The highs and lows of traveling in India

On my last day in Dharamsala, I made the short walk out to the small but very well curated Tibetan Museum, which told the story of Chinese occupation through the eyes of a handful of Tibetan refugees living in the city. It was particularly interesting to see photos of the young Dalai Lama accompanied by his entourage as they walked hundreds of miles across barren fields and snowy mountain passes as they escaped into India. So far, a staggering 1.3 million Tibetans have died as a result of the occupation — from murder, rape, torture, famine, and more. Without going on and on about the situation in Tibet, having visited both Tibet itself as well as refugee areas elsewhere certainly raised my own awareness of the Tibetan struggle — an issue I was only vaguely aware of before I came on this trip.

With only a few hours of sleep, I left the city for a crazy-early ride (3:45 am) on the most crappy bus in history headed for the holy Sikh city of Amritsar, about six hours drive to the west. The main attraction of the city for travelers and pilgrims alike is the Golden Temple, where foreigners can stay free-of-charge in dorm rooms. I managed to score a somewhat private room along with Simon and Carol, a cool couple from the UK that I met in Dharamsala. Just outside our door, masses of Hindu and Sikh pilgrims visiting the temple were camped out across the floor of the courtyard.

The scene during the day:


Even more bustle and bodies at 2:30 am:


Each day, the three of us were drawn like magnets to the Golden Temple. There is something truly magical about the place that is hard to describe. Thousands of people quietly move around the marble walkway surrounding the lake in which the golden temple sits. A line forms outside of pilgrims getting ready to enter the temple itself, where there are a few men chanting, praying, and playing instruments around the clock. After exiting the temple, Sikhs drink a few gulps of holy water from the lake. At night, everyone sits around the walkway to pray, meditate, or enjoy the serene atmosphere that the temple exudes. Simon, Carol and I must have spent ten hours just walking around the temple over the course of the three days that we were in Amritsar.



In addition to the Sikhs providing free accommodation, they also provide free food for up to 30,000 visitors per day, so I decided to go check it out. The experience of eating in the cafeteria totally blew me away — the whole process is like modern assembly lines, but it's all made with people. You walk toward the cafeteria and someone shoves a spoon into your hand. Then another hands you a cup. Then a plate. Then you follow the flow of traffic upstairs into a big warehouse-like room. You sit on the floor on a long bamboo mat next to the person in front of you. Just as you set down your utensils, the slop arrives. From a few feet up, a green pile of slop lands in your plate. Then white slop. Then orange slop. Then water in the cup. Then you hold out your hands and chapati (flatbread) gets dropped into your hands. Then you start eating. At coordinated times, people come by offering more of each color of slop. Although it looks pretty nasty, the food was actually really good — the green slop was like split-pea soup, the white was like rice pudding, and the orange was a sweet grain mixture. I loved the experience, so I went back a couple more times during my stay. Here are a few shots of the action:




During my stay in Amritsar, the single thing that impressed me the most was the people. Sikhs are probably the most considerate, generous and friendly people I've met on my trip so far, and you never feel harassed or scammed, which was a nice break from the rest of India. People love to get their pictures taken, especially the Sikh men — identifiable by the folded turban covering their uncut hair, long beards, steel bracelet and blade. I really enjoyed taking photos of people in the temple and out in the streets. Here are some of my favorites:







A few miles outside of Amritsar lies the India-Pakistan border, and each night there is a big and ridiculous border-closing ceremony with a lot of foot-stompin', silly uniform-wearin' nationalism on display. I piled in a minivan with a whopping 13 other people to go check it out, along with hundreds of Indian people who go to sit in the bandstands and cheer on their country's border guards. The somewhat goofy 15-minute ceremony, carefully coordinated between the two countries, almost made me forget that I was just a few feet away from Pakistan, somewhere I never pictured I'd be. Side note: The guy who drove me to the airport all the way back in Toronto was from Pakistan and invited me to stay with his family in Lahore during my trip. I gave it serious thought over the last few months, but in the end I decided that Pakistan just isn't a smart place to be right now, even though I've met several people who just went and they said it was amazing. I'll have to save that country for a future trip. See Mom, I'm making smart decisions!



I spent my final night in Amritsar celebrating Diwali, the biggest national festival — basically the equivalent to our 4th of July. Walking through the streets, kids light off sketchy fireworks, and while I was running away from one of them burning on the ground I made the biggest mistake you can make in India: stepping in the water. Along about half of the streets in India there is a foot-wide gap between the sidewalk and the buildings, where there is this disgusting, smelly water. It looks like a cross between sewage and that blue water they put the combs in at Cost Cutters, plus a coating an oily film on top and a swarm of flies buzzing around. Trying to escape one of these fireworks, I sunk my right foot directly into the absolutely nasty water, submerging it up to the calf. Holding back my own vomit and tears, I hauled ass to the Golden Temple, where I remembered seeing an area to wash your feet. It was like the end of The Crying Game or something: me sitting there under the foot-shower trying desperately to get that horrible sludge off of my body. It was probably the most disgusting thing that's ever happened to me — I'm seriously shuddering just thinking about it.

After I felt somewhat clean again, I enjoyed a spectacular fireworks show over the absolutely packed Golden Temple complex, then headed for the safety of my new hotel's rooftop where I enjoyed a 360 degree view of sketchy fireworks lighting up the the sky which lasted until the early morning.



The next afternoon I was off to the train station to take a 17-hour sleeper train to Jaipur, the capital of the state of Rajasthan. On the long train ride I was befriended by an incredibly nice Sikh family who generously fed me dinner and breakfast and insisted that I stay in their home next time I visit Amritsar. I was overwhelmed by the hospitality and it left me with one final great impression of the unbelievable kindness shown by almost every Sikh person I met over the previous few days. I was thrilled to be in India, surrounded by such great people.

And then along came Jaipur...

As I was researching for this trip, I read that India is one of the most difficult places on earth to travel with all of the hassles, ripoffs, sketchy situations, traffic, noise, smog and more. Whoever came home with those impressions of the country definitely spent a long time in the city of Jaipur. Every ten seconds or so, someone would come up to me and hassle me to give them money, to go in their rickshaw, to drink tea with them, to take their picture, to shake their hand, to buy them chapatis, to go to their shop, to buy gems from them, etc. Add brutal heat, thick smog, and deafening traffic into the mix, and only a few hours outside made me feel absolutely exhausted. It's almost as if 50 years ago, in addition to the regular classes at school — math, science, social studies, gym — they added a special Jaipur-exclusive course called How to Annoy the Living Shit out of Foreigners.

Despite the constant annoyances, I managed to see most of the city's big sights: the City Palace complex and armory, the numerous bazaars, the beautiful Palace of the Winds, and nearby Amber Fort. My favorite was definitely the Jantar Mantar, an fascinating outdoor observatory with enormous equipment dating from the early 18th century.



The best part about Jaipur—and I realize this sounds completely ridiculous—is that they have a freaking Subway. And a McDonalds. And a Pizza Hut. When you're sweating like crazy, you've got smog in your eyes, and people constantly surrounding you yelling to get your attention, American fast-food joints are transformed from restaurant into refuge. The headaches and hassles of Jaipur melted away with a little bit of air-conditioning, pop music, and a delicious meatball sub. Luckily, I met some really nice solo travelers at my hotel—Stu, Marc & Jac—who were feeling the same way about the city, so we all vented (at Subway) together. Just to give you an idea of how filthy you can get after a few days spent in Jaipur, here's a shot of Stu's feet:



To make matters in Jaipur even more uncomfortable, I started having an absolutely incredible toothache with extremely intense pain on one side of my mouth which lasted for a few days before I decided that I had better see a dentist. After searching for half a day, I finally found a place that seemed decently reputable. In the end, my visit was frustrating: the dentist just tapped on my teeth a little bit, took a few x-rays, and declared that I was fine. A few days later, I'm still in pain, so I'm debating whether or not to head up to Delhi to find a western-trained dentist.

I'm now hanging out in Pushkar, an awesome city to the south which is home to the internationally known Pushkar Camel Fair, which is taking place right now. I love the town so far, my guesthouse is awesome, and I'm back to having an great time. I spent a few hours over at the fairgrounds earlier today, and it was absolutely unreal. I'll talk about the camel fair more in my next update. If the jaw-pain situation calms down, I'll stay here until November 5th (the end of the fair), then continue my trip through Rajasthan. I'll leave you with a shot of my current setting, the beautiful and relaxing city of Pushkar:



Thanks for reading,
Ryan!

Photos updated: Dharamsala, Amritsar, Jaipur, Pushkar. Also, I was finally able to upload the video of me jumping off a bridge in Nepal. You'll have to tilt your head 90 degrees to the left to see it. Sorry!

Three very different towns in Northern India

Leaving the concrete jungle of Chandigarh, I headed for the old British hill station of Shimla aboard the narrow-gauge railway—affectionately called the to the Shimla Toy Train—which winds its way over the course of eight hours through more than a hundred tunnels and even more switchbacks.



The town was once a summer home to the Britsh Raj, who came to get out of the overwhelming heat of Delhi. Shimla is a hugely popular vacation and honeymoon center for affluent Indians, and as a result the town has a really relaxed atmosphere and I enjoyed spending a few days people-watching, strolling along the British-colonial architecture, browsing the busy market street, and enjoying the delicious north Indian cuisine. Here's a video of Shimla's market street, followed by a few scenes from the city:






The only thing that prevents Shimla from being truly relaxing is that the town is chock-full of monkeys. Walking down the street, you’ll hear a bit of rumbling from a rooftop, and then — BAM! — a monkey falls from the sky and hits the ground in front of you. It gets a little bit freaky sometimes. The locals must think so too: they’ve shipped a bunch of the crazy monkeys to a park in Tajikistan. Here’s a shot of a sleepy monkey, followed by a video of a few monkey-acrobats:





Sightseeing options in Shimla are a bit limited, but I did check out lemon-yellow Christ Church which is only the second Christian church to be built in India. I also made the trip to the Himachal Pradesh State Museum, which was surprisingly great. Highlights from the small museum included intricate Indian miniature paintings, an excellent collection of old coins, a display of traditional clothing from different periods of time within the state, and an interesting collection of local contemporary paintings. There was also a small section about Gandhi, which included a fascinating letter he sent to Adolph Hitler in 1939, which begins, “Friends have been urging me to write to you for the sake of humanity.”



I left Shimla on a night bus bound for the little mountain town of Manali, a popular travelers hangout and a base for doing a number of outdoor activities in the area. One of my big reasons for doing this quick tour of Northern India was to try to get out of Delhi’s 90 degree heat for a little while. As I arrived in Manali just before dawn, it was clear I was going to get way more cold than I wanted: the town was freezing and teetering on the edge of winter. A lot like a Colorado ski town, I arrived at exactly the wrong time: it was too cold for summer activities, and the snow hadn’t hit yet to attract the skiers. I enjoyed myself anyway, hanging out in cozy restaurants, reading over tea, exploring the nearby villages, and navigating the crowded streets of the city center. Although I had started getting used to the trash and pollution everywhere, Manali’s otherwise beautiful mountain setting made it all seem so much worse. Trash seemed to cling to every surface, rivers and streams smelled like bathrooms, and the air in the town center was so polluted that I had to hold the arm of my sweater over my mouth in order to breathe. I’m not yet sure what to think of India’s astounding sanitation and pollution problem, but it will certainly be a major hurdle for them as they escalate into the first world over the next thirty years. Here are a few scenes of the mess:





After a few days in Manali, I was very ready to leave so I got on another night bus, this time bound for Dharamsala, which has served as the home of the Tibetan government-in-exile and the Dalai Lama, who came to the town in 1959 after barely escaping Chinese-occupied Tibet. In my first few minutes of walking through the nearby town McLeod Ganj where I’m staying, I experienced culture shock. This time the shock wasn’t a result of the trash, the hassles, or the poverty, but from something else: Americans. Throughout the last three months, I’ve probably come across a total of about 75 Americans. In the course of a single day in Dharamsala, I ran across at least twice that many. Eating lunch, I overheard pieces of a conversation: I can’t believe Steven Soderbergh directed that movie… it just seems so out of character for him, you know? I just sat there with my mouth open in shock. Hearing a mass of Americans talk about regular American stuff with each other was really weird for some reason. I suppose I’ve just gotten so used to not being able to understand what anyone is saying that it has become normal for me. All over town, it was the same story: You should buy that scarf here, honey, it’ll be a lot cheaper than back in Boulder. Boulder? As in… Boulder, Colorado? I don’t know what it is about Dharamsala, but it brings us Americans in droves.

I’ve been here for a couple of days now, and I am absolutely overwhelmed by the staggering amount of stuff there is to do here, mostly revolving around Tibetan culture. McLeod Ganj is the main Tibetan stronghold outside of Tibet, and the relatively small town is mostly Tibetan despite being in India. Movie houses around town screen movies about Tibet along with a handful of Hollywood blockbusters, you can sign up to learn the Tibetan language, get schooled in the basics of Tibetan massage, and more. I’m in the middle of a three-day Tibetan cooking class along with a couple of other foreigners, which has been fantastic. So far, we’ve had a day learning the ins and outs of making different types of momos (steamed dumplings) and a day making variations on bread. Tomorrow we’ll tackle a few different recipes of soup.



Yesterday, I paid a visit to the main Buddhist temple in town, located just a few steps away from the Dalai Lama’s residence, where he lives when he’s not on his regular speaking tours across the world. The temple serves as the main spiritual center for Tibetan refugees, who are forbidden by the Chinese to make the trip into Tibet to the Johkang Temple in Lhasa. The temple complex and foreign tourists alike are overwhelmed by the loud Indian visitors, who unfortunately seem to come to the temple just to get pictures with foreigners and practice their English. Here’s the first of many groups of people that took pictures of me — I know it’s really hard to distinguish me from the group so I’ll give you a hint: I’m the white one in the middle.



The other night, I went to a coffee shop to listen to a Tibetan refugee talk about the horrific ordeal he has been through in Chinese-occupied Tibet. When he was eighteen, he served as a monk in a monastery which was taken over by the Chinese, who imposed a strong set of rules on the monks so that the monastery would be run in harmony with Chinese politics. At risk to their own lives, he and three of his friends decided to rebel by putting up posters around town denouncing the Chinese occupation. They immediately fled the towns and lived in hiding for almost twenty days before they were captured and imprisoned. After three years and two different prisons where he sat in solitary confinement, he was transferred to a work camp where he was forced to work long hours inside a dangerous mine. After only a few months, he was horribly injured by a piece of machinery inside the mine; both of his legs were broken along with one arm, so he was taken to a Chinese hospital where they quickly declared that his legs must be amputated. Thankfully, he was granted the request to be transferred to a Tibetan hospital where he slowly got better, legs and all, over the course of almost two years. As he recovered, there was pressure from the Chinese for him to go back to the work camp. With the help of an old teacher, his doctor, and his sister, he was somehow able to escape Tibet and flee into India. He made his way to Dharamsala where he has been living for years as a refugee, but is trying hard to get Indian citizenship in hopes that he will be able to return to Tibet to visit his family and friends. Visiting is still a risky proposition, because he stands the chance of being imprisoned again for his old crimes, but he thinks that the Indian government will protect him from the Chinese.

It was a pretty heartbreaking story, and unfortunately, I’m sure ones like it could be told by many other people in town, and in other refugee communities in India, Nepal and other parts of the world. Even more shocking is that these horrific events are still happening. Just yesterday, a group of 42 Tibetans trying to flee into India over a mountain pass were gunned down by the Chinese military, killing a nun and a young girl and injuring many. The only reason word got out that this happened was because some western trekkers happened to be on the same mountain pass and caught the whole thing on video and in pictures. Since China’s government highly censors media and there is no free press, people living in Tibet and the rest of China will likely never hear about it ever happening.

Despite a decent amount of international pressure, Tibet remains under strict Chinese control. Although I’m only recently aware of all of these issues, it seems clear to me that the Tibetans have one big shot at gaining a truly autonomous province: the 2008 Olympics in Beijing. At no other time in the history of China will there be more foreign press in Beijing, and it seems to me that if enough people made enough noise, something substantial could be done about the Tibet situation, among other things. Although my brother would probably have a lot more insight into whether or not pushing China to change is completely idealistic (care to comment Bill?), it seems like if they ever would change it would be based on a huge amount of international pressure and potential national embarrassment. Here are two Tibet-related websites that you could check out if you’re interested in learning more or taking action:

International Campaign for Tibet

2008: Free Tibet

I’m planning to hang out in Dharamsala for a few more days because there’s so much to do, then I’m headed for Armitsar, located a few miles from the India-Pakistan border. Then I’ll make my way down to the desert towns of the Rajasthan state where I’ll spend about a month before flying to Thailand to meet up with my friend Gerni, who I’m quite happy to say will be traveling with me for a few months.

Also, while I was in Manali, I made it to Day 100 of my trip, which means that I still have three-quarters of my trip to go — a simultaneously scary and exciting thought. I was going to write a big Day 100 post with all of my thoughts and feelings so far, but I was far too busy traveling and the moment passed. I’ll just give you a quick and shallow summary of thoughts, realizations, and things I miss:

I really miss my friends — there’s nobody on earth like ‘em.

I can spend an unbelievable amount of time alone without getting bored.

I am hopelessly addicted to the Internet.

Time goes by really slowly when you travel. Austin told me it seemed like just yesterday when I left. For me it seems like its already been a year.

With that in mind: thirteen months is a reeeeally long time. Holy crap.

Good coffee tastes even better when it only comes around once a month.

People in Asia seem to have only heard of California, Florida and New York. It’s a strange feeling hearing myself describe Colorado as being “in between California and Florida.”

Beds in Asia are hard. So are pillows.

America is designed in ways I never realized before. Almost every object you touch in America has been considered and coordinated by someone. Every day, I have thoughts like, there’s something screwed up about this bus, or this sidewalk is really weird for some reason that I never had before in America.

Food I miss: Taco Bell, sushi, Dr Pepper, pumpkin pie, and fresh cracked pepper.

Books I’ve read so far: Platform, Peace like a River, White Teeth, Holy Cow: An Indian Adventure, Are You Experienced?, Cloud Atlas, Blink. White Teeth and Cloud Atlas are my favorites so far.

The album I’ve listened to the by far more than any other is Modest Mouse - Building Nothing out of Something. Other bands in heavy rotation: The Books, Black Eyes, Dave Brubek Quartet, Green Fuse, Tilly and the Wall, Lightning Bolt, Humble Ary, Mates of State, MIA, and Pearl Jam.

Well folks, that about wraps it up. Thanks for reading this absurdly long post. More than four pages in Microsoft Word — a new record!

Ryan!

Photos uploaded: I’m totally caught up with my photos, so go check em out! There are new photos from my trek in Nepal, Chitwan National Park, Delhi, Chandigarh, Shimla, Manali and even a few from here in Dharamsala. I’ll try to upload more videos from the last month, but for now I’m just going to focus on keeping everything up to date.

A day in Le Corbusier's Utopia

After I walked home from the internet place last time I updated, I was frustrated that I wasn’t able to accurately describe the chaos of Delhi. Then I remembered: You have a video camera in your pocket, idiot! Here’s the area near my hotel — it gets even more intense than this once you add vehicles and animals into the mix:



The following morning, I jumped on a super-comfortable air-conditioned train headed north to Chandigarh the capital of the state of Punjab. The city is unlike any other in India: it is the planned vision of one man, and is considered to be the greenest, cleanest, and most orderly city in the country.

First, a little history. When India gained independence from Britain in 1947, the massive country was partitioned into three pieces based largely on religious divides within the country. The main Muslim area to the northwest was named Pakistan, the middle Hindu area remained India, and the Muslim area to the northeast became Bangladesh. The majority of the state of Punjab — mostly Hindu and Sikh — remained in India, but its capital Lahore became a part of Pakistan. Punjab was without a capital, and someone along the way decided that the state should just create a new city from scratch. After a long search for architects and planners, Punjab settled on famed Swiss-born French architect Le Corbusier to plan and design a modern metropolis. Only somewhat familiar with Le Corbusier, and with a growing interest in urban planning, I decided to make the trip to Chandigarh to learn more.

Side note: My brother Bill emailed me about the above history being partially incorrect, especially with regard to the formation of Bangladesh. But hey, what did you expect from someone who majored in design rather than history?

I arrived in the train station and was taken by auto-rickshaw through along Corbusier’s organized and orderly roads to Sector 17, the main part of town, where I got dropped off at the hectic bus station. Along the way I saw street after street of what looked to me like uninspired strip malls. Sure, there were a few really nice spots, but overall it looked a lot more like a sketchy area in LA than it did like Utopia. Crumbling utilitarian concrete structures filled every block — parts even reminded me of the war torn buildings I saw a few years ago in post-war Bosnia. There was no war here, however: just the remains of one man’s attempt at building a utopian city, fifty years later. Although I was determined to keep an open mind, one thought kept passing through my mind: holy crap, Le Corbusier was an idiot.



To try to make sense of this strange place, I walked to the nearby City Museum which carefully documents the planning and realization of Chandigarh all the way from India’s independence to present day. I spent several hours in the small museum poring over each display, trying to understand why such a smart architect would have intentionally created such a city. The more I explored the museum, the more I appreciated what Corbu was trying to accomplish. He planned residential areas close to restaurants and retail, but made sure to keep a buffer between high traffic streets and people’s homes. Schools, churches and parks were built within each half-mile sector so that each sector would become its own walkable neighborhood. Many of his ideas sounded strikingly similar to theories behind contemporary mixed-use town planning found in places like Belmar, Bradburn and Stapleton back in Denver. So what went wrong in Chandigarh? I headed back out into the city to try and find out.

I walked through Corbusier’s “Leisure Valley,” a pleasant park that stretches through the city on my way to the Corbu-designed government buildings in Sector 1. When I reached the area, I was again shocked by the unfortunately designed structures I found. A founder of the Purism movement, Le Corbusier believed that disguising or decorating a building’s structure — the concrete, brick and glass — takes away from the building’s purity. He also designed everything to be in harmony with the golden ratio, considered to be proportionately ideal. As a result, Corbusier only built “pure” buildings: huge perfectly-proportioned blocks of concrete. While I value the ideas behind his buildings and he was certainly part of an important era in the history of architecture, I think his buildings ultimately fail to connect and resonate with regular people, myself included.



I was getting sick of all the concrete and ghost-town plazas, so my next stop took me a few blocks away to another surreal place, again created by the vision and creativity a single person: Chandigarh’s Fantasy Rock Garden, created over thirty years by a local road inspector named Nek Chand. The surreal and whimsical place is full of pouring waterfalls, tiny weaving passageways, and hundreds of quirky sculptures made largely out of trash: broken dishes, discarded bracelets, and plastic electrical parts. The enormous place serves as a monument to Nek Chand’s incredible imagination, inspiring kids and adults alike to laugh and point with amazement as they wander the weird and wonderful place. There’s a shot of one of the bracelet sculptures below, but many more from other people here.



I headed over to the nearby Corbusier-made lake as night fell, where the whole town gathers every night for food, fun and people watching. This was the first truly successful Corbusier-creation I had seen yet — the small plaza was packed and everyone was having a great time.



I met a few groups of funny Indian guys who rattled off question after question to me about my life in America. Besides the standard two questions (Are you married? Do you have a girlfriend?), one guy asked me what I thought was the single biggest difference between America and India. I stupidly said something about America being really clean compared to India, which, although true, was unintentionally offensive. The more I thought about it, the biggest difference I’ve seen revolves around gender. Men here seem to exclusively associate with other men, and women with women, unless a marriage is involved. The guys found it completely unfathomable that I could possibly have friends that are girls — the concept is seriously alien to them. Marriages here are still mostly arranged by parents, but there is a shocking western trend coming into India: “love marriages.” While we walked along the lake, one guy whispered, look, there’s some western culture!, pointing to a scandalous couple making out behind a tree. Meanwhile, guys are constantly showing affection for each other publicly — it is normal here for guys to have their arms around each other or hold hands while they walk. After answering all the guys questions, I went with a few of them to one of their favorite fast food places where they stuffed me full of cheese dosa, sort of like a crepe or thin pancake. Here are all of the guys hanging out near the lake:



The next morning I walked around Sector 22 where my hotel was located, trying to get one last feel for Le Corbusier’s vision. Wandering through the residential area and seeing the built-in schools, parks and churches, it was clear to me that his ideas weren’t all bad. In my view, the biggest of Le Corbusier’s failures is the lack of architectural diversity and interest throughout the city. If he had gathered a group of fellow architects and had them each create five residences for his new city, then distributed each design around, the whole thing might have turned out better. If Corbu’s city was based upon the needs of people, he surely should have understood the basic idea that people are all different. Shouldn’t the architecture reflect that same diversity? But in the end, so long as I kept my eyes squinted a little bit, the city actually seemed like a fairly pleasant place to live. Indian people must agree: Chandigarh is considered to be one of the most posh and upscale cities in the country. I would love to return to the city in thirty years and see how Corbu’s city evolves along with India’s rise to superpower status in the world.

I’m currently in Shimla, an wonderful old British-era hill station, which has a very European feel and is apparently quite popular with Indians on their honeymoon. My quirky hotel room here looks like the smallest cabin inside an Eastern European cruise ship, or as my guidebook describes it, concrete bunker chic. I’ve spent the last day wandering around Shimla’s mock-Tudor architecture, and enjoying the people watching on the main pedestrian mall. I’ll write a bit more on Shimla later, but for now thanks for reading.

Ryan!

Also, a quick side note: Congratulations to my home city of Denver for being bold enough to complete Daniel Libeskind’s controversial design for the new wing of the Denver Art Museum, which opened to the public while I was in Chandigarh. I personally love it and some people hate it, but regardless of whether the building is ultimately “good” or “bad,” it seems clear to me now that more architectural diversity around town is almost always a good thing.

I don't think you're ready for this Delhi

I awoke in Pokhara early in the morning and heaved my backpack on the top of the bus bound for Chitwan National Park, near the border with India. Five hours later I arrived in Sauraha, the town next to the park, where I met a guy from a nearby guesthouse who gave me a lift into town in the back of his jeep.

It was the day of the big festival in Nepal, and there were a lot of goats tied up around town awaiting their doomed fate. I asked the guys at my guesthouse if they were planning on sacrificing a goat today, and they told me it was just about to happen, and I could watch if I wanted. Curiosity struck, and I headed behind the hotel to see the action. The goat was tied up and a couple of guys were preparing tables and getting ready for the slaughter. My internal monologue: So I wonder where they're going to do it? It looks like maybe they'll put him on the table over there and hold him down or something. Man, look at the size of the blade on that… THWHACK! Without the fanfare or ritualistic celebration that I had pictured, the goat was cut into two parts, and both were spurting blood and jiggling around on the ground. In case you're squeamish I'll spare you with pictures from the carnage, but here’s the little guy eating his last supper.



The owner of my guesthouse invited me to a soccer game later in the day, which was a ton of fun despite the fact that soccer is a boring waste of time. The opposing team and all of their fans were driven in from a nearby town on jam-packed flatbed attached to the back of a tractor, and the rivalry seemed fierce. A crazy town-on-town brawl broke out near the end, and the game resulted in sudden-death penalty kicks. My team pulled through with a win, and I celebrated with my friend and a couple of players at a local restaurant eating momos (Tibetan dumpling), a post-game tradition. After that, we all went back to the guesthouse for dinner where we were served delicious spiced meat. Delicious, spiced, goat meat.

The next day I ventured into Chitwan National Park in style: riding atop an enormous elephant. The elephant ride was surprisingly great despite its popularity with travelers — we were able to venture off deep into the woods where we saw a rhino, deer, various tropical birds, and more. I really liked my elephant because he constantly kept knocking down trees and wreaking havoc on anything around him, which made the trip even more exciting. At the end of the ride, we made a scene as we trampled through the streets of Sauraha atop the elephant where we got dropped off to watch the elephants bathe.




Later in the day, I joined two guides and two Nepalese travelers and went on a canoe ride down the river where we entered the jungle hoping to see some more wildlife. We saw a crocodile, monkeys, more deer and birds, but didn't get lucky enough to see one of the parks 40 elusive tigers. The two-hour walk through the jungle was like being a kid all over again — our goofy khaki-wearing guides would signal for us to stop and we'd crouch down quietly looking for signs of wildlife. The guides were really knowledgeable, and would excitedly point out different species, plants, and animal tracks along the way. Overall, it made for a really enjoyable little adventure.

I spent another day in laid-back Sauraha, reading, eating, walking around town and enjoying the spectacular sunsets over the river. This was the calm before the storm, so to speak, as I was headed for the chaos of India the following morning.



Another early morning brought me to the travel office where I got in the back of a horse-drawn cart headed for the bus station. The horse seemed unusually pissed off, and kept jumping up and kicking the cart. I asked the driver why his horse was so angry, and he replied, "This horse is magic horse!" I figured it was just lost in translation, so I decided to quit asking questions. A few minutes later, the horse smacked hard into the side a moving bus as we went through an intersection. I jumped out of the cart and saw the horse lying on the ground, and I was certain it was dead or at least horribly injured. To my surprise, the crazy horse got right back up, shook off the pain, and we kept on going to the bus station. Magic horse indeed.

After a couple of hours, my bus ride from Sauraha brought me to the border town Sunauli where I breezed through customs and headed into India for the first time. The town was interesting because both the Nepali and Indian sides look similar, except the Indian side looks like it just got hit by a tornado and nobody seems to have noticed. I haggled for a cheap bus to Ghorakpur, the closest city on the main train line where I arrived as the sun went down. I pushed my way through the trash, touts and lepers outside the station and managed to get a ticket on the night train from Ghorakpur to Delhi. Unfortunately, I could only secure a ticket for second class which doesn't even guarantee you a seat, only a spot on the 16-hour train, meaning I could potentially be standing up overnight on a gross train. I grabbed dinner in the filthy, seedy area across from the train station where I met a cool Polish couple in the same predicament, and we banded together hoping to get a spot in the sleeper car.

The train pulled into the station and our hearts sunk as we saw the whole thing was completely packed to the brim. We pushed through the crowd, stepped over bodies laying in every square inch of the train, and quickly walked through the sleeper class trying to find an empty bed. Somehow, we found three beds, but we weren't sure if they were reserved or not. The Indians in the car told us to wait until the train guy came around, so we did. More than two hours later, he arrived and informed us that these beds were reserved for someone else. Heartbroken, it looked like we would spend the night standing up. The train man told me to sit next to him, and he told me that there was a chance that we could get the beds. "Beds are 150 rupees extra, plus... baksheesh," he said quietly. I've never been to India before, but I could get the gist of what he meant. We bribed the guy with a few extra dollars, and he let us have the beds for the night. In sleeper class, there is no air conditioning, no bedding, and no place to put your bags, so you just have to keep them in the tiny bed with you and try to use them as a pillow. It made for a rough night's sleep, but it's much better than standing the whole night, that's for sure. Here are my first three photos of India: the border town, the disgusting train station urinals, and the station’s waiting area. Not off to a great start.





The next morning we arrived in Old Delhi where we haggled for an auto-rickshaw to take us to New Delhi, a short distance away. We battled through the absolutely insane streets pushing past mooing cows, rickety rickshaws, daring jaywalkers, relentless beggars, piles of trash, horse-drawn carts and more, all swirling around in every direction. I’ve seen some pretty crazy traffic in my travels, but that ride was by far the most insane traffic I’ve ever seen. We arrived in the Main Bazaar, a somewhat crappy traveler slum where everyone (myself included) seems to end up. I booked a room on the fourth floor of a dirty budget hotel, which seems to be all there is in Delhi if you don’t want to shell out a ton of money. Picture the room that Tom Hanks got in the movie Big the first day that he was an adult — you know, the room where he cried himself to sleep.

I’ve spent my last couple of days in Delhi getting used to the chaos and doing a fair bit of sightseeing. I visited the National Museum which was good despite desperately needing some maintenance and a fresh coat of paint — my favorite sections were the delicate Indian miniature paintings, the historical arms and armor, and small Pre-Columbian exhibit. Next, I was whisked off in a 3-wheeled auto-rickshaw to the Tombs of Safdarjang and Humayun which were both architecturally interesting, particularly the latter, which was designed and constructed during the same movement as the Taj Mahal, just a few hundred years earlier.



After stopping off at McDonald’s for a curry-flavored Chicken Maharaja Mac, I headed to South Delhi to see one of the world’s few Baha’i temples. In my opinion, the Baha’i faith is one of the best organized religions on the planet — it places a lot of emphasis on equality, personal paths toward faith, elimination of prejudice, and world peace. The Baha’i temple in Delhi is famous for it’s stunning architecture: a gorgeous marble structure designed in the shape of a lotus blossom.



The rest of my time has been spent exploring the British colonial New Delhi, with its wide boulevards, European-style architecture, and swank boutiques and eateries. I have really enjoyed wandering around New Delhi, check out the shops and restaurants, and getting a feel for modern India. The contrast between India’s social elite and its staggering poverty are pretty amazing, and since I’ve only been here for a few days it’s hard to really grasp. I’m trying to learn as much about it as I can, so I’ll keep you posted in future updates as I explore the country.

It’s too hot for comfort here in Delhi, so I’m heading north tomorrow to cool off in the mountains for a few weeks to check out the sights before I make my way back down here to visit the colorful state of Rajasthan.

Ryan!

P.S. I hope someone picked up on my Destiny's Child reference in the headline of this post. I worked hard on that one. Also, I'm not totally up-to-date with photos, but I uploaded about a hundred from Kathmandu and my trek in Nepal, so take a look.