Various Chapters

Berlin 2011

2011-08-14T11:46:00.006-04:00

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It is interesting to see how my trips have evolved over the past few years. I started off traveling alone or with travel groups since I couldn’t find anyone who liked to travel like I did (active, adventure trips). That was 5 years ago. Germany was a major departure in my travel style. It was far less about seeing the place than about spending time with good friends. It was a very light itinerary and I had lots of company the whole time. So much so that I took off for a solitary trip to Salzsburg to maintain some semblance to how I used to travel.

The idea for Germany originated with a lovely Christmas postcard from Eva, one of my two favorite people from HBS PLD. The post card said “Germany wants to see you” and came with a repeated invitation from Eva to come visit. As a coincidence, Art of Living was hosting their 30 year anniversary in Berlin during July 4th weekend.

Lately I have become deeply involved with a campaign sponsored by Art of Living to promote meditation to New Yorkers called ‘I Meditate NY’. The ‘I Meditate NY’ contingent was traveling to Berlin for the World Culture Festival, complete with the American Flag and custom t-shirts made for the occasion.

70000 people were expected in the Olympic stadium where Hitler gave his marching orders to do what he did. Less than half showed up. It was raining and bitter cold the whole weekend! We braved the cold and wet, layered up in all that we were carrying plus ponchos to keep the wind out. It was nothing short of dedication that kept us there. More than the spectators, it is the performers that I admired. 2000 performers from Bulgaria led by Elitsa Todorva, Outlandish from Denmark, thousands from Argentinians with their famous yoga rave and tango, Swiss horns, Greeks, Germans, Chinese, Ballerinas from somewhere and so many others that I am forgetting. They all performed fabulously without exception in the cold rain. The ballet performers slipping every now and then, the tango pair that just gave up the concrete stage and took to the grass, they improvised where they had to but didn’t quit. Good for them!

While the day time was in the stadium, the first couple of evenings were spent in guru chasing (chasing Sri Sri , founder of Art of Living in hopes of spending time with him), something I still cant bring myself to do for more than a couple of hours, I easily give up. Oh well… By Sunday evening Eva had joined me (from Munich) for her first taste of an Art of Living satsang (spiritual music in a group setting). Crammed into a large hall, we spent a few hours sitting on concrete to listen to some divine music. She was polite about it, but perhaps it was a little too crazy for her!

Sunday night took Eva and I to the up and coming new East Berlin with its fancy restaurants and night life. Monday started with brunch at Literaturhaus restaurant. Eva, Poonam (from New York) and I then spent some time wandering around in museums and a boat ride on the Spree river. Poonam then went on to another satsang and guru chasing while Eva and I continued on.

I had already spent a few hours on Friday with Raisa, also from New York, wandering around Brandenburg gate all the way up to Potsdamer Platz and hence was a bit familiar with this part of town. We tried visiting Dali museum near Potsdamer Platz, but it was closing just as we got there. Eva made up the loss by buying me a catalog of his works at this museum. We visited Checkpoint Charlie and the little of the Wall that is left. What was even more amazing was to hear Eva’s stories of her experiences visiting East Berlin when the wall was still up!

Dinner was at the Lutter and Wegner restaurant where I finally stopped asking for tap water after being flat out refused (waiters at previous restaurants were perplexed at my request but would serve it after perhaps writing me off as an ignorant foreigner. Germans drink bottled water, usually carbonated). Interestingly several vendors came into the restaurant selling newspapers and books (apparently a common practice there). We also visited at Borchardt for an after dinner port; this is where the politicians, stars and other celebs come although we didn’t see any that night.

That was about all the time available with Berlin. There were several architectures, modern, communist and neo classical all to be found in one city. Food was good although Munich stands out better in memory for culinary experiences. Tuesday was to take Eva and I to Munich, which according to Muncheners is the center of the universe (or at least of Germany)!

Munich 2011

2011-08-14T11:44:00.007-04:00

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Munich started with a trip to the grocery store near Eva's where the sausage counter caught my attention. I had never had blood sausage thus far and upon some encouragement from Eva and her husband Johannes, I bought some. It was… ok. It may take some time to acquire a taste for the, er, blood taste! My buddy Daniel, classmate from UK, was to arrive that evening. Emmylou, also from PLD was to visit from Netherlands 2 days later (she was on her way to Paris for a weekend of champagne shopping along with a bridal party!). Eva’s sister Sophie was also going to join for a couple of days making us a party of 6 at full house.

That evening took us to Marian Platz and then onto Haufbrauhaus, perhaps the most popular beer garden for tourists and locals alike. The neighborhood felt European with cobblestone paths and street vendors selling paintings etc. I have to say the beauty of the neighborhood was rather marred by a Planet Hollywood right next door, why they would allow a place like that to open there is beyond me!

The idea of a beer garden is that there is a large outdoor seating and you can bring your own food and order something (most likely beer) from the restaurant. Beer was served in these massive mugs (should I call it a jug?) and I needed both hands to lift it. I barely finished half of the beer while Johannes gulped down two of those. Earlier in the evening I was introduced to Aperol which quickly became my favorite drink while on this trip. With a lovely orange color, it’s an Italian aperitif, less bitter than Campari and served as a spritz.

The next day Eva, Johannes, Daniel and I made a trip to Neuschwanstein Castle, inspiration for Disney’s magic kingdom, built by Ludwig the second back in the late 1800s. It was beautiful, perched amidst the hills, all by itself. It took about an hour to tour the unfinished castle. I bought some merchandise, chocolate and souvenirs. After the castle we drove a couple of miles to a pizza place from where we had a picture perfect view of the castle far away nestling in the hills. It looked like a drawing!

We went into the Olympic stadium, took the cable car up and meandered our way through the alps. We stopped by a flowing river and built cairns. All very leisurely. Dinner that night was at a Greek restaurant near Eva’s. The owner was rather generous with free uzo shots and food was great and plentiful!

Emmylou joined us the next day, she and Daniel had been put up at the same hotel close to where Eva lives. I felt rather privileged on being given Eva’s studio office as my independent apartment, rather luxurious! I like to believe I am special (and so lucky!).

I had promised to make Indian dinner for all and luckily met a woman in a bus who pointed me to an Indian grocery restaurant near Marian Platz. After a lazy morning doing our own thing, we all met up there in the afternoon, I tried the curry-wurst, sausage with curry powder sprinkled (unoriginal, but rather tasty). Munich was getting ready for the 2018 olympics decision and there was a huge stage ready to celebrate, we walked around to take it all in.

We went shopping in the market and the quest for chicken cut up in small pieces suitable for Indian curry began. Eva took us to a butcher where I took great pains to explain how small I wanted the pieces. Somehow he was not getting it and finally allowed me into the sanctum sanctorum (butcher table) to point out how I wanted pieces made. The only word spoken for a few minutes was ‘cut’, he did as I asked and we were both happy (at least I was)! Eva and the gang were, needless to say, amused. But rather pleased with the dinner when it was all done, I am told!

The next day was going to be another busy day with a trip to Tegernsee. Daniel was leaving us in the morning and it was going to be Eva, Emmylou, Sophie, Johannes and I. The train ride was about 2 hours and the lake was amazingly beautiful. It was very quite and serene, I was a little surprised to not see it over crowded like American beach towns tend to be in summer. Not that I was complaining! We took another boat tour and went into random shops to look at things.

My favorite part of the day was a trip up the hill to a restaurant known for its views. I forget the name of the place, but indeed it was breathtaking to look over the lake and town. Max Planck’s Schloss Ringberg (castle) was somewhere out there. We had meant to hike up, have a quick drink and come right back down, but landed up staying several hours. There was a wedding up there and several ladies were dressed in their best wedding Bavarian dresses! Johannes is a camera professional and had been giving me a few tips on how to take good pics, I experimented a little up there and rather like the results!

It was one of the most tiring but fulfilling days. I had one day left and somehow the thought of going to nearby Salzburg had been growing in my mind. So off I went the next day to the home of Mozart and location of Sound of Music.

Salzburg 2011

2011-08-14T11:41:00.004-04:00

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The first inkling of what kind of a place Salzburg was going to be was in the train. It was overflowing with tourists; backpackers, families, couples, singles, all of them! In all the places I have visited, the one thing I can always count on seeing are Chinese and Japanese traveling groups. Never have I not seen them and Germany was no different (wow, I am good at negatives, aren’t i?!) In case you didn't know, Salzburg is the hometown of Mozart and also where the Sound of Music was shot.

As promised by Eva, the first thing you notice in Salzburg is the never ending display of Mozartkugel, chocolates stamped with face of Mozart by Mirabell all over! You cant find these anywhere else (Mirabell has some sort of trademark on the name and/or shape of the chocolate). Salzburg was the picture perfect European town, the perfect tourist eye-candy. Shops, cafes, food carts, narrow cobblestone paths, street performers, river (Isar), cathedrals, people.. the works!

Salzburg is a hilly town (the hills are indeed alive!) and very reminiscent of San Francisco with homes built into the hills all the way up. You can hike for hours and visit churches etc. along the way. I was not in the mood for major physical effort and kept my hiking to a minimum. I had bought a ticket for a hop on hop off bus tour which I lost. Just as well, I decided to wander around and people watch instead. It was a pleasant surprise to run into Jaune Plensa’s face of a girl installed in the grounds of one of the churches, she is also to be found in Madison Square Park, NY this year.

For the evening I had purchased concert tickets to hear Mozart in the fort on top of a hill. That was quite an experience, the view of the entire surroundings was breathtaking, the hills, river, town, cathedral tops… I can easily recall it all into memory now! The concert itself lasted a little over 2 hours. Prosecco and Mirabell candy was available during breaks. They are quite a Prosecco loving country, I must say!

The day went by quickly and sure enough I was back in Germany, ready to say my goodbyes. The surprising thing is that although this was one of my most relaxing trip, I felt the most tired during and after my return. My conclusion is that I need some activity on my trips and good amount of ‘me’ time. As much as I love being with dear friends, no trip is complete without the right dose of solitude spent only in company of the place that I am visiting.

I bought some white sausage from the airport and after much debate with myself did not buy any more alcohol (in Salzburg I had already bought Dom Perignon for Eva and Johannes and a liquor for a friend back home)

And that was that!

Japan begins with Tokyo

2011-02-06T09:11:00.002-05:00

Pictures are here.

Japan was not on my list of immediate places to travel to in 2010. And yet, it so happened that I landed up there at the height of cherry blossom season with friends Eugene and Anu. Eugene and I were part of the hiking group NZ trip last year and Anu and I had talked of taking a trip couple of times but it didn’t happen until Japan.

This was the first time I spent as much time as I did planning a trip (I usually prefer to pay others to do all the planning work!). Hotels were mostly my responsibility and I had some trouble finding a place in Kyoto. We were going to arrive in Kyoto on a Sunday when everybody in Japan and the world who could afford it, would be there to see the cherry blossoms. Anyway, it all worked out. When I reached out to friends for advice on what to do and where to stay, I was surprised to see how many people have visited Japan (often for business). Either Japan is more popular than I thought or my network has grown bigger than it used to be!

Couple of must do things on my list were dress up as geisha, see kabuki (Japanese theatre) and experience a stay at the capsule and ryokan hotels, both of which are Japanese novelties. Eugene and Anu had much bigger must see lists, they were the experts on the shrines and temples we simply had to visit.

We landed on April 1 which happened to be Anu’s birthday. We had originally planned to have a big birthday dinner and all that, but we never got around to finding a place in advance. Anu is vegetarian and I was telling her of the Indian restaurants I had heard of but which we were not going to visit because we were NOT going to Japan to visit Indian restaurants. What do you know, as we walked around in Ginza neighborhood, where we were staying, trying to figure out from (all Japanese) signs if there was a place serving any veg food at all, we landed up at an Indian restaurant! They had TV screens playing hindi movie song videos from the 90s and we started educating Eugene all about Bollywood of the 90s (he was polite in displaying interest).

We were quite tired and after a fruitless conversation with the English challenged Japanese-Thai-Vietnamese-Indian mixed origin waiter to determine if we could go somewhere else to hang out for fun, we called it a night. The next morning we were to meet Minako, a friend of Eugene’s, who was going to show us around Tokyo.

We started the day early with a 6am visit to the famed Tokyo fish market, one of the largest wholesale fish markets in the world. We got off at Tsukiji metro station and walked past several shops fully open for business with tempting sushi on display. The fish market was surprisingly low on fish-smell. Wet floors, lots of little little motor trucks buzzing around and seafood of every imaginable kind (huge and tiny) all over the place. There is a giant tuna auction at 5am which is now closed to tourists because they apparently got in the way. Anu got shooed away when she almost entered the sacred precincts of a stall trying to get a shot of the guy cutting the fish with a very long knife. I picked up some ikura (small orange salmon eggs) on my way out and ate it later, it was far more dense than the one in American and less salty.

We met Minako at our hotel after breakfast and went on to Edo museum with impressive exhibitions depicting the lives of the shoguns, the daimyo (feudal lords) , samurai, the complex class system of the retainers and so on. There were row houses mimicking the real ones that the lower class folks lived in (all of 10sq m!) There was a replica of kabuki theatre with a video that showed the behind-the-scenes action. After over an hour, we moved on Ueno park to see the sakura, Ueno park has a lovely walking path lined with cherry blossom trees. A few street vendors were selling food. We went up a small shrine where a couple of guys dressed in monk like garb played a lovely flute. That was where I had my first taste of takoyaki, the most common street food I was to find in Japan. It is basically fried octopus dumplings served in a box topped with okonomiyaki sauce, mayo (no idea why it needs mayo) and fish flakes. Its cheap, easy to eat hot food on the go.

We had bought a 7 day JR pass in the US that allows unlimited train travel on the JR and Shinkansen (bullet train) anywhere in the country. We spent, what seemed like, forever in a booking office reserving seats for the various train trips we were going to take. You cant reserve seats in the US and it better to reserve seats in advance even though all trains have a couple of unreserved cars (first come first served seating). We would give our requirements to Minako and she would chat with the agent for what seemed like 5 min or so, she would turn around and translate everything that had been said in 20 seconds! I suspect most of the conversation between them was apologies and polite nothings.

When we were done, we went to the Imperial palace which was closed (check hours for all shrines, temples, museums and palaces before visiting since they all vary). We went onto Meiji shrine where we saw a Shinto wedding photo session in progress. The photographers were such perfectionists, fixing every hair and fold of clothing in its place. And then there was a little wind upsetting the bride’s veil and it started all over again. We moved on. This shrine is where I learned the Shinto form of prayer. You bow a couple of times, thrown some money in receptacle, clap twice (attract the attention of the gods?) and then bow again a couple of times. I never got the exact number of bows right, but you get the general idea.

Sometime during the late afternoon. we went to Tokyo tower, took the elevator up to (cant remember which) floor and saw the 360 view (including the Zoji temple nearby). I find myself not very impressed with tall buildings anymore and this one is definitely not all that, but nonetheless, the tower looked pretty as it was lit up after dark (we took some shots of the lit up tower serving as the backdrop to the Zoji temple). In general, the tower is worth a miss.

On the agenda was also Kabuki Theatre in Ginza district. Of all Japanese theatre that I researched (Noh, Bunraku) , this had seemed the most attractive option. We went to kabuki-za theatre which is about to close down for renovations and is the only place in town with English ear phones. The line was quite long, maybe 60-70 people deep. The show goes on all day from 11am till 9pm , but you can buy tickets for one act if you stand in line couple of hours before the act begins. We did our duty and stood in line and imagine our disappointment when they called sold out just as it was our turn!! Bummer!! Would we really not get to see kabuki on this trip?

We kept walking around Ginza, which is basically NY Times Square multiplied by 10. Glitzy stores and buildings, busy and very active. We went to a soba restaurant for dinner, our feet by now felt like lead. Minako left us in the hands of a non-English speaking wait staff after translating our orders. We were the last ones to eat there at around 9pm and the waitress told us as apologetically in Japanese (that Eugene somehow figured out) that they were now taking last orders.

The next day took would take us to Mt Fuji/Hakone, we left Tokyo feeling like we were not quite done with it. Something to think about in the coming days.

Mt Fuji/Hakone

2010-05-22T15:25:00.011-04:00

Pictures are here

We took the Odakyu line from Shinjuku station. Shinjuku is a huge station in Tokyo and we thought it would take us a long time to find our platform, but we found it quickly enough and had time to spare. Eugene and Anu were not quite getting along since each had ideas on what to do and see and in what order. We ogled at food and sweet displays in windows for a bit. Our reasons for visiting Mt Fuji area were multifold. First, Mt Fuji ofcourse. Second that area is known for its onsen (hot springs bath) and it is close to Tokyo. I had booked us a traditional ryokan (Japanese guesthouse) which are known for their traditional stays, hospitality and Japanese meals for dinner and breakfast.

Though I had written in my reservation form that one of us was a vegetarian, they didn’t get the message. At check in time, Anu embarked upon a conversation with the manager about being a vegetarian. After a few minutes he got what 'vegetarian' meant (no meat, no fish, no chicken) and then he started explaining things to Anu. What it was I don’t know to this day. When Anu didn’t understand what he was saying in return, he was soon drawing things (presumably food options) on paper. I asked if it was mushroom, he said no. After several minutes of back and forth, fluent and rapid conversing (Anu in English and the guy in Japanese with neither party really understanding the other but not giving up on talking either), Anu made peace with the understanding that he was saying she can put the fish aside and give to her friends and she would get extra veg stuff. At dinner she was indeed served differently, she got crabs and clams where we got none! How do you say ‘no shellfish’ in Japanese? I think that’s when Anu started adding ‘no sea’ in her explanation of what is vegetarian. Eugene and I were not complaining, we shared the crab and clams. Anu didn’t quite sleep hungry since there were several other small dishes (including awesome tofu) that were good enough. Anyway, it was to be the single best vegetarian meal for days to come!

There was more fun to be had. Anu then asked the lady serving us for a fork. She did not understand. Hand gestures and more repeated “fork, knife” followed. She finally got it and just cracked up. She was thoroughly amused that someone would ask for a ‘foku’! When asked for foku again the next morning at breakfast, she positively lost it laughing and giggling uncontrollably. She probably told the tale for days! I must say for a chopstick-challenged, foku-using, no meat, no fish, no sea traveler, Anu was a bold one in Japan!

Before I forget, there was a cute printed welcome note on the table (repeated verbatim here) “Ms Uppal Jinny. Welcome I enjoy a hot spring and Japanese foods, and I am relaxed, and please spend it.’ Yes, me too and I will be sure to spend it! Other English signs all over were equally hilarious. We were to see may such cute and funny signs in many hotel rooms At least they try!

The rooms were small, tidy and organized with tatami mattresses to sleep on. There was green tea, flask for hot water and cups, a wrapped sweet (usually mochi), a yukata (cotton kimono) with obi (sash), individually wrapped toothbrush with the smallest brush head I have ever seen, a tiny tube of paste, precisely enough for two uses. It was the same deal in all hotels we stayed at. All rooms in all hotels were small, even the trash cans were tiny, but somehow everything was efficient and in its place. The lady who served us dinner also taught Anu and I how to wear our yukata and made a small butterfly shaped knot at the back made our sash.

The onsen in this ryokan was divine, it was outdoors in a small alcove protected by trees and a high wall for privacy. There was a smell of sulphur and it was very sedating (the smell notwithstanding) and I meditated in it for a while.

Earlier that day we had taken a train and then a gondola up the mountain and stopped off at Owakudani with open hot springs. We took a short hike up to where the springs were and had black eggs, eggs boiled in the springs. We also had a black colored bread with some meat filling in it. That was followed by wasabi ice cream (it grows on you and does have a kick in the aftertaste). Unfortunately in all this, Mt Fuji was cloaked in the clouds and we never got a good enough view to take a picture of. Hakone was surprisingly dead for such a popular tourist town, not that we were complaining. Back in town, Hakone had a sweets festival going on and we went to a bakery where they were serving one of the featured sweets from the festival (participating bakery/hotels serve one featured desert along with tea). In general I was beginning to be impressed with the displays of food and deserts whether the fake food in windows or what is served in your plate. Apparently fake food is a huge industry in Japan with restaurants spending as much as million yen in fake plastic food customized for their menus.

Kyoto

2010-05-22T15:25:00.009-04:00

Pictures are here.

A shinkansen ride later, we were in Kyoto. Immediately we noticed a ton of Kimono clad women. After check in, the famed Philosopher’s walk was a few minutes away by walk and the whole town seemed to be out and about enjoying the lovely sunny day and entire streets lined with cherry blossom trees. Philosopher’s walk is a couple of miles long with shrines practically every couple of blocks. We stopped in at Nanzenji temple but not for long. There were several others we wanted to see so we ambled along. We did spend some time at the Eikando Zenrin-Ji temple with the backward looking Buddha (there is a whole story about why he is looking back, google it). We went up the pagoda and took pictures of the view of Kyoto all around. We definitely wanted to goto Ginkakuji (silver pavilion which was at the other end of the walk) before it closed at 5ish, so we walked as fast as we could amongst the sea of people and made it just in time. Kyoto, in general was one of the few places as crowded as it was and Ginkakuji had long lines of people streaming along the single path around the gardens. There was a beautiful zen sand garden. The idea behind a sand garden is that it resembles life, always changing and shifting. How typically Zen! After Ginkakuji we simply needed a break and we sat down to tea and also tried amazake, a fermented rice drink with pieces of rice swimming in it.

We then went to Gion geisha quarters, to see the Geisha and Miyako Odori, the traditional spring dance by the geishas (Anu had researched this beforehand and said it was a must see). The geiko (geisha) and maiko (apprentice geisha) of the Gion district, which is the most famous thanks to Memoirs of Geisha, perform in this show. We didn’t get tickets right away but got the timings of the shows and when the box office opened so we could come back the next day. We then walked up and down the Geisha quarters hoping to spot a geisha and generally looking up menus of restaurants lining the street (all rather pricey). We stopped at a place and had some meat on skewers with beer. As I stepped out of the restaurant, I saw a Geisha step out of a taxi and dart quickly into a house. It all happened very quickly and I didn’t have time to fish my camera out. Given the shape of their kimonos they cant take very long steps, but they sure can walk quickly if they want to! Anu was disappointed she missed the sighting, though we were to be rewarded the next day.

The next day brought breakfast at the hotel with the first good cup of coffee I had had in Japan (I think it’s their half-half that tastes weird and ruins the coffee). We started at Heian Shrine which was a stone’s throw away. We went on to Imperial palace which was sold out for several days! We were just not destined to see any palaces, were we? We visited Kinkakuji (golden pavilion) which was a marvelous gold painted shrine in the middle of the pond, (there is no access to get inside), the gardens around it were lovely. Its hard to describe the beauty of Japanese gardens, they are just sooo… perfectly manicured, everything is either deliberately arranged in perfection or accidentally falls perfectly in place to create an effect so that what beholds your eyes could not possible be prettier. We had tea ceremony here and afterwards stopped by a million stalls selling daifuku (mochi) with every possible filling (chocolate, white sesame, gold sesame, sweet bean, brown sugar, cinnamon etc. etc) We also visited Fushimi-Nari shrine that has over 10,000 tori gates of varying sizes. There is walk that lets you walk through all of them, couple of kilometers long. They are bright orange and walking under them is an amazing experience.

We had earlier gone back to the Gion theatre for the Miyako Odori show and after some English-Japanese language confusion at the ticket counter, got excellent orchestra seats close to stage for the show. We also paid for a tea ceremony which was a rather touristy experience I must say. There was one pretty geisha stirring tea with an expressionless face and another (with an equally expressionless and pretty face) who came over to the audience serve tea to a handful of (I assume special) guests. Anu and I clamored to take pictures as the geisha (actually I think she was maiko) walked back and forth from her seat like automaton. The show itself was spectacular, I was struck by the explicit lack of emotion on their faces and yet if you pay attention you can probably tell what feeling they are communicating. That lift of the brow or something changing in the eyes, so subtle you might miss it if you were not 100% in the moment. There were 8 scenes, with a different cast in each and at the end all 60 performers came on stage for a grand finale. Being close to the stage made all the difference! We happened to be sitting next to a Geisha accompanying an older man and ofcourse we simply had to request her to take pictures with us.

Anu and I we ended the day back in Gion looking for a place to dress up as geishas but got there after studios had closed, which was a bummer! We found solace in a yummy green tea parfait and called it a night. It had been quite a day! Eugene had skipped Gion in the evening and had gone to check out Noji shrine after dark.

Food pattern and experience:

Our eating pattern had basically become this: grab boxes of food and drinks from grocery stores and eat in the train to somewhere in the mornings (except when breakfast was covered by hotel/ryokan). Breakfast in Japan is essentially the same as lunch or dinner, rice, meat/fish, pickled something etc.. Lunch would be on the go or also on the train. Once in a while we would buy something from the train purser who would come by with their food cart. The store food in Japan is quite fresh (even sushi) and the packaging is very attractive. Their vending machines have mostly cold drinks of a gazillion kinds though they also serve (luke)warm coffee and tea in thick plastic bottles that can stay at the same temperature as you buy them for hours. I didn’t like the luke warm state, let my drink either be steaming hot or cold, anything in between confuses me.

Several train stations also have soba stands where you buy your meal in a machine outside the stand, go in with the ticket, hand over to the cook and he serves you piping hot soba or udon that you can have sitting on a bar stool or standing up. Very efficient, no mess no fuss method. As the mornings were cool to cold, the hot interiors of the soba stand were very welcoming. Dinners were either in the ryokan, a restaurant or street food on the go (once dinner was the Green tea parfait desert in Gion). Food (everything in fact) is rather expensive, even a grocery store purchase would come to about 1000yen (over $10 at 90 yen per dollar). Ordering in restaurants was simple enough, just point at pictures, everything was written in Japanese anyway and the few pictures they showed were good enough.

The morning to Osaka, I had noticed a small 8 oz sake bottle (for 100yen) in one of the stores and was curious, I bought it just for the hec of it. Later in the train to Osaka, Anu and I started the Indian song game of Antakshari, we had the sake with jalapeno almonds and had the time of our lives. Eugene was sitting a couple of rows away and a good thing that, he would have been too embarrassed sitting with us (as he perhaps was later, we restarted the game in most train/bus rides, we continued for several days till the end of the trip. Its now Anu’s turn to sing with ‘aa’)

My wow moments with food came with the tofu of various kinds and Hida beef in Takayama (more on both later). While the sushi and sake were great, I did not think they are earth shattering. I think you get pretty fresh sushi and good sake in the north east. I was rather bored of the Takoyaki by end of trip, but no so much of the mochi.

Nara and Mt Koya

2010-05-22T15:24:00.002-04:00

Pictures are here.

The next day we took the train to Osaka, left our luggage at the hotel we were going to stay at the next day and took a train to Nara with a day’s change of clothes since we were going to Mt Koya that night.

We didn’t have much time for Nara so we picked the prime attraction, the Todaiji temple with its Budhha , the largest bronze Buddha in the world. There are tame deer all over Nara, though some were quite aggressive and I saw one snatch food away from a tourist outside Todaiji, The vendor who had just sold the man his stuff, wrestled it out of the mouth of the deer and gave the deer a smack on the head. The deer appeared to have tufts of hair removed from their bodies giving them a shabby appearance. The deer in Miyajima were far more good looking. We stopped by Kofukuji and saw the 5-storey pagoda (second tallest in Japan). We didn’t bother to go inside, we felt we were done with Nara. We then embarked upon a 2 hour long ride, it was made up of a 1 and half hour Nankai rail line train ride from Osaka’s Namba station, followed by 5 minute cable car and then a 20 min bus ride to our Buddhist temple (Shojoshin-in) stay in Mt Koya.

The cable car was interesting, it was so steep that it had steps inside. It climbed 857meters in 5 minutes! It got quite cold as we ascended. A short bus ride on curving roads brought us to the utterly charming town of Mt Koya. It has 115 Shingon temples several of which allow visitors to stay. Something amazing happened to us when we got there. We just automatically slowed down. Nothing was said to us, there were no signs to do so, but there was a physical impact of the place that caused us to just talk slowly, eat slowly, even walk slowly! For the first time I heard Anu and Eugene talk about leaving later and not earlier (we had followed a strict regimen of waking at 6am and out the door by 7ish until then). We were now talking of taking the 11:50pm out of Koya. Dinner (shojin ryori cuisine) was a pure vegetarian affair and simply delicious. The silky tofu was unbelievable, couldn’t lift it with chopsticks, I had to scoop it from bowl to mouth. They had another spongy kind with a ton of water content. Grape tomatoes that were amazingly sweet. In fact every single thing in the various small plates was beautiful on the palate (or perhaps our senses were heightened to the point everything was beautiful, not sure which was the case!). I was to buy some grape tomatoes from a grocery store the next morning and was once again in bliss on the train! The various plates that every thing was served in did not match in color and pattern, but they all looked pretty and petite.

After dinner, I suggested we all go into silence till breakfast and simply take in the place with all our senses. I walked around in the temple, it was too cold to walk outside. The temple was beautiful, the gardens were beautiful. I have no words, it was to be the most peaceful and beautiful part of the whole trip. We woke up for the 6am prayers and it was an hour of listening to the chanting of 3 monks who were also part of the admin staff (one of them had checked us in). We then walked around in the lightly sprinkling mist laden morning with the most perfectly managed Japanese gardens I ever saw. I felt like I was walking in a 4d painting, all this couldn’t possibly be for real! We stopped by several temples, took pictures and all mochi

Osaka

2010-05-22T15:23:00.001-04:00

Pictures are here.

On the train ride back to Osaka, we met Alma, a girl from California who was traveling the world for about 8 mths. She asked if she could hang out with us for the day, we were all going to Himeji Castle in Osaka. I had been told Himeji Castle was an absolute must-see and while it was grand with lovely sakura all around it, I didn’t have a wow moment like I did with Kyoto shrines and Koya temples. Long lines and soon we were walking around inside the castle (Anu and I continued our antakshari when the line wasn’t moving). Here I learned of how many uses for rice the Japanese have found, rice water had been used in the castle walls!! Is there anything on earth that rice has not been used for ? (its also used in the white geisha makeup)

On our way back, Alma told us of a street for awesome food and sights called Dotonbori in Osaka. Turned out it was 10 minutes away from where we were staying. She also introduced us to Curry Pan, a curry stuffed bun. She assured Anu there was no meat which was music to Anu’s ears as she helped herself to some of it. Anu later found out it did have some meat in it, oh well! I liked it, it was quite tasty and had a strong curry flavor.

Dotonbori, it was then. Glitzy, shiny, lots of lights, tons of eateries. We took pictures with the famous clown, mechanized giant crab etc. We got some Osaka style Okonomiyako (pancakes with a ton of shredded cabbage ) for Anu and the rest of us went to a sushi restaurant with sushi on boats streaming on a tiny canal around an island where the chefs made the sushi. I cant remember all that I ate, Alma, Eugene and I we picked up a few things to experiment and shared some plates. The squid with very many legs was not a good idea. There was powdered green tea that you mix with hot water out of faucets sticking out of the table. Its one long bar and you sit on barstools facing the sushi boats. We ended the night with desert in a cool café like place with a ton of black graffiti on white walls. The pictures look nice! It was quite cold, almost as cold as Koya.

That was it for the day, the next day was Miyajima and Hiroshima. Alma also planned to visit those two places, but wasn’t going to start early like us. We said good byes hoping we would run into each other (we never did).

A little about trains now…
There are LOTs of rail companies in Japan. With JR pass, we could travel on Kodama, Rail Star and couple of other lines. Tokyo itself has several metro companies, though Tokyo metro alone goes to lots of places. We had to know which train we could or could not take for free with the JR Pass. Fortunately Eugene had done a lot of research on this so we were quite fine. There are limited trains, express trains, super express, normal trains and I cant remember how many others. The difference is in the speed and number of stops it makes. The one thing that the JR pass didn’t allow us was a ride on the Nozomi, the fastest train at 300kmph. Hikari Railpass super express was perhaps the fastest train we took (Osaka to Kyoto, 42 km in 15 min). Trains of different speeds share platforms, so you have to know which exact train you are traveling to know when it will arrive and where your car is going to stop. The platforms have car numbers painted on for each train type, each rail line is color coded. The electronic signs in the train stations alternated between Kanji and English. The signs posted on stations and platforms were also written in 2 or 3 Japanese characters and English. Getting around wasn’t as bad as I thought. The language problem comes in when you speak to people, not once you get the hang of reading signs.

Miyajima, Hiroshima and Oakayama

2010-05-22T14:51:00.002-04:00

Pictures are here and here.

The subway underground crossings in Miyajama had some amazing bright colored painted art on the walls, it was worth strolling slowly just to admire it A short ferry ride from Miyajima train station took us to this island and we headed straight for the Itsukushima Shrine with the famous water submerged Tori gate close to it. There was another wedding here with the couple walking around the shrine, taking in the sights and stopping every now and then to take pictures. Eugene and I wanted to take the hiking trail around the shrine and Anu did not. So we parted ways for a bit while Eugene and I went to find the trail. We eventually did, but could not finish the 2-3km hike since we had agreed to meet Anu back at the pier at 12:30pm. That was a shame because the trail looked very promising. Anyway, we hiked a good 45 minutes or so before we headed back, picked up some fried oysters on the way and more rice cake with oysters closer to the pier. There were more tame deer here and far healthier looking than in Nara.

On to Hiroshima (or rather back to Hiroshima, since it was between Osaka and Miyajima). Hiroshima made me sad, I didn’t enjoy the stay, all the writings just reminds you of how careless humans are with other human lives. Anyway, we walked around the memorial park and saw some sights. Sakura everywhere. I sat in a café and had a looong cup of coffee while Anu and Eugene checked the museum with videos of the war and bombing, none of which I wanted to see.

Because we didn’t spend a lot of time in Horoshima, we had extra time to stop by at Okayama and visit the Korakuen Gardens. This was the only garden site we visited (though the temples all had lovely gardens). Very picturesque. There was a small square where the sakura had begun to fall on ground. I just lay down and admired the sakura covering the blue sky above me. It was an amazing sight to see the sun starting to go down behind one of the trees in front of me. You can see Okayama’s black castle as backdrop, it looks teasingly close by but I am sure its not. Smalls canals and ponds, an enclosure of cranes, it was all worth making the stop there. We were chased out by the caretakers when it was closing time. Good thing too because it was almost as if sharp @6pm the flies woke up and started circling us.

That evening we took a train to Nagoya where we were going to spend 2 nights. The primary purpose of Nagoya was to be the middle ground between Tokyo and Takayama/Shirakawa, so we would save some train time on the day we were to head back to Tokyo. Staying in Nagoya was also cheaper than in Tokyo. The Nagoya Kyoya ryokan turned out to be a pleasant surprise, it was pretty with a charming garden near the baths.

Takayama Shirakawa-Go

2010-05-22T14:50:00.005-04:00

Pictures are here

The plan was to spend some time in Takayama and then take the 60 min bus ride to Shirakawa-go before taking the last train at 6:45pm from Takayama back to Nagoya. One look at the bustling markets of Takayama convinced us we needed much more time in Takayama. We visited the Miyagawa morning market and I bought some hot red peppers (which I later discovered to be seriously hot, who would have thunk the Japanese would dabble with such hot stuff!). We all also bought an apple each, the samples we tasted were very sweet. The major shopping and eating market is spread across 3 or so blocks. Tons of shops, Takayama is known for its sake breweries and Hida beef. I did know about either until I got there. The hida beef displays in the restaurants were teasing, beautifully marbled beef, I wondered why I hadnt heard of this beef before? I think because all advertising is reserved for neighboring Kobe beef. They don’t make enough Hida to export. We stopped by a store that had sake tasting. I promised I would come back later to buy some, didn’t want to lug sake all the way to Shirakawa-go.

We then took the bus to Shirakawa-go and had lovely views of the snow capped Japanese Alps in the distance, unfortunately the camera did not quite capture the alps. Shirakawa-go is a UNESCO World Heritage sight and is a remote set of villages with thatched roof farmhouses. Due to heavy snow, the roof is at a really steep angle, the style is called gassho-zukuri (folded hands like in a prayer), the roof is almost 2/3rd s of the height of a 2 or 3 storey house. No nails are used in construction of these houses, its wood, straw and strong rope to tie it all together. The roofs need to be replaced every year. The Upper floors are used to raise silk worms. There are less than 2000 residents in about 356 square km land. The river with the mountain backdrop was gushing and green. We took a tour of one the houses (Kando I think), quite dark and claustrophobic though every floor has windows. We had considered staying in one of these houses for the gassho-zukuri ryokan experience, but my readings told me it would be very cold in April and there is usually only one open hearth fireplace (irori) in the central communal room and maybe a small heather in the room where you sleep and shared bathrooms outside the house. I am glad we dropped the idea, there was snow all over the place (though that day itself was sunny and quite pleasant).

Shirakawa-go didn’t not take much time, after a while the homes all looked identically charming. We were rather keen on experiencing more of Takayama so we headed back.

Eugene wanted to walk a trail passing by several shrines and I felt a little shrined out by then. Anu had been told about a place that served shojin-ryori, she wanted vegetarian food: desperately. So we split with Anu and I headed out to find the vegetarian food intending to then continue shopping. The place she had been told about was a false start and then she wanted to head out to a shrine that may or may not have veg food. So then we split and I headed back to the shopping streets (everything was going to close up by 5 or 6). An hour later, I had bought my sake and a lot of gifts for back home (chocolate covered tofu and soy candy among other things), Anu still had not found any food (shrine was closed) and Eugene had abandoned his walk since it was deserted (all shrines were closed). He had, however, run into a traveler from California called Diana. Though we had agreed to meet at a particular intersection @5, we all ran into each other in the shopping streets earlier than that.

Eugene and I had earlier agreed to have a Hida dinner before taking the last train back to Nagoya. Diana helped us pick a place called Takyumi (spelling?) from her guide book. This place was a butcher’s shop with restaurant on top. The food was as delicious as I had anticipated. Succulent, melt on the grill; it hardly needed any seasoning and very little cooking time. Delish!! After the ryokans this was the best meal and other than tofu, the tastiest thing I ate in Japan.

Back to Tokyo

2010-05-22T13:54:00.004-04:00

Pictures are here

Day 10, was back in Tokyo. After a short conference and discussion in the train, we decided to leave our luggage in Tokyo train station and pick up the next morning since we had to come back to Tokyo station to take the hour long Narita Express to airport anyway. We had another action packed day in Tokyo and going to capsule hotel to drop off luggage would take too much time. Our original plan was to go see Kamakura, but with so much left to do in Tokyo, we decided to drop it. We were going to check out imperial palace that was closed the first day, then goto Asakusa (old city, market and shrine), try our luck at Kabuki-za again, visit the Sony building in Ginza that was also closed by the time we got to it the first day , visit Akihabara (electronics district) and then cap it all off with a night in town by visiting clubs in Roppongi. Like I said, action packed.

At the Imperial palace, the palace itself was closed to the public and we were only allowed to walk the gardens. After having seen all the lovely shrines and Oakayama gardens, we were not impressed. The city skyline in the background did have a nice effect. We went onto Asakusa, which was another crazy crowded market place with a long path leading up to a shrine. Huge Asahi building is a landmark and meant to capture the essence of a glass of the beer, with frothing on top and all. A neighboring building has a giant gold flaming ornament (as quoted on Asahi website, although internet articles imply that locals think it looks like something I cannot repeat here!)

As we headed to the shrine, I was reminded of India with merchants selling wares on both sides of the street leading up to a big temple. The only difference was there were no beggars here! More street food, (fish shaped waffles with chocolate stuffing etc..) and more souvenirs and pictures later, we were at the shrine. The shrine itself had giant statues behind really dirty netting, the pictures of the red lamp was great but you can hardly see the, otherwise grandiose, statues flanking the lantern.

Then it was time to go stand in line at Kabuki-za in Ginza and try our luck a second time. On our way we stopped by the Sony building to check out the new products (many not yet released in market). The line at Kabuki-za was even longer than the previous week! We spoke to a couple of the men in uniform and they assured us we would get to see the next act, only we would have to do it standing. We had an hour and half before the box office opened, we decided to take turns eating lunch so we didn’t not loose our turn in the line. Eugene and I went first and had sushi in a nearby restaurant (on the same street as the theatre, I forget the name). It was simply delicious! Anu went next to a neighboring pasta place. And then the theatre gods smiled on us. We got in, Anu took the one seat left, Eugene and I stood.

The act we were about to see was drama, the story something like this: a retainer loyal to one shogun had hidden his child in a school as he ran to save his life while the lord loyal to the enemy shogun came to the school looking for the child. I am sure I got some details wrong, but I have to say though I did not understand a word of what was said and the actors were too far away for me to see closely, I thought that hour and half was quite gripping. I felt the tension and drama all the way in the back. Moreover, there was a gentleman standing close by who kept yelling “Matsumiya”, “Komaiya” and so on. My Japanese classmate from HBS later told me those are names of families that the actors belong to and the audience often yells out cheering words of praise and encouragement. The kimonos were simply breathtaking, the colors and patterns were high impact even way back where I was! If I could, I would have stayed on till 9pm and cancelled everything else for the night, but alas I didn’t have the tickets! Eugene and Anu were less impressed. All actors are men (they dress as women) and the various acts are a combination of songs, dance, drama.

Then we went to check in the capsule hotel that Minako had booked for us. Capsule is a Japanese invention and the idea has not picked up in popularity outside Japan. The primary purpose is for Japanese men and women who miss their last train home (subways stop around midnight) to find a cheap place to sleep the night. Also for drunk men who cant go home and face their wives. For us it was a novelty that had to be experienced. Well I have experienced it and while I am glad I did, I am not likely to repeat it! Capsules are like sarcophagus, one stacked on top of the other. Somehow they manage to squeeze in an old fashioned radio and tiny tv inside it (both fully functional!). Men and women capsules are on different floors, (thank goodness!) and there is a hot bath (also separated by gender as all baths in Japan are).

I was too tired with all the walking so I took a nap as Anu and Eugene went to Akihabara. The plan was for us to goto Roppongi that night, and stay out as late as we wanted. Anu was not happy about the capsule and wanted to stay out all night (which is commonplace in Roppongi). Anyway, we headed out later and Eugene begged out at the train station. He had suffered all the time being made to wake up at 6am. Anu was the only one who didn’t mind waking up at 6am. Anu and I went out and walked around a bit. Hip hop could be heard in couple of bars and it was fairly crowded (though it was early at 10pm). We immediately realized how out of place we were in our cargos etc… I always tell myself after this sort of experience to pack one nice dress for going out and it always gets forgotten. Anyway we went into what looked like an expat filled bar called A970; it was all expats indeed. Struck up a conversation with a girl who, along with several others she introduced me to, were in Tokyo for 6 mths studying law. They recommended a couple of clubs we could goto. But then neither Anu nor I are really the party types, we were not dressed appropriately and were tired after all. We called it a night and decided to catch the last train home. The last train ride was in itself fun. People were packed like sardines at 12:30 am, the conductors were walking the stairways hurrying people up to the platform so they wouldn’t miss the last train. We did make it back to the capsule by 1am and I slept like a baby!

The next day, Anu and Eugene were on the same flight at 11am whereas I was having a little reunion with my HBS classmates in Tokyo before a 4:35pm flight back home. Tetsuya had arranged a lunch for about 4-5 of us in the Shin-Marunouchi building near Tokyo station, he picked me up in his car along with his wife Megumi. We went to Akihabara where I wanted to buy a digital Kanji dictionary for my niece. We went to a couple of stores, Tetsuya said that Akihabara was more popular with tourists than locals (who buy online a lot these days) especially the Chinese visiting by the bus loads. Apparently a particular brand of rice cooker is super popular with visiting Chinese and so are milk formulae. Who would have thunk? We drove where the sumo hangout but didn’t see any. We had intended to go see the sumos during their morning practices at the stables, but had arrived in Japan just after the March tournament ended and the sumo were not practicing yet.

We met up with everybody else to have soba. Inspite of my classmates assuring me it was ok to make slurping noises when sucking up the noodles, I coudnt really do it. I am not crazy about noodles and I was not terribly hungry so I left most of my lunch uneaten (but ate all the tofu and everything else). I am not sure whether that was impolite or not, oh well! We went onto a cute neighborhood near a museum that could have been downtown NY with cafes in a little park with tall buildings around. We had some coffee there. After that it was good bye to some of the gang. Tetsuya, Megumi and Norihiro came to the station and all the way to the platform to see me off on Narita Express, I cant remember the last time I enjoyed this hospitality (India maybe), it was very flattering!

At the airport, I spent my last 1050 yen buying more food gifts and came home with 1 yen. All too soon my time in Japan was over. I left feeling good and able to recommend several experiences in Japan to others.

Last thoughts

The best experiences? Mt Koya, Onsen, Ryokan experience, Kabuki, Tofu, all deserts and sweets, Tokyo fish market, Hida dinner at Takayama , Gion district, Miyako-odori, sakura, Kyoto shrines.

Getting around was quite easy, trains and buses super efficient, the people very polite although a bit inscrutable I think. Food is plentiful and tasty (though you really should not be a veggie if you want to travel the country).

Some of the amusing and interesting sights I have not mentioned were the army of black suited men and women near metro and busy places (sometimes on weekends too!). The purser and conductor always bowed when they entered or left the compartment, whether anybody was looking at them or not. I remember this cute petite uniformed woman at the entrance to a train car where I was standing waiting for passengers to alight before we got on. She would say something, bow at a perfect angle, raise up and say something again (arigato gozaimas I think) and then repeat. She did this with perfect repetition around 10 times that I was standing waiting for everyone to get off. Very few people returned her greeting, but she repeated it with the same perfect pleasant smile and expression on her face the whole time! Another thing to note is that people with jobs routinely work 12+ hours and most importantly don’t complain.

At first the bowing was odd, even excessive. But by the end of the trip I was doing the same and thought it added such a polite and humble air to all conversations. Why cant we all be like that? Maybe I will start bowing to the merchants and planners I work with. Or maybe not, you say?!!? Ok maybe I will take your advice.

Seoul

2009-03-23T00:24:00.004-04:00

Seoul Pictures

Seoul airport was very well organized with buses that get you into town. Hyundai was ofcourse everywhere. I was staying at a traditional korean hanok guesthouse. When I asked for help with directions (most of the signs are Korean with a splattering of English ones), a woman walked with me till I found the place. I was quite grateful since she was clearly on her way back home late in the evening (it was 9ish) and I am sure would have preferred to get home ASAP instead of looking for my guesthouse. My room was small but charming. They have a floor heating system that goes back to the royal times called Ondol. They had air conditioning in addition to the heated floor. They laid out a mattress and sleeping on the warm floor felt like I was laying in hot springs except it was dry! It was quite nice and if you can control the temperature then I prefer that style of sleeping over beds anyday. The shower was interesting, you could control exactly what temperature you wanted your water to be. The toilet seat had half a dozen buttons which I did not dare push since I didn’t know what would happen! My room had a computer and a flat screen TV, they are clearly tech heavy people!

I walked out to looking for a meal and asked a woman in a store for recommendations, she spent a considerable amount of time discussing options with her friend and giving me directions. Most of the restaurants were closed, but I did find a hole in the wall kind of place. I ordered some bulgogi which came to me piping hot. Sides (banchan) of various kimchi dishes accompanied it (as it does all Korean meals). It was nice to eat a hot steaming meal since it was quite cold (30s F I would say) and I had not carried my jacket, just a couple of layers and my new Icebreaker sweater. I had already eaten 3 bibimbap meals on all three Korean air flight segments, so I knew that was one thing I would not try in Korea. A good night’s sleep later I was ready to hit the city to get the most of my one day there. I headed to Gyeongbokgung and was there by 8:30, I had some time before it opened so I headed out looking for food. Korean’s don’t really have a concept of breakfast, its another meal time. So I did as Koreans do, I ordered jjigae, which was a heavy kimchi infused curry with seafood in it. It was also steaming hot and I had to wait till it cooled down a bit. I was glad to have added two new things I can order at a Korean restaurant (in fact I now think Korean BBQ ok compared to their curries). The palace was pretty and is spread out over a large area with mountains serving as a backdrop. The one thing I noticed was that most of the rooms had windows that doubled as doors, either the Joseon people were short or they didn’t mind bending every time they entered or exited the room. This was the main palace they built and was destroyed twice, both during Japanese invasion. In fact the Japanese even messed with the feng shui to insult the Koreans. Even today there is a regular protest by Korean women in front of the Japanese embassy, they cant get over the atrocities committed by the Japs.

I went to the National Folk Museum and they had a whole section devoted to the lives of the royals. There was a culture of celebrating the first 100 days after the birth of a child and they would predict the future based on what the child picked when several objects were placed in front of it (book, money, clothes etc..). So if the child picked the money, he would be a merchant. I listened to the sounds of several classical Korean instruments and would love to get my hands on some CDs so I can continue to enjoy the sounds. Later I waited to watch the change of guard ceremony, it was not as grand as the ceremony in front of Buckingham Palace in UK, but nevertheless interesting.

I then went to Insadong neighborhood which was practically around the corner. The main street is known for its art galleries, restaurants and shops selling knick-knacks. I bought little nothings. I had earlier stopped by a street vendor and bought some hoddeok, small pancakes stuffed with sweet bean or pumpkin paste. This vendor was making them in the shape of fish, how cute! It cost me 500won (at that time a USD was almost 1500 won). I also stopped by carts manned by men who seemed to be entertaining the visitors. I stopped to see what it was all about. They were making kkul tarae a traditional dessert made for royalty, they put on quite a show with a well choreographed schpeal in a chorus. There are several you tube videos. They take a blob of honey, get a generous helping of corn starch and trick the honey into tearing up into thinner and thinner strands until they have 16000 strands. Then they wrap up crushed walnuts or almonds into a few strands at a time and prepare a nice box for you to buy for 5000won. It was quite delicious once you let the honey, flour and walnuts blend for a few hours. I found a youtube video which was exactly how they did it in insadong.

Lunch was at a restaurant where I ordered DDeokbokki , the main ingredient is cylindrical shaped rice sticks, this is mixed along with seafood (clams, mussels, shrimp etc..) and cooked on a stove that was brought to my table. The curry was the spiciest I have ever had and I couldn’t bring myself to finish it, I didn’t care for the rice sticks either. I had also ordered oyster pancakes. I ate all the seafood from the ddeokbokki and a couple of pancakes. I had also order soju, a potato liquor. I had felt odd ordering liquor for lunch, but I wasn’t going to eat another dinner in the city and I wanted to taste this drink that I had read about. It was smooth, rather sweet and quite delicious. I understood why they warn about drinking too much of it, its strong stuff but so tasty you could keep drinking your way to a serious hangover.

After lunch I was a little torn about going to a largest shopping market (dongdeamun) and Chyandoekgung. After dawdling for half hour I figured I had already seen one palace and might like a traditional Korean market (I was thinking of the Egyptian souks and the Peruvian market which were both so rich in ethnic character). So I took the subway from Anguk station to the dongdeamun. It was a very easy system to follow and the subway cars were very wide, there was plenty of standing room. One look at the market was enough to disappoint, rows and rows of busy shops selling everything under the sun, it was like a ginormous Chinatown. I turned around and went right back to Chyandoekgung. Rachel had suggested seeing Biwon (secret garden) in this palace so I was rather keen to see it. You can only tour the grounds with a guide and the only tour I could have done was at 3:30 (the next one was too late since I had to fly back). I made it just in time. The guide was a Korean student with not so great english. She was a rather hard to understand but very enthusiastic about her job. She was hoping we would ask questions and for some reason nobody had any! She asked if the tour was boring, my heart went out to her. So I chatted a little about my trip to the previous palace.

The palace was very much like Gyeongbokgung, in fact it was built as backup to the main one. Biwon (the secret garden) was beautiful and has a pond. There was nothing secret about it, its just that not everybody was allowed to go there, it was exclusively for the royal family and their special guests. The pond had a film of ice on it, I am sure it has a different beauty in summers. The weather has so far been very cold and my two layers were not quite enough, I wished I had carried the gloves I bought in NZ. I thought the young Korean women were generally very petite. The men and women were generally very smartly dressed (the women more so, though I was surprised how many of them wore short skirts in this cold weather). The hostesses in Korean air were also all petite and like dolls.

That was it, back to the airport where I bought some soju and ginseng brandy. After returning home, I realized I keep buying alcohol from the countries I visit, but I never drink it (other than wine). So now I think I ought to have an international liquor party so I can go though some of it! While all countries I visited have a lovely landscape and/or some grand structures to see, the people and food are so exotic in non-western countries and add so much color and flavor that I keep wanting more!

Auckland and Rotorua

2009-03-23T00:16:00.002-04:00

Auckland and Rotorua Pics

New Zealand is very far away. It took me 24 hours of flying time to get there. Folks in my travel group who flew via California saved a couple of hours, but not much. And its 18 hours ahead of me. By the time I arrived into Auckland, two days of my life had passed (well not quite, but you know what I mean). I also realized that its so isolated on the map on earth. If it wasn’t for Australia, those poor things might very well have been lost to humanity! Perhaps that’s one reason why it’s so darned beautiful! So the plan was that I would spend a few days in North Island and then meet up with the NY hiking group I was traveling with in South Island. They were doing the Kepler track while I was in the north.

Auckland was humid and warm. Someone had warned me Auckland was just a city and not that exciting, well they were right. I am glad I only spent half a day. I was staying at Parnell Village, a rather upscale neighborhood. It had a main street with shops, boutiques and restaurants. I had lunch box at a sushi restaurant, much like; no, exactly like sushi back home. I jumped on a hop on hop off tour bus. Went to Victoria Park Market, bought a business card holder. Then got off at civic center and ate a cookie from Mrs Higgins. The bus normally goes to Mt Eden, a volcanic crater. But I missed the last service. So I walked upto Mission from Parnell and took bus 006 to Mt Eden shops and then walked up to the top of the crater. Its quite large and you can walk down to the center. But I was rather tired by then and chose to call it an early night. The one thing I noticed in Auckland was a lot of hearing centers. I wondered what was wrong with the kiwis.

The next morning I was to take a plane to Rotorua. The first thing I noticed was the lack of security, they didn’t scan my luggage and didn’t ask for my picture ID. I just checked in at a kiosk and boarded. How strange it is to be trusted like that, almost awkward. I felt like insisting they see my ID to be sure I was indeed me. The flight was interesting. The plane sat about 20 people, there were two pilots and no stewards. No overhead cabin space (I trust there were life jackets under the seat). A pilot boarded us, gave us instructions and got into the cabin with a wide open door. Every now and then he looked back to be sure we had not fallen out!

Rotorua

When I landed at Rotorua, there was this slight smell of sulphur. It is an active geothermal area and the sulphur is why people come here. NZ was meant to be an adventure trip and I was going to try things I had never done before. Staying at a hostel was one of them. So there I was chatting with the owner of the Backpackers lodge about what to do and things to see. Dinner that night was at a Maori village. Maori are the Polynesian immigrants who are the natives of NZ, the whites are called Pakeha. The Maori are very well blended in mainstream life and you see them as much as locals in cities (except Wellington, I didn’t see that many there). Ofcourse now there are tons of Asian (locals and tourists) and Indians (locals). Indian and Asian cuisine was as common as it is here in metro areas.

Gerry (the lodge owner) shared his life story (was married before, had lived in the US, wife ran off, met second wife in NZ, started business and recently had a second baby) and his opinions of the Maori with me. He was sorry I had already bought the dinner reservation, he could have saved me 20bucks, he said. He sponsors a kiwi (or maybe two) and one day they will be release into the wild with a Maori prayer. He seemed passionate about kiwi (near extinct bird, now being revived through careful planning and sponsorship programs). He has a hearing problem and when I told him about all the hearing centers I saw in Auckland, he explained his generation went to too many rock concerts and were paying the price. How strange!

At dinner, we were introduced to the Maori culture by a Maori hostess. They wear a lot of tattoos; not only on their bodies but interestingly on their faces and even lips. I believe at this village the face tattoos were paint but the body tattoos were real. They are known for the hangi (earth) oven cooking style. Dinner was chicken and beef and some sides (cauliflower in sesame paste, regular and sweet potatoes, stuffing, mint jelly chutney). It looked and tasted like a thanksgiving meal with chicken instead. Dessert was trifle and chocolate log. I wasn’t really impressed with the meal, I tried an NZ beer. I forget the name, but it was ok.

The cultural show started with a volunteer representing our group of about 50 people as chief who would then go and meet the Maori chief in a formal ceremony before the evening could proceed. The Maori seemed to be a very aggressive bunch, either that or they just choose to show that aspect of their culture to visitors (Gerry thought the westerners/tourists encourage that display and that the Maori use too much intimidation even in regular life). Facial and body expressions displayed anger and mistrust, wide open eyes, tongues rolling out. They used (fake) weapons in greeting. Their singing was a chorus and sounded like a war cry. Anyway, the two chiefs finally met and then the so far stern looking chief turned into an MC with smart ass comments and entertaining one liners. It was so commercial, really! He explained the use of their weapons and taught us some greetings and gestures (often used in rugby).

After dinner we were to go for a walk in Rainbow Springs and see some native fauna. We saw Tuatara and rainbow trout. Tautare are called living fossils because they’ve been around since the time of the dinosaurs! We walked upto the Rainbow springs, the water at dinner table was from this spring. There were glowworms, trout and then finally the highlight of the evening: the kiwi. Kiwis are nocturnal and don’t fly. We were asked to stay very quite, not use our camera flash and wait until the kiwis decided to show themselves. I did see a couple rummaging for food. They look cute, it was impossible to take a picture without a flash. It was raining hard by then so by consensus we cut the tour short and all went home.

The next day I left early morning to Wai-O-Tapu, they have a lot of color in the pools and craters. The claim to be NZ’s most colorful volcanic are and very well might be. The colors were indeed stunning. I forget the minerals that made the greens and reds and various other shades. There is a walk around the area that takes about 80 minutes and it was beautiful. They have mud pools that just look awesome, I think our guide said something about them being 170 deg C. No dipping here please! The smells would get intense near the pools. They have a Lady Knox geyser that erupts every morning @10:15am and goes upto 20 meters. In case you are wondering how it knows the time, a park employee triggers an eruption by putting soap detergent into the mouth which causes the normally separate chambers of very hot and cool water to come together releasing all that pressure. I guess if they left it alone it would erupt less frequently but go much higher. But then that would be an imposition on the tourists to wait around, wouldn’t it?

Back in town, I went to the Rotorua museum and learned that Dr.Wohlmann (whose brainchild the bath house was) meant for it to be a world famous thermal bath house. It was too for a while with Europeans visiting regularly for treatments, with stories of people who were cured of the arthritis, asthma and may other ailments. But tragically enough the building and materials kept collapsing due to the acidic air and they rebuilding. It was quite tragic really to read of his dreams come to nothing eventually (or not much). I went to Kuirua, a free thermal park with thermal spring that you can dip in. I debated visiting the Polynesian spa but just wasn’t interested and thought the spa treatments too expensive. I also saw a video on the story of the eruption of Mount Tarawera, it must have been scary to see a mountain just erupt (the seats of the theater shook to give you some real effects). I liked the museum very much.

It was chilly at nights and the morning though the days were sunny (temp range was 8-21 deg C). The next day I was torn between activities like Luge, Zorb or just lazing around. I knew my south island itinerary was packed and that would be tiring enough. I am not used to lazy vacations and it was hard to convince myself to do just that in Rotorua. Eventually I did, I went to redwood forest (yes the redwoods came from California long ago) with the intention of hiking. Instead I went to sleep on the grass in the sun (it was still chilly). Oh how wonderful that was! I went to Rotorua Lake and did the same, lay down and slept on the grass listening to songs of Lekin. Isn’t this what you are supposed to do on vacation? The answer is YES.

South Island Part 1

2009-03-23T00:13:00.004-04:00

Milford other pics
Glacier and other pics
Sky swing and sky dive pics

The next day I was to fly to Queenstown and then take a bus to Te Anau to meet with my group. So far while Rotorua had been fun, I didn’t think anything was particularly beautiful. As I sat in the bus which took a winding road towards Te Anau alongside rivers and mountains, it came to me “This is why I came to NZ, to see this beauty. This is it!” It just went on and on, unbroken chain of mountains with clear water, just stunning!

I met with the group (Armando, Eugene, Hans, Rachel, Gagan, Elena) and the first thing on the agenda that evening was glowworm caves. We had rented three campervans with mattresses and kitchen stuff in the back, the vans were practically be our home the for next several days (we occasionally slept in backpacker lodges)

It was a chilly on the alpine lake and the caves were damp and dark. A canoe ride took us to the large colony, there were thousands maybe tens of! I could have just reached out and grabbed a few and slipped into my pocket, which is precisely what the guide warned us not to do! The cave has tiny stalagmite since its only 12k years old. The water was crisp and cool to drink.

The next day was Milford Sound. I am (slightly) embarrassed to admit that until then I didn’t know what a sound was nor for that matter a fjord. I knew there is a Long Island sound in NY and that it’s a water body but didn’t know anything else. So I asked the guide to explain. Turns out Milford sound is technically not a sound but a fjord, but it got labeled and nobody changed. Though that whole area is called Fjordland National Park. The guide also told us the story of Tasman, an explorer that the sea and national park are named after. Though he got credit for “discovering” NZ at Milford sound, he apparently never set foot on land when he got here. The Maori ate 3 of his people and he turned right around and went to Indonesia.

There is a waterfall on the sound the boat went right upto it so everybody on the deck got a nice shower. It was quite exciting (I wore a poncho so I wouldn’t be completely wet). Cruising through the sound made me realize, once again, how insignificant we, the humans, are compared to these majestic mountains and waters. And for such tiny creatures, we make so much trouble!!

On the boat I tried teaching Armando (Cuban origin) to pronounce “Fjordland”. The best he could come up with was “freeland”. Try as I might, I could not get his “r” in the right place and the “d” was just not happening. At some point we would make some progress (I think we got to “freedland”) and then within a few minutes all would be lost and I had to start over again. Armando was to become funniest in the group and loved imitating others. He had marked me as too “fu-fu” since I had expressed some surprise that we weren’t showering everyday, he was also amused by what he thought was my british accent (he particularly picked on my usage of ‘delicious’, ‘rubbish’ and other such words). Gagan (traveling from India) was the “please take my picture in an action shot” guy, he had already taken 1300 pics less than halfway into the trip.

After the boat ride we went to an underwater observatory to see coral and sealife that we would apparently never see anywhere. We got to what looked like an introductory area with windows that you could look out of. Turned out this was it! It was small and while there were some beautiful creatures outside, I was expecting something large and impressive. Something like the underwater museum walks in US (Georgia aquarium). Rachel (Korean origin) was disappointed too, we had seen better coral in the US!

Queenstown

This was the adrenaline D day, the day of bungy jumping and sky diving and all that crazy stuff people do in NZ. I had previously booked sky diving and now felt another adventure was in order. Gagan and I decided to go sky swinging in tandem and in retrospect, I am glad I had someone to go with. I would have definitely chickened out otherwise. Armando was booked for bungy jumping and he couldn’t stop talking about it. I think he was a nervous wreck thinking of what he had to do. After all that talking, turned out Elena had booked him for the wrong day and he couldn’t do it after all!

As we drove up the step slope of the canyon for sky swing, the driver turned up the music, he was playing Chemical Brothers “Hey Boy, Hey Girl” and that song will always remain associated with the anticipation and excitement I felt in what I was about to do. As I walked the ramp to the pod out over the canyon I tried not to look down into the canyon. I was in a bit of a daze when he was giving instructions, because I couldn’t help look down and get more and more nervous. Finally, when he let us go, I closed my eyes. The whoosh, the air and the feeling was adrenaline pumping enough, I opened my eyes when the wild ride had slowed down (it was a 120m drop). I looked down and around me. Hmm… not bad, not that scary! Later when I saw another two guys swing, I freaked out! I am so glad we were the first ones to go so I didn’t know how it would actually be. When we came back, I was shaking, muscles I didn’t know I had were moving somewhere. Inspite of all this, for a crazy moment I wanted to do it again. But Gagan didn’t, and there was no way I was going alone. The whole thing lasts less than 5 minutes, but the drive and back was a total of 2-3 hours.

After lunch, I rushed into an Icebreaker store and bought some woolens at a discount. Icebreakers are made in NZ and hence a bit cheaper (also due to currency rate). And then it was off to sky diving. The staff took great pains to make us feel good about hurling ourselves out of a place. It was 15000feet drop and we would be falling at 200kph at one point. The nice lady assured us its not as scary as bungy jumping or canyon swinging and here’s why: for bungy and sky swing, you are jumping relatively close to earth and you see the other land mass rushing towards you. You know what you wont hit it, but the visual is scary. Sky diving is very high up and you don’t even know what’s happening. And then you are gliding safely in a parachute before long. I believed her and resolved to not close my eyes this time.

As we waited for my turn, I wrote “I AM MAD” on my hands upon a suggestion from another woman in my group. I decided to forgo the gloves so I could take a picture with my hands open in the air. They warned us many times to look at the camera and make funny gestures since it looks good in pics and all that. Inspite of all this I didn’t even open my hand wide! I kept my eyes open but I think is a great improvement. It was indeed surreal, it felt very safe. And the fact that this time I did not look down too much made it a much better experience. I asked my tandem master to spin a few times as we were gliding. It was all over too fast. After this and quad biking in Peru and this I think I can safely say I have retired from adventure activities (oh wait, I haven’t done rafting and I have not driven 4WD in the desert. Okay, maybe semi-retired)

That evening, Rachel, Gagan and I were driving together and were supposed to meet up with the group a little after Wanaka to camp at boulder creek (beautiful site). We made an unscheduled stop at an orchard and I bought some honey and we helped ourselves to candy and other free munchies. I had heard Wanaka Cinema was a must see so we made another unscheduled stop to see what it was all about. It’s a big living room with couches and small tables, you can get food and drink at the café next door and sit comfortably while watching a flick. It was rather cute. They had a pattern made of international coins on their door. Rachel and I grabbed some dinner at the café and then we made our way to the campsite. It was isolated and abandoned countryside, not many people choose to drive at night and the road signs are ok, not great. We went the wrong way for a few minutes, but by then getting lost, making u-turns was “du jour” for us all (it was particularly funny the number of times all three vans made a u-turn in the middle of the road when the leading van realized it had made a mistake). Besides our vans stood out, since every inch was painted in a theme (good thing so you cant see scratches and dents people make).

Somewhere along the way we picked up a hitchhiker called Nadav from Israel. He is 23 and has been traveling Australia and NZ for 7 months with no plans to stop (more precisely plans to stop when the money runs out). The next day, we stopped at Fantail café for brunch. I charged my camera since it was nearly dead. We stopped for pics at several places and kept driving along highway 6 along the Tasman sea (did I mention it looks green and not blue?)

Glacier!

We had a glacier hike that day on the agenda. I once again became aware of my lack of general knowledge, I never quire knew what a glacier was. And if I did, I had completely forgotten. Now I think of it as a giant river flowing between mountains, except its frozen and can reach the height of the mountains itself. It grows and recedes. Most glaciers have been receding (global warming?) but Fox and Franz glaciers have been growing the last few years. The guide explained how they were formed (as fresh snow falls on top, it push down and then its way into valleys, pushing the gravel up against the mountain wall and subsequently the mountain a bit higher), as they recede the valley cant hold on its own (without support from the ice) so there are routine rock slides and that whole area is generally unstable. On the way to the glacier, we had crossed the Indo Australian and Pacific earth plates. They have about 15 earthquakes a day. Unstable for sure! We had to hike up 800 steps through rainforest to get to the glacier. It was sunny and the hike in this section was quite humid.

When we got close, we put on crampons we were given and started the hike on the glacier. It was about 11deg C on the glacier. It was amazing to think I was walking on this giant chunk of ice, and to think I was seeing only a fraction of the whole thing. We were very close to the mouth of the glacier and our guide told us of two visitors who had gone upto the cave at the mouth unescorted and got caught when the ice shifted. Took them days to find the bodies (one just washed up somewhere miles away). We could hear what must have been giant blobs of ice moving under us. Since it was sunny, it was slippery in parts and the guides constantly made new steps on the ice so people could climb up and down. Indeed, the glacier is never the same from one moment to the next. Just like a river. The ice is packed so dense it was bluish in color, though dirty in parts due to gravel and dust of the valley.

The guide offered us the chance to climb down a crevasse, it was very slippery and a hard climb and Armando turned around after he fell (though he wasn’t hurt). My hands were frozen by now (I didn’t bring gloves, someone told me it was summer in NZ) but I did get down and took some pictures and then wondered how on earth I was going to get back up. Anyway, the whole thing was a fabulous adventure. I now want to goto an iceberg. I wonder if I can climb one?

One our way onwards we stopped at Franz Joseph and by it held no particular charm since it looked the same as Fox. So we moved on.

That night, most folks dined out and Rachel, Eugene and I decided we would cook and eat in. We are staying at a place with a real kitchen! We had a multi course meal with salad, mushroom soup, beef barley soup, fabulous biryani rice (rice packet with masala paste), beans, sausage and then orange for desert. Did I mention that I didn’t like the sausage in NZ at all? I tried it in a couple of places, no good. Their banana nut bread on the other hand is delish.

South Island Part 2

2009-03-23T00:06:00.003-04:00

Lake Mathison is a wonderful picture spot with reflection of Mt Cook in it. Alas we were not meant to see it since it was cloudy that morning. We moved on and meant to Hokitaki to see the eels but got distracted by mention of hot spring along Wananganui river. It was supposedly a kilometer walk to the springs and it became a 2-3 hour long adventure to find it! We parked on the road and walked along rocks lining the river for what seemed like ever. Half of us wanted to give up the other half didn’t, so we moved on. We ran into some DOC (dept of conservation) folks who had just been airdropped, they pointed out where the spring were. At some point we had to cross a narrow strip of water and I tell you it was the coldest water I have ever set foot in. I was afraid I would get a cramp right there and fall into it. Anyway, we did cross over, Hans and I were trailing. We met up with Eugene, Rachel and Nadaf and discovered we had been left behind by the rest of the group. We wandered in a very abandoned area, there were warning signs to keep out and I was at some point in time worried since we had come very far and there was no sign of humanity. Anyway, Nadaf played his harmonica and entertained us (he knew this hindi song “ichak daana”, I was pleasantly surprised!). Rachel had talked about Rahul Khanna the Indian movie actor in the film Earth. She thinks he is hot! We eventually caught up and discovered the springs. It was utterly relaxing and I lay on the hottest spot of all.

While I had managed to stay covered and protected from the sand flies, it was here that I finally got taken. A few bites on my hands and ankles. Rachel assured me it would itch very badly in a couple of days and especially at night. She was so generous with the detail, that Rachel! She ofcourse was the worst bitten of all with angry red blotches all over.

On our way back from the springs, Rachel commented that this was it, this was the landscape they showed in the movies shot in NZ. I agreed, it was indeed beautiful. So far the landscape was stunning, we had been driving along Tasman sea which is green in color. It was never ending stretches of large mountains looking over water. I was convinced that my camera could never do justice to what my eyes beheld.

When I joined the group, Rachel was the de facto cook, by this time I had become her de facto assistant chef. That night we made pasta, beef sauce and had it with champagne and wine. It was raining hard the next morning and we made our way into dp:one a restaurant with lots of abstract and modern art on the wall (for sale) at Greymouth. The name stands for “development one”, the restaurant is in the first commercial building in Greymouth. We passed train tracks, this was the first I saw train tracks. There is a train from Greymouth to Christchurch, apparently a very scenic route. We also stopped at a Jade store and gallery, I bought some Paua (abalone) shells and jewelry for myself and gift giving.

The next day was pancake rocks, it was in a plantation setting and the rocks themselves were amazing, they got pressed into themselves over time so they look like a stack of pancakes. Once again a reminder of what water and nature can do given time (lots of it). By now we were driving along country side and farmland. I could not stop taking pictures, the sight of slivers of clouds sitting across mountains was just gorgeous! Pancake Rock Pictures

Click here for Nelson and other pictures.
The plan that night was to eat seafood at Nelson. Except when we got there all restaurants were closed by 9:30pm (and this is supposedly a big town). Not only that, the holiday park where we were camping was also closed. So we slept in our vans, cooked on our stoves on the sidewalk washed up in public restrooms. I wondered if this is how the homeless live!

The next morning was the warmest I woke up to so far. We walked up to the beach which was nearby (Tasman Bay) and as I look at my pictures, I think those are the best I have of NZ. The water was very calming, the clouds were like in an impressionist painting. I also noticed the way the city was laid out. Much like Queenstown and parts of Auckland and later Wellington, it is hilly with homes layered up the hills. Very reminiscent of San Francisco, the streets are often sloping.

Anyway, we went to Boat Shed café on the waterfront for brunch. They did not have mimosa (they didn’t know what that was), so we bought OJ and champagne and made our own. We had oysters with roe, bread with some great olive oil. I also had baby abalone, its more or less as expensive as it is here, but in NZ dollars. This was my first time eating abalone and while I didn’t fall in love with it (like I did with escargots), it was fine. (Chewiness was between scallops and squid). As I sat at the table, I felt supremely civilized eating with cutlery that had been definitely washed (I think) and a real cloth napkin! Restaurants expect no tip though they charge 20% surcharge on public holidays (maybe kiwis go out in loads on public holidays and make a lot of noise).

So far I had not driven much since I was the slowest of all (rather they had all become accustomed to speeding in the 2-3 days they had been driving before I joined them, so I just didn’t drive all this time). But this day I drove and it was an absolute delight. The right hand sitting, left hand driving and left side gear box was ok, the only part that took me some time was the turn indicator. The windshield wiper started every time I meant to turn!

After only a couple of hours we stopped at Mussel Pot in Haverlock to enjoy some greenlip mussels, a specialty of the area. We had them steamed, marinated and boiled along with Sauvignon Blanc from nearby Forrest winery. Dining was definitely getting fancy. Food so far in NZ had been uneventful, when we did eat out it was nothing you couldn’t get back home.
We drove on taking more pictures along the way. We had planned to visit wineries since we were in the famous Marlborough country. Except they all closed by the time we got there (5ish). That was rather disappointing since I had really wanted to taste and buy some good NZ wine. Anyway we headed for our campsite for the night which turned out to be a lovely place and we paid extra to camp by the lakeside. I ordered some fried fish at the café and ate with left-over something. By now Rachel and I had made good friends and we decided that instead of sleeping inside we would lay out under the stars. It was unbelievably beautiful and it’s a shame we didn’t do it more often. I struggled to stay awake so I could keep looking at the clear star studded sky. We awoke to a wake up call from Mama duck with 7 of her baby ducks walking right by my head. Later as I went to the washroom, the sink was full of cicadas. Absolutely disgusting, I didn’t know if they were dead or just sleeping. At some point, I was wondering if they would ever clear out and a woman came by and scooped them out of the sink and threw them out!!

We went to Picton, which is another picturesque town. Here Eugene, Rachel and I said our goodbyes to the group and took the ferry to Wellington. The ferry ride is famous since it meanders through the sound with lovely sights all around you.

Wellington

2009-03-23T00:00:00.003-04:00

Wellington Pictures

Once in Wellington, Eugene, Rachel and I took a bus to the YHA where we were all staying. I was once again reminded of how helpful and friendly the kiwis are. We asked the bus driver to tell us where to get off and when we got to our stop, not only did he tell us where to get off, he got off the bus to point out the building while the rest of the passengers waited. Can you imagine an NYC transit driver doing that?? The kiwis were in general very helpful, if they could give you a room, they made phone calls on your behalf to find one for you. The desk staff at YHA spent a considerable amount of time with Rachel and me when we were looking to rent a car (we couldn’t get one, they were all sold out). They are in no hurry and genuinely seem to want to get you what you are looking for. That was quite a departure from the other cities I have visited so far!

After we dropped off our bags, we went off immediately for a hike up Mt Victoria from where you get a 360 view of the city. I was tired but the hike was not hard at all the sights were rewarding. We dined on Mongolian BBQ at Ghenghis Khan. It was a nice, quite relaxing 2 hour (maybe longer) meal where we discussed all our travels and experiences. Eugene (Russian origin) has traveled quite a lot and takes a great interest in the history and facts of the places he visits (or wants to visit). Definitely a treasure trove of information on places he has visited or is interested in.

When we got back to our rooms, I was so tired I just crashed into bed. The next morning the three of us did a walk from my book, we walked upto and across the City to Bridge sea with its funky architecture. We made our way to the beehive stopping on the way to shop, I bought some sheepskin Ugg and another pair of leather high boots and some more souvenirs. We went into the beehive and checked out a neighboring cathedral. Then it was time to drop Rachel off at the bus station, she was off to the north island before heading home.

Eugene went onto the botanical gardens and I headed back towards the hotel. I stopped at the civic center on the way back to watch a musical competition between groups of kids from school (I assume). Onto Cuba street, its several blocks of cobblestone path with no vehicular traffic, just shops, restaurants etc.. Lunch was at Phoenician falafel. I stopped at a wine store and bought some sauvignon blanc, pinot noir, gwertzraminer and a dry reisling. I wasn’t sure if I would be allowed to carry more than two bottles back to the US, but I decided to risk it. Turned out it was no problem at all. I also bought a rain jacket at one of the sporting goods store. That was my biggest shopping day other than Queenstown.

After dropping all my shopping at the hotel, I went to Te Papa, the must-see museum in town. It is huge and you can easily spend the whole day there. The big moment was seeing the colossal squid, it had eyes of a soccer ball and tentacles at 2.1 meters. Yes, it’s huge! Good thing I went when I did, I read upon my return they had removed the squid for cleaning. I walked through several exhibits and learned an interesting fact: Christchurch (city on east coast of south island) is ever so slowly moving away from Greymouth (city on west coast) due to the movement of the earth’s plates. All that walking in the museum made me hungry and I stopped at Pandora Panettera for some hot chocolate. I also bought some panforte, loved the spicy aftertaste! I ran into Eugene when I was preparing to leave that evening and said my goodbyes again. I took a bus to Auckland and arrived around 7 the next morning. I had breakfast at the casino in Sky Towers, I was impressed neither by the casino nor the restaurant. I thought Atlantic City casinos far fancier. And that was it, an afternoon flight was to bring me into Seoul where I would spend a day before heading back home. I had made some notes with Rachel on the must do/see things in Seoul and had plenty of time to read my guide book on the plane.

Bombay

2008-12-27T07:19:00.006-05:00

I had a few days to take off at the end of the year and had looked into several travel options and after all that research, I finally decided that in light of the economic situation of the country, I would not travel anywhere and save my money. Instead I signed up for a 10 day meditation course and contemplate life (or the economy, I have lately started meditating and am loving the little I am able to accomplish by way of quality meditation). And then 26/11 happened in Bombay. It was very disconcerting and I decided on an impulse that I would use that time go to Bombay instead and see my family. Pictures are here.

I didn’t have my travel papers ready and my friends assured me I would never get a good deal on tickets to travel in the peak month of the year. Anyway, que sera sera, one Monday I had everything ready and was all set to travel the following Monday for a week long trip. My siblings wondered why I was coming for so short a trip and why couldn’t I extend it since it’s the holidays in the US and all that. I told them it’s either a week or nothing. They took the week.

As I landed in Bombay, I noticed that I had taken off and landed in 30 deg temperature, the difference was in the metric (F and C). As soon as I stepped out of the aircraft I knew I was in Bombay, the sticky humidity, the warmth, the dust as we drove out of a makeshift parking lot. I felt it instantly in my skin, hair, eyes and throat. Airport security was no greater than before, I cleared customs very quickly and met my brother Bobby and sister in law Charandeep outside (they are renovating all major airports in India, Bombay still has some ways to go before they are finished).

As we drove home (very short drive from the international airport), the signs of growth were everywhere, there is a metro train system being built on the main road. I lived in that neighborhood for 11 yrs and used to take the bus to the main train station. Now people will take the train directly from the main road (Andheri Kurla road), how cool! They widened the roads significantly and in the process demolished a lot of illegal but well built structures: stores, restaurants, hotels and all. I had not idea they were all illegal, I guess a lot of people lost a major part of their livelihood.

I slept for a few hours and woke up when it seemed like all the alarms in the world had gone off at the same time. Turns out my bro sets the alarm in about 3 cell phones, you know, primary, secondary and tertiary. Leave nothing to chance. I made some tea and sat in the newly built platform by the window and tried to remember my teen years in that exact same flat as I saw people leaving for work/college etc.. on the street. Breakfast was something heavy (most meals in India are too heavy for me, but saying no is almost never an option, providing and consuming food is the primary method of expressing and receiving affection, its is also a primary form of having a good time as per my brother. He says whenever people ask him how an event or a holiday was, his best reply is “oh it was a lot of fun, we had a blast, ate a lot of good food”, he says this in Punjabi and it sounds far funnier.)

Before I left for Bombay, I saw the film Slumdog Millionaire and there are some cool scenes shot in VT station with trains in the background. I had this urge to travel by local train somewhere, anywhere in Bombay. So my sis-in-law and I took the train to go to downtown to look for this store where I had bought ethnic stuff for the home years ago. I vaguely remembered the store name as Bombay Cottage or something in Churchgate. We went to Bombay Store (near Kala Ghoda) and Bombay Cottage Industries near Gateway of India (gateway is where the terrorists landed). They were both great stores, but not the one I remember. I still don’t know what store that was, maybe it shut down. The train ride was the highlight of the day, I was super excited, it was a fast train too! My sister in law was not happy about me peaking my head out of the train, but I just couldn’t help it (the trains have open doors on both sides). The polluted air, the sorry sight of rubbish all around the tracks notwithstanding, it was very nostalgic. I even thought of trying my “get on and off while the train is in slow motion on platform” move, but didn’t get a chance, there were women ahead of me getting off at Churchgate. Besides my agility may have rusted since the time I did that routinely in college days (very risky, do not try!).

We ate lunch a Kamat’s, an eatery I used to go to in my college days. They have a small casual dining place with 5 tables and the menu scribbled on a board and a bigger place with AC and a real and much bigger menu. The spring dosa was awesome, one was more than enough for both of us. We also had sabudana wada which they served with lassi as a side which was unusual, besides the wada was not that great. We then went to Café Mondegar for coffee, very popular with tourists, they have cartoons from Mario Miranda all over on the walls.

The next day I visited my sister Jyoti in Bandra, she did the best thing she could have done by moving very close to this shopping place called Elco Arcade. While I don’t care for the shopping much, there is this restaurant (used to be street cart, they have since moved up) that has been selling chaat etc...(misc Indian spicy snacks) since forever and it’s the absolute best in the world. I consider it my solemn duty to eat there every chance I get and it’s the only time my sister won’t insist I eat at home. So I did the right thing and lunched there. Dinner that evening was at Royal China, they have excellent dumplings though their (peking) duck was a little dry. I lunched at Elco again the next day.

Even though lifestyle and habits in Bombay are beginning to mimic US’ lot, some things will always stay unique. The sheer traffic in and out of regular homes, the driver, the maid, this that and the other person! My sister, even as a home maker, has a domestic staff of about 4 odd people. Another typically Indian thing is the sense of obligation that you have to call such and such and visit this cousin and that aunt otherwise they will take offense or feel bad or worse, it would be disrespectful and that is an absolute no-no. I had planned on visiting no relatives at all since it was such a short trip and I wanted to spend QT (quality time) with my family, but an Uncle and Aunt decide to visit me since I wouldn’t visit them. Then my sister guilted me into visiting my maternal aunt (mom’s brother’s wife) and then ofcourse I had to visit this one cousin who had lived close by for years and are senior members of my dad’s family in Bombay and then ofcourse I had to visit this other cousin who visited me this past summer. Visiting is, by the way, at least one meal if not longer. Visiting is also not done alone, it becomes a party with everybody invited (though this time I broke both rules by visiting a cousin for breakfast AND by myself, I am getting bold!). I was calling relatives up until the last minute to explain why I was in town but had not come to see them.

Anyway, all said and done its nice to know that even though I am careless in keeping in touch with many of my relatives, I am very much part of the eco system and am always welcome for some chole/chickpeas, chicken or mutton (sometimes both!), rice, roti, yogurt, atleast one vegetable if not more, dessert, fruit, not to mention appetizers served before all this wholesome goodness. All this followed by tea accompanied by some interesting cookie, snack or nuts that someone brought from someplace special that you must absolutely have a taste of. That's how they get you, “just taste it, just a little” and before you know you are staring at a plateful in front of you wondering how can you either smuggle it into your handbag for later or slip it into the plate of the person next to you before they can react.

The things that are in common with life here? Eating out, shopping (with or without cause or need), increasing out of town travel (business or vacation), rising divorce rate, marrying outside your ethnicity, young couples living away from their parents, brand-obsession, dating, PDA (public display of affection, though it varies by neighborhood), use of american slang by kids, the concept of disposable income, increasing volunteering work by the younger generation.

Another thing I notice is the tolerance and even encouragement given to professional degrees and education in non mainstream professions in my own family. My dad’s side of the house are businessmen going back generations and education beyond bachelor’s was never considered important (except my parent’s family, they were always different, they were the first ones among their family to migrate to Bombay and to support professional education for the us girls). I see the next generation getting into MBAs and marketing and all that. I have a niece who wants to live in Japan and be an anime artist and my sister is not freaking out (she is a little, but not too much)! As a teenager, I remember being asked by relatives from Punjab whether I was going for medical or non medical studies, their world was only those two options!

I spent an afternoon with the youngest 3 of my 8 nieces and nephews (Angad is 10 and was born after I moved out of India, Guntaas and Trisha, both about 13, were very young then), I took them out so we could spend QT and not be distracted by the elders. We went go carting, rock climbing, dashing cars and played some video games. Angad was full of questions about cars (that’s his obsession, that kid knows more about luxury cars than I do!), I also debunked some myths about America he had (are all Americans fat, are all Americans blonde?). Guntaas told me about this school play based on recent terror events that they were participating in, she was playing a hostage and Angad had a few lines about growing up to be a commando or something. Then we went to Pizza hut and pigged out. I am a “cool massi (aunt)” and this afternoon was my investment in maintaining that title.

From there I went to visit another sister Rosy who recently moved to a new flat and did a wonderful job decorating her place with a very India/ethnic theme. I didn’t get to see my oldest sister Asha since she lives a short flight away from Bombay and her kids had exams so she couldn’t get away to come visit me. I didn’t call any of my friends in Bombay since I knew I wouldn’t see them. A friend whom I met on my Egypt tour last December did email me, she and her fiancé (they met on the same Egypt trip, who says you don’t meet people when you travel) are traveling throughout India and Nepal, they were landing in Bombay the day I was taking off. We never connected, which is a shame.

I didn’t notice any lingering shock over the terror attacks though the media was still talking about it. It’s true that Bombayites have a tendency of recovering quickly and moving on with life after any and every major catastrophy, some consider it a sign of callousness or dispassion towards their fellow humans. I think its more a reflection of “you gotta do what you gotta do to survive in this big city” attitude, who can afford to keeping looking in the past? This event did seem to linger a little longer than most others though.

All too soon, it was time to get back home. It was a short but lovely trip, rather therapeutic for me. I wasn’t as whiny of Bombay weather and traffic as I usually am, ofcouse I didn’t go out much and it is winter time after all. But all said and done I am delighted I went!

Cusco

2008-04-23T20:45:00.016-04:00

Almost exactly a year ago, I wrote the chapter on southwest USA camping trip and here’s a line from it “Hiking is the only outdoor activity I truly enjoy and I wish to someday become a serious hiker and conquer some difficult mountains.” Well, I’ve got one under my belt and many many more to go…. Machu Pichu is something I started thinking of last summer and when I got talking to my cousin Eva about it, she had been thinking of it too. Well, before I knew it, we booked ourselves on a trip in April.

I was determined to be better prepped for this trip than all others since this is serious hiking. So I did my research and did all my homework. Or so I would like to say. Eva did the research and picked the outfitter, I bought a book that I read very little from before the trip. (I did read up a lot more on the trip) I had planned lots of prep hikes, but barely did a few, all minor. Nevertheless, I convinced myself I could do it, the altitude would be ok and then there’s always coca tea (common and popular with the locals and tourists alike to combat altitude sickness). To my surprise I did do alright! In retrospect, only Day 2 was hard. And then again since it was well organized, there was never any danger or risk to life or limb. Its illegal to hike up the trail by yourself, you have to go with an organized group. The Inca Trail to Machu Pichu, my friends, is a road well traveled. Anyway, I am getting ahead of myself. Lets begin from the beginning. For a change, I wont post pictures in the blog since they are all here:

Cusco And Lima:

http://www.facebook.com/p.php?i=539939268&k=Z5B6556ZTX6M51EFV1VUTS

Amazon:
http://www.facebook.com/p.php?i=539939268&k=ZZB2Y2WST42M51EFV1VUTS

Machu Pichu:

http://www.facebook.com/p.php?i=539939268&k=YYEYX3WSR35M51EFV1VUTS

I am also publishing these chapters in chronological order, the others are in reverse order.

Eva, her husband Barry and I arrived into Lima Friday night, met over breakfast in the AM and then took a short flight to Cusco. We had big plans to go rafting and all that the very first day. Very wise that we didn’t. Cusco is at about 11000 ft, oxygen is at a premium. The first day I had a little headache that came and went. We walked about town, went upto San Blas, an eclectic neighborhood with cafes, restaurants and clubs. As we were walking about, we heard loud music in one of the many narrow cobblestone streets. We went into what looked like a party with a band playing. I thought we had walked into a private party. We were about to turn away when a woman (who looked drunk) came up to us and led us in. We ordered some warm beer and chatted up with a man in a tie. There were other tables with people who were eating with so much concentration you would think there was a food competition. The man told us this was a change of season party where everybody was invited and they sold beer and food. There was a bucket full of raw meat that was going to be cooked. I danced to the music a bit and the drunk woman warmed up to Eva and Barry. She declared him to be macho man and insisted he drink out of her cup. We left soon after Barry couldn’t take anymore of the warm beer.

We went onto Muse café for coffee and then Hotel Monestario, a very upscale, fancy pants hotel to drink some more. I ordered Pisco sour (my most expensive drink in Peru at $9). Pisco is a grape brandy and Pisco sour is a must-have drink in Peru. Didn’t like it. Later I was to try many other Pisco cocktails (sunrise, capitan etc…), loved them all except the sour. We had lunch at Incanto which is an Italian place near Plaza De Armas (main town square, all major Peru cities have one). Barry ordered ceviche (sliced raw fish and onions marinated in lime juice), which is another must-have in Peru except it’s a must-have in Lima and not Cusco since there isn’t much variety of seafood in Cusco (trout is the most popular fish in Cusco). He got vegetarian ceviche instead which was actually not bad at all. Very nice ambience, a big igloo shaped oven in the middle of the restaurant where they make breads and pizza. Later that evening, we couldn’t decide what to do about dinner so we ambled into a pollo place. We each ordered quarter chicken (9 soles). The rice here was divine. They had boiled it in some sort of stock and it had some herbs that we couldn’t place. It looked like regular white rice but every mouthful was so flavorful!

The next morning as I went down to breakfast in the hotel lobby I was pleasantly surprised to hear Hindi film songs. And it seemed to be coming form the radio. I asked the girl if it was radio and all she managed to communicate to me was “Shah Rukh Khan”! We met the rest of the group a bit later. Emily from CA, Tim and Robyn from Portland, OR and our guide John from Cusco. Small group. Nice. I like that.

We went to Sacsayhuamán, a major Inca site in Cusco. John talked to us about Inca history. It was like a big fortress with a garden on top of the mountain. Fairly light day. The Inca walls were quite amazing, large stone pieces glued together real tight with no gaps. Turns out the INcas used to mummify their dead much like the Egyptians and used natural herbs to bathe the body and left them up in the mountains to kind of freeze dry. The Incas grew in might from the 12 century onwards, much after the Egyptians. I wonder if they learned their techniques from the Egyptians somehow.

Lunch was at Sumaq Misky, I ordered Lomo Saltado (marinated steak and vegetables, one of the most popular meals in Peru). I also tasted some Alpaca meat. Dinner was at Macando where I had Juane. Its rice and chicken cooked in banana leaf. Very tasty. We shared Yuca fries and some yummy appetizers. I was drinking a modified version of hot rum when Barry suggested I try Havana Club rum. Very smooth. And very expensive!

Day 3 started with a bike ride down the mountain all the way, very lovely. I am sorry I didn’t take enough pictures. I am not good at biking and was paying too much attention to the road ahead (we shared it with regular traffic). The afternoon started with Pisaq market where I bought a lovely floor runner made of alpaca wool. The shopkeeper assured Emily and me that he took 25 days to make it by hand. Rubbish, I say! But its pretty, colorful and I like it. After a box lunch we hiked up Pisaq mountain to see the ruins. Pisaq is in Sacred Valley, a picturesque valley that was, well, sacred, to the Incas. They still farm on the mountains in addition to the valley. By creating terraces on the mountainside they can create different microclimates on different parts of the farm. Technique inherited from the Incas, who in turn probably inherited from the Pre-Incas and then perfected it some. Turns out Incas didn’t invent all the things they are famous for, they inherited a lot of their culture, mythology and techniques and were smart enough to improve them. And yet there is not a lot of documentation about their ways and methods, some was destroyed when the conquistadors (Spanish) came.

The hike was, as promised, "heart pumping" but good practice for the Inca trail we were going to take to Machu Pichu. We were wondering how the locals go up and down on a regular basis since they farm and live on the mountains and the rest of the community and market is in the valley and they are not likely to have a car. We were told the locals chew coca leaf about three times a day, they are probably addicted to it.

Eva was quite miserable on the Pisaq hike and by the end of the day, she and Barry decided they weren’t going to hike the trail after all. They realized that they were on vacation away from the kids and it was not necessary to work so hard. Wise decision, I say.

Dinner was at Pucara, I was too full from a power bar I had eaten earlier, so I had creole soup and guacamole dip. Tasted purple corn drink, quite yummy. Eva had ordered the same in Incanto, but hers tasted lemony, this was sweet. They have very large corn in Peru though I hear neighboring Ecuador has even bigger, giant corn.

The children in Cusco were absolutely adorable, they all have round faces with cute sun and wind burnt flushed cheeks that only serve to make them look cuter.

The next day,the rest of us were going to start off on the journey to the unknown. Looking back, its amusing when I remember how I was, clueless about what the next few days were going to be like. I just had a vague expectation of it being hard. How blissful it is; this not knowing!

Machu Pichu

2008-04-23T20:44:00.013-04:00

It was going to take us three days to get to Machu Pichu, Day 4 was going to be in the ruins with more optional hiking. We were going to hike this trail: http://www.donquijote.org/tourist/maps/peru/img/cusco4.gif

I tried looking up the cumulative elevation gain since there was a lot of up and down even within a day. To my surprise there is no information on the internet about cum gain. Oh well, suffice to say it was a LOT!

Day 1: We started off at 6AM in a bus ride towards Ollantaytambo. After breakfast at a scheduled stop, I bought a warm hat and also a walking stick even though I don't like sticks on hikes (did so at the insistence of John and Abraham our trail guide. I made John carry it about half the time). I also bought a poncho for the inevitable rain, the best purchase on the trip. It would have been too hot to hike in my rain jacket, even though its rather thin.

We excitedly got our passports stamped at the entrance, took a "before" group picture and started up walking by Rio Cusichaca. Before I forget the river Urubamba is the major river, it changes names as it winds about in the Andes and was sacred (but ofcourse) to the Incas. It was a sunny day and hike was not very steep. I have been on some lovely hikes in the Southwest and NY USA, and have been impressed by the scale and depth of the mountains and valleys. But this was unmatched. The valley overlook, while not any deeper than, say Grand Canyon (perhaps less so), went on and on forever. I have this memory of us stopping very close to a cliff (he had a tendency to always stand close the edge while talking to us, used to freak out one of the girls in the group) where we could see an Inca site below and we all sat down like students and Abraham stood close to the cliff edge and lectured us on Inca facts and history. The Inca trail is about 25000km and we were about to hike about 45 km of it. It was lovely to look around on a very sunny (though cool) day. I had read that Inca blood has been diluted beyond recognition and most Peruvians today are mixed blood. Abraham, however, insisted he was Inca blood. I asked him how he knew. He said in all seriousness, “Because I chew coca leaf and drink chicha (corn beer)”. I told him I had had had coca and was hence halfway there myself!

Lets talk a little about the porters. We were joined by 6 other people, so the tourists were 12, and then there were 3 guides (John, Abraham and George) which brought the visitor total in our group to 15. We had 20 porters (including a chef with a hat!) who carried our things, tents, food supplies and everything we would need for the 3 days to get up there. They carry 25-30 kilos of weight on their backs and walk the same path as we do. Oh I am sorry, they sprint up the path while we drag on. By the time we got to lunch site, the dinner tent was already up. There were individual bowls of cold water with bar soap for us to wash up. Hot soup was served by the waiter followed by about 4 dishes of vegetables, rice and meat, all freshly made. And then as we, the royalty, went on to the hike, they cleaned up, packed everything and overtook us to make it to dinner campsite to have tea, cookies and fresh popcorn ready. In the morning they would wake us up with hot coca tea and have warm water bowls outside the tent for washing up. They would boil water twice a day so we could carry clean water for the trail. Positively luxurious! And here I was with 10 lbs on my back struggling to find a way to reduce a few more ounces so I could be light.

Anyway we moved on, Abraham was a little quick for me. I was roughly in the middle of the group which was nice since I usually am a straggler. Later we all argued on who was lagging behind more than the others and complimented each other on how good the other person had been that day. I lost my sunblock on the way, it just fell out. I asked Abraham to please tell the Lost and Found department of Machu Pichu to keep an eye out for it.

Day 2 of the hike started at 6:30AM and was going to take us into the high jungle and was promised to be the most difficult. Steps all the way and we would get to the highest point on the trail at 4200m, Dead Woman’s Pass. George started wearing a t-shirt that said “I survived Dead Woman’s Pass”, I really wanted a similar t-shirt, but alas I never found it. So high jungle it is. This part of the hike was hard, very hard. It was steep steps all the way. And we were truly in the dense forest. It was misty and rained gently for hours. I think we got terribly lucky, I had read stories about downpours and a submerged trail. I loved the weather and the misty forest around us, I was prepared for the wet and it was cold but not freezing. But the steps, oh those steps! My legs ache to think of those Inca steps. At some point, about 20 minutes before we got to Dead Woman’s Pass, you could look up and see the end of the steps. It was very motivating to drag yourself upto the end…. Only to find it was a clearing with a flat path and more steps further up. As I walked on, I heard the loud groans of others who had made a similar discovery. Actually it was more like shouts of “What the F$@*”. Whichever Inca built that part of the trail had a mean streak in him. I had taken my walking stick from John and was using it to haul myself up the steps. I was doing switchbacks between the steps, carefully studying the trail looking for the shortest step. Whenever there was a tiny path to the side of the steps, I took it. Every step up had to be carefully measured. John and George advised singing in our mind as a motivational technique. I couldn’t focus on a song so I kept repeating “I can do this”. Which was motivating, but got boring after a while. Note to self: find inspirational phrases. There was a time I asked myself: “Why am I doing this to myself, when I could have been at home listening to some fine music, reading a fine book and drinking fine tea. Or regular tea, I am not picky. I could have enjoyed the free pizza they were going to serve at work that week. Why Uppal, Why?”

We finally made it to Dead Woman’s Pass, which was a bit of an anticlimax since we couldn’t see anything, it was so misty. Its so called because you can see the shape of a woman lying down in the mountains. I saw the face with nose and a breast, but nothing much else. You can see more from different views. And then unbelievably enough, it got worse. We had to climb down steps. Definitely not good on my knees, I kept thinking of how much damage I was causing to my knees that I will pay the price for years later, more importantly the next day.

Abraham usually led the group and George acted as sweep. John flitted back and forth looking after his group. At some point he caught up with me and started talking about his life and culture. I was happy to listen and was trying not to talk too much, because then I get distracted and you know what happens when you are distracted. Sure enough, as I was in the middle of answering John’s question about whether it was true that Indian men have many wives, I slipped and fell. Never mind, no harm done. I picked up, brushed off and moved on. And continued my cultural education of my guide John. At some point he started telling me about the deaths by accident of tourists and porters on the trail. I asked if we could please continue that conversation later (maybe back in the lobby of that nice and safe hotel in Cusco over coca tea)

Anyway we made it to dinner camp at around 3pm. Dinner was, as always, a lovely affair, tonite there was hot virgin sangria. Abraham passed around a bottle of rum to mix with sangria as reward. It was over in no time. We played cards, I went out later to see the starlit clear night with a thin sliver for a moon, the bright milky way and the southern cross (which you can only see in the southern hemisphere). Before dinner Robyn and I found a flat ground away from the camp and did yoga. It was very relaxing and may have contributed to my near absence of soreness the next day inspite of the grueling hike. I asked John how the porters feel about us foreigners coming into their country and leaving behind all that mess. He said that they probably appreciated the money but made fun of everybody that wasn’t one of their own. He said they made fun of him as well since he is not a native. He said they appreciated when someone made an effort to talk to them. They speak Quechua, the language of the Incas. We learned that George was nicknamed Arnold Schwarzenegger by other guides and he is indeed buffed up and talks and laughs like Arnold. It was a good bonding night throughout.

Peru has 4000 varieties of potato, we had potato in almost all our meals on the hike, sometimes more than one variety in one meal. We also had quinoa. Quinoa was considered mother of all grain by Incas, it is very healthy and I have become quite a fan. They also served freshly popped popcorn and cookies, at tea time and though I am not a fan of popcorn, it was hard to stop eating.

Day 3 had an early start as well and was on and off sunny and we saw the back of Machu Pichu mountain. There was more culture talk at Phuyupatamarka, Abraham talked of possible human sacrifice by Incas to please the Gods, the person being sacrificed was usually prepped with hallucinogenic. There was a lot of walking down steps as well as a flat sloping trail. I really hated the steps down. We reached our last camp site soon enough, there was actually a hot shower there! Yoohoo! The night before I had ambitions for a cold shower, which was the only option on the trail, but one toe in the cold water convinced me otherwise. I had whined about the lack of shower options on the trail causing Emily to say I was "picky, picky, picky". I just wanted to be "clean, clean, clean". I had so far managed with a cold sponge. Brrrr.

We camped near Winay Wayna ("forever young" in Quechuan) Inca site which is called mini Machu Pichu, it’s a large concave site built into the side of a mountain. We went for a walk and pictures. Dinner was going to be served in a restaurant though it would be cooked by our chef. This was the night I got an appreciation of how crowded and busy the trail is. No more than 400 people are allowed to start the trail at a time, we were all there in that one campsite. There was alcohol for sale at the restaurant and as you can imagine the place was trashed with empty bottles and was very noisy. This was also bid your porters good bye night since they were taking our things back to Aguas Calientes (town at the bottom of the mountain) the next AM and we would not see them again. We tipped them and then shook hands with each of them. A few bold ones helped themselves to a kiss on the cheek with the women. They were mostly shy and there was no real interaction between us.

The next day (Day 4) we woke at 4:30 and started at 5:30 when the entrance opened to Machu Pichu. In about 2 hours we were at Sun Gate. Once again lady luck smiled at us, there were no clouds at all. Machu Pichu itself was visible, albeit overcast making it look grayish. As we walked down, the sun played hide and seek and I got some good pictures of the ruins in the sun. We were reunited with Eva and Barry who had bused up from Aguas Calientes early morning.

There is a mountain called Huyana Pichu which serves the backdrop in all the shots of Machu Pichu you will see. It’s a steep 45 minutes climb up and at the start of the trip we were all very keen on hiking HP. Abraham and John were not sure we would have time to do that and the MP tour and lunch at Aguas Calientes and still catch 2:30pm train back. They said we’ll see. Anyway, we stopped at the restaurant section of Machu Pichu and there is an $500-$800 a night hotel that celebrities stay at. We got a pretty Machu Pichu stamp on our passports. It was busy by the time we took our breakfast break, many of the train and bus travelers had arrived by that time, I will say that Machu Pichu is very touristy. Like I said, a road very well traveled.

Anyway we went onto the tour of Machu Pichu, which was a holy city for the Incas, the workers who built the city were also of the higher class. It has temples as well as homes for the highest nobility. The difference is in the quality of the stones and how they are laid together. The stones in the temples connect perfectly, you couldn’t slide a paper between the cracks. Machu Pichu was (re)discovered in 1911, it was saved from the destructive Spaniards (conquistadors) since it had been lost when they arrived. We visited all the major sites and temples (including sun dial, sun temple, temple of three windows) with Abraham pointing out the significance of each and the architecture. The Incas worshipped the Sun God Inti. Come to think of it, all old faiths have a different name for the Sun God, but the Sun was universally worshipped. Machu Pichu has over 200 structures and is believed to have housed 700-800 people during Inca times. By far this was the largest site we saw on the hike. Machu Pichu means old peak and Huyana Pichu means young peak in Quechuan.

And then out of the blue John and George said “lets go climb Huayana Pichu” and I found myself agreeing wholeheartedly. A few of us went, the rest either stayed in MP or went back to Aguas Calientes. I think the elevation gain on Huyana hike was between 1200 and 1500 feet, the round trip takes an hour and half, we started @11AM and had a 2:30PM train from Aguas Calientes though we had to be at the station at 2 (it’s a 30 min bus ride there form Machu Pichu). It was going to be tight, but we started off anyway. I am still amazed with myself that I did it. The good thing about the hike was that it was short narrow steps and I found myself going up on all fours on sheer willpower. I actually made it to the top in under 40 minutes. Tim, John in less than 30. When I got to the top I felt this indescribable sense of accomplishment for the first time on the trail. I didn’t have that when we got to Machu Pichu, day 2 was by now forgotten. It was a lovely view, you can see the whole of of Machu Pichu (even portions you cant see from Sun Gate) and it indeed looks like a condor. I just sat on the top for several minutes soaking it all in quite unable to move (combination of the splendor and exhaustion) .Coming back down the exact same path was not bad, short steps are fine. Its those darned steep ones that kill you and your knees.

Anyway, we made it to lunch at Via Jores in Aguas Calientes where I ate like I have not eaten in years. Second and third helpings and 2 helpings of desert. I had worked hard and was hungry. The sweet potato dumplings were delicious. The train ride down was nice, everybody in my compartment dozed off without exception, I took my 40 winks and then enjoyed the view past the window. It was an hour and half in the train and then another hour and half bus ride back to the hotel. And that was it, the adventure was all behind me (or so I thought).

The Experience

Machu Pichu is associated with spirituality, many feel the presence of God and spirits there. I think the fact that it is high up (about 2400m) makes you feel like you are close to the Gods (one reason why the Incas built it so high). Besides there is always a cloud presence. Most mythical stories (atleast the Hindu ones I grew up seeing in pictures) show the Gods in heaven among clouds, I think the clouds give it a mystical quality which lends itself to spirituality. Ofcourse when one is spiritual, you can feel the presence anywhere but the natural beauty of the place helps. The hike in the high jungle was my favorite part. I had to stop every few steps to rest for a few seconds which helped me admire my surroundings, and I chose to hike by myself for a large portion. It was amazing to “hear” the forest and see into the clouds. You could look down the valley one minute and then the clouds would move in the next blanketing everything, making you forget where or how high you were. By the way, I had done very well with the altitude. I chewed coca leaf mixed with sweetening ash (you hold it low in your cheek and let your saliva do its job) once more for fun than need. The porters would wake us up with hot coca tea every morning and that was about it. No headches, no nausea. I did well.

Cusco Again and Amazon

2008-04-23T20:43:00.015-04:00

The night we returned to Cusco, we wanted to celebrate. Emily, Tim, Robyn, John and I went to John’s neighborhood to enjoy pizza at a family restaurant. Afterwards we went to Cross Keys for drinks. Robyn had a bad reaction to cigarette smoke from fellow patrons and begged out. The 4 of us stayed on, I was surprisingly not tired and not at all sore. We talked about Iowaska and San Pedro with John. Tim wanted to deal with “issues in the past”. I said I was curious about my future. John described how you have to prep yourself for 3 days before you take it. Upon my return I read an article in which the author described his experience with Iowaska, it mostly revolved around puking and feeling awful. Maybe I’ll just wait for my future to get here. Patience is a virtue. Iowaska, on the other hand, is a drug.

After we left Cross Keys, Tim desperately wanted to go back to the hotel, he looked beat. But John made a very emotional speech. He had opened up to us over drinks about his life, feelings and dreams. He wanted to celebrate our great accomplishment and friendship and appealed to Tim that while they would all get another chance to celebrate in Cusco later, I would not get to do that with them since I was leaving the tour before it ended. This was mostly tish-tash-hogwash, his wife was out of town and he wanted to party. Not that I minded being used. We went to Extreme and danced a bit. All clubs are the same everywhere, really. Good music. I don’t know where I got the energy to dance. Then Tim really really wanted to go and I decided to call it a night as well. John and Emily stayed on.

The next morning as we met up around breakfast time, a new group had moved in. Their guide was prepping them for Inca trail. It was amusing to see those naive people, they didnt know what was in store for them! Emily and I enjoyed listening in to their questions, were we really like them less than a week ago?

The next day was free day. I went to the Inka museum in the morning. Eva, Barry and I decided to go for quad biking (they had already done rafting during their free time). We had earlier talked of doing Moras Moray (large concentric agriculture terraces with each step its own microclimate), but it was too much effort to get there and I convinced myself I had seen enough Inca sites and terraces.

So we started the new adventure. It was all fun and fine for about an hour and then I nearly went over a slope downhill and braked at the last second. And then, at a left curve in the path I didn’t turn the steering enough. The bike went uphill, I fell off and went under the bike and the bike rolled back on me. One tire went over my lower leg and the other rolled over my thigh and just sat there. I pushed it off me. The guide came back running, he had a very worried look on his face. I was remarkably calm. The bike was surprisingly light. Though my pant leg had torn in two places, I wasn’t hurt. I later had large black and red bruises but nothing deep. I pretty much lost credibility with myself. The guide insisted that I follow him and go very slow. Eva and Barry took off and did their stunts and here I was going mostly downhill at a snail’s pace. It was punishing, I was so tense, every single muscle was tense. I had lost my nerve and the ride back was no fun. Its amazing that the hike did nothing to me and that hour long tense ride left me sore for a couple of days.

Upon returning I was sobered up by the thought of how close I came to hurting myself. Anyway, Eva, Barry and I we went back to Incanto for dinner. I ordered cuy (roasted guinea pig), a must-have in Peru. It was ok, very little meat. Now I can say I have eaten cuy. The next day was the Amazon!

To get to the Amazon, we flew to Puerto Maldonado and spent some time in the market there. That was the second market I visited in Peru with food and groceries. The most fascinating thing to me was the meat being sold. All sorts of meat and body parts I couldnt recognize. We then took a boat ride on the Madre de Dios River to our lodge. Puerto Maldonado was hot and humid. The lodge was pretty and we were the only guests there. Very nice. The weather was my least favorite kind, hot and humid. I was sure I would keep complaining about it till we left. After lunch, we slathered on plenty of sunblock and repellent (they have non malarial mosquitoes which dont buzz a whole lot, their style is quiet), wore almost knee high gumboots and headed into the jungle looking for various monkey species. It was a pleasant walk with Ricardo, our Amazon guide explaining the flora and fauna along the way. We did meet monkeys, they were happy to come down to get their banana treats from us. Headed back for dinner and a shower. I had a lizard for company in the shower, it lived on my shower floor the whole time. I always had to keep an eye on it, ready to jump out if it made an inappropriate move. After dinner, we headed out on the boat looking for caimans (croc family). It was a dark night and Ricardo used a flashlight to spot caimans. It was hard for our untrained eyes to see them and they invariably ducked into the water when we got close, no matter how quiet we were. It was straining to look in the dark not knowing what I was looking at. I gave up at some point and enjoyed the utter serenity of the ride and the lovely star lit night instead. And then on the last day when we were headed back to the city we saw a caiman sunning itself on the mud bank. Just like that, out of the blue! Tim had discovered a tarantula hiding out in a tree near his room, he said it was a girl, it had pink toes (seriously, it was the pink toed tarantula).

The next morning we headed out early to beat the sun for a journey into Lake Sandoval and surrounding forest. Saw the amorphous butterfly (it reflects light and appears blue), owl butterfly, several spiders large and small. Lots of huatzin birds, they make a sound as if they are exhaling. Their young ones have claws on their wings for them to climb back up if they fall down. Some think this anatomical oddity is leftover from its pre historic past. We also saw a frog almost become dinner to a small snake. We debated if that skinny snake could have possibly digested the frog. I think the snake was a bit too ambitious. The frog was stunned and didn’t move, Ricardo finally lifted it up and tried to get it on a tree but dropped it where it was probably found by another snake. Oh well… life goes on. We saw the walking palm. A long long boat ride followed, Ricardo paddled for what appeared to be forever. It was hot and I was miserable! We went up a lookout point and saw a caiman swimming across the lake. FInally it was over and we headed back.

We were supposed to head out for a walk in the evening again. But I had declared I was done for the day, there was a hammock with my name on it. They were also playing some lovely music. Inka iskay beats by Miki Gonzalez. Eva and I bought his CDs later in Lima, perfect for relaxing. I am listening to it as I write my blog.

After lunch Ricardo offered to play the flute, I was on the hammock when he started and it was hard to leave my perch and join them on the porch. He told us of his life and country in between playing the flute. It was lovely. The beautiful sky with the picture perfect clouds and the river made a perfect backdrop to him playing his flute. On the river you can often see flotsam floating down lazily, it all made for a beautiful sight. It was indeed like a dream. I gathered from Ricardo and John that there is some attitude between Limayans, Lima natives and Cusqueñas, those from Cusco (also the most popular beer). Limayans think Cusqueñas are simple mountain folk and Cusqueña think Limayans are rather snobbish. Cusqueñas also resent the government taking their hard earned money in the form of taxes and not pumping enough back into their economy.

After the music session, we went to see the resident macaws. There was this big colorful guy called Pete and a smaller macaw. We fed them crackers and Pete bullied the little one into giving up his share. Pete also performed stunts on the branches, what a show off! The lodge manager, lady called Vanessa, insisted the two macaws were normally very friendly. Tim offered his finger to Pete to see if he was intelligent enough to recognize it wasn’t food. I am not sure what Pete thought, but he enjoyed biting Tim’s finger with all his might.

As they started to get ready to head out for the walk it suddenly turned windy. Surprise, surprise, it was a storm, the temperature dropped dramatically and the lightening started. Ricardo said it wasn’t safe to head out in the storm, the earth in the Amazon is soft and high winds are rare. Trees get uprooted easily and tree limbs were likely to be flying around. I was amazed by the change in the weather, it was rather exciting! Vanessa said it was most likely the friajes, a cold front from the south pole that comes more often in the dry season (after June). We were so lucky to experience it on our trip. It dramatically changed the whole Amazon experience! Vanessa wanted to wait till morning to see if it got cold to be certain. And for sure, it was cold in the AM, just the way I ordered it on weather.com! The lightening wouldnt come down at all but would light up the whole sky, the winds were strong and noisy for hours. Poor Pete tried to brave it out but was frightened enough to try to come into the dining room. Later I saw him sleeping out on a tree branch standing up! Tim and Robyn were given the gift of a tree top laden with near-ripe bananas at their doorstep by the storm, they donated it to the lodge. They also had several visitors in their house, a possum, spiders, cockroach. I usually made sure my net was well draped over my bed during the day time so I wouldn’t have any surprises later.

The next morning was a trip to the botanical garden, we saw a leaf that smells of garlic. The natives use it as a natural repellent for little babies. We each ate a leaf that was like an anesthetic, there was another tree root that smelled like camphor, several leaves that left behind a color when crushed on your palm. Tim painted his face and lips with one that was bright red, I took a picture and promised him I would submit it for Amazonian drag queen of the week. There was dragon blood tree, if you make a cut on the trunk, it bleeds red drops of liquid. We saw cacao and coffee trees. I ate a coffee bean fruit, it was rather sweet.

That was about it for the Amazon, we headed back to Puerto Maldonado for another flight. Thats when we realized how small the airport really is, it has two gates and that’s it. Eva, Barry and I were returning to Lima to catch a later flight back to the US that night, the others were flying back to Cusco and then going on to Lake Titicaca.

We had several hours to spare in Lima before our home bound flights, we headed out to the Miraflores district. Fancy buildings and shopping plazas. We had awesome seafood ceviche at Vista La Mar, with tables that overlooked the cliff out to the Pacific. We had dinner a little later at La Costa Verde in neighboring Barranco district. I ordered my last Pisco cocktail (pisco and vermouth. I did buy Pisco to take home) and Sole with garlic potatoes for dinner. Lima is known for excellent seafood and this restaurant was highly recommended by our waitress at Vista La Mar. The food did not disappoint, in fact it was the best meal in Peru that I had in a restaurant. La Costa Verde is on the beach and Eva and I walked out for a bit for her to dip her toes in the Pacific.

There’s a lot more to do in Peru. You can go into the heart of the Amazon (to the extent they allow you, the government does its share to protect the jungle and natives), you can go see Nazca lines and Arequipa. You could spend a month backpacking and still not be done. As for me, I think I saw the two biggies and was quite happy with my trip (even though I returned with a generous helping of mosquito bites and the large bruises from my quad bike fall, I guess thats why its called "adventure trip")!

Egypt: Sufi Dance pictures

2008-01-06T21:02:00.001-05:00

Egypt: Cairo again and the end

2008-01-05T20:22:00.001-05:00

The day we arrived in Cairo we had dinner at El Haty, a local restaurant with no foreigners. It was the kind of place where one look at the kitchen would turn you away. But by then we had been through much worse and survived. I ordered the lamb kabab (by then I had learned to copy Esam's choices since he knew what was the best to order and how to order), it came bbqed and loaded with fat. A side of veggies and rice accompanied it. It was an awesome meal. I also tried fayrouz, a pineapple malt drink. The drink was so-so.

That night Wini, Xiayi, Andy, Brooke and I went to Cairo Jazz club. After spending 30 minutes in a taxi and stopping 5 times for directions and being hopelessly lost, we got there at 9ish which was way too early. We started playing cards and were then told cards are not allowed. Then we started playing "I have never...", some interesting information came tumbling out from the group. Soon enough the music started, there was a bongo player accompanying the DJ, very cool. A (non Egyptian) couple was kissing on the dance floor and was asked to stop. So these were the modern club going Egyptians. They were very young, relatively hip (no scarfs, but no skin either). We, on the other hand were so obviously touristy in our cargos and sporting our recently purchased scarfs. While we were trying to be Egyptian in our dress, the Egyptians were trying to be us! Brooke, Andy and I stayed till closing time which was 3am.

We met up with Ola again the next morning for a trip to the Citadel. We went into Mohammad Ali mosque where she talked to us about Islam and the functioning of a mosque. She invited us to ask any questions we wanted, assuring us she and Esam were very open minded. By then many of us had discussed the religion and culture to death and there were no questions.

We drove by the City of Dead a couple of times, an eerie complex of tombs. There are homeless who live there because they have nowhere else to go. After that we went to garbage city in Mokattam, this is a large recycling unit in Cairo. Men working here collect garbage from homes. Women separate the recyclables and pile them for the next step of the process. Other women make greeting cards, paper gift bags and also fabric mats and bags from clothing collected from factories and stores. It is quite a large and impressive project, the Cairo unit alone employs 45000 people. The employees have insurance, the kids are educated in a school in the recycling building. I bought a book that describes the project, I am looking forward to reading it. We also went to St Simon's church, fabulous architecture.

Next on the agenda was the Khan-el-Khalili market a very very touristy market. Ola said her goodbyes to us here. We lunched at Egyptian Pancakes restaurant, I had the meat and cheese pancakes. It reminded me of a crispy kheema naan (if you add cheese to it that is). Delicious. The owner, Ahmed El Genteel (sp?) wanted to know what we were looking to buy. And then he decided to escort us into the market, its a never ending series of small lanes. You could go on forever. He insisted he knew exactly where to take us for quality things. We were looking for kafiyeh (Arab scarf), Ahmed called it the Palestinian scarf. I wanted spices, Kerry and Denise wanted to buy gold, Wini and all wanted perfumes. Ahmed took us around and got us all. He had this air of supreme confidence in telling us what we should do and how much we should pay. His modus operandi was as follows: he paid the shopkeeper and told us the price he had paid and we were to pay him. Needless to say, he was working on commission. The prices he quoted seemed reasonable enough (I asked a shopkeeper for a price without him around just to get an idea). He was like a personal shopper to us, he saved us the trouble of haggling and took his cut. At one point I owed him 22LE and gave him 25LE telling him I didn't need the change back. He told me with a proud air that he wasn't going to keep it, that he would give it to the poor. He said that he takes money from the rich and gives it to the poor. I don't know why he made such an honest statement to me, but indeed in his eyes I was the "rich" that he was taking money from. Giving to the community is one of the five pillars of the faith and there are many who take it very seriously. I suppose whether its their money they are giving or that of the "rich" is minor detail.

Wini and I wanted to rid ourselves of Mr G and went our way to the other side of Khan-El-Khalili, to the local's market. Mr G stayed with Kerry and Denise to ensure they did not have trouble spending their money in a jewelry store. We bought some towels and I found a beautiful red belly dancing belt with small tinkling discs on it. Paid about 20LE (across the street they wouldn't budge below 35Le for it). It will go very well with my garba outfits.

That evening we went to watch a free performance of whirling dervishes (Sufi dance) in the courtyard of Wikala El-Ghuriya near the Khan-el-khalili market. The building used to be a merchant's hostel (wikala means inn). It was mind blowing. The first guy whirled non stop for about 35 minutes, his facial expressions suggested he was praying the whole time. The music and singing was very inspiring. Then came 3 men (two were father and son whom we met outside after the show), they were amazing too. It was one of the highlights of my trip.

The next day, Brooke and I went to Coptic Cairo. Christians in Egypt are called Copts and are a small but wealthy minority. We just walked around aimlessly and then went and sat in a synagogue for a while. Onto the Citadel area next near Sultan Hassan Mosque. We had kushary and then some tea and sheesha at the Sharouk cafe. We climbed up on a minaret in one of the mosques and then went to Mokattam city to Virginian Cafe to watch sunset over the Cairo skyline with the pyramids barely visible through the haze far out in the horizon. Back to the hotel for a Egyptian dish of the day dinner (which should be renamed Dish of Everyday, since its description is printed on the menu!). It was veggies and lamb mixed together in a tomato sauce served with rice. Quite tasty actually.

Kerry, Bill and I had planned to go see the sound and light show at Giza that evening. But the English version wasnt until 9:30pm and I had to leave for the airport at midnight. Kerry wasnt feeling very well, she had been quite sick nearly the whole time. So we abandoned our plan and I finished my book instead.

And then that was it. Time to say good bye. I LOVED the trip, it turned out better than I had imagined or expected. Very educational in the ways of the world and how different people can be. And yet how similar. Every day in the trip had something new to offer. I thought I would hate Cairo based on the first day's experience. But the view of the city, where the skyline is lined with very many minarets was lovely. The city of dead, the garbage city, the dervishes, the red sea, the felucca, the corniches, the bright moonlit nights, the mammoth temples, giant pyramids, it was all awesome. I am sure if I was more interested in ancient Egyptians it would have been that much more enlightening. The soud of Azaan (Muslim call to prayer) everyday was very familiar to me, it reminded me of when I used to stay over my sister's when she lived very close to a mosque in Bombay.

The food of Egypt

The food was fine, not fabulous, just fine. A lot of it was standard middle eastern fare (which is one of my favorite cuisines). Typical Egyptian food is surprisingly vegetarian, which is obvious once you understand that Egypt is a poor country. Meat is expensive. Its the same in India. Even the meat eating families dont eat meat all the time. The curries are predominantly tomato based and garlic is common (not so much ginger). Rice, pasta, eggplant, zucchini, potatoes and some lentils were very common. There were two kinds of local breads we had. A more common whole wheat kind you can buy in the market (I bought some for 50paistres each in Aswan) that looks like puri, except its baked. And another kind we had at the Nubian home, this had a more elaborate cooking method, the dough is left on the roof to rise and then is baked in a fire hearth. The regular tea was almost always an unimpressive lipton tea bag in hot water served with plenty of sugar, no milk. Egyptian men drink tea with sheesha in the very many tea shops lining all major streets in markets. Coffee was either turkish or nescafe. I had Ohm Ali dessert in Aswan, layers of flaky pancakes dipped in milk loaded with various nuts, the whole thing is oven baked. Others tried the pigeon in Sofra, I mostly stayed with mezze and kofte and kababs, things I was familiar with. I tried tagen (oven baked casseroles) and meat fatta which was new to me. I think the kofta was always the best made thing.

Crossing the roads

Yes, this deserves separate mention. Several major roads have intersections that are far apart, along the corniche they maybe too far to walk upto. The vehicles come down as fast as the traffic will let them, they will swerve in between lanes as much as they can, and on busy roads, the traffic will never slow down. So how do you do it? By the time I learned it, it was time to leave. But I will share it with you. When you have finished your prayers and ensured your will is in order, step out on the road as soon as you see a smallest break, with one hand firmly up in the air facing the oncoming traffic, all the while looking at them. Walk slowly till the oncoming runaway car/bus/etc has slowed down. You will know when you have won that battle. Keep moving slowly, sometimes you have to let one vehicle go. Never mind. Keep moving slowly with hand firmly up. There should be a confidence on your face even if there is none in your heart. If you make it to the side, give a prayer in thanks. Repeat to cross back. Or better still, just stay on the other side.

In summation...

I highly recommend visiting Egypt even if you are not into ancient Egyptian history, having a local guide is priceless (especially if you want to go into local villages and communities and talk with the locals). It is possible to have a fun vacation in major cities and Red Sea resorts like Dahab, Taba and Nuweiba with little or no exposure to what Egypt is all about, but that isn't my idea of fun. As a woman, I recommend traveling with others, the men are not as leery and obnoxious as they can get in parts of India (and also Morocco according to Brooke), but caution is recommended. 2 weeks were barely sufficient to do all we did and saw, I never went into the desert and didn't visit Alexandria. A total of 3 weeks should do justice, but then you can do the desert in another country. Learn a few Arabic phrases, they love to talk and love it when you try to speak their language. Try not to buy too much in the tourist markets, the quality and prices are all suspect. Keep lots of hand sanitizer handy!

Happy Travels in 2008 to you and me!

Egypt: St Katherine's, Mt Sinai and tea with Bedouins

2008-01-05T18:43:00.001-05:00

We drove to St Katherine's monastery. Its at the foot of Mt Sinai and is home to the burning bush. It has a room full of skeletons. Apparently once the monks are buried, they are exhumed after several years and their skeletons added to the general pile and their tombs reused. The monastery is located at nearly 5k feet. Mt Sinai is about 7.4k feet high. The picture is the monastery from a height. After we were done with the monastery we checked into a hotel, had a great buffet lunch which included an awesome dessert buffet. We went back to the foot of Mt Sinai at around 2 to start our climb up. Brooke, Andy and Sandy got themselves camels which take you 2/3rds of the way up. Scott, Victoria, Xiayi and I started on foot. The most interesting sight was a Bedouin man, camel in tow, cigarette in hand, talking on his cell phone. It was so unexpected we couldnt get our cameras out fast enough to take a picture.

We were to go up 7km long switchbacks. We kept taking shortcuts across the switchbacks. The last 750 steps have to be made on foot, no camels allowed. There were several tea shops along the way up. We had been assured it would get very cold. We were going to see the sunset and hike back down in the dark with our flashlights. A guide by the name of Moussa had accompanied us. On the top we took pictures, there were several other trails up, Mt Katherine is higher at 8.6k feet. I had carried a change of socks and additional layers to wear and when I stood up after I was done preening, everybody started laughing. Turns out I had forgotten to roll my pant legs down. Haha, so funny. I wasnt the only sock clown in the group though, Orange Bill always orange socks which matched his orange jacket which matched his orange hat. Esam always wore red socks which matched his red shirt/jacket. We had some very color coordinated men in the group. Anyway, this picture shows what kind of super boots I hiked Mt Sinai in. Sunset was quite nice (see picture). The hike down had a better wow quality to it since it was a dark and starry night. As hikes go, while I have been on far more difficult trails with more stunning views, this hike was special just for the historical significance of the mountain.

The next day we drove to Cairo, it was about a 7 hr trip. The bus was very comfortable. We stopped just after the tunnel through the Suez Canal for lunch and learned more about the canal. The landscape on the drive back was surprisingly mountainous. We also stopped at an Oasis (kind of) on the way where we were invited by a Bedouin woman to have tea (Bedouin tea called habak, minty flavor). Esam passed the tea leaves around for us to smell them and Bill promptly put them in his mouth. He was like an infant, that Bill. He spat it out quickly enough when he realized it was not food!

The woman boiled water in a tin can over a makeshift fire. Esam picked up a twig, rinsed it with water and declared it to be our spoon. Instead of sugar she accidentally added salt. We all had a good laugh, more freshly made tea followed. She must have been embarrassed about the salt, though I couldn't tell from her wrinkled face under the hijab. The tea stop was entirely unscheduled and that's one of the things I loved about this trip, all the interaction with the locals was very educational. I thought the Bedouins (of the Gebalia tribe according to Esam) we met were the most beautiful people, with naturally kohl lined eyes. There was more shopping here, Kerry bought a Bedouin mask and others bought trinkets.

Egypt: Sawa Camp at Nuweiba and the Red Sea

2008-01-05T18:17:00.001-05:00

The next 2 days were simply enchanting. We were the only ones in the resort and we each had a hut right on the sand. There were so many ways of doing... nothing. There were no activities, I went for a walk about and around. The moonlight on the red sea was fabulous, across the red sea were the mountains of Saudi Arabia and a bit to the left was a city in Jordan that went ablaze with lights at night, its one of the things that I couldn't take a good enough picture of and cant do justice to in in words. It will remain a fond memory.

Xiayi had this $2500 camera with tripod and all. We called out to her when the moon was about to rise, she ran back to her hut and ran back with the tripod and by the time she had it all set up, it was over! This happened to her a few times, but inspite of it all, I am sure she took the best pictures.

Christmas was a turkey dinner (turkey came from Cairo) followed by a delicious desert called Sahlab, it was thick, creamy with chocolate and caramel swirls topped with nuts. It was warm and it was divine. One morning I had Shakshouka for breakfast, which was exactly the same as egg burji (eggs, tomatoes and onions all cooked together). We had all purchased really cheap liquor (15LE for 500ml of decent rum or vodka), I let Brooke finish mine on the last night. I had rum with hot water with lots of ground cinnamon and sugar, my version of hot buttered rum in the absence of butter! Some of the folks went snorkeling the next day, I made some more progress with my 900 page book. More card playing. A local bedouin woman came by for henna tattoos, it was funny to watch her slip her hijab down far enough to enjoy a smoke!

By now Bill was firmly established in his role of the most talked about person in the group. He was traveling after a shoulder surgery, he had injured himself bicycling. He is a neuro-psychiatrist in a highly specialized area related to dementia and addiction. But he was absent minded and all his actions were in slow motion (we thought perhaps due to medication, he had started the trip by asking for Codeine). Everyday someone had a funny Bill story to tell which brought about plenty of laughs. At first I was afraid he would be offended, but he took it very well. I think he actually enjoyed the ribbing and came back for more! He always wore an orange hat and an orange jacket, I nicknamed him Orange Bill and that name stuck. Brooke teased her Grandpa Bill the most and he loved her for it! Esam was the next most talked about and analyzed person in the group, but rather more seriously.

I did yoga the second morning and then again in the evening. It was a whole other thing, doing yoga on the beach with the gentle sun rays falling on me, across from the mountains of Saudi Arabia! Our stay at Sawa was over quicker than I wanted, I would have been happy to spend the rest of my vacation there!

Egypt: Karnak temple and Hurghada

2008-01-05T17:31:00.000-05:00

Off we went to Karnak Temple the next morning. This is actually a large complex of temples. About 30 pharaohs built their temples in this complex. There is a hypostyle hall with a series of columns (134 columns as I read somewhere), our guide Ahmed explained the prevelant theory on how they were built. It is assumed that they filled the space with sand and rolled rows of cut and shaped stones on top of every column at the same time. Then they added more sand and added another row of stones. The stones were piled on top of others without any glue or adhesive, they had to be a perfect smooth cut so that the vacuum would seal the joints together. Amazing, dont you agree?

After Karnak we had a 6 hr bus ride to Hurghada where we were going to spend the night and take the ferry to cross the Red Sea the next day to goto Sharm-El-Sheikh and then onto Sawa Camp for another relaxing 2 days on the Red Sea. Hurghada was a regular party town, very modern and totally touristy. Apparently popular with Russians. I picked up some real estate brochures in Sharm-El-Sheikh which is also popular for diving and the sun, you can rent a 1 BR from 325 euros and buy a studio for about 28k euros. We dined at a local seafood restaurant in Hurghada. The food was great, I had the fried sea bass. Afterwards we went to Papas Bar where they played the same 5 songs over and over again. Bryan Adams Summer of 69 was one of them. There were a couple of Arabic songs in the collection at which the staff climbed on top of the table and started dancing. It was Wini, Xiayi, Scott, Brooke, Andy and I. They all ordered meters (11 beers for 84 LE) and I ordered a cocktail. Before we knew it we had spent a few hours playing cards (by then we had become the regular card playing gang). Later Brooke and Andy went on to Ministry of Sound and didn't return until the next morning. The rest of us returned about midnight and I slept soundly. Wake up call in this hotel was the basically the hotel boy knocking on doors, there were no phones in the rooms. I slept right through the "door-knock-wake-up-call", Xiayi woke me half an hour before we were to leave when they didnt see me at breakfast. It was quite a rushed exit for me. But then again I wasnt the last one, Brooke sauntered in when we were all in the bus and then we were off!

We had been warned us that the Red Sea could get rough. Some of the gang popped in a few pills. I kept one handy. Didn't need it. The first 5 seconds saw a woman doubling over and escorted out by her friend. I loved the rocky ride and shall declare myself sea-hardy.

Egypt: Luxor and a deal is made in the souq

2008-01-05T10:06:00.000-05:00

On the way from Felucca to Luxor we stopped at Kom Ombo (it has a huge croc mummy) and Edfu (dedicated to Horus, falcon headed god) temples, there was some serious damage to these temples caused by the Christians back when. Its amazing how much damage people cause due to religious intolerance!

Denise knew a smattering of Arabic. And by God she was determined to speak it. The locals would look at her strangely when she did that, they knew she wasnt speaking English, but couldnt figure out what the hec she was saying. After a few more attempts, they would realize what was going on and their faces would light up "White woman is speaking Arabic"!! And then there would be more conversation in Arabic where neither party fully understood the other but they were all happy people now that they had bonded over a common language. Its weird how this happened every single time! I just loved watching the interaction and facial expressions, it cracked me up every time. Scott (American living in Bulgaria) on the other hand, deliberately spoke to the locals in Bulgarian, just to confuse them, since he looks so American and they expected English! He got such a kick out of it!

Finally, we were in Luxor. After we had scrubbed ourselves clean, we went for an orientation walk in the evening on the Corniche past the beautifully lit Luxor temple and Winter Palace hotel, and onto a fine restaurant called Sofra. They had every imaginable spice flavored tea. I had fenugreek first followed by anise tea. Brooke, Andy and I shared several mezze (middle eastern appetizers) for dinner.

The next day some folks went for a hot air balloon ride on the west bank and the rest of us met up at the Colossi of Memnon (the two giant statues in the picture below are that of Amenhotep III) later for our donkey ride up the mountain and hike down into Valley of the Kings. It was strange to journey on a donkey, mine just loved to trot and had a donkey poop fetish, he just kept sniffing! We gave up the donkeys near the top and hiked down. That entire landscape reminded me of the grand canyon, it was eerie!

The idea behind the Valley of the Kings was mainly that the pharoahs were fed up of their large pyramids being robbed thereby seriously disturbing their journey to after life so they decided (upon advice from a priest) to instead build secret tombs underground. They did this for over 500 yrs, they relocated the workers to the area, built villages for them and these workers never went back to the city. Due to the strict secrecy, subsequent generations of workers sometimes built a tomb over an already existing tomb! What's most amazing about the whole thing is that inspite of all this secrecy, most of the tombs were robbed anyway!! That must have killed those pharoahs! Oh wait, they were already dead. We visited several tombs, Tuthmoses, couple of the Ramses and King Tut's among them. His mummy (may it rest in peace!) and one sarcophagus was there in all its glory. On our way back, we visited Temple of Ramses III at Medinet Habu where the reliefs were several inches deep (see picture).

Lunch was at our guide Ahmed's home where he proceeded to write our names in hieroglyphics. We all ordered some silver jewelry, rings, bracelets with our names on them in hieroglyphics. I got a silver finger ring with my name that I wore the rest of the trip and now sits somewhere in the drawer to be forgotten for eternity. The food was divine, the best included meal in the trip.

After returning we went to Metropolitan cafe on the corniche and had some drinks. Dinner was back at Sofra, I just loved that place!

The Souq experience:

The most interesting part of the evening was my visit to the souq. So far, we had visited Aswan and Luxor souqs. The most common line used on me was "Are you Egyptian?" and "Excuse me, can I help you spend your money?". After I said I was not egyptian, the inevitable response was "Oh, you look so egyptian". Then there were those who were not convinced "Are you sure you are not egyptian?". BAck in Cairo the response to my statement that I was Indian was invariably "Amitabh Bachhan!". One guy insisted I looked more Egyptian than other Indians. Whatever works dude! Anyway, after Metropolitan cafe, Sandy and I got separated from the rest of the group and went to the Luxor souq together (I never went out by myself the whole time i was in Egypt). I was looking for warm socks (we were going to Mt Sinai which was going to be very cold). There were none to be had. We wandered into a sheesha shop, I had wanted to buy one, but had decided to get it in Cairo so I didnt have to carry that big bulky thing everywhere. Thats how I we came to be in the shop of one Joseph, a coptic christian; just for me to get an idea of prices.

Joseph was extremely helpful, he wanted us to know that his goal was to educate us about his country and that he didnt care if we didnt buy anything from him. It was couple of days before Christmas, he just wanted to be hospitable. He pulled apart a sheesha I pointed out and showed me how to put it together, pointing out the fine hand carving, workmanship etc. etc. There was a lot of conversation and exchanging of pleasantries. I had to ask him several times for the price but it appeared that any discussion of money was anathema to him. He was just trying to help! He finally quoted 850 LE. I was ready to move on since I wasnt going to buy a sheesha here anyway and I really wanted to goto the loo. We were actually on our way to the pee-for-a-pound-loo when we were distracted by the sheeshas. Joseph directed me to a nice clean loo next door that I used for free. I was then ready to leave. And this is where it got interesting. Joseph offered us tea, he told us that it is Egyptian hospitality that if they offer tea we cannot refuse. I said no anyway and at the same time Sandy , the eternal tea drinker, declared "Oh Yes, I will have tea!" and sat herself down comfortably. This is where my friend Joseph, the consummate salesman, made his faux pas. He looked at us and asked "Who is buying the sheesha, you or you?" I said I was and Sandy said she wasnt. And then to my disbelief, he made another faux pas. He asked Sandy if she wanted to buy something! I burst out laughing that he wanted us to buy if we wanted tea. At this, he tried his best to recover with more charming words and pleasantries. Anyway, he wouldnt let me go and wanted me to name my price. I said 100-150LE in the hopes that he would just give up on me. But no, he wasnt done yet. I had been suckered in even as I entered the shop!

So after an interesting 30 or 45 minutes of fine back and forth with Mr Joseph, I walked out of there with my sheesha after paying 170LE and also with an invitation for tea/coffee later that evening or breakfast the next morning both of which I declined. My sheesha now sits in my living room, its not perfectly functional (the hotel manager later pointed out its minor air gaps), but it was meant as a decoration anyway. But it was such a learning experience to talk to Joseph about his life and culture!

Egypt: Felucca and cultural education

2008-01-04T20:53:00.000-05:00

The next morning we departed for our 2 day, 2 night felucca trip which was to take us from Aswan to Luxor. I pretty much spent the next 2 days wearing 2-3 layers of clothes buried in my sleeping bag (meant for upto 9deg F weather) alternating between playing cards with the gang, reading Sacred Games by Vikram Chandra (very very filmi bollywood style story of a Bombay policeman and a mafia gangster), staring out to the water and repeating these activities in no particular order. It was on and off windy, hence much colder than it would normally have been. The felucca had a large mattress on which we sat, ate our meals, and slept on in a line at night. In all it was a lovely relaxing trip, our days had been very active thus far, we were on our feet from sun up (sometimes even earlier) to past sun down. The felucca was a welcome break! We sailed in a zig-zag pattern across the river to take advantage of the wind. The second night was a nearly a full moon night and after warming up by the fire, I went for an accompanied walk into the quarry near where we had docked. It was lovely, just an awesome beauty of a night!

We had been warned to bring our TP rolls since there was to be no WC on the way. We pulled over when we had to pee and went into bushes with random cows and donkeys watching guard (or watching us, whatever!). It was funny to see everybody trying to be discrete in the beginning, tucking pieces of TP in their pockets. By the first evening, we were openly walking around with our rolls in hands, What was the point, we all knew where we were going! We were even sharing TP (unused ones, in case you were wondering). By the way, we were required to bring back used TP in plastic bags so they could be disposed of properly. Enuf said, its all good in the name of Responsible Travel (do not soil the environment, even if you soil yourself in the process). The whole toilet experience was rather traumatic, but makes a good (if rather gross) story to tell and helped our group commiserate together, like I said, we bonded over TP and TT (toilet trauma).

Let me not forget to mention the makeshift toilet erected for the night stops. A fabric enclosure with this chair with 4 thin legs and weird toilet seat over a dug out hole. Ours had a flap that wouldn't quite shut. Heaven help you if you were in there and the wind blew in the wrong direction. It was also not very high, Andy, the tallest in the group at 6'5'', was quite visible before he went down. Ok, enuf said. I'll just move on then.

We had 2 captains, Nubian men, who cooked, cleaned, steered and performed minor repairs on the boat. At night they built a fire on shore, they sang, they danced, they played drums and they smoked sheesha. The first night, we found a Nubian cafe on the road across some fields . They actually had running water out of a tap and a REAL WC!! Hurray! We went there for tea and some sheesha after the jamming Club Felucca had slowed down.

The second day just before lunch, the mast broke. There was a lot of frantic talking, general craning of the neck, waving of the hands, attempts at climbing on the mast. The sail was moved, a little here and then a little there. After that our fine captains declared it broken and unrepairable. It had to be taken back to Aswan for a carpenter to fix it. Plan B was drawn out and executed by Assistant Captain Esam: we were going to get to one side of the river, eat lunch, do our Daraw village excursion, go to the other side, dock there for the night and leave for Luxor the next morning. We had traveled about 35 km out of the 40 km planned.

The caterpillar looking thing in the picture is Sandy looking for a sock in her sleeping bag, she had lost one in the toilet hole (dont ask how that happened!) and was determined to find the other one which was somewhere in the sleeping bag. The felucca behind her was another Intrepid group that docked with us that night.

Daraw was a small village with a tiny souq. There were auto rickshaws made by Bajaj. We went to see camels in the backyard of a home, more pictures, more baksheesh. It was a poor village. Esam talked about day in the life of the people who lived there. Interestingly lunch is the main freshly cooked meal of the day and dinner is leftovers. Lunch is when most guests are invited over instead of dinner. There was interesting trade going on over a sheep's hide in the souq. By the way, I had noticed several sheep/goat skin in front of several shops in the Aswan souq. Those were the sacrificed ones.

And now for some culture talk

That evening (as he had occasionally done on other days), Esam spent a lot of time telling us about Egyptian as well as Islamic life, history and culture (Egypt is 85% Islamic and has a wealthy Christian minority). He encouraged us to ask any questions. His description of his country and religion was presented in simple and clear terms. He told us about how it is supposed to be. A lot of his statements started with "Normally..." We ofcourse had a lot of questions, several sensitive ones. He handled them all quite well. I thought he made a great ambassador for his culture and religion. He called Egypt the "middle of the middle east", there seemed to be no sense of association with Africa or Africans. We talked about the political attitudes of Egyptians. Though the government has cordial relations with Israel, the average Egyptian sympathizes with the Palestinians because, being Arabs, they are considered brothers. What would you do if someone attacked your brother, he asked? That attitude provides an interesting insight into how the Egyptians think. This familial sense of responsibility towards those of your community, ethnicity or religion is very prevelant in India as well. He described a typical day in the life of an urban Egyptian.

He told us about the state of education all the way to university in Egypt, it was made dirt cheap after independence and yet there are those in villages who cant afford it. When a poor man has to choose between educating his son and daughter, he chooses his son. Because a father's first name is passed on as a surname to the children and not the mother's. Women are not required to change their names after marriage. Most jobs are low paying and with the government. The week is Sunday through Thursday, Friday and Saturday are a weekend. Christians and Muslims almost never intermarry, Nubians also dont intermarry with Egyptians or Coptic Christians. He acknowledged that modern Egyptians had almost no relationship with the ancient ones due to dilution by invaders from the middle east, the ottomans etc.. Another interesting fact he shared was that, unlike some Hindus where a woman has to bring dowry into a marriage, in Egyptian society the man is the one who has to bring a lot to the table. A flat or house to live in, things to set up home with, a sustainable income. The culture forbids both man and woman to have "relations" before marriage.

Unfortunately I did not get much insight into the lives of Egyptian women and how they think and feel, what their views are. All the locals we interacted with were men. The Nubian women were a bit of an exception, when we had visited the Nubian home in Aswan and the Nubian Cafe, the women came out and sat with us. Since they dont speak English very well, we couldnt talk much, but they are obviously used to interacting with foreigners. Women were also the ones doing business with us, selling us wares and henna tattoos. They were rather bold and friendly in manner.

Back to Egyptians, as we learned later, men sometimes bend some rules of society. It appears that Egyptian men are marrying later in life (we met several single men in their late 20s and 30s), I suppose it takes them time to build up a career and enough money to attract an Egyptian woman. In the meantime, they (atleast the ones in tourism) reach out to visiting foreign women for "relations". Guide books warn women against making direct eye contact with the men. And then there is the whole thing about Orfi marriage common in Luxor. Another similarity between Egyptian and Indian cultures I noticed is their love for conversation, throw any 2 Indians (from India) together, they will talk themselves to death. Egyptians seem to be the same, they always had so much to say to each other! Even when they first meet.

Egypt: Abu Simbel and Aswan souq

2008-01-04T20:08:00.000-05:00

We arrived at Abu Simbel around 6am. Now this was awe inspiring! It is unbelievable to me that the entire structure was moved in 1960s since it risked being submerged under Lake Nassar (artificial lake created by the high dam built to control Nile flooding). How on earth did they move it without causing damage? More importantly, how did they carve this massive structure out of the mountain 1000s of years ago? Its really 2 temples built by Ramses II (there were totally 11 Ramses, not all sequential) for himself and his wife Neferteri. There are fabulous colored reliefs inside showing Ramses conquering his enemies being watched by wifey dear. What a show off! The large (20 meter high) statues outside the main temple were super impressive with statues of his wife and other family members lower in the pecking order at their knees. There were several colored reliefs. This temple (in addition to Karnak in Luxor) stands out best in my memory of all the temples that I saw in Egypt.

Sandy and I gravitated over to the cafe ordered some tea. They served us 10LE tea in plastic cups. We made a ruckus about wanting real glass tea cups and we got it. The guy at the counter made Sandy promise she would return the cup (heaven forbid we should run away with their tiny glass cups with permanent crud in them). I found the perfect fridge magnet I was looking for, King Tut's regal mask in the shops outside Abu Simbel. A quick 1LE worth toilet stop later, we were back on the bus (there were to be no toilet stops once the convoy moved). I had by now declared this a pee-for-a-pound-country.

On the way back we stopped at Philae temple, this was also moved when the damn dam was built. This temple is dedicated to Goddess Isis. Some of the construction in this temple is actually Roman. The more I hear about ancient Egyptian mythology the more I find similarities between Hindu and ancient Egyptian religions. There are so many gods and goddesses and so many stories, there are even gods for qualities like wisdom etc...

Aswan souq

Back to Aswan, we went back for dinner at Panorama. I had mousakka, loved it! Onto the souq (market) to do some shopping. By now we had realized that Egypt was far colder than any of us had imagined. The night before we had gone into the souq to buy food supplies for the Abu Simbel trip and I bought a fairly large thick cotton maroon shawl with a lovely pattern that looked Kashmiri to me. I was always wearing atleast a couple of my wicking shirts and shawl on top of it. I was looking for a scarf to cover my head and was just not able to get a good deal (they all wanted 40 LE and I didnt want to pay more than 10, I walked away several times and they didnt come after me! bummer!). Denise (Australian) wanted to buy a caftan, Xiayi (Chinese heritage woman living in Australia) and Wini wanted to buy kurtas. We wandered in and out of shops looking for the perfect color/size. Xiayi was convinced she looked best in yellow color (she said because she is yellow!!) and Wini and I went on a mission to convince her that she looked lovely in pink. She finally hesitantly bought a pink scarf (I bought a red one, we paid 10LE each, yoohoo!) and then went crazy and bought a pink kurta as well as a blue one (or was it green, I dont remember). The shopkeeper taught us to tie our scarves Arab style. It was a fun girl's shopping trip.

I was a bit worried about not having enough cash on me (Egypt is predominantly cash only country) and had also forgotten to take my bank card. I could not remember the pin for my credit card and had managed to lock my credit card after several unsuccessful attempts at the ATM (there are several in the major cities). I wanted to call US collect to resolve the matter. Esam informed me there was no good way to call collect from Egypt! I was amazed. How can you not call collect! I never figured out that mystery.

Egypt: A train journey and Aswan

2008-01-04T19:55:00.000-05:00

That night we took the overnight sleeper train to Aswan. It was a few days before Bakri-Id. Esam assured us that the trains were normally far less crowded than they were on that night. I sure hope so! At the train station, I had flashbacks of train travel in India: the train arrives and a horde of men, trunks, assorted animals, vehicle tyres, other types of cargo descend upon the door. The mass stays by the door and just as you think the compartment couldn’t possibly digest any more objects, someone gets in and another 5 people or things take his or its place.

Sandy and I lamented the lack of little kids running around selling hot tea and snacks to waiting passengers like you see in India. After a long time I met someone with a greater love of tea than I. I could see that we were going to get along fine.

Our train was late by an hour and was far more civilized. For some strange reason the driver kept braking hard every now and then. I could not imagine why. This went on through the night, on one occasion I thought we almost had an accident. I wanted to know who gave that man his license! Anywho, I love long distance train travel and enjoyed sleeping in a gently rocking top bunk (the brake obsessed driver notwithstanding).

Our hotel was on the corniche (main road parallel to the Nile) with a lovely view of the river. It’s amazing how much an entire population can depend on a river. All major cities in Egypt are along the Nile and all the major ancient structures were built by transporting the piece parts on the Nile. The flooding of the Nile (before the high dam was built) forced entire sections of the population to relocate. Life revolved around the flood cycles of the Nile even back in ancient times. In fact, people whose livelihood was destroyed by the flooding were relocated by the pharaohs so they could earn a living by building the tombs in pyramids and valley of the kings. Lunch was at Panorama restaurant: I had meat fatta (rice over bread, tomato sauce and slices of meat with fried garlic over the meat, the whole thing is oven baked). Others had tagen, also oven baked dish, can be had vegetarian with chicken or meat. I noticed our head waiter had a mark on his forehead, like a huge dark natural bindi. Later Esam told us that men who pray 5 times a day over years develop that mark (zebibah) on their forehead. I later read in an article (http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/12/12/news/letter.php) that it is more an Egyptian phenomenon to wear this mark, a result of Islamic revival in the country. I don't remember ever seeing the mark in India (not that I knew a ton of devout Muslims, but I never noticed it).

Meeting the Nubians

We were taken to a Nubian village on the boat of one Captain Jamaica (a.k.a JJ) on Elephantine Island who had once grown a Rasta hair style as advertisement for his business (there was a Jamaican flag on the boat). This island has natural rock formations that look like elephants. Nubians are all Muslims and have African features and many were relocated after the high dam submerged their villages under water. I don't know if there is tension between the two groups, Nubians and Egyptians, the people we met were very jovial and JJ called Esam his brother. JJ shared his wedding pictures with us, his wife was dressed in a very Indian looking ghaghra choli for the engagement and white gown for the wedding. He appeared to be a relatively wealthy Nubian, the house was large and airy with pretty upholstery and embroidered everything. We had tea, Egyptian hospitality demands that you partake of drinks offered to you, you cant refuse. I was to later learn how Egyptian hospitality takes on an entirely different meaning in the bazaars (souqs).

We sailed past the Old Cataract hotel (THE place to stay for the movers and shakers), Agha Khan’s tomb, St Simeon monastery, some ancient ruins that I forget the significance of. After a fun and long camel ride, we visited another more rural looking Nubian home where we had traditional Nubian dinner. After dinner, there was much music and dancing and general merrymaking, a whole bunch of boys came by rather suddenly and started singing and playing drums. The rest of the village seemed to join in. It was very lively music, we danced a bit. Then it was time to do some business. Out came trinkets, embroidered hats, henna (I got some henna along with Victoria and Denise, it was jet black after it dried, I almost think it was dye and not real henna). Then it was time to go home and rest up for an early morning (3:30am) start to goto Abu Simbel. There was a lot of whining and complaining about it but we had to go with a convoy. Almost all the temples and tombs we went to were with a police led convoy. It’s a security measure and also a technique for crowd control.

Egypt: Pyramids at Giza

2008-01-04T19:49:00.000-05:00

The next day was an early morning start to goto the pyramids at the Giza. We took the metro to Giza station, it was a piece of cake. Trains have separate women's compartments, like in Bombay. I recommend the metro over taxi when possible in Cairo (metro doesn’t go everywhere). Then a short bus ride took us to the pyramids. Most pictures give you the impression that the pyramids are in the middle of the dessert, but they are very close to the metro city, though the western side of the pyramids is dessert. We were introduced to Ola who was the only Egyptian woman I had any sort of conversation with the whole time. The pyramids were bigger than I had ever imagined. However, I failed to have a super wow moment, I am not sure whether it was our approach, we entered from the south side and our approach revealed one structure at a time, and I think the best view is from the east (to take it all in at once with a desert backdrop). We got to that view last. I did learn to my surprise that the pyramids are solid structures and not hollow inside. They have tiny pathways and small rooms sufficient to hold the mummy and treasures. All that limestone and sandstone came from all over the country and was transported over the Nile on feluccas (wooden sailing boats with one or two sails)! Amazing, those pharaohs!

There was a lot of plastic trash around, an unfortunate side effect of tourists and lack of sufficient cleaning up. Better than India though. Ola gave us a lot of information about Khufu, Khafre and Menkaure (the pharaohs who owned the Giza pyramids) which I shall not repeat because I have forgotten most of it and its all on the internet anyway. The sphinx was more an accident since it was a large rock obstructing the building of the valley temple, so they carved the rock into a sphinx. Note that a pyramid is only a part of the complex with several components which must be built in its entirety to be considered complete. Most pyramids today have only portions of the complex left. Khafre (owner of the pyramid with the Sphinx) has the most complete valley temple found.

The pyramids at Giza was where we got our first taste of the one thing that ultimately bound us all together as a group. Toilet troubles. Egyptians don’t use TP (like in India), they charge 1LE (Egyptian pound,, 1USD is about 5.5 LE) to use the public WC and give you carefully measured 4 slivers of TP when you go in. Know that the flush may or may be working, there may or may not be soap. There may or may not be running water to wash hands with. Consider yourself warned.

This was also where I got my first taste of Egyptian friendliness and helpfulness (it later graduates into Egyptian hospitality). A guard helped us take pictures where you seem to be touching the top of the pyramid and then wanted payment. We paid him couple of pounds. (If you goto Egypt, carry LOTS of singles). As we walked through there were friendly camel wallahs who wanted us to only look at the camel. That’s all, just look, or just tell them where you are from. Ofcourse once you look or answer one question, you are hooked, before you knew it you were taking pictures with the camel, feeding the camel and so on and so forth. Kerry (woman from Australia) did it all, swapped some life stories with the camel dude and left a couple of tenners lighter.

Note to future travelers: Egypt is a poor country and tourism is a huge source of revenue. All tourism personnel seem to live on baksheesh (tip) and if you are a foreigner with dollars/euros/pounds, better be prepared to shell them out. Think of it as simply the cost of seeing this amazing and interesting country. In that it is no different from traveling in India. They love to start a harmless, friendly conversation which quickly graduates into an offer of a service or product. You haggle to the best of your capabilities, the economic value of services/goods on the streets and markets in countries like Egypt is what the provider or seller succeeds in making you pay for it. That’s it, period.

Anyway, after the pyramids (we went inside the second pyramid to empty rooms, they were all robbed back in ancient times), lunch was this vegetarian single dish meal called Kushary. It was a simple mix of noodles, pasta, lentils, tomato sauce, hot chilli sauce, garlic vinegar and fried onions on top. I was not impressed, I was hungry with all that walking, it didn’t feel like enough food and there wasn’t enough extra sauce to go around and I was shy about asking for more than what was on the table. 2 weeks later back in Cairo, Brooke (Aussie girl living in London) and I had Kushary again in the Citadel, this time with extra everything. Extra fried onions, extra hot sauce, extra tomato sauce (they also served fried wheat crackers which were awesome). Yummy!! I liked it! It costs 4LE, cheapest full meal money can buy in Egypt. The thing about Kushary places is that the only communication you need to make with the waiter is the size of the dish (small, medium, large) you want and the drinks you want, kushary is the only dish on the menu, there are no other choices. Subsequently, service is super quick.

Off we went to Egpytian Museum with more information from Ola. Went to the Mummy room. I cant believe how much time and effort the ancient Egyptians spent in ensuring their passage to after life. Much like the Hindu concept of Nirvana, this life is merely a layover, it is more important to plan for what happens after this life is over. As Brooke commented: if Ramses only knew that his mummy would one day be in a glass box with random people peeping from above at him… what would he say? The animal mummies freaked me out a bit, there were gory descriptions on how some animals were dropped in vats of hot paraffin to kill and mummify at the same time. King Tut's sarcophagus's (two of the three he was found in, the third is with his mummy in Valley of the Kings), his treasure trove and his infamous mask was there in all their glory. Turns out most of the pharaohs were rather small people and not that attractive. The drawings, sculptures and all structures, on the other hand, are larger than life and with perfect bodies. Talk of vanity!

Egypt 07: The trip begins

2008-01-04T19:05:00.001-05:00

Why did I pick Egypt? I had 2 weeks of vacation time, I desperately needed one after several months of a rather stressful personal and professional life. I wanted to go somewhere not too hot and not too cold, didn’t want to spend too much, and wanted to go with an organized group since I didn’t have time to research or plan much myself. The Intrepid Discover Egypt trip was the best match I could find. And that’s how it came to be that I found myself bleary eyed one Sunday morning around 4am at Cairo airport. I was rather ill prepared, I had hardly read anything about Egypt, did not have a book on

Egypt

and did not have any writing materials to make notes on. I had chosen to not carry woolens and very many warm clothes. I was going to Africa, wasn’t I? Only the thermals and gloves I was wearing since I went from work to the airport. And a couple of turtlenecks, just in case. More on the warm clothing situation later.

Everything I saw and felt first couple of hours reminded me of Bombay so much and that pretty much set the tone for the rest of the trip in my mind. I kept comparing things and people to how they are in India. There was this general sense of chaos (compared to western airports) and an argument broke out between 2 men for no apparent reason. Another shouting match by the baggage claim, no wait, those are relatives just having a conversation across the conveyor belt! On the road, the lanes had these white lines between them that should have meant something, but they might as well have been invisible to my driver, he drove as he liked in between lanes, so did all others. It was so Bombay at late night. Or even Bangalore.

After I napped a bit in the hotel I walked to 26 July street (main street in downtown so named after Egypt’s independence day). My first impressions of Cairo during the bright sunlit day: noisy, crowded, polluted and terribly busy. Later that evening, Sandy (Aussie woman, world traveler, lives on a farm without email and travels without a camera) told us the story about how she had to be escorted by military men to cross the impossibly busy streets. I did not have a scarf to cover my head with and was a bit conscious with all the scarf wearing women (very few full length burqas though). I was generally impressed by the dress style of the women, they almost all wore full length fitting skirts or jeans, fitting shirts (almost knee length tunics) and a head scarf. Very smart. Some wore full length kaftans with embroidery and sequins. Right away I wanted to buy one even though I knew I would never wear it after retuning home.

The stores had these large floor-to-ceiling windows full of identical mannequins for all ages. There were dozens of dressed mannequins window after window. It was as if they had decided to display all of their merchandize in the windows. It was a bit freaky to see all those figures up on display. There was a lonesome Peirre Cardin store with one measly mannequin and 3 pieces of clothing. Looked rather sad surrounded by all that pomp and gaiety in other stores. Had some unimpressive food at Café La’Americaine and back to hotel for some more napping.

My roommate-to-be Wini woke me up. She is Singaporean, works in real estate and makes Very Important Deals, her blackberry went off the whole trip, even on Christmas day. We made small talk and went down to have some coffee. At around 6pm we met with the group and were given an introduction by our tour leader Esam. So these are the people I am going to live with day in and day out for the next 2 weeks! I don’t remember any particular strong impressions from that first meeting. I was happy to note that most of the people seemed to be individual travelers (there was only one married couple from US currently living in Bulgaria). Bill (elderly gentleman) was the only other American. Esam, our tour leader, shared chocolate filled dates with us and I was the first one to help myself to seconds. Already I had demonstrated two traits that were to be my hallmark those 2 weeks. Sleeping and eating. I was starving by the time we finished the introduction. Esam had a lot of information to share, among other things, about respecting the culture (keep shoulder and knees covered), not taking pictures of locals without permission and respecting the environment (don’t leave trash around). Off we went to Gad for dinner, downtown Cairo was a regular garden party at that time of the evening. Everyone seemed to be out walking around, talking, generally having a good time. Lots of cafes with men drinking coffee and smoking sheesha (hookah/waterpipe). Did I mention, the whole country smokes! If not sheesha, then cigarettes. They smoke EVERYWHERE, on the streets, in restaurants, hotel lobbys.

Vermont Fall Trip

2007-11-03T18:30:00.000-04:00

I had a week off from work while in between companies (I have quit consulting and traveling 100% for work) and my niece happened to decide she would visit me during that week. Since it was smack in the middle of October, what better idea than a fall trip to Vermont? I had never taken a trip just to see fall colors and had always heard how pretty Vermont is. Another reason to take this trip was I just wanted to drive and drive. I have just moved to a very urban neighborhood and take the train to work. When I do drive around here, its a nightmare, I miss driving on the highways, it used to be unwind, listen to loud music, me-time. Hence it was decided that Vermont it is.

I made reservations in a B&B in Montpelier, did some research on the web for best routes to take at that time of the month. A colleague suggested a cheese trail. Great idea, except that we had 3 days and cheese trail and fall colors takes longer than that to do well. So I decided we would take all the routes and addresses and play by ear.

The first night we ate at the New England Culinary Institute's Main Street Grill in Montpelier. They had live jazz and when we first got there it was packed and we had to wait at the bar. When we did get a seat at around 9pm, the place emptied in minutes and we were the only ones for about 30 minutes! I began to wonder, how sleepy is this town? But then a new set of people started to come in, they seemed to be locals/regulars since they all knew the musicians. Anyway, I had the steak, my niece had the duck. We thoroughly enjoyed our dinner and drinks, they served very reasonable portions (I dont like large slabs of meat) , very well made (though my niece had to send hers back since it was a little rare for her and the bokchoy was too buttery)

It was a very English country inn, our room was absolutely girly, pink paint with flower patterns everywhere you looked. I am not sure how a man would have taken to it. Continental breakfast was part of the room rate. I dont get the concept of Continental breakfast, all that bread and sugar just doesnt do it for me. We did go in the next morning to take a look anyway and have our tea. I must say though it was indeed pure carbs, atleast it was home-made delicious carbs and since we were on vacation and didnt want to stop for breakfast, we indulged.

After breakfast we asked for advice for best fall routes and the guy at the front desk suggested Rt 100 and 108 to Stowe. He said we could take the gondola. I had read that the Gondola was closed at that time of the year, but he seemed sure it was open. So off we went towards Stowe. I have seen fall colors in NY (Bear Mountain and the Catskills) and somehow thought Vermont would have better colors. In particular, I was expecting to see lots of blazing oranges and reds. And told my niece the same, I also told her we might see some purple. She was very skeptical about purple. But since I am the aunt, and like to believe that I know what I am talking about, she kept her peace.

Well, there werent that many blazing colors. And there was certainly no purple. Could I have been mistaken about purple? Nahhhh... I know what I am talking about and I was sure we would see some. The Gondola was closed off (ofcourse) and we went on to where the road gets extremely curvy and hilly. It was fun to drive. We had noticed some hiking trails and stopped on the way back at one of them (we went back and forth a bit since we couldn find it at once). We started up a trail and after about 1/2 mile, it got very wet (there was a stream running by and it may have rained earlier) and the rock scrambles got really rough. Last year when I visited India, I went climbing on a local mountain with another set of nieces and nephews, which had prompted my younger niece to say what a "cool Massi" (aunt) I was. I was sore for a couple of days after that hike, but didnt feel a thing! So I had this reputation to protect (you know lest Divya goes back and squeals on me), but at the same time was concerned about breaking a bone or two if either of us slipped and fell. So I made an executive decision to turn back. I can only hope my nieces dont read this blog and that Divya remembers I am her local guardian while she is in this country! The picture on left is where we turned back.

We went into town and stopped for a quick lunch since we still wanted to walk around a bit and then visit a cheese farm. On the way to the farm we passed through Waterbury and noticed the plaza with Cabot Store and Lake Champlain, we drove in to take a look and didnt emerge until several hours later. The store had plenty of cheese and crackers to taste. When my niece first got here as a student I had taught her to take advantage of all the free things students get while in school (I remember all the crappy water bottles, bags, t-shirts, I took them all and wanted her to follow in my footsteps). Well, practice what you preach, so we sampled the free stuff (my favs: horseradish, smoked cheddar, jalapeno. My least favs: maple smoked). There was an overload of maple in everything (every imaginable food sold had a maple version, in another store candles, toileteries etc.. had maple in them). I bought some cheese to take to work.

We went next door to Lake Champlain Chocolates, they had several licorice candies, some great, some just awful. We bought some just made fudge that the nice lady, who had let us taste everything we wanted, cut for us on a string. Then followed coffee and some more chocolate and the cheese farm was forgotten. My niece and I are 10 years apart and get along fabulously. We had plenty of nothing to talk about. Thats really it: we talk about nothing and we laugh over nothing and everything. Hours can pass and we will have accomplished... nothing. That how we spent our day, doing a lot of nothing. We are the "show about nothing".

We went to Pajama something (nightie store). They had these full length robes and we started trying everything on. There was a group of old men and women outside the store and I guess we caught the attention of one the old men who was looking in though the window. He was generous enough to give up a thumbs up or down for everything I tried. How nice! My prince charming!

We drove a bit more to see more colors and then decided we would see a film in town and not bother with anything else that day. We had time to kill for the film (Micheal Clayton) so we ambled into Mr Pickwick's English pub. I asked the bartender if he could make me a hot alcoholic drink (I described to him the Hot Buttered Rum I had in Savannah). He said he couldnt make it so I stuck to my usual. He said he had garlic stuffed olives, hmm.. I definitely wanted to try those. He gave me a pack to take with me and though its a bit salty, I like it!

The movie (she hated it, I thought it was ok) was followed by Pizza next door. We both decided our waiter was cute and would flirt if given a chance. But we were ready to go home and sleep, we had done so much that day! On the way I somehow remembered the morning drive into town as very short and via backroads, my GPS kept taking me to the highway so I ignored it. Once I was finally on Rt 12, we both remembered it being a 30-40 minute drive. It was a dark, dark, very, very lonely drive. If I was alone, I would have definitely freaked out! But finally we got home and flopped into bed.

The next day we were going to visit the glass blowing factory, the Taylor Cheese farm and then head home. The factory experience was fun, very nice to watch them make a whole vase out of molten glass. Off to the farm then, the GPS took me through backroads (mostly Rt 100 and 107) and this drive turned out to be absolutely gorgeous. This was fall, as it should be!! There were still not as many blazing colors as I wanted, but much more than central Vermont, there were no bare trees and full color and plenty of hills and mountains off to one side. We got to the farm after a couple of hours of leisurely driving and the farm turned out to be pretty much abandoned, not a human in sight. There were a couple of customers in the store who told us people had left money on the counter and taken what they wanted. Complete honor system. We bought some more cheese, a lemon ginger soda drink (awesome!) and left some money on the counter. There was milking at 4pm that day(!) I was trying to interest my niece in walking around a bit (look Divya! cows, cows!). She was not impressed ("plenty of cows on the streets back home, Massi" was her response). So we headed back, after stopping at a diner that looked like it was straight out of a movie like Fargo.

I noticed the distances and speed limits on the highways were in KM as opposed to miles, I still wonder why (Canadian influence?). All in all, it was a great trip. Great drive, great company and very relaxing. Pictures to come soon.

Atlanta and Savannah

2007-07-01T22:18:00.000-04:00

Atlanta

How can I not write about Atlanta? I have been traveling to Atlanta for business almost regularly for nearly two years. I think it’s a fairly interesting city, my team is mostly young people and that’s the general feel I get in Atlanta, it’s young and new. Lots of fine restaurants, lifestyle malls that I love visiting. My overall experience traveling here has been great and I have made some friends at work to keep.

The airport is terribly crowded, they have one security entrance for all terminals unlike Newark, where they have a security area for each terminal. I rented a car every week and the best cars I have had are a Seabring Convertible, Ford F150 (I loved bullying everybody else on the road), Infinity M35, Chrysler Crossfire. Got to first name basis with 90% of the customer visible staff at hotels I stayed at (I varied between Mariott and Hilton hotels).

The highlights of places that I visited are here (sorry just this one picture):

CNN tour: CNN is headquartered in ATL. Was fun seeing the anchors speak live, though nobody famous when I went and it wasn’t as active as I imagined. They have the longest free-standing escalator in the world. I suppose we should applause.

Georgia Aquarium: Definitely worth a dekho if you ever visit ATL. Awesome large window with tons of sea citizens you could stare at for hours.

Georgia High Museum: I saw the Louvre exhibition (paintings and sculptures from Louvre) right after I returned from Paris. It’s a nice museum; they have some interesting modern art as well.

Buckhead: Hip neighborhood, a good friend of mine has a condo in a high rise. Gorgeous views; fine restaurants; very happening.

Chateau Elan: Winery about 40 minutes north of Atlanta. All wines I tasted were fairly light bodied. I did appreciate the crispness of the steel-barrel aged whites.

Food is quite important to the people in Atlanta. One of my colleagues took the trouble to explain to me the difference between grilling and barbequing. He owns a grill worth a couple of thousand. http://www.kamado.com/, he must know what he is talking about.

Places I ate at where I either remember the food or the experience in order of preference (they are all in starting in downtown all the way to Alpharetta areas):

Fogo de Chao: My most memorable meal experience in Atlanta. Partly because of the company (it was a team dinner with the funest people at work). Brazilian BBQ is one of my favorite cuisines. We spent about 2 hours chowing down on the meats. Was hard to leave (it does become hard to move when you have eaten twice your weight you know).

J&R: Very very good BBQ. Squash side was just divine. Very southern (read “loaded with butter”)

J Chistopher’s (bkfst/brunch) : I went there for Easter Sunday brunch and was disappointed, when I went back there another day with regular menu, I wondered why they had changed it at all. The regular menu is a much better selection and everything I have had there since then, I like.

MiPilon: Dominican restaurant. The best Yucca fries since I left Miami, moist and perfect sized portions. Large portions of entrees from buffet.

Minerva and Madras Saravana: Best Indian restaurants I visited. Minerva’s lunch buffet is big and you can smell the chilies in the air. Shockingly red/orange colored Gulab Jamun, what’s up with that?

Goldfish: Huge chunk of spicy tuna, topped with ikura and quail egg. Awesome.

Season 52: Very lively and noisy crowd (even for weeknights), friendly staff and good food.

La Madeleine: French bakery and cafe, great soups, quiches, sandwiches. Very dainty; the food as well as decor. I feel guilty afterwards though, I am sure they use as much butter as Paula Deen! Their Crepe Champignon had this awful guey white mushroom sauce that had more flour than needed in it.

Savu at The W: Perimeter Mall. Loved the hotel lobby, very chic. Food was decent.

Armando’s: Fish or lobster tacos are the best!

Divan: I was introducing my team to the hookah, most of them had never tried it before. Turned out to be a fun party! Food was ok. Hummus was great. The colleague whose 40^th birthday we were celebrating smoked for the first time in his life. Never too late to start killing yourself, is it?

Grape: It’s a chain in Atlanta. Bold purple upholstery that I like, a wine store and decent food. They are generous about letting you taste wines before you select one.

Dreamland: They serve white bread along with dipping sauce. Unusual for me. Good BBQ food.

Bogeys: We used to go there for wings. Two BBQ experts in my team loved this place so I am mentioning it. I thought it was ok.

Dante’s: Fondue style expensive food with Jazz. What I liked about the place is the theme, they have live crocs and turtles and it’s a boat. Tons of pictures of famous people. Menu in dozens of languages. I read the one in Marathi and Hindi. Dante seemed to spend time at every table making as much conversation as you let him. Food was just blah, the good thing though is that you cook your food in soy oil. So it’s healthy blah.

Kurts: German food, Weiner and Shnitzel and all their cousins.

Slovakian: Felt and tasted like Kurts to me. But then what do I know?

Benaras: Vegetarian thali system that was a little unusual, they bring entrees in kadai and serve it like al la carte, but its one price unlimited. North Indian gravies.

Imperial Fez: I saw a male belly dancer for the first time. Slender young guy with a middle eastern style beard! Maybe I’ll skip the dance next time. Food was barely ok. Maybe I’ll skip the whole place next time!

Urban Tea Party: After several attempts to goto a tea place in Atlanta, I landed up going there with couple of girls from work. They have a decent sized collection. Tea was served in a paper cup. Enuf said. The company was great though.

Oceanaire: Fancy pants place, $$ and fresh tasting seafood.

Atlanta Seafood Company: Went there with a friend from Kerela who grew up eating fish for breakfast, lunch and dinner. He gave this place a resounding thumbs-up.

As for casual dining:

Zaxby’s: Its fast food or close to it. Something about their Chicken Blue Buffaloed Zalad Salad and I was hooked. Never tried anything else on the menu.

Atlanta Bread Company: Tomato basil soup, various salads, tuna sandwich, California avocado sandwich, I could live on that stuff for months (and I did too).

Savannah

Along with two of my colleagues, I made a day trip to Savannah one fine January day. The weather was gorgeous in the 80s. We tried having lunch at Lady and Sons and there was a 3 hour wait. We made dinner reservations instead and lunched in one of the squares.

At Lady and Sons, I visualize this assembly line where a machine picks up food from your plate, dips it in a vat of butter and then places it back on your plate before it is brought to your table. I tried the fired green tomatoes, not my favorite. I thought the food was tasty mostly due to the amount of butter and wondered what all the fuss was about. But much later I read Paula Deen’s memoirs and now see her in a different light knowing what she went through. I am becoming more and more involved in women’s causes and her story is inspiring. Still not eating that food again though.

We took a bus tour and I totally appreciate the squares, I could easily spend hours in one with a good book. While we were waiting for dinner time we went over to River Street by the water and wandered into a bar (cant remember the name). Feeling a bit adventurous, I ordered the Hot Buttered Rum. That’s exactly what it was, hot rum drink with a dollop of butter on top and a large stick of cinnamon in it, I loved it. That’s also where I had pickled Okra for the first time, will happily try both again!

Southwest: To sum it all up then...

2007-04-30T21:59:00.000-04:00

I was best prepared for Grand Canyon (all those warnings of death, I think) and it was personally the most rewarding hike though not the best views (at least not until you get to the end point). Kept my pace for all hikes and in general thoroughly enjoyed all activity. Even the stormy Monument Valley ride was thrilling. Hiking is the only outdoor activity I truly enjoy and I wish to someday become a serious hiker and conquer some difficult mountains. Most of the camping was in cool or cold weather and my whining notwithstanding, thats just how I like it. It adds a little something to the whole adventure. Plus I cant stand hot weather (my friends wonder why since I grew up in a tropical country, I guess I got de-tropicalized somewhere along the way!). I do wish I had hiked a bit more, but then that is best done by staying in one place and then I would not get to see so many places. Well then if I want it all, I'll just have to find a way, wont I?!?

During this trip, my feet felt just fine (layers of socks, boots, gaiters), but my hands were abused like never before. My inner gloves got wet easily and all that work to set up and bring down tent, pack and unpack in cold weather did a number on them and after a few days they felt like dry leather most of the time (the hands that is). I was quite generous with the body lotions and moisturizers due the cold and used sun block as well. Nevertheless, Nat and I decided that after the trip we needed a major spa visit as well as detox for all the overeating. This was no organic food trip.

I am still a beginner at this stuff, but I did learn some valuable lessons on this trip. If you decide to go on a serious hiking trip, you don't need to read on. You already know what to do. For those like to dream they will do these trips someday: know that the weather can change dramatically from place to place and often in the exact same place over a few hours. We went through snow, rain, high winds, hot sun, sub zero as well as pleasant weather in this trip. As Jeff says "take good care of your feet and they will take good care of you" (Actually, I am not sure those are his words, but they sound good, maybe I should take credit instead). In my case I should have taken better care of my hands as well. Take thin manageable layers of clothes instead of bulky clothing (unless you are hiking in minus 25 in which case why are you still reading my blog, don't you have better stories to tell me?). If there's one thing you need to remember about dressing up, its layers, layers, layers. Chiefly so you can delayer easily and put things away when you warm up. It is worth spending the extra $ to buy clothing items from specialty stores. They also happen to look good on you. Discipline yourself about drinking LOTS of water well before you start the trip. It should become a habit before you leave home. being shy about peeing out in the open is not an option. Stay with people (except when you are peeing of course, that is best done in private, the wilderness of it all notwithstanding), don't take unnecessary risks. Its not worth it. Take as many stops as you like on hikes, don't let anybody pressure you to go faster than you can. I read in the Grand Canyon that if you can talk normally while you hike, you are doing fine. But don't go slow enough to loose the adrenaline. Start early to loose the crowds (and avoid the sun). Learn how to stay dry in wet weather. Don't let your body overheat or overcool at anytime. And if you do well, come back and tell me how it went!

As for Vegas, it is the first time I went to a place known for gambling and had fun without gambling at all! It was a touristy trip, other than the show I just walked around and took pictures. Now I can say I have been to Vegas. Do I want to go back there? For the shows, definitely yes, otherwise not really.

Check out Gavin's excellent collection of pictures at http://editthis.info/wd/Main_Page

I particularly enjoyed his pyscho-analysis of the group.

Southwest: Vegas Baby!

2007-04-28T21:23:00.000-04:00

As we left camp, it started snowing. And we had the only accident the whole trip. James cut his finger while chopping some fruit. Almost disappointing after the stories of death by falling down cliffs and all!

As always I brought some fruit into the van in case I got hungry. This morning as I took a banana out to eat, it was frozen. And so I ate a Cliff bar instead. Big mistake. Never eat a Cliff bar when you are not active. I was totally wired and I didn’t eat anything until that evening (and even that was a light dinner). We got to Las Vegas and as we were chatting, Jen talked about having a flutter. Peta agreed she might have a flutter as well. Nat was also going to have a flutter. What the hec is that all about? Turns out, its English for “gamble a little bit”.

Chuck and I went off to see O (Cirque de Soleil) at Bellagio. The rest of the gang went to Rio for the buffet. We all agreed to meet at the Treasure Island Siren show at 10PM. I had a front row seat at O (it is a great advantage of buying single tickets, no matter how late you book, you are bound to get a great seat!) I felt the heat of the fire and the mist several times. What I want to know is: what is that guy who is on fire a good 10 minutes onstage wearing to not feel it at all! Even his hat is on fire, I guess he has a mask we don’t see since he stays way back on the stage. I could see the performers up close with their makeup and panting bodies as they came up close after their performances. The thunder and lightening was very convincing though I could smell chlorine in the air. I give the music as much as 50% credit for making the show awesome. I think all live performances would be useless if there was no music. The stage would get converted into a pool of water and then dry floor in a matter of seconds, the pool had to be several feet deep since the acrobats dived from a height of 2 floors. I would love a behind the scenes tour of that stage and how the performers get in and out of the bottom.

After the show I parted with Chuck and went to see the chocolate waterfall. Disappointing. The flower show in the atrium was wonderful though. The fountain show outside Bellagio was great, though for $35M they could have added some color to it, don’t you agree? I got a viewpoint with the Eiffel tower behind it, so I got some good shots of the fountain. Went back to TI at around 10 and ran into Dan and Bev. Gavin had somehow been separated from James (Nat was with him). Dan and Bev went into Kahunaville, I think this searching for James business was keeping them away from their alcohol quota far too long. I walked with Gavin to the Venetian looking for James, got to hear the gondola dude singing Pavarotti. I don’t think Gavin noticed anything, he was worried about where James might be. Ah, the pain of having a 19 yr old son who has a mind of his own! We then joined Dan and Bev at Kahunaville, Collette and Tim were already there. Then the bartender tricks started, very impressive. First with a single bottle, then a bottle and a glass, then bottle and 2 glasses, then 2 bottles and 2 glasses, then 4 bottles. The bartender was generous was his R-rated tricks, free booze flowed from bottles into mouths, dollar bills flew and all was well with the world. I was happy with my cosmo (I thought it was weak, I went for a second). Gavin and I left early to go back to the hotel and by coincidence, James, Nat, Jen and Gary joined us in the hotel shuttle. Father and son were reunited and all was well with the world (a second time that night).

The next morning I said my goodbyes to the group since they were going on ahead to LA and I was flying out of LV that evening. Didn’t see Dan and Bev at all (I don’t think anybody did after the previous evening, they were flying to Mexico from LV). Gavin had collected everyone’s email address and promised to write. After I returned to my room, I felt something like group withdrawal syndrome, I suddenly realized that I wasn’t going to be seeing them anymore. No more dinners or cleaning duty. No making plans about every single day together. No discussing how the day went and “what did you do today”? Gosh, how easy it is to become co dependent in a group. I think that’s why they say, when in trouble on hiking trips, never separate. You draw strength from each other.

I then went back to the strip. Lovely lovely day. Sunny, lower 70s maybe and very breezy. Went to see the white tiger at Mirage, I guess he is showing off his tan. Walked through Forum shops (with the fake blue sky) which is part of Ceaser’s, loved the Atlantis show so much (they have statues that talk and make fire and water; no they don’t pee), I saw it twice and recorded it on video in bits. The music is great and loud. When I came out of Forum, I asked a guard where I could find pastries. I was craving some. The guy said if there’s any pastry shop on the strip, it’s in the Paris casino. Off I went to Paree. The strip was amazingly busy. Paris is like … well Paris. Fake blue sky again. Fake Parisian streets. Occasional fake cobblestoned path. A leg or two of the tower inside. A portion of Arc de Triomphe outside. Found a pastry shop (but of course), bought a couple to go.

Finally it was time to say goodbye to Las Vegas, I enjoyed my second day of the strip itself much more than the first. In the shuttle the driver and another guy who works in the casinos were talking about the fact that a casino girl in Palms makes $41 an hour. The driver thought it must be the playboy section. The guy said he’d be happy to put a tail on him for that kind of money!

Southwest: Grand Canyon

2007-04-28T21:22:00.002-04:00

We stopped at Cameron Trading post where I bought cactus and jalapeno jelly, BBQ sauce, beer bread mix, Indian fry bread mix and other goodies for gifting. I always buy fridge magnets of places I visit. And for some reason I had forgotten to buy a Bryce magnet. I asked about it everywhere we stopped, but I guess it wasn’t meant to be! When we stopped for lunch, Ron asked us to wear our spare shirts over our heads get in line and not ask questions. Then we made a human chain and he walked us a little distance with shirts over eyes and eyes closed. Then he made a big deal about opening our eyes all together and we were at a view point in South Rim overlooking the entire canyon. If you have been to the Grand Canyon, you know what that first look is like. Quite overwhelming in scale, though the colors appeared much paler than I had imagined. I think the pictures I had seen were taken at dawn or dusk when the redness becomes more pronounced. The North Rim appeared to be very close, though the two rims are as much as 20 miles apart. Anyway the grandeur and scale was unmatched with anything I had seen so far. It was just a little too white.

As we wandered around to get more pictures, I noticed everywhere I went there were posters describing the dangers of hiking in Grand Canyon. Stories with pictures of young athletes who had died while hiking there. They really kicked up the paranoia and I have to say it affected me. I bought extra water bottles though I had a 1.5 liter water bag in my backpack. I bought electrolytes as well. They advise you should eat twice the normal amount and drink a liter of water per hour of hiking. Oh well, I was quite determined to hike as much as I could and felt quite prepared for it. While Ron went over the hikes, I first decided to do the South Kaibab which is 6 miles round trip and about 2k ft elevation change. The stories of the dead hikers was still fresh on my mind. Then the super hiker bunch started talking about the Bright Angel trail which was 12 miles round trip and a little over 3k ft down. Collette assured me if I had done Yosemite falls I could easily do Bright Angel. I agreed to do it and give myself the max time published by the newspaper (12 hours) to Plateau Point. And promised myself if it got dangerous I would turn back no matter how disappointed I was.

That afternoon, Gavin, James, Collette, Tim and I saw an IMAX film whereas the rest of the crowd went off for a copter ride. The film was fantastic and I got dizzy as I tried to follow the scene where the copter takes these crazy turns around the bends in the canyon.

The next day was going to be windy and cloudy so we decided to see sunset that night. It was my team’s turn to cook again, but this time we had taken up Chuck’s suggestion and were going to do hot dogs, baked beans and chips. We were going to grill the dogs over open fire. Chuck asked me if we were going to heat up the beans. I wondered how else we were going to serve the beans. He said in all seriousness that we could give people the cans and they could warm them up over the fire themselves. That was way too funny!

The sunset was GORGEOUS! The first two pictures in this blog are the same canyon (though different viewpoints). That’s the view of Grand Canyon they show in all pictures, red, orange and all shades therein. Ron took us to a little known viewpoint near Mather point with a rock that sticks far out and it was just us out there. It is a short climb down and everybody except the hiking group stayed up at the rim (Collette came down as well after a while). Even though the rock we were on had ledges, they couldn’t be seen from the rim and it appeared to those at the rim that we were taking serious risks with our lives. We took lots and lots of pics, Ron showed us a trick where it looks like we are falling down the cliff. We were like kids full of antics.

I did not sleep well that night, my first. I had apparently been been sleeping the best out of all, but it was 22 °F that night which is something else altogether. I kept awaking to layer up and finally slept in about 4 (albeit thin) layers of shirts and pants. I felt the cold rise up from the ground and decided if I didn’t get enough sleep, I would skip the hike. I had already given Jeff’s fleece outer pants to Nat since she had been miserable about her sleeping bag, couldn’t just ask her to wake up and return them now could I? We had decided to wake up at 5AM (in spite of much objection from Dan and Bev who routinely slept late), watch the sunrise at Yavupai point and then go to the Bright Angel Trail. Chris and Peta were going to skip this one.

Bright Angel Trail

Forced myself to awake, washed up with the smallest amount of water possible (in that cold, water, especially cold water is the enemy). James had this newfound enthusiasm for hiking after having completed the Angel’s Landing and though he always had to be encouraged by his father to wake up and do his chores, he was up and ready to for the hike at 5! Nat and I had pretty much slept in hiking gear, except the boots. We all declared the sunrise rubbish compared to the sunset the night before. No colors. We took a shuttle to goto Bright Angel trailhead. In the bus I took out a Cliff bar since I hadn’t eaten anything and wanted some energy before the hike. The driver reminded me there was to be no food on the bus. I wanted to be smart mouthed and asked if I should spit it out. Dan pointed out that would still be food on the bus.

We started at 6:15AM and went down fairly quickly. I was left behind but not too far. There is a rest stop every mile and half on the 6 miles one way trail. We saw barely a dozen other hikers. Some were coming back up, I guess they must have camped somewhere down there and were returning early to avoid the sun. I made it to Plateau Point a little before 9AM. The paper said the Plateau portion of the hike (the last mile and half) is extremely strenuous and I wondered why since it is the flattest part of the trail. When I got onto it, I realized why. On all the hikes I have ever been on, the impressions of the area around me are always positive. Words like beautiful, grand, breathtaking come to mind… you know, depending on how nice the view is. Somehow on Plateau Point (picture of the plateau below), I kept thinking how desolate and oppressive it was. Behind you are the cliffs you have come down on, very high and the rim is so far off (4 ½ miles hike to be precise), far ahead of you is the canyon spreading out, and around you is this same flatness, almost desert like in quality and if the sun is strong, imagine how mentally stressful it can get. Besides, it was deserted and I was walking some distance behind the rest of the group. Not a soul in sight (I would see the gang occasionally as the trail turned). Get the picture? Certainly not hiking there in summer. James and I agreed that part of the trail seemed to never end. The sun played hide and seek a bit behind the clouds. But the temperature difference is dramatic (I went from low 20s to upper 70s in hours), the only time in my life my fingers stayed swollen for hours.

Plateau point was quite humbling, as we looked down we realized we were barely half way down to the Colorado river that made the canyon. You look up and there are these huge cliffs going up. Took a 20 minute break for photos, lunch and then started back. I told the gang to stay with me till Indian Gardens (the last rest area coming down) and then go on with out me since I was going to take my time and there would be plenty of people by then on the trail. Indian Gardens has a nice camp area, must remember that in case I decided to visit again and go to the river.

I hiked back up in about 4 1/2 hours with breaks. Jolly good compared to may past performance if I may say so. If it had been any sunnier, I am sure I would have taken a lot longer (maybe the entire 12 hours the paper said it can take). There are really not many places to hide out from the sun on this trail. On the way met some mule parties. At some point as the crowd coming down started getting thicker, the comments on my hat started coming. I was wearing my large, colorful sombrero-like hat (that I had bought for my Caribbean trip years ago). Several people complimented my hat and some told me they were watching me (or my hat to be precise) come up the switchbacks (as you climb down you can see most of the trail as well as the Plateau Point). I was the “hat lady” that day. A woman on a mule said she loved my hat, I offered to trade it in for her mule. I can’t believe she gave up on the wonderful offer to be the “hat lady” of Bright Angels!

I had finished a liter and half of water going down and about 2 liters coming up (had filled up on the way). I had carried 3 and half in all. At the last 3/4s of a mile, ran into a guy who asked if I had water to spare. I gave him my unopened half liter bottle and was glad to be rid of the weight. The last half mile dragged on FOREVER! I had climbed down and back up 3175ft in that hike.

I went back to camp and was sore in my legs. I sat down and didn’t want to get up or take a shower. The hikers were all back and so were a couple others. I made some tea, my first intake of caffeine that day (oh I forgot the 2 Cliff bars I consumed). But that cup was simply deelish! Took a shower. For such a popular national park, the shower and toilettes are the worst. The toilette sinks don’t have hot water and the showers are completely separate from the toilettes (we camped at Mather campground at South Rim). And it was the most expensive shower so far at $1.75 for 5 minutes. No new blisters (had 2 very small ones from Zion) though I had removed my outers socks at some point and had worn them back again after I felt the inner socks alone were chafing too much.

Ron had chopped a portion of a tree trunk, no silly logs would do for us in this temperature. Ron was cooking since it was our last night camping and was going to make Japanese curry. It had Indian curry powder leftover from my dinner, coconut milk, all the leftover veggies and meat and hot dogs from the night before. What was Japanese about it, I don’t know. He also made rice pudding with all the leftover cream, milk, rice (basmati, mind you), cinnamon sticks and cinnamon powder (I wonder why he hadn’t use the leftover bay leaves and garlic, that would make a nice touch, no?). The curry was fabulous, the basmati in the pudding never got cooked (but some people ate it anyway, including me).

As we stood around the fire (sitting was not an option, it put your upper body too far away from the fire), we passed Buttershots Schnapps around to all and toasted a few more marshmallows. It was expected to be in the mid 20s that night. For some reason, it was this last night of camping that Dan got drunk. He and Bev had made a show every night of competing to see who drank more beers and I guess this was win or loose night. He was quite mild as a drunk, went around to all and sang to them (at least sounded like singing), sat on Peta’s lap a bit, cuddled up to Chuck. After we had all gone to sleep, he started shouting. I never found out what he was yelling. But after some time, Peta yelled from her tent “Dan, shut the f@*! Up” and Chris followed with “Yeah, shut the f@*! Up”. No more was heard and we all slept like little lambs. This was the loudest and rowdiest someone in the group ever got. Pretty tame group, I say (not that I am complaining).

Southwest: Monument Valley

2007-04-28T21:22:00.001-04:00

I wake at 7ish for a 9AM departure, today we will not make breakfast it is included in the price of the steak dinner the camp owners made us last night. Breakfast is Swedish pancakes with bacon, OJ, coffee and fresh orange. No eggs, no toast, no oatmeal. Kinda sad really. Jenny didn’t eat at all because she does not like pancakes. And we had loaded the trailer early since we weren’t going to make breakfast. We have been on Mountain time since Zion but for some reason my Cingular phone is perpetually confused and is always ahead or behind local time. A couple of days we crossed time zones back and forth during the day and Ron set the “van” time as our time. Except my Cingular network set my phone to whatever time it thought it was. And I didn’t bring a watch (don’t ask why, I have no good answer). That is why I woke up an hour early (5 instead of 6) the day after Angel’s landing hike. I am sure the people who live there have learnt not to rely on their phone for the time.

Weather was good, 50s at night and upper 60s in the day. Lake Powell has been the best weather so far. Lunch was someplace on our way to monument Valley that I can’t remember. But I do remember it was very windy. Jen and Gary started towards a McDs close by, I ran after them. Then Gavin and James came after me. Before we knew it most of us had opted to eat indoors instead of the crazy wind. Though we didn’t know it then, the wind was a sign of things to come.

A 2 hour Navajo guided tour of the Valley was part of the trip. When we got there, it was still windy and we made jokes about flying out of the open truck. When we got in and took off, it got windier and worse still, we drove right into the desert and the valley. Later I learnt that the winds were at 35mph and with the sand flying into our faces (noses, ears and all…) it was the closest I have been to a sandstorm. We saw 3 sisters, 2 hands, elephants, camel and several other monuments. At some point the guide stopped for us to take pictures at a large sand dune that Gavin, Bev and I climbed to the top of. Bevan decided to roll down. Monkey see, monkey do, I rolled down after him, but not before I had emptied my pockets of everything. It was quite a thrill rolling down (especially since I had to close my eyes so I wasn’t quite sure where I was going). I ate a lot of sand that day, I guess it belongs to the fiber family so it must be good for me. We passed female hogans (which are half an oval), traditional home to the Indians which represent the female womb and the male conical hogans which represent a giant eagle. There are very few Indian families that actually live in the Valley, it must be freaky to be surrounded by all those lonely structures that look like animals and birds. Or maybe beautiful, depending on your perspective and what you are used to.

When we returned to the visitor’s center, it was closed due to power outage. We got to our campsite and it was too windy to set up camp, we rented a few rooms in the hotel close to the camp instead. We were going to sleep on real beds, and watch TV! Yoohoo! But the news was all about VTU and quite depressing, so James and I switched to Will and Grace instead. Ah, civilization!

The next day we left at around 8 and took pictures of the Monuments with a bright sun this time. What a difference! The pictures in this chapter were all taken the previous day. We were on our way to the last camping stop, Grand Canyon. A place I have wanted to visit for years and was going to be the highlight of my trip as I promised myself. Ron asked us to take an extra shirt with us in the car and not ask questions about it. I wonder what that is all about!

Southwest: Lake Powell and Slot Canyon

2007-04-28T21:21:00.000-04:00

The camp where stayed was literally in the middle on nowhere. There was a highway nearby with a passing car every few minutes if we were lucky. I kept thinking of the film Fargo. The nearest town, Page, is 35 miles away. That night we went into the clubhouse at camp playing pool, reading, they even had a strobe light in there! The next day, I woke up at a lazy 8:30 AM for a 10AM departure. Chris, Peta and I decided to do the slot canyon, everybody headed for the beach area of Lake Powell hotel. The slot canyon tour meeting point was in a plaza called Dam Plaza (how imaginative, they even had a Dam Bar and Grill). Slot canyon was the second best sight so far after Bryce. Horizontally curved canyon walls and amazing colors due to the well defined sun beams coming down on the canyon floor and in many cases bouncing off the walls. The sand flowed smoothly and beautifully off the rocks. My camera battery died just as I was warming up to the pictures. Darn it! I took some pictures with my phone camera, which pretty much sucks. By the way, it is best to see the slot canyons between 11 and 1 when the sun is at its strongest and you get the most well defined beams. Jen was very sorry she didn’t go after she saw the lovely pictures.

We went back to Lake Powell, by then the party had moved to poolside since the beach was shaded and too cold. Got to see some skin that day. I swam a bit, read a bit and made general chit chat with the group. I landed up talking to my boss on the phone about an upcoming project opportunity in Australia and told the group about it. Gavin rebuked me for taking a business phone call. Jenny was absolutely determined I should go since she had just visited and loved it there. I was to be encouraged the rest of the trip to move to Australia pronto! Even Gary who said very little to me kept asking me if I had decided to go.

That night, after the steak dinner prepared by the campsite owners, everybody, except me, started (or rather resumed) drinking and James confided in us that he had been controlling his use of slang with this group. At this we all wanted him to use his slang and in fact could he please teach us a few? Here’s what I can remember:

If it’s too much effort you say “its long”. Do you want to set up tent by yourself, “naw, its long”
Bear means a lot of. “I had bear beer”.
Allow it means not interested. Do you want to hike Angel’s Landing again? Allow it. (this was most interesting since it means the exact opposite of what you’d expect)
Bullsack is for when you are annoyed.

Southwest: Bryce

2007-04-28T21:19:00.000-04:00

We parked at Sunset point at 8000ft for lunch at Bryce Canyon. The hoodoos of Bryce were amazing. They were the BEST sight so far! Rather creepy tall human shapes. Apparently the chief of the Native Indian tribe would tell his people that hoodoos were tribe members who had been turned into rocks and that if they did something wrong he would turn them into hoodoos as well. “See that hoodoo with one eye, that’s the dude who didn’t look after his cattle” It really was a spectacular view, I couldn’t stop taking pictures. I imagined every hoodoo to be a person who was watching us as we walked through them. Many of them had eyes and nose and some even smiled! When we got down, it was sunny and warm and yet it was snowing a bit. Weird. Portions of the bottom looked like sand dunes from up above and I thought what fun it would be to ski there (even though I don't ski, I have taken several lessons, but just cant do it). Apparently you can ski in parts of Red Canyon. We came up to sunrise point and walked back to Sunset point. We saw neither a sunset nor a sunrise at Bryce though I am sure it’s a wonderful sight what with the deep brown-red colors on the hoodoos. Bryce is made of silkstone which is very fragile, its crumbles easily if you step on it. Nat and I wondered how it would be if it all came tumbling down on us.

One the way to Lake Powell Peta, Nat, Gavin and I played scrabble in the Van. This time I had Collette helping me on the side, she is a scrabble champion (so she says). We were racing ahead of others when we ran into a controversy over the word Equines (we put an s at the end of Equine and along with a few other tiles made 3 words giving us about 39 points with that one play). Gavin and Bevan didn’t think it was a word. Collette threatened to stop playing if they questioned her knowledge. I was winning, what I did I care? I stood by Collette. I won and agreed to look up the word in a dictionary when we got a chance (or maybe not).

Southwest: Zion

2007-04-28T21:08:00.000-04:00

We drove through Primm Valley where we stopped for a break. The group had been talking about Indian curry, you know, subtle hints about how much they loved Indian curry. So after convincing Chuck (who was vehemently against making anything other than hotdogs and beans), I decided to make rice Pulao and Chicken curry and have the boys do the chopping. As we cooked that night, James (19 yrs old) was quite keen to learn how to chop veggies and after going at it for about 40 minutes got his well deserved cigarette break. Bev offered to chop since that was his specialty. Chuck struggled with a garlic clove or two and refused to refine his technique even after I showed him how to crush it a little with the back of a cup so the skin would come off easily. He grumbled several times “I told you we should have made something easy”. I was amused at his intense dislike for cooking. Most of us had abandoned the beer bought by Ron for wine we bought ourselves. I landed up going through about 3 glasses of wine while cooking, Gavin brought out his radio and played some music. The food was great (I thought the curry was rather thin, not enough onion and tomato masala, but everybody dutifully complimented the food) though the wine was not such a good idea since it dehydrated me a bit that night. I went to sleep at 11 with more alcohol than was good for me given I was hiking the next day.

Angel’s Landing:

I forced myself to wake up at 6AM, it was dark outside. After a shower the hikers were all ready to leave by 7:30AM. We took the shuttle to Grotto stop where we started up Angel’s Landing hike, about 2.5 miles one way. I made it to the top in good time, the last 0.5 miles is on rock chains. To get to the other part of the mountain where you make the last bit of the climb, you have to walk over a narrow ridge connecting the two with deep cliffs on both side and chains to support you. As I neared the ridge area, I kept telling myself, I cant do this, I cant do this. And then I found myself saying it out loud to others. Dan had second thoughts as well, but he went on ahead eventually. I just couldn’t do it. I was terribly disappointed with myself that day, though I have never for a moment regretted not going with the others. I did climb on chains a little bit and getting back down was not easy! Not to mention there was a woman ahead of me who was freaking out about getting back down and her paranoia was not helping me!

I then took the bus to the last stop (Temple of Sinawava) and walked the (Merced) River Walk, I saw people heading out to the Narrows trail (the canyon gets really narrow and you wade upto chest deep river water on this trail). I thought I would get back to camp and ask Ron how to rent the clothes for the narrows walk. In the bus back to camp I was terribly sleepy and really really wanted to just sleep. When I got back to camp, Ron was not there, so I promptly went to sleep instead! I had finished 1.5 liters of water and then some and still felt dehydrated. I woke up occasionally to the sound of rain. By the time I awoke many people were back. By now Dan and Bev were firmly established as the goofiest of the crowd providing us with plenty of humor. I played scrabble with Gavin and Natalie. I barely stood second (Gavin helped me beat him, what a gentleman!). There was a hearty stew for dinner that night. I realized that I had been overeating at almost every meal and wasn’t burning it all up in my hikes. Oh well, never mind, that’s what a vacation is for, isn’t it?

The wind made it much colder that night, we played a guessing game (man is moving towards the center of a field, he knows he will die when he gets there, what is going on?). We were all definitely warming up to each other.

The next day was decamping for we were leaving for Bryce. I woke up at 6 again and it was very dark, went back to sleep and woke up at 6:30. Still very dark and Nat’s alarm didn’t go off though she had set it for 6:30. I wondered why. Went to take a shower, came back and it was still dark and not a soul was moving, not even Chuck who usually was the first one to awake and start coffee. I went back to sleep fully dressed and in my boots. By now my confusion with the timezones had already begun without my realizing it.

It was going to snow in Bryce and Ron suggested camping at Lake Powell for 2 nights instead. We were all one in our agreement. Setting up and bringing down tents in sub zero temperature is no fun. Besides while the rain slides off the tent, the snow would stick and then freeze. We passed the upper portion of Zion on our way out and a tunnel they said couldn’t be built due to the sandstone. The upper portion was side swept by the wind and the appearance was very different from what we had seen so far. We passed the Red Canyon and the town of Summit at 7777ft elevation. We drove on scenic byway 12, the most scenic route in Utah. The first 3 pictures in this chapter are Angel's landing, you have to see the full view of the one with people climbing up to see the rock chains. The last picture is the side swept portion.

Southwest: Barstow Desert Town

2007-04-28T21:03:00.000-04:00

We drove past Mojave desert, past the huge airplane parking lot. We went from 33 °F that day to 80 °F in a few hours. Camped in a KOA campground near places like Jenny Rose restaurant (the name over a huge heart sign that blinked red at night), Peggy Sue’s diner, Ghost town road. It was expected to be in the 50s that night. At first I wasn’t sure why we were going there, but the desert does have its beauty and I slept out under the stars, the only one in the group to do so. Ron had assured me there were no bugs, I am glad it wasn’t until the next day that James pointed to a huge crawling creature close to where I had slept. My team had dish duty that night, I couldn’t have picked a better night and a better place. They had a huge sink with running hot and cold water. All toilette sinks had running hot and cold water and paper towels in addition to dryers. The showers had a raised platform to prevent the water from creeping into the area where you step in after the shower. We were to never see that kind of luxury again! Most importantly we were dry, did you hear me, DRY!

Southwest: Yosemite

2007-04-28T20:50:00.000-04:00

We piled into the Van with a trailer in the back and drove to Yosemite. Everybody was polite and quite. Very quite. I asked a few questions of the Aussie couple, learnt that they were traveling the world and working where they could find a job (currently living in London) and then ran out of questions and then became quite myself. At Yosemite, we stopped at O’ Shaughnessy Dam in the Hetch Hetchy reservoir and went for a short walk to the lower water fall. We camped just outside the national park at Indian Flats campground in El Portal. Ron divided the group into teams which would then take turns cooking, doing dishes and cleaning the van. He wisely put a woman at the head of each team. I was team C with James (Gavin, the IBMer’s son), and Chuck (the only American other than Ron). Right away Chuck suggested hot dogs and baked beans for our team, “keep it simple” he said. A phrase I was hear from him several times during the trip. A young Oxford graduate Dan was to be in charge of the trailer loading and unloading. Jennifer (who had been traveling the world the past 3 mths with boyfriend Gary) was to be in charge of organizing food (heaven forbid we should run out of important things we need to survive in the wilderness, like coffee). Ron cooked fajitas that night and we all helped in everything since the team structure kicked in the night after. He also gave us our itinerary for the entire trip, instead of Great Basin Desert, we were to goto Barstow another desert town (some useless excuse about traffic/route that I don’t remember). Too early to be litigious I decided.

The next day we had a quick breakfast, packed sandwiches for lunch and left by 8 AM (early AM departure was to be quite the norm with couple of exceptions thereafter). We went to see the giant sequoias at Mariposa Grove. It had started to drizzle a bit when we got out of the van, then there was light snow and before we knew it, it was snowing steadily. We walked a mile or so to see the Giant Grizzly, took pictures and were glad to get back into the van. Off to Yosemite where it was raining. Collette and Tim (the only married couple) realized they didn’t have rain proof gear so they went shopping, the rest of us started off towards the Nevada fall on the Mist trail.

Vernal Falls:

The first major stop on the trail was at Vernal falls (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vernal_Fall). (The picture here is Bridal Falls, the steps below are part of Vernal Fall trail) People in the group started getting left behind very early in the rain and the added mist of the fall itself. I forced myself to climb up the very steep steps to Vernal falls at the end of that portion of the trail. My hair and hands and gloves were wet, I was cold by the time I reached Vernal falls and had developed a foot cramp. By then it was James, Gavin, Aussie couple, Natalie (Londoner who bunked with me, she has done the Three Peak Challenge in the UK, http://users.tinyonline.co.uk/richieev/tp/), Dan and his college friend Bevan. Other than Gavin and James, I will refer to them as the super five hereafter because they were super good as compared to me on hikes. Bevin hiked in a fabric sling bag, kind of like a laptop bag and loafers and 2 thin layers of shirt and regular pants that didn’t look waterproof to me. I so wanted to send his picture hiking like that to Jeff since he had warned me about being underprepared compared to others. As it turned out Bevan did some hikes and the Zion Narrows (a walk through the very cold river water) in flip flops and was agile like a monkey. I asked what was up with him, Dan explained that Bev was in the armed forces and has been through much worse. Well, that is one explanation.

Anyway, I was beat and wet and cold. James and Gavin wanted to turn back and the super 5 decided to go on to Nevada Falls. I was happy to turn back with G and J. There was no way I was going to risk being left behind alone by the others. That was my worst hike of the trip. I didn’t like the steep steps (I prefer a steady incline) and I got terribly wet and cold (I already said that, didn’t I?) I decided that I need to find waterproof inner gloves since my fingers are always the coldest. I was also a little disorganized in this hike getting confused with where I put things and having too many layers on at one time and with a bulky ski jacket, the only jacket that I had for protection against rain. My legs and feet were remarkably dry though in my water resistant cargos and overpants and the gaiters on top of it all. Thank goodness for small mercies!

On our way back, ran into Chuck (a little about him: he is in his 50s and has recently traveled to Peru and Russia. At first I thought it was business trips and then he told us he had women “friends” in many different countries that he visited. I was tempted to ask him if he had seen Birthday Girl, but decided to let it go!). Off we went to Ahwahnee hotel which has a huge roaring fireplace. Others arrived there soon after us and we pretty much took over one section of the fireplace with our wet bags and clothes. We dried our things by the fire, had hot chocolate. Peta (Aussie girl) came in and told us the Nevada Fall trail was closed due to fallen rock and she had turned back but that the other 4 (Dan, Bev, Nat and Peta's boyfriend Chris) had gone ahead anyway. I felt glad I had turned back earlier since I would never risk hiking with that warning sign. I love my life and have my own bills and loans to go back to! I spent hours and hours by the fireplace, I didn’t want to leave.

Yosemite Falls

The next day I woke up to the sound of rain on my tent and my phone alarm. It was easy for me to awake at 5 or 6 since I was really on east coast time (I still needed a loud alarm to shock me out of my sleep though, never said I was disciplined, did I?). Today was going to be Yosemite falls at 2700 ft elevation. I started the hike with the super five on a beautiful and sunny day. It was steady incline. Was left behind very early, ran into Collette and Tim, left them behind and met up with a couple of other couples on the way to the top. I stayed with one couple from the SFO area and we made it to the top together. They offered me cocomela, a coco leaf candy. At first I heard “cacao”, until they explained what it really was! It is supposed to counter the effects of heights. The views were very nice on the hike. Made it to the top in 3 hrs of hiking over 3.5 miles (from 10am to 1). Took a half hour break for lunch and photos and was cold by the end of it. I then had a very leisurely stroll back down (lasting 2 and half hours) and enjoyed watching the huffing and puffing climbers who had started late. They all wanted to know how much further to the top. And I would generously assure them it was only another hour to a cardiac arrest and oh the view is lovely! Definitely worth it. The last picture here is the upper as well as lower Yosemite Falls. The one before it is the view from the top.

It was only at the end of this hike that I truly learnt how to wear the backpack correctly even though Jeff had demonstrated how-to more than once. I now knew all the chords that had to be pulled in the right places to have it sit on my lower back just right with the least stress on my shoulders. Slowly but surely, I was on my way to being a half way decent hiker. I saw hikers of all kinds on this hike, with tank tops, fashion outfits, the flimsiest walking shoes, people with babies and strollers. It was a regular garden party. People do it; how they do it, I don’t know.

While it had rained in Indian Flats, it had snowed in the valley, I guess it could have been worse for us if he had camped there. We made a fire that night and toasted marshmallows. Jenny had never had them before and quite liked them. Next day was particularly cold, I woke up, peeked out of my sleeping bag (I would sleep with most of my head inside the bag) and went right back in. It had been 36 °F previous night. A huge church group has moved in next door, they biked 150 miles in 2 days to get here. I gathered this information over the communal brushing of teeth in the ladies room from one of the group. Gavin had already guessed they were a church group, he said he somehow just knew. Definitely need a thinner rain jacket, this ski thing is way too bulky. Bevan walked around in half pants (bottoms torn a little and then rolled up) and wet hair this AM. Yesterday, he emerged from his tent in nothing but a towel around him looking for something (clothes maybe?). To hell with protocol must be his motto! That kid has something new everyday. Jenny informed us that her boyfriend Gary had slept in his new hat and socks. We all had a good laugh, my group is surely getting interesting and we are warming up to each other quite nicely. Gary was best man at Jenny’s first wedding. I thought that was oh so romantic… in a weird way.

Due to the hiking activity and the fact that I had been doing fine with just one small cup of coffee in the mornings, I was feeling quite healthy and good about myself. We stopped in a grocery store on our way out of Yosemite and there was a Starbucks, I resolved to not even look at it. We bought food supplies for 2 days of dinner, breakfast and lunch and moved on. I left with a tall regular. Oh well! Never said I was perfect.

2007 Southwest USA. The trip begins

2007-04-28T20:45:00.000-04:00

I have taken 2 weeks off from work that I want do something fun and active with. I was planning a trip to Italy which didn’t work out so I need to find something new and quickly. After taking advice from several friends, I decide to go on a trekking trip with an organized tour group (thereby rejecting all other suggestions my friends gave me, that’s what friends are for, for you to not listen to). I have never traveled with a group of total strangers before. This should be interesting. I sign up for a Trek America tour that starts at Yosemite, goes onto Zion, Bryce, Lake Powell, Monument Valley, Great Basin Desert, Grand Canyon and then finally ends at Las Vegas. I like it because it covers several national parks and more so because of Grand Canyon and Las Vegas, two places I have wanted to visit for years and didn’t get a chance to. I visited Yosemite years ago, but it was a couple of days with hotel stays and I don’t even have the pictures to prove that I went! Trek America provides the transportation, a tour guide and camping equipment, you have to bring sleeping bag and other personal things. I am told most of the people in the trip tend to be English and Australian, I am quite excited with the thought of traveling with “foreigners” with lovely accents. Oh, the other good thing is there is no single supplement for Trek America. I refuse to pay a penalty for being single. They should pay ME for all the interesting possibilities I bring with me!

As I prepped for this 12 night and 13 day camping and hiking trip (of which 11 nights are in a tent), I was “mentored” by my colleague Jeff (who writes a wonderfully funny blog at http://curmudgeonism.blogspot.com/). Jeff recently visited Kilimanjaro and quite took to his new task as mentor. I showed him the various inners and outers (socks, gloves, wicking shirts) I bought at REI. He outright rejected the backpack I brought with me (pretty red bag that I traveled to Europe with last year). He said it wasn’t that my backpack was inferior, it was downright unacceptable. That hurt. And in order to forgive him I accepted his offer to borrow his hiking REI backpack instead. I also borrowed from him a rain cover for the backpack, fleece outer pants, headlight, gaiters. It really helped me recover from the mean remarks about me being poorly equipped for the trip. I borrowed a super warm sleeping bag and inflatable pillow from another colleague. Why buy when you can borrow is my new motto in life. I went on practice hikes with Sierra Club in NJ/NY and Kennesaw in GA to get used to hiking in the cold weather.

The trip begins at San Francisco. Ah! the city from not so long ago. I was so nostalgic getting back there after nearly a year. I stayed at the St. Francis Drake this time and though I got in late, I visited the Starlight Ballroom on the 21^st floor. Lovely view of Union Square and the city beyond. I was amazed at the large colorful Indian mural on the Macys store façade and even more surprised at a statue of Ganesha on the store front. What is an American corporation doing with a Hindu religious figure on the store front? Not that I mind. The host in Starlight Ballroom told me it was their annual flower show, I still don’t get the Ganesha connection. Had a glass of Graham’s 10 year tawny Port and was ready for bed and to meet my group at 7:30 the next AM.

In the first 30 minutes of meeting my group and the tour leader I noticed a couple of things. You know how Americans are considered loud and obnoxious and animated, well the English were the exact opposite (there was an Aussie couple as well, same thing though). Hardly a few words were exchanged and I missed the immediate rapport that Americans (and I) like to establish when faced with strangers. That and the fact that the accent was harder than I thought it would be for me to understand. Good thing I brought a book! The other was that my tour leader appeared far too overweight to be a serious hiker, and when I saw him light up as soon as we stepped out, I was convinced that he wasn’t a hiker. After having hiked with Sierra club leaders, I guess I expected something similar, but Ron turned out to be a commercial/touristy guide more than a hiking guide. Which is fine in retrospect, but that day was a little disappointing.

Anyway as we were loading our luggage into the trailer, I noticed a suitcase amongst the luggage with a band that said IBM AS 400. I had found a fellow IBMer from UK ! There, that should give us plenty to talk about.

Kovalam, Kerela

2006-12-16T20:57:00.000-05:00

I had 5 days and 4 nights to spend in Kovalam. I had read on the internet that it’s very “indulgent touristy”; it is precisely that. 90% of the tourists were Caucasian (mostly from Europe) of all ages and inclination, a huge part of the economy of that area (hotels, restaurants, ayurved and yoga clinics, taxis, shops, street vendors) revolves around the tourist with the euros (and occasionally dollars). And it shows too!

Nevertheless it was the abundance of “differently colored” tourists that made me feel like I could blend in as opposed to standing out (since this is the first time I have traveled in India alone, in all my interactions with the hoi polloi, I land up feeling like an outsider, the “locals” can always tell I am from the west and its affects their attitude towards me. It’s as if that’s what my identity is now; I am “from the US” first and Indian afterwards).

The beach was beautiful, I had a room right on the beach with a lovely view from the balcony. After 2 days I got fed up of the fact that when the power went out, this hotel did not have generator backup for AC, so I changed in to a hotel at 3 times the rate. Here the view wasn’t as great (though still on the beach), but the room was great and there was a swing in the balcony with a view of the beach which made up for everything. Kerela has thick green foliage, tons of coconut trees (but fresh coconut water was not available everywhere), it’s a tropical forest and beach right next to each other. And the sandy part of the beach was very short.

My sister had traveled to Kovalam the previous month and had got to know some local business owners who I interacted with. The owners of the Palm Beach restaurant were really nice, the food great (the seafood currys and other local dishes that is. After I tried their salmon grill with steamed veggies and fries, I was once again reminded of the fact that when you visit a restaurant, you should always try the local delicacies and not their preparations from another part of the world.). One time there was a large group of the hearing challenged sitting next to me and were having a lot of very lively cross conversations, it was so tempting to look and try to guess what they were all saying. But ofcourse that would be so rude!

I got Ayurveda massage with a doctor that my sister had recommended. She would practically drown me in oil, it’s icky but very relaxing and about 2-3 weeks of that treatment can surely do wonders to your body. But alas, I had only 5 days. I am glad I made full use of those days by doing….absolutely nothing.

My days were made up of sitting on the beach or my balcony reading the Great Indian Novel by Shashi Tharoor, eating, getting a massage, more beach and reading, eating, maybe some walking on the beach and then eating again before sleeping. One day it started pouring unexpectedly and I had the time of my life enjoying it from the swing in my balcony. I would swing out far enough that my legs got wet in the rain but I wasn’t fully drenched.

Another day I woke up at 7 and tried swimming in the beach, it was difficult with the current so I just sat in the water and let the waves push me around. That day I observed one full round of fishing activity by the local fishermen, starting with the men pushing the boat out into the sea (they didn’t go all that far out, I could see them the whole time), planting the wide net and then 2 sets of men pulling the ropes at the edges of the net inshore and with it the fish. When I first saw the dozens of fish dying, it made me feel really guilty, as a fish eater, about sponsoring the killing of the fish. But then I got over it at the thought of enjoying some fresh fish curry later that night. All in all given the number of men who did the work, it wasn’t a lot of fish! They went out again a couple of times after that, but by then I was ready for breakfast and a nap.

On the last day I went for a backwaters cruise since that’s what Kerela is known for. I had spent a lot of time debating whether I should visit the better backwaters in Kollam or Alleppey, but that would have taken 5-6 hours of traveling for a few hours of backwaters and the heat made it impossible for me to do anything except bum around. So I took the local backwater which wasn’t great, but the stillness and peace of the water was very therapeutic.

All said and done, I think I will gladly go back to Kovalam or maybe another beach in that area for a much longer time (atleast 10 days if not more), and then do some more sightseeing as well. If I can come up with a solution to tolerate the intense heat of south India I would love to travel down the west coast and come up the east coast with inland detours where required and visit all the big temples of the south. That would be just divine!

This brings me to the end of my travels this year (I think!), it has been an amazing second half of 2006. I have seen more new and widely different places in the past 6 months than in all my life! And it has all been very nice. Here’s wishing a Happy New Year 2007 to you and me!

Bangalore and Mysore

2006-12-16T20:51:00.000-05:00

This is my first visit to Bangalore. In fact this is the first time I have visited south of Maharashtra. After having spent several weeks in India, I have decided south and north (north to me is anything other than TN, Kerela, AP, Karnataka) could easily be two different countries. The language (English is spoken with such a different accent), the food (I was frustrated in not getting decent chaat anywhere and found most of the food very spicy), the mannerisms are all so different!

I stayed at the Taj Residency most of the time where the prices of everything and room rates are wildly exorbitant, but is a grand hotel with great service. I visited the Forum mall, it was as if the entire town was there. I read somewhere that folks go to malls mostly for the air conditioning! Met my brother in law to eat at the pub there (Firangi Paani), it was more like a sports bar than a pub (in the English sense), food was ok. I didn’t shop much though Cauvery Arts and Crafts on MG Road was perfect for me since there was something to buy no matter what your budget.

The ISKCON center in Bangalore was the best thing I did with my personal time. An old friend (from Bombay university) took me there. All ISKCON centers have a fabulous architecture and are quite ostentatious in the way they decorate the Gods, what with real silks, gold and diamonds dressing up the idols with lovely facial features and big expressive eyes. Most of the popular touristy temples I visited in India had a special entry for a fee in order to avoid lines. Sort of like express service to God. ISKCON was Rs 150 (free otherwise). For that I got prepackaged prasadam (blessed food), three Krishna introduction books and I got to see the Idols from the front lines! Anyway, all said and done, I like visiting ISKCON centers and have always liked Artis there, I was lucky to arrive just as one was about to begin and stayed till it was over.

I went back to ISCKON on a week night and stayed for dinner as well as evening Aarti. They had the Palki Utsav which was a delight. I have always enjoyed the energy and the obvious passion of the devotees when they dance to the loud but simple and repititive Hare Ram Hare Krishna chant, the Palki Utsav seemed to have set them free!

I had a weekend to spare, so I decided, after much deliberation and comparing of different touring options, to go on a Karnataka State operated one day bus tour of Mysore. It cost a grand total of Rs. 560 for a Volvo AC bus ride and guide and it is the best thing I could have done. As I got on the bus and saw others piling in, small and large families, couples, girls who were obviously college friends, it occurred to me someone creative enough could make a movie or write a book with the many stories of all these people (with me as the central character of course!). We had pre-assigned seats and my neighbor was a sportswoman who was part of the Haryana delegate in the ongoing Asiad tournament. By the end of the trip, we were familiar enough to make fun of our fellow travelers (I believe this is the most endearing quality of north Indians, they love making fun of everybody, and often, of themselves)

The tour took me to Chamundi Hindu temple with the large statue of the demon that the Goddess destroyed, scary looking dude. Tipu Sultan’s palace was in a sad state indeed with poor lighting and faded painting in many parts. The guide told us that every inch of the palace was painted and if there was enough light I am sure I would have appreciated that. St Philomena’s church looked like it was influenced by Notre Dame though the guide didn’t mention and this obvious fact wasn’t written anywhere.

Mysore Palace took the cake that day. Grand and beautifully maintained, all the rosewood and teakwood doors, pillars, arches and several ceilings were densely and intricately carved. Besides a lot of these carvings were painted in lively colors. I couldn’t help but compare with the Palace at Versailles and though much smaller, it was just as charming. The rulers were obviously influenced by western lifestyles since there were several paintings on the ceilings and a lot of the family portraits were done western style (though in India garb). It’s a shame they don’t let you take pictures inside, I bought a book of pictures and you can admire some of the rooms here.

Brindavan Gardens ended the day, it was dark by the time we got there and I couldn’t really see how big the gardens are. They have a musical water fountain and they played plenty of south Indian songs, but the title song of Dhoom got the loudest cheers from large crowd. This reminded me of a similar musical fountain I have visited in Aurangabad, they probably have these in many parts of the country.

Though the bus driver started off by playing South Indian songs, I am glad he switched to Hindi film songs by mid-day. No road trip can be ever complete without Hindi film songs, can it?

Goa

2006-12-16T20:46:00.000-05:00

I visited Goa for a weekend in November. My old friend from Bombay University invited me to stay at her Mother’s who has a big house in Chandor, about 15 kms south of Margao. I didn’t have much time thinking about this trip so before I knew it was upon me. As I rode the taxi from the airport to Margao, I was impressed by how green it was, the coconut trees were a welcome sight. At my friend’s apartment, where we stopped before heading out for the evening, I was served rose tea, something I have never had before. I must remember to buy some before I go back to the US.

The house where I stayed was absolutely impressive, it was large and airy, the rooms had very high ceilings. My friend’s mom is obviously very fond of fancy furnishings; it showed! There is a TV soap in India “Kyonki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi”, it’s terribly popular with mothers and daughters-in-law alike. I became aware of how popular it is when my friend’s mom told me she had designed her double staircase entry to the foyer based on the house in that soap!! It was an absolute pleasure staying in a typical Goan home, with a typical Goan family eating typical Goan food. There’s just one thing I forgot to try though, Feni (liquor made out of cashew apple). Oh well, maybe another time.

Goa is a very small coastal city-state, so naturally fish is the thing to eat there. I thought Goan flavors would be new to me, but I was happily surprised to find that my sister’s in laws (who are Maharashtrian originating from the coastal city of Ratnagiri) make fish curry almost identical to what I had in Goa. During that weekend, I had fish curry for every single meal (including Sunday breakfast)!

Friday night was at Martin’s Corner, a restaurant popular with locals and foreigners alike. We had Chicken Xacuti (prepared in a mild curry), Kingfish (local Goan fish) with dry masala which was a little sweet, prawn (in a coconut curry) which was a regular and delicious selection in all most of our meals and fried calamari (the batter was a little too much I thought). We had spent a few minutes earlier in the evening at Colva beach, since it was dark there wasn’t much to see or do there.

Saturday was the main sightseeing day. We visited the Mangeshwari temple, built in the 1500s. After having just traveled in Europe, I was eager to see the Indian historical temples, and I am sad to say no matter how beautiful the architecture is, the places are just not as well-maintained as they should be.

Lunch was at a place called Florentine in Saligao, their specialty is Goan Chicken Cafreal (dry masala). We also had shenaneo (mussels), fish caldin rice (very light yellow curry with lots of coconut which I didn’t care for much) and prawn fry (which I must make at home coz it’s simple and delicious). This is where I discovered the joy of eating poi (Goan bread) dipped in fish curry. I wiped the bowl clean with the bread, it was so good!

We then spent a couple of hours lounging at Baga beach, where they have places like Stay Longer lodge, Linger Longer beauty Salon and Tito’s famous hash joint popular with locals and tourists alike. I could easily spend a few days lounging on the beaches out there.

Dinner was at home, there was Mackarel reichado (dry masala), Rosan (which was ragda curry made with konkani spices) and a desert called Bebinca (layered coconut pancakes made with eggs and milk), and but ofcourse, fish curry. My absolute favorite Goan food is easily fish curry, prawn made any which way and the bebinca desert. Making bebinca is a long process, they add and then cook each layer with a fire from the top so as not to burn it. And the correct method of eating is to peel off the layers and enjoy them one at a time.

Sunday morning was at the Menezes Braganza House, the biggest private home/mansion in the state. It has been opened for public viewing by the owners who still live there and provide guided tours for portions of the house. They had tastefully decorated and furnished huge rooms, the old furniture and paintings were well maintained. A lot of the furniture and dinnerware was from China. I continue to be amazed by how much cultural influence China has had in countries all over the world. The Hindi film Chehre Pe Chehra was shot in this house, in fact they had a film shooting that weekend.

I also visited Chandreshwar temple, the oldest in Goa, built around 2000 yrs ago. It’s quite a hike up the steps, we cheated by driving most of the way up. The drive to the airport was a perfect end to a great weekend, listening to Mando Music, a form of Goan music which is always in a chorus, this music reminded me of Cuban/Spanish music.

London

2006-12-16T20:22:00.000-05:00

By the time I got to London, I had walked and seen so many sights in Paris, that I felt that London did not get the advantage of my enthusiasm and energy the way Paris did. I took the Eurostar (chunnel-tunnel) train to London and my first reaction was how nice it is to see and hear English all around me. The accents I heard however weren’t all that English, I had to wait till I reached Coventry to hear that. At first I thought London didn’t have enough places for me to see in the 2 days I was going to spend there given I wasn’t planning on doing any museums and wasn’t all that into Shakespeare. But by the second day I realized that I wouldn’t be able to do everything I wanted to. In particular I didn’t have enough time to do a Thames river cruise. London underground was, like Paris’s, an absolute delight in its ease of use. Actually I think London and Paris have a better underground since it is all connected and you never have to get onto outdoor street level to change trains/lines unlike in Manhattan where you sometimes do.

Day 1: I did the Westminster Walk from the book (Rick Steve's London 2006) though in reverse starting with Trafalgar Square where I had a Bangers and Mash lunch at Chandos Pub close to St Martin-In-The-Fields church. I stayed for a lunch concert in the church. After lunch, I strolled to Leicester square looking for half price tickets. There were almost none that day. Besides I was having second thoughts about staying out late night after a day of traveling and sight seeing. I continued onto Westminster Abbey, took the tour and s tayed for the Evensong. I realized there why they call it Bloody Mary. They were all mean men and women ruling the country back then. I also came to the conclusion that while the most notable thing about Paris is its art and the nudity therein, the thing that struck me most about English history was how barbaric and murderous they were! That night I had a potato jacket dinner (baked potato with stuffing), it had corn, tuna and mayo. Strange concoction but not that bad tasting.

Day 2: Since I had missed Pompidou in Paris, I decided to visit Tate Museum of Modern art. The most amusing piece of art to me was Du Champs Fountain. The one next to it was the most disgusting. There was a room dedicated to Guerilla Girls, a group that promotes women artists. They had lots of facts about women in art (85% of all nude women in the Metropolitan are women’s but less than 5% of artists there are women). Then there was this room with a year’s worth of mail correspondence received by the artist stuck all over the walls with the lettering crossed off with marker pen (thats modern art for you!). I took one of the tours that talked about Cubism, Futurism and something else that I can’t remember. The lady giving the tour spent a lot of time discussing one of Du Champs’s piece called Bachelors and the girls or something like that. Unless she had explained how the artist meant for that piece to be interpreted (he wrote 94 pages describing the significance of everything on that piece of glass), I would have had no clue. I don’t know whether I have the artsy bone in me or not, but I am able to appreciate western art only as I learn about the artists, the life they lived, the times they lived in and the suffering some of them went through. My appreciation for western art is an acquired one not an intuitive one.

Day 3: I started at Victoria station and had “English breakfast”. Sausages, eggs, chips (French fries) and tea. What’s English about it I don’t know. I bought tickets for a hop on hop off bus tour and went around town not wanting to get off since the bus was nearly empty and the weather was off and on sunny but nice even if it was a little chilly on the top deck. Afternoon was for afternoon tea at St Martin-In-The-Fields crypt café. I realized how much we Indians are influenced by the English culture. They have the red buses, so do we in Bombay. They have Victoria Station, we have Victoria Terminus in Bombay. They have afternoon tea, so do we (though ours maybe served with pakoras instead of scones and cake). They dunk their biscuits in tea, so do we. They even call it biscuits unlike cookies as they are called in the US. And of course the cant and the shant. And then there’s the Indian influence there, Indian food is perhaps as popular (if not more) than English food. I was amazed to find prepared Indian curries in regular grocery stores. I had chinese lunch at Jenny Lo's and then late afternoon was at Madame Tussaud. I found her western figures far more convincing than the Indian ones. I think it was supposed to be Aishwairya Rai, but it sure didn’t look much like her. Gandhi and Amitach Bachhan were so not real. Diana was scary real. They had this silly ride through English history and a show about stars (film and other) which were both wasted on me. I didn’t feel like I got my money’s worth at this place. I ended the evening with a trip to Harrod’s. While the merchandise was not that much fancier than, say, macy’s in Herald Square, they had this Egyptian elevator with Egyptian theme all around it and of course the Diana and Dodi memorial with the glass in which Diana had her last sip of wine and the diamond ring meant for her that made this store a tourist spot.

Day 3: I had half a day and was worried I didn’t have enough time to do Buckingham Palace change of guards and Tower of London that I had planned for. But the tower turned out to be remarkably devoid of lines even though there seemed to be a lot of people there. So I did the guard change properly by going to St James’ Palace to see the inspection of the new guard. So there was this senior looking officer who checked 3 other less senior looking guys who later checked the men in their respective groups. The main guy then came back and checked all the men in all the groups. There was a lot of marching back and forth by this senior guy. The main things that I could see they were checking were the big hats and straightening of the dress. It was funny to see them touching each other like that. I expected this whole process to be fairly solemn given it’s the Queen they are protecting, imagine my surprise when the incoming band struck up with the Pink Panther song! As I saw the main change of guard in front of the palace, I was even move surprised when they played all Abba songs. They played Dancing Queen, Mama Mia, Fernando and Winner takes it all. It was fun! I left before it was all over for the Tower of London and was able to get in without any lines, headed straight for the crown jewels. I don’t consider myself terribly patriotic, but seeing all those jewels and bejeweled pots and pans and plates made me realize: they did get a lot of that from us, didn’t they? And the Kohinoor of course. Later as I joked with one of the beefeaters that I had seen the Kohinoor that they took from us, he told me I couldn’t have it back. I listened to one of the Beefeaters regaling the crowd with barbaric tales of how people were tortured. And admired the blue of the Tower Bridge from up close. And then it was time for my train to Coventry. All too soon my time in London had come to an end.

Day 4: My friend took me to Warwick Castle, which is the second most visited castle after Windsor. The tour there was all about the affairs of Daisy. We hardly heard anything about Lord Warwick, it was all about Daisy, who obviously ruled over men. I wonder if it was her who inspired the character of Daisy in Great Gatsby. I was quite done with sightseeing and enjoyed spending time with my friend who has the cutest little girls who reminded me of my many nieces when they were little.

And with that ended my first ever trip to Europe. It was great, it was therapeutic and it was beautiful!

Paris

2006-12-16T19:34:00.000-05:00

I had a few days to spend in Europe on my way to India and I was advised that Paris, London and Amsterdam were the must see cities. Since Paris and London are close together and there is a very good friend in England that I wanted to see, the decision was an easy one to make. It wasn’t until the very last minute that my plans were finalized, so I bought Rick Steve’s Parisand London 2006 books to guide me. I am so very glad I did. No matter how touristy his suggestions were, it gave my trip a structure and since I prefer reading over listening it was unnecessary for me to buy the audio tours in several places I visited. There is a lot of information in these books, they ought to be read very well before starting the trip. The weather turned out to be a blessing, I had many sunny days with the temperature in the 50s; nights were usually cooler.

I had booked a room in one of the Ibis Hotels, this is a budget hotel and was sufficient for my needs. The good thing in Paris and London hotels was that they quoted me one room rate and there were no extras (like taxes) charged. The Ibis I chose was in a safe neighborhood and close to a Metro. I was surprised by a view of the Eiffel tower from my room (this picture is not it); it was an unexpected treat to see Eiffel sparkling for 10 or so minutes every night on the hour. They do turn off all the lights on the tower at some point though, in case you didn’t know. I purchased a bundle of 10 metro tickets which was a great idea from the book. I also bought a 2-day museum pass which was another great idea.

Day 1: I visited Rodin museum the day I arrived, I have had an interest in his sculptures for a while. It was a treat indeed, they were all there, the Gates, Burghers of Calais, the Eternal Kiss, Hand of God, Thinker, Woman by the sea and many more. I next took Bus 69 from Champs de Mars, which passes through many sightseeing spotsup until Bastille which appeared too lively for me to pass up. There was a bunch of teens dancing on the sidewalk for a huge, what looked like, a student audience. The boys were dressed in fake-drag. They performed to some
racy numbers and the whole thing was quite funny. From Bastille, I walked upto and around Place de Vosges. I had coffee at Café Francais near Bastille. Almost all cafes in Paris have chairs facing the street, I guess to assist in people watching. I realized why Parisian coffee is so loved by Americans. It is made much like coffee is made in many parts of India. Hot frothing coffee, served with hot frothing whole milk. No cold half-half here for you! I next went to a patisserie on St Antoine to buy pastries. It was a very difficult decision on what to buy, or rather what not to buy. I landed up buying several (my favorite was a fig filled pastry that looked and tasted much like the Indian modak). This turned out to be too much since it took me the rest of my stay to finish eating all that stuff.

Day 2: I followed the Champs-Elysees Walk in the book which started at Arc de Triomphe with its lovely 360 view of Paris and the huge traffic circle around it. Paris is mostly small buildings. Its vehicular traffic is mostly small cars and has lots of scooters. The overall traffic scene reminded me more of Delhi/Chandigarh than a big city. The walk on Champs-Elysees took me all the way past Les Invalides with its magnificent gold dome and past Place de la Concorde where the royals were beheaded upto Tuileries Gardens and then the Louvre. Since the Louvre was open late on that day, I hopped over the river Seine to see Muse D’Orsay first. I had picked up a finger sandwich at the recommended LaDuree (which I think I saw in London as well), the pastry counter there
drove me crazy as well. I wanted to take a picture, but they wouldn’t let me. Before going to D’Orsay I had made dinner reservations at Le Souffle on Mont Thabor, a friend had highly recommended this place. Back to Louvre; where I bought the Da Vinci Code audio Tour (which turned out to be mostly about Mary Magdalene and other Jesuit art). The Louvre of course is overwhelming, they told us in one of the tours that if you spent one minute in front of each painting, it would take over 4mths to see all the art. Dinner at LeSouffle was divine. Salmon soufflé (along with a glass of Gewürztraminer) filled me enough that I couldn’t finish the Cholocate soufflé even though it was to die for.

Day 3: Was a Sunday and it started at Notre Dame as per my plan. I will probably never go there again on a bright sunny Sunday morning. While I had very few lines everywhere else I went (since Oct is a bit off season), this place was a madhouse with a fair in the square in front of the church. I waited one hour to go on top of the church and had a chocolate crepe from the street vendor while I was waiting. It was well worth going to the top, the chimeras (the huge monstrous figures are chimeras and the skinny figures sticking out of the building with water spouts are the gargoyles) are quite a sight against the backdrop of the city. The bell is huge, 170 tonnes. I must read the Hunchback of Notre Dame for sure!

After Notre Dame, I walked through Latin Quarter and then into Luxemborg Gardens where I sat for along time listening to a band practicing their music while I waited for an overworked non English speaking waiter to serve me coffee in one of the cafes in the gardens. I walked on Blvds St-Michael and Du Montparnasse which took me to Galleries Lafayette which I had heard so much about. The first floor looked like JC Penny on a sale day and I was so disappointed I didn’t bother going to the other floors. I next went to La Grand Epicerie where I bought some liquor from Miclo, the steward assured me my friend in the UK, who I was buying this for, would appreciate it since it was ohhhh.. soooo French.! I loved this grocery store and bought some food to eat and then went back to buy some chocolate. I also visited La Bon Marche next door, now that’s what I call a fancy-pants department store. Couldn’t really afford to buy anything, but looking doesn’t cost anything. I next went to Torcadero for the view of Eiffel, it was indeed breathtaking. I walked across the river and took a Siene river cruise. It was lovely and coldddd!

Day 4: Was dedicated to Versailles. It is the grandest of all palaces in Europe and Louis XVI and wifey dear officially lived and ruled from there. I don’t know if any Indian palace can match its grandeur, but this one was really Grande. Not just the building alone, but the gardens and the mini (or maybe not so mini) private quarters of the king and the queen (separate of course). Everything in all the open rooms spelt opulence, decadence and wealth. I also visited Sacré-Cœur in Montmarte, walked aimlessly in the many by-lanes, dropped by Dali museum which was a treat since I have mostly seen his paintings and never his sculptures. I thought the entry was a bit expensive (10 bucks) for a museum that size. I was quite determined to go see Moulin Rouge so off I went walking on the street that connects Pigalle and Blanche (I forget the name). It was very seedy on either side of the street with sex shops and given it was 5pm I was a little worried. But as I crossed over to the island sidewalk in the center, I was pleasantly surprised to see women with babies in strollers. So I did walk upto Moulin rouge, took a quick picture or two and got onto the metro on Blanche.

On day 3, I had tried visiting Centre Pompidou the museum of modern art, but it was closed due to strike. I went back there since I really wanted to see it, it had a funky enough exterior that piqued my curiosity. But alas! It was not to be! It was stilled closed. And that was it for Paris and me since I was to travel to London early next morning.

My impressions of Paris are that it is beautiful, old, and it is full of smokers. The bourgeois in the Metro were universally fit and good looking, the only obese person I saw was most likely a tourist!