'teachers' for the afternoon. I found my own monks to help and sat down with them, drenched from head to foot. The topic of conversation was school, including discussing what was the naughtiest thing i did at school. The australian girl next to me (who had recently shaved her head to raise money for cancer patients) said she used to hit people and lie at school... mental.
This evening we definitely had our most intense interaction with the tibetan exiled community, so far its all been an interesting change in exotic culture for us, although occasionally we'd be confronted with the realities of the tibetan refugees lives (for example our cooking class teacher was forced to walk to india from tibet at the age of 13, taking him three months) .. it was not until we went to a talk made by a tibetan man who had been shot at a protest any of us really grasped what a desperate situation they are in, forced into a foreign country with thier native culture slowly slipping irredemably away in a tide of government building projects and chinese migration. The man spoke to us of his two year journey, from the day he was shot twice at a protest for attempting to protect the body of a 20 year old monk shot that day, to his forced escape into the tibetan forest, to his 12 month battle with his wounds which went without any medical attention... nasty
okay internet shop shutting! love to you all
xxxx
we are currently in the refugee tibetan capital Mcleod ganj again up in the green green mountains, mostly surrounded by clouds, but occasionally clearing so you can see the whole valley. Its amazing up here, not as beautiful as some other hilly places we've been but the tibetan exile culture makes this place really amazing. There's tibetan temples filled with tibetan people in excellent tibetan monk clothes.. tibetan language courses, tibetan food, tibetan healing etc etc etc.
We've been cooking tibetan food and been visiting this amazing charity in the evenings which is educating both tourists and the tibetan refugees that live here. We watched tibetan movies and ate momos with them yesterday, and i went and helped teach some of the monks english this afternoon. I wandered into this funny little room from a huge rainstorm full of male and female monks in blood red robes huddled in small circles with their 'teachers' for the afternoon. I found my own monks to help and sat down with them, drenched from head to foot. The topic of conversation was school, including discussing what was the naughtiest thing i did at school. The australian girl next to me (who had recently shaved her head to raise money for cancer patients) said she used to hit people and lie at school... mental.
This evening we definitely had our most intense interaction with the tibetan exiled community, so far its all been an interesting change in exotic culture for us, although occasionally we'd be confronted with the realities of the tibetan refugees lives (for example our cooking class teacher was forced to walk to india from tibet at the age of 13, taking him three months) .. it was not until we went to a talk made by a tibetan man who had been shot at a protest any of us really grasped what a desperate situation they are in, forced into a foreign country with thier native culture slowly slipping irredemably away in a tide of government building projects and chinese migration. The man spoke to us of his two year journey, from the day he was shot twice at a protest for attempting to protect the body of a 20 year old monk shot that day, to his forced escape into the tibetan forest, to his 12 month battle with his wounds which went without any medical attention... nasty
okay internet shop shutting! love to you all
xxxx
Thursday 20 August 2009
manali la la
hello!!
we have finally now reached one of the most northern points of our adventure, manali, which is up in the himalayas. not only is it excellently chilly up here, but it also turns out to be white person backpacker central, im not sure ive ever been so excited to see white people. they such an unusual creatures in india, and generally are wearing strange and amusing combinations of western/indian/hippy clothes (we are no exceptions to this sad, embarassing rule).
we've finally got up here after being released into the wild from our lovely, extended network of indian friends, who passed us from uncle to cousin to auntie to grandpa for a good week and a half. Our first super long haul bus ride of 13 hours started with being shoved into a random rickshaw, then crammed into a tiny minibus full assorted people and luggage, then dumped on a mysterious darkened highway road, with a few other bewlidered bus passengers, left to stew for about 45 minutes, before the rest of our bus load eventually joined us and we were on our way.
The bus ride itself was like an extended, low level nightmare. Light relief provided by steaming road-side cafe chai, a sweet gift from Leh we met on the bus who immediately offered her home for us to stay in, and chirping bollywood movies at 3.25 am. otherwise very few comforts accompanied us on that bus. probably character forming though..
more soon!
xoxoxox
we have finally now reached one of the most northern points of our adventure, manali, which is up in the himalayas. not only is it excellently chilly up here, but it also turns out to be white person backpacker central, im not sure ive ever been so excited to see white people. they such an unusual creatures in india, and generally are wearing strange and amusing combinations of western/indian/hippy clothes (we are no exceptions to this sad, embarassing rule).
we've finally got up here after being released into the wild from our lovely, extended network of indian friends, who passed us from uncle to cousin to auntie to grandpa for a good week and a half. Our first super long haul bus ride of 13 hours started with being shoved into a random rickshaw, then crammed into a tiny minibus full assorted people and luggage, then dumped on a mysterious darkened highway road, with a few other bewlidered bus passengers, left to stew for about 45 minutes, before the rest of our bus load eventually joined us and we were on our way.
The bus ride itself was like an extended, low level nightmare. Light relief provided by steaming road-side cafe chai, a sweet gift from Leh we met on the bus who immediately offered her home for us to stay in, and chirping bollywood movies at 3.25 am. otherwise very few comforts accompanied us on that bus. probably character forming though..
more soon!
xoxoxox
Tuesday 11 August 2009
BLOG TIME!!!
hello all!
wowie, first (proper) blog post. i know that keeping a blog makes me a big internet nerd, but at least you all can be equally informed about whats going down in india, even if you dont care, you must know!
to recap on whats happened thus far..
arrived at delhi, DEATHLY HOT, tried to cool down in toby's flat to no avail, hang out on his roof and watch the parrotquites, then the crows and then bats fly around the sky, sleep in death hot flat with fans, powercuts so just death hotness, wake up and drive around delhi in AC car, alternate between death and comfort, see some sights, head back and fight over shower, wake up at 4.00 am to catch bus to haridwar, arrive in gross bus station and catch hilarious old indian bus with funny fans and indian people who STARE at us, arrive in sweaty haze to lovely haridwar with oliver and his mum drives us to the group of arshrams she lives in, we shower and rest, are told that our clothes are pretty much blasphemous, ad are given huge, swamping indian clothes to wear,blah blah blah.... see HUGE ganga ceremony in crazy monsoon rain at dusk, have mental ride home, pushing land rover to its limits by driving through practical swimming pools of rain, having had our course blocked by fallen trees, all in the driving rain, we finally wake up on our beds made of wood (mm such comfort in ashrams), and oly and his mum generously give us an excellent lift to rishikesh. Now alone travel finally begins, no more supervision, sadly, feels a little bit like being left alone at university.. you feel as though you're an adult, and it will be fine, but you would quite rather run back to more familiar places.
(ive missed out loads.. but you get the idea)
Right at this very moment I'm sitting with sophie in an internet cafe in Rishikesh, one of the hindu pilgrimage places. People come here to stand by the river at sunset, clapping to some funny music, release leaf boats filled with gorgeous little pink and orange flowers lit by candles into the river in order to worship the female power. And then everyone tries to put their hands into these arabian-nights style candles, possibly burning their hands off in the process.
Rishikesh is amazing beautiful compared to the gross-ness of delhi, its divided in two by the huge fast flowing river, and is surrounded by the start of the himilayas, which are covered in lush green forests well fed by the monsoon. I think it looks like a rain forest, an apparently there are tigers and elephants up here. Elephants here i come...
okay, too much catching up and now more exciting things than sitting in an internet cafe must happpen! Will write more soon ya'll. Are you hanging onto my every word?
wowie, first (proper) blog post. i know that keeping a blog makes me a big internet nerd, but at least you all can be equally informed about whats going down in india, even if you dont care, you must know!
to recap on whats happened thus far..
arrived at delhi, DEATHLY HOT, tried to cool down in toby's flat to no avail, hang out on his roof and watch the parrotquites, then the crows and then bats fly around the sky, sleep in death hot flat with fans, powercuts so just death hotness, wake up and drive around delhi in AC car, alternate between death and comfort, see some sights, head back and fight over shower, wake up at 4.00 am to catch bus to haridwar, arrive in gross bus station and catch hilarious old indian bus with funny fans and indian people who STARE at us, arrive in sweaty haze to lovely haridwar with oliver and his mum drives us to the group of arshrams she lives in, we shower and rest, are told that our clothes are pretty much blasphemous, ad are given huge, swamping indian clothes to wear,blah blah blah.... see HUGE ganga ceremony in crazy monsoon rain at dusk, have mental ride home, pushing land rover to its limits by driving through practical swimming pools of rain, having had our course blocked by fallen trees, all in the driving rain, we finally wake up on our beds made of wood (mm such comfort in ashrams), and oly and his mum generously give us an excellent lift to rishikesh. Now alone travel finally begins, no more supervision, sadly, feels a little bit like being left alone at university.. you feel as though you're an adult, and it will be fine, but you would quite rather run back to more familiar places.
(ive missed out loads.. but you get the idea)
Right at this very moment I'm sitting with sophie in an internet cafe in Rishikesh, one of the hindu pilgrimage places. People come here to stand by the river at sunset, clapping to some funny music, release leaf boats filled with gorgeous little pink and orange flowers lit by candles into the river in order to worship the female power. And then everyone tries to put their hands into these arabian-nights style candles, possibly burning their hands off in the process.
Rishikesh is amazing beautiful compared to the gross-ness of delhi, its divided in two by the huge fast flowing river, and is surrounded by the start of the himilayas, which are covered in lush green forests well fed by the monsoon. I think it looks like a rain forest, an apparently there are tigers and elephants up here. Elephants here i come...
okay, too much catching up and now more exciting things than sitting in an internet cafe must happpen! Will write more soon ya'll. Are you hanging onto my every word?
Saturday 1 August 2009
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