Category: Asia

When we arrived in Delhi from Bangalore on Monday we walked to our hotel and one thing I’m starting to realise is that the nicer hotels have better pillows. At the Holiday Inn at Delhi International Airport they have a pillow menu. They give you the option of soft or firm pillows, I picked firm and would have happily fought Mark for it but luckily they provided 2 of each. Pillows alone can change my entire mood. I had the best night’s sleep in Delhi and woke up nice and rejuvenated.

Before we came to India I always thought the Taj Mahal was in Delhi, but it’s not. It’s about 4 hours away in Agra, so we hired a driver who arrived Tuesday morning and we left in the morning and arrived in Agra at 12.00pm.

Before going to see the Taj Mahal we went to see Agra Fort which was quite amazing, but the Taj Mahal is just something else. It was quite surreal standing there and looking at it. While standing there I thought “I’ve made it to the Taj Mahal”. I tried to stand there for as long as possible to take it all in but it was so hard with the amount of people there constantly knocking into me and pushing past. I don’t think I will ever go back but I’m glad I made it there in the first place. 

Yesterday we drove to Jaipur from Agra so that we could visit a few other sites and be even bigger tourists. Jantar Mantar was one of the sites we went to and it was quite amazing. It’s the Unesco historical Astronomical Observatory in Jaipur. It has a range of different instruments used to measure the heavens. 

Later last night on our way to dinner we met a lovely boy, Dhruva who helped us explain to the tuk-tuk driver where we needed to go. As we were hopping into the tuk-tuk he invited us back to his house for chai. After dinner we stopped back at his house and met his family and had chai thanks to our Indian sim card (It has made this trip so much easier).

His grandmother runs a school on the bottom level of the house free of charge to anyone who cannot afford to go to any of the other schools in town. His grandmother and grandfather had 3 sons who all live at the house with their wives and children. 20 people in total live there. They were so lovely and definitely improved our view on what India had been. After chai one of the granddaughters drew henna on my hands while Mark went up to the rooftop. We were meant to only stay for an hour but were there for 2.5 hours. They invited us back in the morning.

We went around there at 8am this morning so that they could show us how to fly kites – after all it was the first day of the Annual Kite Flying Tournament. It was quite amazing to watch and learn and see how something so simple can still carry on with all of the younger generations. After over staying again we raced back to our hotel to meet our driver. He took us to Amer Fort and then we stopped by the Kite Flying Tournament where the day was just beginning with performances by local artists. 

We are now in the car on our way back to Delhi. A part of me is looking forward to getting to Bangkok but after meeting Dhruva a part of me wants to stay in India a while longer. I think this may happen a fair bit on our trip…

Much love, B xxx

We arrived in Kochi, surprisingly only half an hour behind schedule, considering we were delayed by over 2 and a half hours. I didn’t sleep the best on the train which has so far been normal and ok. It doesn’t really bother me. What did grind my gears a bit this time was that before we had arrived I had a train worker grab at my foot and shake me. He wanted me to give back the sheets, pillow and blanket you get given on the train, so as I was slowly unwrapping myself from my cocoon sheet I realised he had already started to pull the train sheet out from underneath me. He meant business.

Before we left for our trip we did a quick last minute shop at Kathmandu. A spare of the moment purchase of 2 cotton sleeping bag liners have been the best thing we’ve had with us this trip. Not just because it means we can be covered in our own sheet and not the ones the trains give us (we make up the bed with them as a protection so that our sleeping bag liners don’t get dirty – you can laugh at us – I do) but it also means that when we go to a hotel and realise that there are no sheets or blankets for us we can use our own.

This happened to us last night as we were getting ready for bed. After we had packed our bags ready for an early car trip to the airport we realised there wasn’t anything to cover us while we slept. I didn’t think this would be a problem as it’s super hot in Fort Kochi anyway but while we were trying to get to sleep Mark got up to get his own sheet to protect himself from the mosquitos. I then got worried that Mark would be protected and then I would be left vulnerable to the mosquitos. So of course, I got up and got mine. I fell asleep soon after thanks to our sleeping bag liners.

Kochi was pretty laid back, we visited an old synagogue and old church while there and otherwise just walked around and chilled out. You can get good seafood in Kochi, so we tried to eat as much seafood as possible.

Mark noted, and commented a few times that the people in Kochi all looked like and acted like they were trying to out do each other. Below is his first input to the blog…

Everyone there is always trying to be more hardcore hippie than the previous. Every conversation we overheard or we were involved in was “I felt this” and “I feel that” “I believe this” “I believe in that”. And there we were watching stupid things on YouTube. Most of these people were mid to late 20 year old females who had broken up with their boyfriends and were now trying to ‘find themselves’ in the Spiritual land of India. Happy hunting lads.

We are at the airport now waiting for our flight to Bangalore- you can get 3o minutes free wifi if you’ve got an Indian mobile number. Luckily we bought a sim card back in Goa. One thing that surprised me about India was how terrible the internet is here. Finding half decent wifi makes us so happy now.

 

So our train from Goa to Kochi is delayed. We are not sure when it is arriving so we decided to speak to our Honcho about his life. As previously mentioned we are using Vodkatrain to help us get around India. One of the good things about using them is the Honcho they provide. A Honcho is a local, usually a similar age to us, that they employe as our tour guide. Normally there would be a group of us on this tour, however this time around it’s just me and Mark which for us is a bonus because we get a private tour at the cost of a budget group tour. It’s also been a good way to get to know our Honcho well and get a better understanding of Indian culture.

Our Honcho is Ashwini, also know as Ashu. He is 27 years old, studied Tourism at university and he absolutely loves his job. He currently lives in Delhi as this is where his work is based but he is originally from Sirmour Village in the north of India.

We’ve heard the words “family system” a lot from Ashu as he has been explaining what life in India is like. He comes from, what we see is a fairly strict family, and he has told us that because he is an only child it is his responsibility to support his parents as his father is due to retire in the next couple of weeks. He told us that in metropolitan cities children don’t always do this anymore, but for him it is something that he has to do.

His father’s retirement is happening soon and he said that they will have guests over to celebrate. “I spoke to my mother and she said that 2600 guests have been invited” at this, both Mark and I stopped and I actually said to Ashu “Do you mean 2-6-0-0 or 2-6-0?” he laughed and told me that no it was in fact 2600 people that had been invited. There would be only vegetarian food which is all Ashu and his family eat – a sweet rice dish for desert, rice, lentils and vegetables for the main. His family would also provide alcohol for the guests even though they themselves don’t drink. From this, Mark, being Mark, tried to calculate how much rice alone would be needed. His calculations worked out that if 2600 people went to the celebration and each person ate 300grams of rice they would need around 900kgs-1000kgs, taking into account that Ashu told us some people go up 3-4 times and that the rice is also needed for the desert. Ashu estimated the cost of the food alone would be 30,000Rupee(AUD$750) which is one month of his father’s salary before he retires. When he retires he will receive a pension because he worked for the government for over 40 years, this will be around 12,000Rupee (AUD$300) a month.

From this he explained to us that weddings were another huge celebration where a similar number of people would be invited, if not more, and it was compulsory that there be a representative from each family, that was invited, to attend the wedding. As gifts go, he said that people would give money and there would be someone (usually an elder) there to record the gift and gift giver in a book. Ashu said that when it came time to attend a wedding of one of the guests they would open up the book to see how much money they gave and give at least the same, if not more.

He is not married and does not have a girlfriend as his parents will choose a wife for him. He expects he will be getting married in the next year or so. His parents asked him what he wanted most in a wife and they will go out and find someone they feel is appropriate. It’s not as simple as them picking a wife and getting married. Once the bride and groom have been agreed upon by both sets of parents they go to visit their priest who analyses their horoscopes. There are 36 points (or topics) which both the bride and groom’s horoscopes are scored on. They need to get a minimum of 21 to match for the marriage to go ahead. If the score falls below 21 they will not get married. So after everything, it comes down to your horoscope.

We learnt that a lot of the country still follows very rich traditions in their daily lives, however across the major cities these traditions are softer and people are slowly taking on customs from western culture.

Overall, speaking to Ashu has opened our eyes to just how different life here in India is compared to Australia. Especially when he asks us about what we do and our response is “Whatever makes us happy”. What we’ve learnt from Ashu is, I believe, his point of view of India and his take on India, drawing from his family, his traditions and his education. It has been fascinating speaking to him, but hopefully before we leave India we will be able to get some other perspectives on life here. 

 

It is so nice to have clean clothes. Back in Aurangabad I had hand washed some clothes in the sink so I was looking forward to having a few days somewhere where we could go get our clothes washed. Goa was this place.

Everyday on our way to the beach we would walk through a curve in the road which had washing lines everywhere with clean clothes on them to dry. We dropped our things off here when we arrived in Goa and picked them up this afternoon.

If you are in Candolim, Goa I would recommend going to see Ashu. He is a lovely man that charges what we thought was a minimal amount to wash and dry your clothes. 20Rupee for large items (AUD$0.50) and 10Rupee for small items (AUD$0.25).

If in Candolim, you need to be on Fort Aguada Road and turn up onto Bypass to Siquirem, if you keep walking up this road you can’t miss the washing lines – you can see them from down the road.

Our clothes were neatly folded in a pile when we walked into his workshop and he picked up our clothes so delicately it was as if he was picking up a baby. We happily paid him 300Rupee and took this photo of him which he was happy and super proud to stand for.

it’s the simple things…. B xx

Ahh Goa. How I love you.

The train ride from Mumbai to Goa was pretty uneventful. I only slept about 3 hours because one of the downsides to being in a space that contains over 50 beds is that some people snore, and some people snore really loud. The train was delayed by 2 hours but apparently that’s not uncommon. A plus of getting on in Mumbai is that it’s the first point of call for that particular line and because it’s first point of the train gets cleaned. When we got on it smelt of bleach and disinfectant. I loved it.

Goa is just what we wanted. Quiet place to sit on the beach, eat, drink and tan. It’s what we have been doing the past few days. We’ve found a nice little beach shack called ‘Sun and Sand’ and as we walk in everyday they say “Hello Mark” and his reply is the typical Aussie “Hey Mate” they then laugh and bring us a menu. For Christmas Mark got a Aerobie frisbee which has kept us entertained every afternoon.

 

One of the things we’ve noticed about Goa is the local dogs. They have been everywhere we’ve stopped in India but have never paid any attention to people. It’s different here in Goa, they follow you here and bark at you and growl. The other night as we were walking back from dinner this cute little dog started following us which was ok because it was cute but then it started to attract the attention of the other dogs. I didn’t like this as all I could think of was rabies. I had my rabies shots back home but was trying to remember what the doctor told us if we ever got bit. And then of course my mind was running… “Where was the hospital here, was it clean?” “would they use clean needles to give me a shot or would I have to pay extra for that?” And then to bring me back from my paranoia a dog started growling and charging at us. I was glad to get back to our hotel without a trip to the hospital.

In other parts of India we didn’t really see any kids trying to sell us anything, they would ask for money but wouldn’t sell us anything. It’s different here. There are kids everywhere trying to sell you something. They walk around in groups mainly trying to sell jewellery. The youngest we’ve met is a 3 year old who seemed to only know the same sentences which he kept repeating but after a while I showed him how to take a selfie with my phone and he laughed and smiled and wanted more. He was acting just how a little kid should be and it was nice to see him smile.

It will be sad to leave here but we’ve got a little while left in India and we still haven’t made it to the Taj Mahal yet.

 

If only there was a fly on the wall to capture the moment we saw our beds on our train from Aurangabad to Mumbai. They were heaven in comparison to our previous train; 2 tier bunks instead of 3 tier, no one sitting on our beds and there was a curtain to close off our section with the walkway. Ahhh the small things. We both had the top bunks so made up our beds and laid awake waking for 2015 to turn into 2016. At midnight we whispered ‘Happy New Year’ to each other and went to bed- probably the most low key New Years we’ve ever had.

Arriving in Mumbai was pretty straight forward and we caught local and metro trains to get to our hotel. The local trains here in Mumbai are just like the ones you see in movies – people hanging out of the space where a door should be, and jumping out of the trains before it has come to a stop. It wasn’t unusual to look out and see people running along the platform so that they could jump on before others had a chance. It was all a race to get one of the few seats that are on each carriage. The crowds and heat on these trains were full on, I nearly fainted on one of them from the heat. Mark of course was fine, he’s like Ironman.

Our hotel was an hour out of the city centre and looked just like Delhi and Aurangabad (we were starting to get disappointed at this stage) but then we went into the city and it was just as we had imagined India to be. The architecture and history was amazing. The train station there is World Heritage Listed and you can see why!

We visited the Mumbai Museum which was good but when you’re on a backpackers budget it probably wasn’t worth the 400Rupee per person when we were more than happy to wander around the city and explore.

Today we got to have a sleep in and met our Honcho at 11am so he could take us to see the slums of Mumbai. He explained to us that in the last few years the Government has built housing for the people living in the slums. We didn’t take any photos of the people living there, just this sign showing where we were.
The slums were pretty full on but not as bad as I had thought. Before we got there I was picturing the slums in Slumdog Millionaire but it just wasn’t like that, or maybe it is as you go further in but that just wasn’t possible for us. We were able to walk around the outskirts with no issues, however as soon as we started walking through you could actually feel the change in the air. People stopped doing what they were doing as they saw us approach and it started to get eerily quiet the further in we walked. Some of the men along the road started talking and yelling to each other- we’re not sure what they said but our Honcho got really anxious and told us we had to leave.

Our next stop was Dhobi Ghat – the local washing centre. The photo below pretty much sums it up, although, you might not be able to see the man urinating in the water that is also used for washing, and the people bathing in that same water. It might explain why anything here that was once white now seems to have a brownish tinge to it.

We’re now back in Mumbai city at a restaurant waiting for our next train. We’ve got about 4 hours to go until we can board so we are going to go and search for a bar where Mark can have a beer. Something that is so simple back home is actually a bit of a task here in India.

B xx

When we arrived at the airport there was a suspicious looking Indian guy holding a sign with our names on it- this came as a surprise to us as we hadn’t organised transfers and what was more confusing was he was in the international terminal not on the outside. Not knowing what to do we went with him, he had our names on a sign after all. Turns out it is a service the Delhi Airport provides to those flying business or first class. He didn’t really do much but walk us through to our bags, something we could have done ourselves but afterwards we had to write a review about him. By this stage he was making me uncomfortable so we quickly wrote our reviews and left for the Metro.

The train was empty when we hopped on but soon filled up very quickly, mainly with men. Women in Delhi have access to a female only carriage on the Metro so that’s where I imagine the women were. I was the only female in our carriage and after a while found it was best to just keep looking down.

After 24 stops (not that I was counting or wishing it would go quicker) we got to Karol Bagh station, jumped in a tuktuk and got to our hotel. That night I slept with my money belt, passport and jewellery.

The next day we woke up and went for a walk and I felt slightly better than I did the night before but I still felt uneasy. We don’t normally use tour companies to travel but thought it would be a good idea in India. I’m glad we did and we booked through Vodkatrain. They provide a Honcho for your group and book your travel and accommodation for you, it’s really laid back but you have access to local help if you need it.

We met our Honcho after our walk and then made our way to the train station to get our overnight train to Aurangabad. The below photo is me before  we got on the train. I was looking forward to getting on there, settling in and relaxing in our cabin.

 

This photo below is what I first saw when I got on the train. It was nothing like the overnight trains we had been on before. Where were the cabins? Why were there so many people? Where was the attendant checking tickets? Why was it so dirty?

I was in complete shock and to make it worse we had to walk through the entire carriage to get to our seats at the end. AND THEN, once we got to our seats there was an entire family just sitting there. Apparently they weren’t due to get off the train yet so we had to share and wait until they got off. This happened, not at the next stop like they said but about 4 hours later.

Our Honcho told us not to eat any food that was being sold on the trains as the standards weren’t regulated and some people just got on the trains to sell food. There is what they call a ‘pantry cart’ on the train where they prepare food just for the train goers. We were told to not eat this food either as “there is all of the food and all of the rats in the cart”. Not that I needed much convincing to not eat from there, but this comment just set it in stone. Don’t eat the food.

We eventually managed to set up our beds and go to sleep, however in the middle of the night I needed to go to the toilet and I couldn’t hold on any longer (I had already been holding on for about 10 hours) but the train was moving so fast and it was so dirty in there I had to wake up Mark to come and help me. I just wanted to cry. The toilet was a hole in the floor with foot rests for you to squat over which is what I expected but what I wasn’t expecting was how dirty it actually was if you looked closely and by closely I mean by just allowing your eyes to adjust to the light. Mark had to hold me up while the train moved so I wouldn’t touch any of the walls or fall over in the disgusting mess around us… Safe to say there is no going back now, he is with me for life. Half a bottle of hand sanitiser later and I just wanted to get off the train.

Aurangabad so far hasn’t been too exciting. We went to visit Kailasa Temple which was cool – we got mobbed a lot though by school kids wanting photos. We were told that a lot of them had never seen a Westerner before. Right now though we are waiting to go see an imitation of the Taj Mahal before dinner and before we get on yet another overnight train, this time to Mumbai.