India, a truly colorful experience

The last few days have opened up my senses to this world more than any country thus far. Looking back, the only comparable experience was in Palestine. After arriving in Delhi on Tuesday night, beth and I were pleasantly surprised to discover that this city appeared to be in better condition than Mumbai. The following morning our friend Eric, from Dubai, was to meet us for an early morning tour of Delhi. Then we would head to Agra for the great Taj Mahal.. and eventually hit Jaipur to complete our tour of the "Golden Triangle."

Heck yes. Thats my name up there

Starting in Delhi was a great way to get our feet under us for the next few days. We visited the Shah Jahan mosque, the largest in India, then took a bicycle rickshaw ride through one of the older markets. THIS is where you really get a taste of India. Blank faces of half naked men gazed at our rickshaws as we fought to squeeze through the narrow streets. The children were the ones begging for money while the adults just looked at us as if we were from another planet. Once we got back in our luxurious air conditioned van we reflcted for several moments about different tidbits each one of us had seen. Some include: a naked man walking comfortably down the street, a man getting a straight razor shave from another man in the middle of the street, and many people hawking produce such as roots of the lotus flower. We had a total of about 6 hours to tour Delhi before heading to Agra, which was plenty.

Beth and I at the Shah Jahan Mosque in Delhi. Shorts were a bad choice for the day.


Once again, I wasn't kidding

Around 3pm our driver picked us up from lunch and we set sail for Agra. My friend Adam Weinstein made this trek last year and told me to make sure I stayed awake for the 5 hour journey from Delhi to Agra; boy was he right. Sure, leaving the city you see less motorbikes and much less air pollution, but there are a whole set if different things to see that made horrific stories of poverty suddenly come real. Once we scratched the outskirts of Agra we were suddlenly let down to see some unusual gridlock traffic. We sat with the van in park and off for about an hour. We later came to find out that what was apparently a car accident turned out to be a riot. Many police officers lined the streets all weilding some sort of giant night stick, while riotors came by screaming Hindi chants. Welcome to Agra. No less than two hours later after a wonderful impromtu dinner at reataurant Maya, we saw around 200 people in the street outside our hotel. Evidently a kid dropped a gun and was shot in the head on accident. Not sure about this one. We went inside to decompress and get ready for the Taj Mahal the next day.

Is that Ketchup on my forehead?

Eric and I at a "beer bar"

Taj Mahal: a memorial for Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan's favorite wife, Mumtaz Mahal. It took 22 years to complete and the help of over 2000 people. Words cannot describe how magnificent this structure really is. One cool thing that we learned was that there were plans for another Taj Mahal, a black one, built for Shah Jahan himself. The foundation and garden were complete but Shah Jahan's son, the succeeding Emporer, had him arrested for spending too much of the peoples money on himself. Shah Jahan was said to be the richest ruler in the world by a landslide. Out of the many wonders of the world that I have now seen, this one rivals Petra and Machu Picchu closely.

Breathtaking view of the Taj.

This guy got a little too close to the monkeys that roam around the Taj Mahal.

A view from the Guest House.

Jaipur was a great city as well; with many forts and other important sites to see. The market square was particularly interesting with a small herd of people following us around. Indian kids that looked like miniature men, gawked at Beth and didn't even ask for anything. They just followed us on every street, through every alleyway. We spent two days here, visiting more historical sites, and more textile factories.

In Jaipur at a wood block stamp factory. Beth is using her art skills to finish this piece.

One more shot of the trio at the Amber Fort in Jaipur.

Beth and I on Shanti, the elephant that took us to the top of the Amber Fort.

Eric riding solo on Hema. Eric started behind us but the started yelling "chela" which means Lets Go! At this moment our elephant jockies decided it would be fun for us to compete in a full on race to the top. This is was one of the funnest momemts in my life. No Joke.

Gorgeous

Monkeys are everywhere in India. I find this particularly funny because Eric is absolutely terrified of them.

The last important part of our stay in India was Diwali, India's festival of lights. This is similar to the 4th of July celebration in the US where everything revolves around lights and fireworks, except Diwali celebrates a significant Hindu holiday. I had read somewhere that Diwali outdid any other firework celebration in the world. Beth and I certainly confirmed this. For a solid week everyone and I mean EVERYONE is lighting some sort of "cracker" all day and all night. What we first thought were gun shots in Mumbai, were actually just M80s. It was such a great coincedence to be in India for this gigantic festival and to spend it on the rooftop of our hotel, Cabana.

A view from the rooftop of our hotel in Delhi for Diwali

Leaving India was sad, but we had Thailand to look forward to. The stink of our last day in India was that I came down with a bad cold, which came with a fever. Luckily Beth and I somehow got upgraded to First Class on our flight to Bangkok which made everything much better.