India…..I love it, but I hate it……but I love it!!

G’day all,
Well again it has been just a massive few days in India. How can any day not be massive in this crazy old country? If I could put India in 3 words it would almost be impossible but I would have to choose crazy, spiritual, and colourful. I think in any one day in India just walking the streets you could see 1000 things that would just blow you away and things that could only happen in India…that’s why I love it here. I think life without India again is going to be so uneventful but I’m also kind of looking forward to normality again. Anyway enough of my daydreaming back to the past few days. My short 44 hour bus ride from Kathmandu to Delhi ended up being pretty close to torture but finally arriving felt so good again. I met this cool Japanese/French bird named Naomi on the bus so we kept each other sane by just cracking jokes for the whole bus ride as nobody else spoke English on our so called “tourist bus”. The highlight of the bus ride was seeing a UFO out of the window and watching it for a good hour or more. I first spotted this strange cigar shaped bright light out of the window and thought it was moving but couldn’t be sure as the bus ride was pretty shaky. When the bus stopped for petrol I watched this light hover up and down and left and right for a good 10 minutes and I was so pumped when I realized this thing ain’t human. It bounced around the sky like nothing I’ve seen before and moved so fast and silent and smooth that I can honestly say I’ve seen a UFO now. We had to stay a night on the border of Nepal and India as the border didn’t open until 6am. The hotel we stayed at was so rank and ever since that night both my hands and my feet have thousands upon thousands of tiny bite marks all over them and it’s really annoying me. I stayed a day in Delhi before catching an overnight train to Jodhpur in the desert state of Rajasthan towards the Pakistan border. I was very close to missing my train as my cheapness almost got the better of me. I spent too long bargaining with the rickshaw drivers until it got to the point of ‘pay anything now and leave or miss the train’. The rickshaw driver went nuts to get me to the train station on time hitting two pedestrians and a straw cart on our 20 min thrill ride. I arrived at the train station at 8:45pm, the same time the train was due to leave. I then ran to Platform 16 assuming it was mine and launched myself into the moving train Tom Cruise style pushing everyone out of my way and pulling myself and my 30kg bag into the train. Luckily it was the right train however I was about 9 carriages away from where my bed was waiting for me and I was stuck in the standing refugee section for a few hours until the train finally stopped again. Anyway I’ve been in Jodhpur for two days now and it’s an incredible city to be in. It’s called the “Blue City” as many buildings are painted sky-blue to apparently keep the insects away and to keep it cool (as it’s so bloody hot here- many 50+ days) Towering above the sea of ancient blue buildings is a huge 125 meter old fort called Meherangarh. I found the fort almost as impressive as the Taj Mahal and it was a top surprise as I pretty much just came here to see the blue buildings. I spent a fair few hours exploring around the fort and they had a great audio tour included too. It took me ages to find my way back to the guest house as this town looks like something out of a “Where’s Wally” book with a million identical alleyways in a labyrinth of boxy blue buildings. If yesterday was hot then today was boiling. I think it would have been close to 50 degrees so I decided to spend the day in style…in the Great Thar Desert! I vibed my way to the bus station and caught a government bus to the desert town of Osiyan, 65km north of Jodhpur. I was the only tourist I saw all day and being on this crowded bus with a heap of Indians staring at me, I felt as uncomfortable as a fart in a spacesuit. One bloke started taking this piss out of me and saying stuff in Hindi to me in front of everyone then they all laughed at me. The only comeback I could come up with to make it even was to whip out some hard Aussie slag that they had no chance of understanding. I had a little chuckle and nose laugh to myself as I came back and said “settle petal, pull out the big guns shirley ya flam’n galah, think ya top brick don’t ya, ya dopey mongrel…so suffer in ya jocks…ya tool…now rack off ya clown”. I felt like I had the whole of Australia behind me at the time so I had nothing to lose however I think he must have thought I was from Antarctica or something with a language like that. It was one more crazy bus ride to add to the collection but I finally got there and boy was she stinking hot. The town was dusty and tourist free and full of Indians with turbans on their heads, white gowns and tweaked moustaches. After drinking about 3 litres of water I found a little kid that could take me on a 2 hour camel safari through the sand dunes so before I knew it I was smack bang right in the middle of the Indian desert sitting high on a camel. It was such a great feeling being the only tourist or person even to be seen riding a camel through this surreal sandy desert. It was like something out of a movie it was so picture perfect but I was guttered that my camera was broken. As we approached this tiny desert village I was amazed as this mini tornado whipped through the village out of nowhere and almost ripped the roofs off the huts. It hung around for almost 5 minutes and got within about 20 meters from us as it roared and zigzagged around violently ripping up shrubs, sticks, and dust, and spinning them at least 50 meters into the air. I’ve seen many whirly winds before but nothing like this. It made such a loud noise it sounded like a V8 and would have easily been strong enough to pick me up and perhaps the camel too. I was almost in a state of shock but this kid seemed to think nothing of it as it happens all the time here but he said they are very dangerous if you get caught in one. He also said he has been picked up and thrown from one before. I was surprised it didn’t rip the roof of this hut it passed right over but I guess they are designed to withstand mini tornados and they looked quiet strongly built. I had a cup of tea with the local village then rode back through the dunes into town again. After a looking at a couple of ancient temples I was buggered and caught the bus back to Jodhpur again. Tomorrow I head of to the Hippy town of Pushkar so I’m sure as eggs will have more crazy stories to add from there.

Oorooo Cockatoo…Woodsy

PS: Incase your wondering I scabbed another travellers photos for the blog :)

Varanasi and the Ganges

G’day all,
Well I have just spent the past 3 days in Varanasi, one of the most amazing and holy places I’ve ever seen. I met these really great English people on the train from Agra to Varanasi Tom, Gemma, and Louise and I’ve been hanging out with them the whole time. Tom headed off to Bombay and I’m meeting up with Gemma and Louise again in a few hours in Katmandu in Nepal. On the train up to Varanasi we had to chain our backpacks to our sleeper beds so nobody could steal our stuff during the night. I think I also may have kept one eye open whilst sleeping too because apparently many backpackers get their bags stolen on the trains over here. Once arriving in Varanasi we quickly fought our way through the pack of hungry rickshaw drivers and found a really nice new hotel to stay in just off the Ganges River. When we arrived we were so dehydrated and hungry and so I bought a bottle of water, a coke, an iced coffee, a mango juice, a sweet lassie, not to mention my latest stable diet of chips and fried eggs. We first went for a walk along the Ganges and came across our first “burning ghats”. The burning ghats are where they publicly cremate the fresh dead and spread their ashes and remains in the Ganges as a way of freeing them from their sins and enter Nirvana (heaven in Hindu). We thought that maybe it’s done privately inside a building but we were well wrong. We first saw this fire with logs and what we thought it was a pig being cooked. As we got closer (like 2 meters away) we realized it was the top half of a dead man on fire and charcoaled with his hands clenched tightly (see 2nd picture and look carefully at fireplace). It was so freaky and we were almost in a state of shock as we didn’t expect to see what we saw. Apparently they do hundreds and hundreds of cremations each day and some of the burning ghats burn 24 hours a day. Depending on the price and quality of the wood it can take anywhere between 1 and 4 hours to cremate a person. Before we knew it we were invited to watch another cremation as they brought out a fresh body, dipped it in the Ganges and placed it on a pile of logs right in front of our eyes. We watched for a good 45 minutes as the body went from fresh meat to charcoal chicken. The weird thing was that they had 5-10 year old boys running the cremation and they poked and prodded the bodies with sticks until they crumbled away to a little chunk of charcoaled meat is left and it’s thrown into the Ganges. They hit the heads and arms of the bodies until they either snap off or disintegrate and at one stage we watched this mans skull being smashed into two by this tiny little kid. The locals talk about the cremations as if it’s nothing and they push you around to have a better few and get in close as you can to see it better. The worst part was when the second body sizzled to a point where the skin on the dead mans belly exploded and his guts popped out of his chest and lay there out in the open. Apparently the Ganges has magical powers and it stops the bodies from smelling bad while they are being cremated. The weird thing about that is it’s so true, you couldn’t smell and hair or nails burning at all. What was even worse was and perhaps slightly in bad taste that it actually smelt not too bad at all and it actually brought on cravings for a nice Aussie barbecue of snags, chops and rissoles. Apart from the burning ghats there were a million other things happening on the fascinating and colourful walk along the Ganges. What don’t you see? There was everything from kids playing cricket, people doing washing, kites flying, people scrubbing water buffalos and cows in the water, to even raw sewerage being pumped straight in across the footpath and into the river. The water is supposed to be so polluted it’s rated as septic yet you see the locals swimming in it, bathing in it, and even brushing their teeth and drinking it. Each night there is a big ceremony along the Ganges with thousands and thousands of people watching drums being played and acts performed whilst candles are floated down the river in the background. Apart from the whole cremations thing I found it to be quite a romantic town. On our second day in Varanasi we did a 5:30am sunrise boat tour of the Ganges which was really nice and had one of the best sunsets I’ve ever seen. I think the highlight of the tour was seeing this mangy dog chewing on the remains of a burnt human body it had pulled out of the river. There are thousands of people bathing at sunrise and you see many really old people waiting to die bathing to bless themselves. Varanasi is also famous for its silks and it’s pretty much the best place in the world to buy a silk scarf or a bed cover but it also means a million dodgy Indians trying to sell you fake silk to rip you off. One silk shop we went to had photos of the actress Goldie Hawn all over the walls as she is a regular customer there. It is very dangerous after 8pm in Varanasi so we all got back to our hotel each night before dark and relaxed and indulged in the fantastic food the hotel cooked. Food and accommodation is so cheap here you can live like a absolute king and eat and drink pretty much whatever you like (apart from beef) for under $3. On Friday night we caught an over night train and two busses up to Katmandu in Nepal. I’ll update you all next from the land of Everest and friendly people.

Woodsy

Welcome to India

G’day all,
Well I have been in India for 4 days now and mate what a 4 days it’s been. I don’t think I have ever seen such a crazy crazy crazy place in any one stage of my eventful life so far. I flew in to Delhi on Friday night and was so determined to not get ripped off that I followed my Lonely Planet guide like a bible. At the airport I met this cool bloke from Taiwan named Leon who was heading to the backpacker area too so we caught a bus from the airport together. We were the only foreigners on the bus and were welcomed to India with a friendly sign on the backs of the bus seats saying “LOOK UNDER YOUR SEAT THERE COULD BE A BOMB RAISE ALARM EARN REWARD”...... I was like yeah welcome to India Pauly. I finally found myself a room after dragging my titanic sized backpack through this dodgy backpacker come cow lined street for a good half hour. I was so relieved just to put my bag down and relax for a bit when I got there. My room was pretty Elizabeth/Hakem West ghetto but for 6 bucks who’s complaining right it’s India. After settling in I went for a stroll around town and slid me thong through a nice fresh cow borrie (although part of me still thinks it may have been an old Indian mans curry from last night). The next morning I met up with me mate Leon to go check out the Red Fort together. We bargained with a few rickshaw (tuk-tuk) drivers until we eventually got this poor old Indian bloke to ride us there on his cycle rickshaw for 40 Rupees ($1.20 Aus). We thought it was just around the corner but didn’t expect it to be 30 mins of hard slogging in the heat away. I swear I felt so sorry for this poor old bugga slaving away for us with no gears on his bike. He was sweating like a pig and had to walk it at times because he was too exhausted to peddle. I ended up chipping him a 100 R for his hard work and he nearly fainted as if he had won the lottery. This place makes Cambodia look rich. I’ve never seen anything like it and if you came here let me tell you it would blow your mind and open it at the same time. Heading into the Red Fort the men and women had different lines for the security check. I was patted down as you do before being groped in the privates and was left in a state of shock. I mean if it was a nice looking young lass then no dramas but not this slimy old Indian man with a big grin. The fact he had a shiny machine gun strapped to his back forced me to take it like a bitch and just walk on in with a nose laugh and a red face. The Red Fort was pretty snazzy but no where near as entertaining as just walking down an average street in Delhi. We caught the metro back to our street and I had never felt so stared at in my life on that train. The Indian people just eyeball you up and down as if you’re wearing a bikini and they have dark sunnies on. I really don’t know whether I feel famous or intimidated but I guess I should stop telling them I’m Shane Warne’s younger brother. On the walk back from the metro we saw a body wrapped in cloth being carted down the road 1 meter from us and that’s when I realize this aint no Burnside Village. The other funny thing you see here everywhere is cows just roaming the streets everywhere and just crossing roads and standing on medium strips just staring at the traffic. On Saturday night we checked out New Delhi which was much more civilized than Old Delhi and it was actually nice and clean and they even had bins, lawn, and footpaths. Yesterday I caught a train up to Agra, the home of the world famous “Taj Mahal”. The train ride was kind of interesting as I had another Indian bloke staring at me for 4 hours straight. I felt like clocking him one in the snozza but what can you do hey. Every 30 seconds someone walks up to you trying to sell you something in the most high pitch Hindi voice they can manage. Everything from toy machine guns to zips were offered to us and even Indian lady boy beggars popped in to say G’day. It would have had to been around 40 degrees yesterday but luckily I managed to find myself a nice room fairly fast once arriving in Agra. They cool thing about my hotel here is they have a roof top restaurant overlooking the Taj Mahal and it’s literally only a few hundred meters away from it too. After a powernap I went for a stroll and ended up playing cricket with some Indian kids in a side alley and almost hit a 6 over the fence of the Taj Mahal. I couldn’t believe how many monkey are just roaming this town. On each roof sits sometimes up to 8 or 10 highly active monkeys. On they way back home there was a power black out (about the 7th since arriving in India) and Agra become somewhat scarier with all these monkeys swinging off buildings everywhere and jumping from roof top to roof to over your head in pitch black. After a disgusting green curry I had an early night as I woke up at 5:30am today to watch the sunrise over the Taj Mahal. The gates opened at 6am and I was one of the first ones in for the day. The beauty of this palace is quite amazing and to see it in real life and watch the sun come up over it is an experience that has to be done. After stressfully and finally getting the famous photo with the Taj through all the tourists I got myself a guide and learnt all about the history of the Taj which is almost as amazing as the look of it alone. I spent a few hours there then chipped some Indian kids a couple of bucks to take me on a Camel ride to the Agra fort which was also really impressive. I was absolutely buggered after that and came back to the hotel and slept for hours and through a lazy 4 black outs. I got up just before dark and went for one of the craziest and coolest walks I’ve ever done. I decided to walk away from the tourist area and get myself lost in the labyrinth of alleyways they have in Agra. The further I got away from the Touristy area the more amazing it became. I became an instant celebrity as literally 40 to 50 Indian kids and Adults would swarm around me at a time and want to shake my hand and talk to me as if they’ve never seen a white man before. One man pulled me up on stage at this street concert and presented me with flowers as a gift and said “Welcome to my country my friend”. Everywhere I walked people waved and smiled and stared at me and 2 out 3 people would ask what my name was and want to shake my hand. It was an incredible experience but also makes me glad I'm not famous because it gets so wearing after an hour. Well it’s a full moon tonight and I'm about to go up to the roof top to look at the Taj being lit up with the moon light. Tomorrow I take an overnight train to Varanasi to check out the Ganges River so I that should be really cool. Update ya all from there troops.

Woodsy....safe and well in Agra, India