Heaven (I hope!)

Courtesy: http://www.indiatravelnext.com/images/kovalam.jpg

Flying to Kerala for the week!  Although it's monsoon season I still have hope that it may actually look like this when I'm there :)

Mamta Samajik Sanstha

The non-profit we visited for a few days in Dehradun is called Mamta Samajik Sanstha. They’re doing work in health and sustainable development, similar to the non-profit we’ve been interning with in Delhi except in a rural setting. During our visit we were able to visit some of the satellite Gender Resource Centers in the rural villages they work in as well as a health camp.

For more information, check out their website here: http://www.mamtasanstha.org/ 

Also, check out the websites of the organizations I've actually been interning for this summer as well! 

http://www.jmcindia.org/

http://www.newconceptinfo.com/

No Words Part 3

As I mentioned before it rained 99.9% of the time we were in Rishikesh.  However, nothing could prepare us for the rain that poured from the sky on Tuesday morning or really just all of Tuesday.   I don't know how else to describe it but say that I now have a new definition of the word "downpour".

I fortunately came prepared with my raincoat (although it didn't help me much as you can see from the picture below) and luckily they were selling 50 cent ponchos (a.k.a. colored trash bags) everywhere so Lauren and Lena could attempt to stay dry as well.  

Like holidays, rain also makes people manic at the bus station and again you had to elbow your way in to got on a bus.  Luckily we got on one rather quickly and only had to stand in the aisle for about 50 minutes of the hour long ride.  Unfortunately, chivalry is not alive and well in India as most of the seated passengers were men who did not offer up their seats to us nor any of the other women who were crammed into the aisle on the bus.

Once we arrived back in Dehradun we got to wade in ankle deep water filled with trash, cow poop, dog poop, urine and God knows what else to find an autroriskshaw to the NGO we were visiting for the next few days.

We finally arrived at the NGO only to find that literally everything in our bags was completely soaked. I ended up categorizing things into soaking wet to wet/the most dry thing I have so I guess I'll wear this.  

Note: After 24 hours our clothes still had not dried and thank god the next day there was a short period of sun so we could hang them on a clothesline.  Also, three days later one of my books is still damp.  Just saying.

Rishikesh

We finally made it to Rishikesh late Sunday afternoon by the bus that was supposed to take us an hour and actually did.  Yay!

Rishikesh is considered to be one of the gateways to the Himalayas as well as the yoga capital of the world so naturally it was filled with hippies, pilgrims and yogis.  After being harassed by our rickshaw driver for not giving him the overpriced amount we agreed on when he decided to drop us before the place we told him we arrived at Lakshman Jhula bridge, a suspension bridge over the Ganges river.  

  

I'm not sure how many people cross the bridge everyday or better yet at one time but as you can see from Lauren's face it's a little scary.

Although it rained 99.9% of the time we were in Rishikesh it was actually pretty relaxing and peaceful.  Most of our time was spent at the Buddha Cafe (yes we ate there three times) but really that was because it took us 20 mins to get a menu 2 hours to get our food and another hour to get hour check each time we went.  The only explanation I have for why we kept going back despite the poor service was that again, it rained 99.9% of the time, we had nothing else to do, and it was just so quaint and peaceful there.  See photos below:

Of course a trip to the yoga capital of the world could not be complete without stepping in a pile of cow poop.  Just kidding -sort of.  While I did step in a very large pile of cow poop, we also did some late afternoon yoga with your stereotypical yoga guru looking man.  The session was really relaxing but also depressing to realize I haven't moved my body much in the past two months.  Really happy I bought that CorePower Yoga Groupon.

No Words Part 2

The saga continues...

After decoding the email we got from Make My Trip and only making sense of "canelled" meaning "cancelled" we were advised to just go to the bus station on Saturday morning where buses apparently leave every hour for Rishikesh.  Unfortunately, Saturday, as well as the following Monday were national holidays and the bus station was literally insane.

  

#1: The ticket booth wasn't open when we got there nor did it open the whole 2.5 hours we were waiting there.  

#2: Apparently some buses allowed you to pay for your ticket on the bus, but competing with 16 million people to get a bus ticket was both terrifying and impossible.  

As soon as a bus pulled up there was a mad rush to the window where the driver was sitting and women were literally screaming in pain because they were being crushed as they desperately tried to get tickets.  Luckily we met Rick, a Dutch guy who was going to Dehradun, a city nearby Rishikesh, and he stood in the sweaty, manic crowd with money for our tickets as we watched on in pity.  Despite his efforts, none of us were able to get tickets.

During the madness we made some "friends" (a.k.a. other people trying to get to Dehradun/Rishikesh) and made plans to get a group taxi with them to Dehradun because clearly the bus was no longer an option.  After arriving at the bus station aroung 9:15am we finally got in a shared taxi and were on our way to Dehradun around noon.  Delhi to Dehradun is about a 240km (149 mi) trip.    The 4 hours it was SUPPOSED to take to get there already seemed way to long for that distance (in the states I've driven almost double that distance in 4 1/2 hours).  However, India never ceases to amaze and it actually took a mere 10 1/2 hours instead.  We finally arrived in Dehradun around 11pm and although Rishikesh was only "an hour" away we decided our best option was to stay the night in Dehradun and continue on to Rishikesh the following morning.  After being turned down by 3 or 4 hostels who were fully booked for the night we finally found a place to stay around midnight.  Overall it was a great start to our "relaxing" weekend.

No words

This email I received tonight pretty much sums up all our attempts at trying to make travel arrangements to ANYWHERE in India.  Note: this was after spending a week trying to find a way to get to Rishikesh and feeling relieved that we finally did it...

Subject
NU25143914801307-B2C-ON-Bus Domestic
Discussion Thread
Response Via Email (Jagdeep Randhawa)	11/08/2011 09.23 PM
HI OMINIABOHS Greetings from Make My Trip With refrence of your booking id NU25143914801307 , I would like to inform you that due to some stuck down bus operator canelled your booking from Delhi-Rishikesh . We tried to call on your contact no (9560030486) but no one pikking the call . So , we processing full refund for this booking and we advice to arrange new alternate for his travel sorry for inconvenience Yours Sincerely, Jai Prakash Rawat Jagdeep Randhawa Customer Service Consultant

Amritsar

This weekend Lauren, Lena and I took a weekend trip to Amritsar.  Amritsar is basically the Sikh capital of India, which was very apparent when we got off the train and nearly everyone we saw had a turban and beard (signature Sikh look).  We took our first train in India and better yet our first overnight train!  Our train left Delhi around 9pm and didn't arrive in Amritsar until 8:30am the next morning.  I was pretty sure nothing could be more uncomfortable than sleeping on our bed at the guest house but the top bunk I slept on during the train ride proved me wrong...

 I found this picture on Google images since I forgot to take a picture of our train accommodations - sorry for the blurriness.  Anyone over 5'7 beware because you're not going to fit on the bed.

Once we arrived in Amritsar we set off in search of our hostel and were very disappointed when we found it.  Note: AVOID Hotel Grace in Amritsar.  Luckily we found another one not too far away that was decent enough for a one night stay and just around the corner from the Golden Temple (basically the epicenter for Sikhs in India).

 Golden Temple.  Apparently more people visit this site than the Taj Mahal in India (approximately 100,000 people a day).

 Within 5 minutes of being inside the temple area we ran into this guy - can't remember his name :(  He became our unofficial tour guide/preacher of the greatness of Sikhism for next hour.  I have to admit that my mind wandered during much of his preaching but he took us through all the back areas of the temple including the kitchen, which was really interesting and we never would have found some of the spots on our own. He also did it all for free!

The most interesting part of the temple, and where we spent most of our time there is the kitchen.  The kitchen dishes out free vegetarian meals to over 100,000 pilgrims a day and everyone who works in it is there on a volunteer basis.  Many of the people are actually the pilgrims who visit and help with whatever task they are given.  

 Chapati (kind of like naan) making machine in the GIANT kitchen.

 Women sorting the good from the bad chapatis (the bad ones go to the animals).

 We made our own chapatis!  I made two :)  Not sure who ate them...

 GIANT vats of rice pudding.

 Pilgrims getting their free meal.

 Old man taking a nap in some hidden back area we discovered with our "tour guide"

One of the Sikh's customs is to never cut there hair. The men usually have long hair that they put up in a "bun" on top of their head under a turban and have very long beards.  Sometimes they don't look that long, but really they've just twisted it up into itself.  The women also don't cut their hair.  This includes no eyebrow plucking/waxing.  You probably thought this picture above was of a man and a woman but these are actually TWO women.  I'm not sure why the woman on the right has a beard, because I'm pretty sure that's NOT normal, but either way she won't get rid of it because of her religion.

After spending the afternoon at the Golden Temple we hopped in a van and took the one hour ride to the Indian-Pakistani border for the border closing ceremony.  Yes, this is the border were the patrol men wear funny hats and dance/march around.

I'm not sure how many people come to the border closing ceremony everyday, but the stadium was completely full and people were left waiting outside the gate the to watch the ceremony from there.  On the way in we had to get in to separate, single file lines.  One for men and one for women.  We had a pretty intense female patrol woman on our side who literally beat people to get into a single file.  So that was interesting... We quickly obeyed to avoid the abuse.

Long story short.  The ceremony is basically one giant party.  People dance, people sing, people run back and forth carrying the Indian flag and it's like one big showdown between India and Pakistan on who can party the best and which border patrolmen have the best high kicks.

Don't ever forget to wear your KEENS in Shaheen Bagh

This week Lauren and I have been testing out the health facility booklet we're working on for the community mobilizers at the Gender Resource Center.  That means we get to wander around the slums trying to find all the clinics on the map. 

 

Unfortunately, I forgot to switch from my flip flops to KEENS before I left the house...

 Never will I ever forget again.

Jaipur

This weekend we took a trip to Jaipur, the capital of Rajasthan (the state next to door).  At first we were planning on going by train but then a travel agent convinced is to go by private car instead.  There were positives and negatives to this arrangement.  Positives: we could leave and come back when we wanted and didn't have to worry about catching overpriced autorickshaws around town.  Negatives: Sometimes the driver had his own agenda on what we did/didn't want to see...

I'm pretty sure about half of the 1+ billion people living in India live in Jaipur because somehow this city was way more crowded than Delhi.  I didn't think that was possible.  Overall it was a pretty good trip and it was really nice to get out of Delhi for the weekend.  Below are some pictures from the trip.

 City Palace, Jaipur

 City Palace, Jaipur

 Rajasthani dolls.  Kind of creepy and yes, I bought some.

 Miniature painting of an elephant

Jantar Mantar

It was built by one of India's former kings and holds a collection of astronomical instruments.  I have absolutely no idea how they work.

 Galta Temple

This temple was in the middle of nowhere in the mountains and has been taken over by a ton of monkeys.  A terrifying but also exciting place :)  I'm pretty sure I took about 500 pictures here...

 Terrifying moment #1.  Walking up these stairs.

 I don't know who he is or where he came from, but I love him.

 Bathroom break.  Note: This was on the side of the street, not in an enclosed area.

 This picture may help convey the humidity situation we're dealing with.

 Hawa Mahal.  The intention of this place was to allow the royal women to watch everyday life on the street below since they practiced "purdah" and weren't allowed to go outside.

 View from the windows in Hawa Mahal

 Hawa Mahal, Jaipur

 Amer Fort