It’s amazing to think that we just celebrated another year traveling, and now another birthday in strange new lands! It’s something special indeed and I just wanted to commemorate it here and now. G has been an amazing travel partner and my bestest friend. I feel extremely fortunate to be able to celebrate another birthday of hers while on the road, even with her T-Rex impersonations!

G, every moment has been priceless, and I can’t thank you enough for the awesomeness that we’ve been able to experience together. Happy Birthday, with lots of hugs, I hope you have an awesome day today!!

Happy Birthday G! is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

A lot of people grumble their way through their birthdays or ignore or forget them altogether. I like my birthday. A lot! It’s a great day to celebrate being around. I like being around!

I’m sure it helps that I’ve had such a damn great life, and that for as fun as childhood and adolescence was (and it was!), it seems to only get better every year. I mean this time last year, I was in a room with a view of the TAJ MAHAL. The Taj Mahal!! Since then I’ve gotten to have adventures galore in India, Sri Lanka, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines, Mongolia, Taiwan, China, Tibet and Hong Kong. Despite the distance and the time apart, I am still close friends with my closest friends and get to enjoy our bonds that I have tried very hard to maintain despite the challenges. With a couple of them, I am even closer than when I left. These are some very excellent gifts to reflect on a year later (and every day, which I do!).

Recent exploits have been excellent as well, and life is basically just humming along at optimum awesome all the time. The past, both recent and distant, has been incredible, the future both immediate and later-upcoming – I’m looking at you, Snowboard Season in Japan… – is mind-blowingly exciting and awesome, and as for the present, well… I’m sitting here in Hong Kong, getting to stay with an awesome HK local and fellow NAU peep, a friend of a friend from when they were neighbors in my most favorite of towns. I’ve gotten some birthday wishes already, Boyfriend’s been workin on SOMEthing for days, and I’m headed to Disneyland tomorrow for a great day of fun and exploration of a familiar scene in a very unfamiliar way.

Life. Is. Good.

Birthday excitedness aside (but only for a second, please :)), since we last caught up, we have indeed successfully loved the crap out of our last three weeks, and those several high-stress planning days in Chengdu – scheduled around panda pats of course – paid off with some awesome memories, great experiences, and some wonderful new friends. And all at a great price! We followed up the cruise and tour through Tibet (Potala Palace and MT. EVEREST!!!!) with a stop in Xian and saw the incredible Terracotta Warriors, unbelievably met MORE new awesome friends, and had a blast at our sweet hostel with its rad underground hopping bar, a free drink every night, and nice room and facilities for a mere $4.90 a person. Even our airplane/train combo to exit the country in time went well, I managed to squeak in my articles for the month to help fund us $150 more for some special bday drinks (we found Hoegaarden here!!! That’s ALMOST as good as Blue Moon!), and we found ourselves in Hong Kong just as planned after all that! Amazing!

We’ve had some fantastic food and good times here in HK just doing some low-key noodling around, half enjoying Davy’s company and kicking it, and half doing our tourist civic duties and walking around, taking in the sights. We’ve eaten some incredible sushi one morning and dim sum the next, visited the beautiful harbor to view the skyline and the water twice, walked the Avenue of Stars and seen the Bruce Lee statue and Bruce Lee, Jet Li, Chow Yun Fat, and Jackie Chan’s stars, watched the light show over the harbor, sat and had a ridiculously overpriced drink on the waterfront, visited the art museum AND the space museum, took in an IMAX Under the Sea show in the planetarium’s HUGE overhead screen (so cool), and walked around enjoying the bright neon lights of the street signs downtown and that fascinating mix of thousands of people and an orchestrated chaos in movement…yet directed with such utter efficiency, with a seamless metro and train system that should be the envy of the world over (especially YOU, PHOENIX!!!).

We did miss our 10-Year High School Reunion this week too, which was quasi-devastating for a person like me who honestly does love staying in touch with old friends and acquaintances, however strong or weak the tie, and does very much care how people are doing who I haven’t seen for years. I figured I’d be living a life of travel by the time ten years came around, but it never occurred to me then that I’d miss the reunion for it, thought I’d just build it into the plan, whatever that plan might be at that point. It was too weird though, too weird to imagine going back at this point. To be at Mt. Everest or the Terracotta Warriors one day, then Glendale and my high school and with all these peeps I haven’t seen for 10 years the next, and then Hong Kong right after that. We had to maintain the continuity of this trip. It’s been more than a year but we’re still trying to wrap our heads around it. But fortunately I already got to see some pics and hear some reports, and the great thing about life and other folks in it is that you get to keep going. It sucked to miss this one, the first reunion since graduation, but you can bet I’ll be organizing the next one when I get back. :)

From the roof of the world to back at blessed oxygen-rich sea level, top to bottom life is good. And as for me, 27 was damn good and 28 is gonna be even better.

Viva la vie!

It’s mah birthday! :D Time for an update! is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

I’m interrupting your programming for a moment to drop a little update since there is much to update about, and we’ve been fairly out of touch (or so it feels anyway) since we got better –finally!!!- from our Indian pneumonia and able to be up and about, having more adventures than time to write about them.

There’s still lots to tell you about and we want to get you in a fairly cohesive, chronological order from Point A (Ellora, where we’ve left off) to Point B (Delhi, where we are now after a stop off in Agra for a final farewell to the Taj, and packing our bags one last time in India to catch a flight tomorrow on to the next major point of the trip, starting –unexpectedly- in Singapore).

So much has changed in the past few weeks. Our long tenure in Varanasi, which was only supposed to be a couple of days, ended up being a month and so effectively demolished our pre-determined (but flexible) itinerary and routing which was set to coincide with the best weather patterns through the various countries.

That plan scrapped, we were left to re-create a new one. But we still had the same amount of countries we wanted to visit and things we wanted to do in them, but now less a month in which to do it. The two major factors constricting our time schedule besides the weather were: going to see the whale sharks in peak time in the Philippines, and getting back to Nepal (probably from all the way out in the Philippines) to trek to Everest.

So we were trying to scramble to figure out a guiding company and the time that would realistically be needed to complete the hike so we wouldn’t pay for all this only to not make it all the way to the base, and just end up being out a lot of money with a big goal not even achieved. But meanwhile, even with all this up in the air, time had dictated we needed to move on and keep doing stuff while we still had a last couple of weeks in India, and our time and attention turned to Bandhavgarh National Park to seeking out wild tigers in the jungles of Central India.

That’s right, WILD TIGERS!!!

And we saw one – and even a wild leopard! But even better than the glimpse of tiger we caught through the trees were the travel-friends we made. We ended up sharing a jeep with an Irish couple who were also both 27, and when our safari with them failed on the tiger spotting thing, we agreed to stay an extra day to try one more time and then share a taxi between the four of us to the otherwise ridiculously difficult-to-reach Khajuraho (involving an hour-long bus, an hour-long train, another several-hour long probably-delayed train, probably an overnight somewhere and a rickshaw ride, and then another multi-hour bus ride… or one 5-hour taxi).

Sadly, the final tiger safari was also a dud tiger-wise (did always see loads of other animals at least), but the taxi ride was smooth and beautiful and much more affordable with 4 of us, and the temples of Khajuraho were astounding and fun to explore with our new Irish friends.

Ray and I had been hemming and hawing about whether to go up north to Rishikesh to try out some yoga since this is, after all, India and the birthplace of yoga, but the logistics of it were seeming overly-complicated and the fact of the matter was, especially after talking so much to Amanda and Cathal about their awesome experiences they’d had in Singapore, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos and Thailand and about what awaited us in the near future, we realized our hearts had quite simply already moved on.

They were headed to Agra to see the Taj for their first time and Ray and I had wanted to go back to Agra as the last stop in India to say goodbye to it, lest I never lay eyes on it again (hard to imagine…never seeing the Taj again!??!). It made a lot more sense to skip Rishikesh and just go to Agra, then Delhi…logistically, and emotionally. Apparently, even though we had other plans, in our hearts, we were ready to move on from India. Sometimes it’s just time.

So we went to Agra with them, and got to spend a couple more days together having a blast and hearing some great stories and got a lot of really useful information that has ended up shaping our trip quite profoundly.

They had done a lot of trekking in Nepal, and they assured us emphatically and without hesitation that we don’t actually need a guide for Everest Base Camp. We’d heard this before, and especially for the time when we’re going, I’d also read this before, it’s like a trekker freeway. It’s a beaten path so not something you could get lost on even if you did manage to break away from the stream of people, and food and accommodation is plentiful enough that you really don’t need to be catered for either. EBC was something Ray and I had planned to and were willing to spend a lot on, but that was because we thought it was something you unequivocally needed a guide for. Not only would it save us money not to get one, but more importantly, we could for sure then go at our own pace (if you’ll recall, my hike to the summit of Humphrey’s took me exactly double what it takes normal people to do – not an experience I was looking forward to repeating, or attempting to not repeat by hauling at a speedy rate every day, for a 15-day trek). So we started considering just self-guiding.

Then we realized…wait. If we’re not going to use a guide, we no longer have to scramble to arrange one. Wait. If we’re not going to arrange a package…actually….we don’t have to go this year at all. It’s not like we’re saving any money by doing it this year since at the time we want to head over there, we’ll be just about as far distance- and cost-wise as you can possibly be from Nepal before you’re back in Arizona (since we’d probably be on an island in the Philippines).

So for fun, we tried taking out Everest from now and moving it to April of next year. And bam. We had another month at least free, which we could now spend in the remote regions of un-tourism-spoiled Laos which we’ve heard across the board “spend as much time as possible there” but to which I’d allotted an ungenerous seven days, and a couple of weeks or three in Vietnam, which I’d also initially dismissed as relatively uninteresting but upon further research have found more and more worth sticking around to explore, and the same with Malaysia and the Philippines.

And so there you have it: suddenly a brand new shape of trip. My, how things opened up once one time-constraint was removed. It is very exciting, and we are so stoked for this new chapter of our journey. It was all rather unexpected, and now that it’s happened, all rather perfect.

Furthermore, after talking with Amanda and Cathal, it was established that Singapore was a great place to shop for electronics. And so, since we need a new waterproof camera (story coming soon) and have decided a couple other gadgets will be worth the investment for the duration of the rest of our trip, we rerouted to go from Delhi through Singapore for (a likely VERY expensive ) four days, then head to Thailand, Laos, the Philippines, and back for Vietnam and Cambodia, Malaysia and Indonesia and onwards.

It had been really neat to travel with Amanda and Cathal because they had just arrived in India after traveling through SE Asia and so had a lot of valuable comparisons and contrasts to draw as they took it all in. We totally ate up all the information, in eagerness for these beautiful new places and fun experiences they were describing that we had only read about so far.

For our part, their perspectives on India threw into sharp contrast just how much the norm this crazy India place had become to us. Since we started here, and had left but then returned twice, this seething, undulating, overwhelming country had somewhere along the way become our home base, and in so doing, become our home. We had unwittingly imprinted its ways and customs, and so it was with great shock and disbelief that we heard from them that actually, no, not all Asian countries operate this way, with the constant assault of the senses. In fact, none do. Not quite like India.

Apparently, there won’t be men peeing everywhere on buildings and in the streets anymore. There won’t be cows in the cities, or people who just STARE at you constantly. Look, yes, and with great interest sometimes. But with warmth and smiles. This is all rather hard to imagine, believe it or not!

It will be a total headtrip to go from what has gotta be the dirtiest country in the world (not hatin on India, believe me it’s worthwhile despite the filth), to the cleanest (no gum allowed). For sure it will be a shock to go from what has been absolutely wonderful incredible budget prices to some of the most expensive. But why not. We like shocks to the system, right? We started our trip in INDIA, after all!

And India has been absolutely fantastic. Yeah men pee in the streets and people stare and it’s quirky as all hell. But it’s an incredible, marvelous place, and I’ve no longer any doubt that I’ll be back. How could I not? It’s India. It’s INDIA! And India is AMAZING!!!

We’ve still got some stories coming for you on the places we were able to visit in India:

Delhi
Amritsar
Mcleod Ganj
Manali
Leh
Agra
Jaipur
Pushkar
Bikaner
Jaisalmer
Jodhpur
Udaipur
Surat
Ajanta Caves
Ellora Caves
Mumbai
The beaches of Goa
Alleppey
Kollam
The backwaters of Kerala
Madurai
Trichy
Tanjore
Varanasi
Bandhavgarh National Park
Khajuraho

These 26 places in India all mean something to us now more than just dots on a map. Every place has held unique, wonderful memories, stories, and experiences. So much so that we’re still trying just to catch up!

And of course in these past six months on the Subcontinent, there was also 5 weeks in Nepal, seeing: Kathmandu, Chitwan, Lumbini, Pokhara and the Sun Kosi River.

And there was Sri Lanka, which we haven’t even mentioned yet, with: Kandy, Anuradhapura, Polonnaruwa, Nuwara Eliya, the elephant orphanage, and Colombo!

It’s not just leaving India but a HUGE chunk of our trip time-wise and developmentally. Cathal and Amanda made it pretty clear that while SE Asia will still have its fair share of challenges, discomforts, oddities and annoyances…by the sounds of it, it won’t come close to those we’ve dealt with in India. And frankly, India hasn’t been so bad, not at all. I’m so glad we jumped in headfirst to this crazy, churning sea of chaos. It was one of the best swims of our lives.

So tomorrow before daybreak, we will hop in a cab and head for the airport and begin the next chapter of this trip. We are so curious and excited to see what differences and experiences lay in store now. If it’s any bit as enriching and rewarding as India and the Subcontinental countries have been, we’ve got some truly amazing times ahead of us. MAN, it is good to be alive and have a backpack on our backs!! Vive la vie folks, and we’ll talk to you again from Singapore.

Goodbye from India!!

A Real-Time Update from the End of the Tunnel is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

Being from the Indian Jones era (NOT counting the latest movie, bleh), it is only natural that as a child I was fascinated by ancient temples and ruins. Long before this trip I had dreamed of scouring the temple caves of a religion long forgotten. I even imagined encountering a multitude of diabolical booby-traps from which I managed a narrow escape. For this journey, however, things weren’t quite the same as the movies. I didn’t have an adventure-worn brown fedora, only a brown (and severely tortured) Adidas hat. Nor did I have a trusty whip, rather a headlamp and battery-hungry GPS. Ok so clearly I am a product of the digital age, but despite the differences, this trip is an adventure nonetheless!

We started our journey to Ellora from Aurangabad after a quick breakfast juice from our now-favorite Aurangabad hangout. Half an hour after asking the juice shop owner where to catch the best ride to the caves, we jumped aboard the local bus to Ellora, and a bumpy hour later we were dropped off at the entrance of the famed Unesco World Heritage site. Playing Dr. Jones as best as I could, I fingered the bill of my hat quickly, and then flipped it backwards. The adventure began.

I spent two minutes at the entrance purchasing tickets, and about 10 more scrambling around to find that I stupidly had left our Lonely Planet guide back in the hotel room. Slightly annoyed, and looking very confused and stupid, I looked left, and then right, and then was promptly approached by a teenager with a stack of books. Even looking like you are momentarily confused (or perpetually stupid) attracts the vendors like flies to…well, anyway.

“You need a guide sir?”

I looked left and right a couple more times, and then asked to see one of his products. Since we had no other source of information, and we both refused to hire a 500 rupee guide, we purchased the 50 rupee book and were on our way. Despite the multiple spelling errors, the small book proved helpful in finding the temples we really wanted to see. Time was precious, and there was no way we could see every one of the 30 intricately carved temples in a single day.

After a quick look in the new book, we decided to first head to the Jain temples at the northernmost part of the complex and then work our way south. The book suggested the opposite and to start at the Buddhist caves, but G and I agreed that we had seen quite a few Buddhist temples at Ajanta. We wanted to make sure we had the full experience at the Jain and Hindu temples by taking our time. Since it was a cloudy day, and I am awesome, I pulled out my compass and we worked our way north, passing a large number of black-faced, grey-furred monkeys.

The first cave was 2 kilometers north (that’s just over a mile for you US folk ;) ). Within half an hour we were at the first temple. The entrance way stood tall, towering over our heads. Inside the small complex there was a large stone verandha, guarded by a huge elephant.

As we walked closer to the temple rooms, we were amazed by the detailed carvings that covered the walls.

Of course a temple complex just wouldn’t be right without great scenery, and this little waterfall was it. G even managed to spot a cool watersnake in the pool below.

All the temples so far had been really cool. But then we reached the most insanely awesome temple in all of Ellora. Nothing at this site compared in size or intricacy. It took 100 YEARS to carve this temple out of the solid-rock mountainside. It is the largest monolithic temple structure in the entire world. It was crazy.

This place was so huge, it absolutely dwarfed us.

Ellora had everything from elephants to crazy carvings of Shiva. There were even stories carved into the temple’s side walls.

The coolest part was the fact that this temple is still in active use. We set our Tevas aside and walked into a pitch black room while firing up our headlamps. As we looked around, we saw people were sitting with their legs crossed on the ground praying. Others were standing around ushering pilgrims to move along to the temple’s holiest relics.

We walked 100 feet to a room in the far back before turning off our headlamps. It was barely lit by a few small candles that did little for visibility, and added a great deal to the creepiness factor. The small candles caused shadows to dance along the walls, as the pilgrims came and went. We stood in the room for a couple of minutes staring at the center of the room, and taking in the experience.

In the center of the room a round stone sat on a carved table. It was a “Shiva lingam” (which is, er, a fancy way of saying giant stone Shiva phallus). Water dripped from the ceiling onto the lingam as voices chanted Hindu prayers in the adjacent room.

The orange robes of the sadhus were barely visible to me when a hand reached out and grabbed my arm. The shadowed figure told me to ‘touch for good luck’. I placed my hand on the lingam, and felt a cold slimey texture. I didn’t know which was creepier: the fact that I was putting my hand on something cold and slimey in a dark, dank stone cave…or the fact that it was Shiva’s giant stone phallus. G and I stood there a minute more before walking back towards the temple’s entrance. Quickly.

Meanwhile, a crowd had formed in the dark below a carving of Shiva on the ceiling. If the lingam room wasn’t creepy enough, the carving on the ceiling sealed the deal.

A voice spoke from behind me and said that the carving ‘watches you’. Hindu followers found this reassuring, as Shiva is ever-watching. G and I both found it creepy. We pointed our headlamps at the ceiling and shot each other sideways looks as we watched the carved face follow our every step. Um…Freaky?

Now thoroughly creeped out, we left the Hindu temple.

Wanting to see the last few caves in the fading daylight, we made a mad last-minute dash to see some of the Buddhist temples at the complex. While the Hindus built their temple to house a holy phallus, the Buddhists decided to make this temple look oddly like a parking garage.

After the extravagant carvings and paintings we’d seen in the Buddhist temples at Ajanta, the rest of the Buddhist temples here couldn’t quite compare. The massive Hindu temple definitely took the cake for this day. I half-expected a boulder to chase me out the exit as I flipped my hat forward and switched off my GPS unit to end my big day as the 21st-century Dr. Jones.

We chowed down on some thali, then waited out on the street in the typical state of semi-confusion that always accompanies wondering when or if a bus will come to take us home. But this time, a shared jeep pulled up and offered a cheap – and immediate – ride back. It looked much roomier than a local bus and G said she had read that this was in fact a credible option, so I shook off my fears that they might kidnap and rape us and we hopped in. Naturally, the excessive room didn’t last long as we stopped every kilometer to pick up more people. At one point, there were 20 people crammed inside. This is a 10-person capacity Jeep, mind you. It took an uncomfortably crammed hour to reach Aurangabad, and although it was no temple of doom, it had been an adventure nonetheless.

Next we were headed to the jungle: the concrete jungle of Mumbai.

Be sure to check out the photos of the Ellora Caves in the album.

Marveling Over the Ellora Caves is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

Happily, we’d read the good information (thanks, Lonely Planet!) that we could come from Jalgaon in the morning and stash our bags at the cloakroom for the day, then head on to Aurangabad (the base four hours away for the Ellora Caves) in the same day, so that’s what we planned to do. The entrance to the caves opened up at about 9a and after depositing our bags, we headed off to start our exploration of them about 9:30a. Amazingly, you could actually be hauled up the long flight of stairs to the caves on a chair for a mere 400 Rs (~8 US dollars). It was tempting, just for the inanity of the experience, but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it – actually have people CARRY me around!

So we trundled ourselves up the stairs the old-fashioned way, and after the long haul to get there, finally threw ourselves into our backpackers’ duty of thoroughly exploring these Ajanta Caves – the “Louvre of central India”.

The Ajanta Caves are a “World Heritage” site, which while I’m still not entirely sure what that means or entails, has generally come to mean to us that we’re in for a day of fun things seen, done, experienced, or otherwise leading us to think, “THIS is what we’re on this trip for!”

Indeed, the caves were no exception. One of the important parts of visiting and really “getting” these caves is first trying to wrap your head around their oldness.
Their construction (carving, really) dates back to beginning from 200 BC and ending about 650 AD. They were later abandoned and apparently forgotten until a British hunting group came across them in 1819. Sad for the generations in between that would never know of them, but good for the caves, as it is to this abandonment is that they owe their remarkable preservation.

There are 30 caves in all, almost all of which are accessible to the public, and are cut into the face of the cliffs overlooking a horseshoe-shaped bend of a river. The oldest caves are in the middle and the newer ones closer to each end.

We spent the day poking around the various caves in a very Indiana Jones-esque sort of exploration. The dramatic lighting and lack of very many other tourists lent to the sensation, and we enjoyed the day pretending we were adventurous archaeologists very much.

The carvings were awesome both inside and outside of the caves. Ray liked all the neat religious statues. I, of course, loved the elephants. And we both thought the reclining Buddha was pretty awesome, which was the last big thing we saw and a great way to end the exploration of the caves.

The last big cave that held the reclining Buddha was unbelievable. It looked pretty cool as it was, and was reminiscent of standing in a giant stone ribcage.

It would have been interesting enough to have had done those carvings. But to think that this started out as just a solid rock cliff and that it was first hollowed out and THEN carved like that. Incredible. But even so, the real kicker was to look closer, and realize…some 1400 years later, we’re only seeing the half of it.

That’s right. These things were PAINTED, too. And by the looks of what remains this many hundreds of years later, they were painted with extreme detail and indescribable vibrance. That was the kicker for me. It boggled the brain and short-circuited me. Good thing we were done for the day…information overload otherwise! World Heritage sight indeed, and well worth it.

Before we left, we crossed the river and hiked up the mountain to get an overview of all the caves, then celebrated our nice day out with a fried rice meal and a cold soda at the restaurant and collected our bags from the cloak room. We hoofed it out to stand on the main road and caught the local’s bus (our first time standing out on the road and just climbing on!) the rest of the way to Aurangabad.

It was hot and crowded and we got lots of stares, and it was totally awesome.

We were beyond cramped and not especially comfortable, especially Ray who had to stand the whole way (several hours), but we do like riding the locals’ buses sometimes for those hauls that aren’t painfully long (or overnight). It’s cheap and efficient enough, and nice to be a part of the “real thing”. A lot of the time we feel just kind of out of place awkward, but when we can utilize the local buses like this, it reminds us how far we’ve actually come since we first stepped foot on Indian soil. Literally and figuratively!

It had been a great day (even if it was Thanksgiving and we had no turkey!), and we were excited to go on to see what the Ellora caves would hold for us the next day.

To see more of our Indiana Jones-ing, come see the Ajanta Caves photo album.

Indiana Jonesing it up at the Ajanta Caves is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

It was a long train ride and despite leaving at daybreak, night had fallen by the time we arrived in Jalgaon. Fortunately, the most recent addition to our train bench was a helpful young Indian who lead us to our desired hotel which was a laughably close distance from the station – laughable because not knowing its precise location, we probably would have hopped on a rickshaw and been charged an appropriate “stupid tourist” fare to go the whole 200 feet away that it was.

Not only was our young friend very helpful and congenial – and didn’t want anything from us!? – but the hotel was owned by THE nicest person in all of India. The hotel and room was one of the nicest and cleanest we’d seen, and the price was fantastic. It was a great end to a long travel day and nice after the somewhat bizarre day we’d had the day previous.

For perhaps the first time, I actually had a craving for Indian thali, which we’d not eaten since our first time – the Rajasthani thali that totally and completely conquered us in Jaipur. The nice hotel owner gave us a great recommendation to a nearby restaurant and the locals had a good stare at the intrepid backpackers who were actually going to try a local meal. It was hugely spicy and, despite appearances, amazingly over-portioned and by the end thanks to the unneeded free refill I got before I could protest, I was having to force myself to bring fork to mouth to keep eating my rice until I finally had to give up. Conquered again by the thali. It sure was great, though! And only cost 90 cents!

On the way home, we saw a cart selling movies and managed to find a disc with several movies on it, including both of the Bollywood flicks that we’d seen and enjoyed – Blue, which we’d seen at the famous Raj Mandir cinema in Jaipur had been our first Bollywood film ever and I totally loved. The movie blew my socks off and was perhaps the one action film in all the world I like – the sequences were amazing (flips on jetskis!? Motorcycles going full speed on the tops of trains!?!) and the music is some of my favorite I’ve ever heard. The second movie, Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani, we’d seen for our anniversary in Udaipur. That one was a romantic comedy so a little harder to follow the plot, but it did have one of the trademark Bollywood film music and dance sequences (similar to the one that was at the end of Slumdog Millionaire, if you’ve seen that movie, only they occur throughout the movie, sometimes rather randomly!) that was absolutely awesome. It was probably the singlemost erotic non-erotic thing I’ve ever seen. I don’t think they even kissed.

[Sidenote: I’m still trying to grasp the concept of relationships and sex here in India. Ray and I long ago gave up holding hands so as to be culturally sensitive here since public displays of affection are frowned upon, but the men (perhaps because of that) hold hands – like, fingers interlaced – and are quite often basically all over each other as a “sign of friendship”. Almost everyone wears long pants and keeps their legs and shoulders covered up for modesty, yet the temples are adorned with some very, very explicit – even educational! - carvings and statues. The temples at Khajuraho are a great example of this, but only one of many. This is, after all, the home of the Kama Sutra!]

Anyway, the song from the movie, Tu Jaane Na, is now one of my favorite. Give it a listen or twenty and be amazed at HOW FRIGGIN MUCH IT GETS STUCK IN YOUR HEAD. The video from the movie is worth a look too, maybe you can see what I mean about the non-erotic erotic thing. I’ve included it down below for you. It’s not my upload, so if it ever doesn’t work let me know and I’ll update the link. I’m not sure why they’re randomly in what I believe is Turkey since as far as I know the rest of the movie took place in India, but why question awesomeness?

So when we saw we could score (albeit crap quality) copies of both those movies plus two others that we’d not seen, Bollywood’s Kurbaan and Hollywood’s 2012 (which was still in theaters back home), we grabbed it. We also got new toothbrushes, which is an exciting thing (because no one wants to get an Indian root canal, do they!?), and headed home to get ready for our early departure the next morning.

We were sad to leave the awesome hotel and wished that Jalgaon was one of those places that you just wanted to linger for a few weeks, but…well…it’s just not. And the Ajanta caves were beckoning, and rightfully so….

Before we get there though, check out the Tu Jaane Na video.

Good times in Jalgaon making our way to the Ajanta Caves is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

The train ticket booking went well – I thought – until once we had registered and paid for our reservations for early the next morning, we then returned to the issue at hand of going to Dandi this afternoon, and the man told us that there wasn’t enough time to go today. Clearly, something had been lost in the translation that this was something we had wanted to do, and therefore probably shouldn’t have booked the first-thing-in-the-morning train if we were now not able to accomplish it today.

We find that though we like to stick to the tourist trail anyway, sometimes even if there is worthwhile stuff OFF the backpacker’s tourist trail, it’s not so easy to get there once you’ve diverged even a little bit, as we apparently had in Surat. So while I would have liked to go see it, and we were so close, we decided we could live probably ok without it. We had seen the site in Delhi where Gandhi had been shot in 1948 so we had at least gotten to walk (quite literally) in his old footsteps somewhere in India.

So we were glad to skeedaddle from Surat early the next day. Fittingly with the rest of our stay there, breakfast was an underwhelming, poorly translated interpretation of reasonable substance to start the day. We even got up super early so we could order eggs and tea and curd with banana and toast and so on to be sure to hold us over for our long day traveling. In fact, what we were able to get was toast. (With no jam, for reasons unknown). And…hot milk. No tea either. Who in India doesn’t have tea? Even Ramniwas in Jodhpur had said that, as an Indian, he simply cannot and will not leave the house without his cup of chai first – it’s bad luck. We must have found the one place that didn’t have even a tea bag in the entire country.

Surat…Su WHAAAT? Get me back on the beaten track please! is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

At about 6:30 this morning, just after I had made it into a euphoric dreamstate, I was awoken by two things. The first: my head slamming six inches into a thankfully-cushioned mattress and the second, a bunch of squeaky Hindi voices barking something down the bus aisleway.

What they said, I’m not sure, but if I were to guess, it would be something along the lines of “Wake up you lazy bastards”, as this was the general demeanor of the wonderful bus staff.

We were headed for Surat, or at least that’s what we thought at about 5:30 this morning when we looked out the window. I remember the time, because it was shortly after my 10th failed space expedition. But when I opened the curtains an hour and a half later at 7a, I caught a glimpse of a highway sign that said “Surat 18Km” with an arrow pointing left.

Now, since my back was facing the front of the bus and I saw the sign passing behind the bus, my logic, even in the early morning, dictated that we were moving away from our destination. In that instant, things just sort of flashed past me as I barely grasped what was going on. G and I were still rubbing the sleep from our eyes, and we both maintained a glazed-over composure as I described what I saw. For about 10 minutes, G and I were left wondering if we had missed our stop, and were caught somewhere between panic and, ‘I’m carsick and I don’t CARE anymore’.

Luckily, about 30 minutes later (far too late for us to have done anything about missing our stop) we made a right-hand turn, followed by another right. We were traveling back in the right direction of our destination. Sometimes it’s just best not to ask questions.

We traveled a long distance on this road, passing many banana and sugar cane fields, before being dropped off at a bus stand. As far as we could tell, we were now in Surat. After quickly verifying the location with a couple fellow passengers, we ran off the bus with luggage in hand to meet the touts.

My annoyance level was still up from the night before with the jerk bus drivers, so dealing with touts now put me in a grumbly and less accepting mood. Unfortunately, Surat isn’t very well described in the 2007 edition of Lonely Planet, and we had absolutely nothing to go on other than what the touts were offering. So G and I had decided that we would say ’200 rupees’ was our max for a hotel. We hoped this would minimize the commission the rickshaw driver would tack onto our bill for bringing in customers. After giving a good majority the “Delhi-Denial”, we found one offering a ‘nice’ hotel at 350 rupees. Since 350 was our real budget, we hopped in and were on our way.

I left G in the rickshaw with the bags and went to check out the guesthouse. I walked up a couple flights of stairs and down a dirty hallway that was pock-marked with cement cubby-holes whose sole purpose, it seems, was to be a place to deposit trash. That should have been an indication that the hotel staff might have missed a memo or two about cleanliness. When the bellhop opened the door, the first glance wasn’t too bad. I walked in.

A squat toilet earned minus 10 since it was usable, but annoying. Even that’s okay because 90% is still an A. But minus 10 for the cleanliness of the bathroom. Minus 10 for a dirty floor. Plus 10 for a TV, even though we probably wouldn’t watch it. Minus infinity times infinity for the rat droppings on one of the pillows. We like rats, but are you kidding me? Is there anything lower than an F-? I left the hotel without saying anything to the reception or the bellhop.

I hopped back in the rickshaw, visibly perturbed, and we moved on to another hotel named “Hotel Decent” (the E was cracked and falling off). At 500 rupees a night, it was a far nicer room, but out of our budget.

We tried a few more hotels after ditching our rickshaw driver (since we thought he was inflating our cost) and walked all over Kingdom Come with our big bags to try to find something better, but they were all full or too expensive. Exhausted, sweaty, and now wholly demoralized on our quest for budget lodging, we settled for “Hotel Decent” with the cracked E, and started walking back to it. Adding insult to injury, our rickshaw driver drove up behind us.

He was smiling smugly as we trudged along with all our bags still in hand, and offered to take us back to his hotel for free. Just wanting it to be over, we got in. The sign for the hotel really said it all. Surat was sure to be a place to sleep and get the hell out of, and that’s what we did. So much for getting “off the beaten track”.

Arriving in a New City is Always a Special Experience. Especially with a Budget and No Guidebook. is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

Bit of a debacle, today was. So last night we went for our 8p check-in for our 8:30p bus, which then turned into an 8:30p check-in for our 8:45p bus, which I think ultimately became a 9:15p departure. India!

But the fun started when we got on board and started looking for our sleeper, berths “11 and 12” when the sleepers were labeled “A, B, C…” etc. And with great horror and dismay the person who showed us where our berth was (one of all of them who spoke no English whatsoever) walked all the way to the dreaded…BACK of the bus.

Now, we’d already sworn off buses after the launch-y ride INTO Udaipur. But when we found out we’d have to take another night bus ride back out of Udaipur (why is this starting to seem like the epic trips into and out of Leh?), we conceded, consoling ourselves that at least we’d booked a seat up at the front and would maybe be launched only an inch on every bump instead of a foot.

Ray’s been pretty good about the whole foreign-travel thing. I think you’d be hard-pressed to start your traveling career as a greenie like himself with a more initiation-by-fire place than India. The customs are different, the gestures are different, the dress is different, the language is different, the writing is different. Maybe the only thing harder would be a place where violent crime is prevalent and/or a warzone. I’ve not yet been to Africa or the Middle East, but for where I have been, I can vouch for Ray and say he’s pretty bad ass for taking his first international foray into the non-resort-package world by jumping right into the deep end with India. There’s only one thing he can’t stand here. He can’t stand being laughed at.

So step back onto our bus for a moment. There we are, bags in hand, looking down a long aisle with huge packages of crap blocking the way (because there are always big sacks of something or another blocking the aisleway of these buses – this time it was textile materials, and this time we didn’t bother trying to step around them since the locals didn’t either). Ray’s a pretty docile guy. But when he saw that we were not only not in the front, like we’d been assured we’d be, but at THE very back berth – AGAIN – he wasn’t going back to the suicidal bus-gallows without a fight.

Not even a fight, really. We politely tried to tell them that we’d been assured we were booked on a compartment at the front. The first guy who had pointed out our berth just said Yes, yes, back here. No, no, up here. No, no, back here. Omg. Ray tried to appeal to the driver(s? as there are always at least 3 people up there in the peanut gallery).

Now, especially being American and from a country that is so adamantly “they’re in America, they should speak English” and is correspondingly vastly mono-lingual, I understand that we should speak some of the language, and I am trying to scramble to learn it as much and as quickly as possible before it is completely obsolete to do so anyway (since there are a bajillion dialects and sub-languages and we’re about to leave the Hindi-speaking region altogether anyway). But I understand that since we don’t speak their language, we deserve to have a difficult time getting around and getting things accomplished the way we’d like. That comes with the territory, and that is fair.

But I don’t care where you are in the world, what culture you’re in, or all things being culturally relative…there are some ways in which a human being is just unilaterally and unequivocally an asshole.

Ray wasn’t being a jerk; we’d been told one thing when we’d booked the damn bus and now we were being told something different (and wretched) now that we were boarding it. He wasn’t yelling or screaming or throwing a fit, all he said to the guy was that we were supposed to have been at the front, that that was what we’d paid for. The guy says something in Hindi, presumably translating for the rest of the peanut gallery what Ray had said (ah so you do speak English), and they all – not just chuckled, but ERUPTED – into this leering, spiteful, uproarious ass-holey laughter.

I’m pretty good at being forgiving of people, especially at times like this when I know we’ve put ourselves in our own position of vulnerability with our ignorance such as with the language, but come ON. You don’t have to speak Hindi to know that guy just said “I am the world’s BIGGEST DOUCHEBAG and there is a special place in hell waiting just for me!” and the others joined in with a raucous chorus of “Hahuhuh yuck yuck yeah us too! We’re going to be reincarnated as slugs in our next life and deserve every inch of the shoe sole that stomps us!”

Readers of all nationalities, take note. Americans, us especially because this isn’t an attack on Indians, this is a complaint about jerk-people and there are plenty of us back home too. I’d like to believe that hopefully when we encounter stuff like this, we are at least restoring some karmic balance for all the American jerks that engage in racial slurs, prejudices, and stereotypes. So please don’t add more. For god’s sake, treat your visitors kindly. If a foreigner is lost, go out of your way to help them out and find their way. Even if they’re not lost, go out of your way and be welcoming, friendly, hospitable. Even if they don’t speak English (yet). It’s not easy being in a foreign place, where everything is upside down and inside out and insane and crazy. If you don’t appreciate what they’re trying to accomplish by being there at all, which is more likely than not to try to make themselves a better person, fine. But there’s never a reason to make them feel like that made us feel.

There was no good place to go from there when that happened, so for as much as we wanted to further our cause to save ourselves from 11 hours of utter hell – or at least deck the guy in the face (call us hockey players), in case Ray was going to continue the good fight for the sake of being a good-husband and wanting wifey to be comfortable, I gave him a small head jerk and said it was fine, they weren’t going to do anything but stand there and unravel their reincarnation evolution, let’s just go and not subject ourselves further to this humiliation. (Somehow, it feels humiliating just to stand anywhere as the only white people in a one-mile radius as it is, with all those eyes staring at you constantly, let alone this. We try to tell ourselves it’s just curiosity and a cultural difference, like the books say. But it bleeds the self-consciousness out of us til it sure feels like judgment sometimes).

So, resigned, we went and shoved our stuff into our cubby hole. I tried to cheer Ray up by pointing out it was a much nicer mattress and cubby hole than the last one, with glass window doors instead of curtains. He tried to be cheery back, but about five minutes later I had to say to him, “Honey, it’s ok. Just let it go. Your blackness is getting all over our compartment and making a mess.” He stewed a few seconds longer and then mostly let it go, which was good because his dark cloud of what must have been daggers and arrows and such that he was shooting up at the front of the bus was seriously crowding our compartment that was already small enough.

The ride, predictably, was the worst yet. At least 4 occasions saw my entire body flung off the mattress straight up into the air (but at least I didn’t hit the roof – always look at the bright side?), and the shoes that were in the bin above our feet were lifted out and came down to smack our legs multiple times. And I swore a couple of times that we were going over for sure, because I had to grab onto Ray to keep from crashing through the glass wall onto the floor. I remember feeling surprised though at how, despite clutching on til the bus righted itself again, I pretty much just kept calmly laying there, either sleeping or dozing or foregoing either and just existing in my bubble of happy-place sphere (it’s padded).

For as unpleasant as some of these days (or nights) and experiences of this trip are, I know without a doubt it’s going to pay dividends a million times over back on more familiar, comfortable ground. I’ve known it before from even my milder past travels, and Ray’s said already, he knows that back in America, where we speak the language, know the customs, know how things are SUPPOSED to work, know how to use all these things most effectively, a) “NO one is going to f with us”, and b) nothing, absolutely nothing can stand in our way. At least nothing that we have a say in. And for the things we don’t have a say in, well we’ll know full well how to deal with that and make the best of it, at least. We’ll be used to that much!

So, another notch in the belt of “well, THAT was a crappy experience”, but we’re better for it. But please, go call or write any foreigner you know in your country right now and just tell them you know it must be challenging sometimes and they’re doing a good job and you appreciate them being there trying to learn about and experience your country, and is there anything you can do for them to make their stay pleasant? And by the way, if you’re still at all hung up on the “couchsurfing” concept or wondering why we would ever go stay with a “stranger”…it’s because those are the people who are doing that for us. People are pretty awesome. It’s just that that particular batch of drivers on that bus were pretty average.

Don’t ever be average.

From the Personal Files: Helping Jerk Bus Drivers Unravel Their Reincarnation Karma, One Night Bus Ride at a Time is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

There was Delhi with Diwali and the day of sight-seeing, Agra and my birthday at the Taj Mahal, Jaipur and the big day sight-seeing plus our first Bollywood movie, Pushkar with the days of the Camel Fair and a marathon bout of site updating, Bikaner and its beautiful fort and the awesome rat temple, Jaisalmer and staying in the fort with our first couchsurfing host and the big camel safari, Jodhpur and another couchsurfing visit, the awesome Mehrangarh fort and sight-seeing with our Spanish friend and fellow couchsurfer Utxin…It had been an amazing time. Now we’d arrived in Udaipur, said to be the most romantic city in India, just in time for our 3-year anniversary (yes it was planned that way), and it was perhaps little wonder that we wanted to do very little there.

We had semi-high aspirations for our celebration. The first year, I’d surprised Ray with a week-long cruise (since I was working in cruises at the time). The second year, since we were saving money for this trip, we opted for something low-key but fun and memorable and went to the little themed old western mini-town called Pinnacle Peak in Tucson and walked around and got one of those ridiculous “Old Fashioned” portraits, where you dress up in old western gear – yes, I even wore lace. Never again.

Now here we were in India, and we decided we’d go and look for some cool rings to commemorate the occasion (and Ray had wanted from the beginning to mark me off limits to any roving Indian eyes – well, better than peeing on me, I guess), then “splurge” on some 750 Rs (~$16) massages, and go to another Bollywood flick.

In actuality, in our post-travel sloth, all we really got around to doing was have a nice breakfast (lunch really, if you go by time of day) overlooking the lake, browse some amazing miniature paintings in one of the shops, and eventually, make our way to the cinema. Some couples would celebrate their anniversary with a nice, candlelit dinner at an expensive restaurant. We had pizza and Fanta floats at the food court of the cinema. That’s how we roll!

We had only planned to stay in Udaipur two nights, but our disinclination to move stretched on into six. In all that time, we never did really rouse the interest to go “sight-seeing”. There was the ubiquitous temple to go see, the lake palace, probably other things… But we’d reached that point where we’d seen enough palaces, temples, forts, so on and so forth, and seeing them outside from a distance on our rooftop restaurant was good enough. Udaipur just wasn’t meant to be a sight-seeing place for us, it was meant to be a resting point, and it was.

That’s not to say we didn’t do anything. We did enjoy very much watching the sunset over the lake as we sat on the rooftop with dinner, and we did make a point to catch the nightly viewing of James Bond’s “Octopussy”, which was filmed right there. It was neat to see it on the movie then just raise our gaze to see the lake palace sitting there just off our rooftop.

We also spent a lot of time marveling over those miniature paintings that were so famous and rightly so in the region. I could post a picture but it would never do them justice. The detail on these paintings is simply phenomenal. We’re not much of “shoppers” but these were something that we said many times that we’d have to come back to India someday just to come and buy these, when we’re not on a long-term backpacker’s budget. So for now, we settled on just a few very inexpensive but still beautiful and amazing ones to send back home and bought them from one of the sweetest couples in all of India.

What I like about doing a long trip like this is that instead of us commanding the itinerary, we get to let the trip run itself sometimes. It’s more of an interactive exchange between sentient being and natural flow. In this way, we’re not just taking the trip, but the trip is taking us as well. I’m not a meditator (in fact I tried it once and it made me want to get run over by a train), but this trip is almost like an extended meditative state, where you get to learn to listen to the inanimate things around you (like the trip itself), go with the flow, enjoy the present, focus the future, draw upon the past, and in the end, just be at peace with life for what it Is – and not just what it’s “supposed” to be but doesn’t always pan out to be.

One of the most important things a long-term traveler can learn is to listen to the little sounds that tell you despite the guidebook listing plenty of things to do and see (as it always will, because that’s its job), sometimes you’re just meant to relax, unwind, and recharge your batteries for the next bout of sight-seeing and experience-living and traveling trials and tribulations and awesomeness.

We didn’t feel an ounce of guilt for not doing the things listed in the guidebook. We enjoyed our little room with its lake view, we enjoyed our anniversary, and we enjoyed getting caught up on our whirlwind lives and ready to roll again.

And as it turns out, it was a good thing too, because it was game-on the moment we moved to set foot outside Udaipur…!

But come check out the photos of Udaipur before we deal with all that.

Ray and G’s Wild and Crazy 3-Year Anniversary in Udaipur, or “Actually, Getting a Massage Sounds Like a Lot of Work” is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

We learn slowly, but we do learn, so after enough launching rides at the backs of buses, this time we had requested seats at the front of the bus. But apparently we’re still learning, because foolishly we still believe what we’re told when they assure us we’ve been booked at the front. So imagine our surprise when we clamber aboard and are directed to not only not seats at the front, but not seats at all. The man points us to a single sleeper compartment in the middle of the bus. Sleepers are preferable for the ungodly experience of nightbuses, but we’d rather been looking forward to sitting upright for this daytime trip, actually.

Until he pointed to our seats. Yep. Very back row. Single sleeper compartment for two of us it was.

Not twenty minutes into the ride, I was grateful for our new seating assignment not just for being spared the post-axel launchage, but because of all the insanely shaky, bumpy, rattly, ridiculous bus rides we’ve subjected our bones to on this trip, this one took the cake. The musical horn just added insult to discomfort. It was so bad, all I could do was laugh. And film it.

My thankfully horizontal position no doubt saved me a few gallons of carsickness, and thanks to my tendency to be able to curl up and sleep like a log whenever the world of unconsciousness is preferable to that of waking reality, what could have been a pretty wretched ride wasn’t too bad. For his part, Ray just sat there with a look of utter unamusement and the occasional look of incredulity at me that I was sleeping through this nonsense.

However, about two hours before our arrival in Udaipur, I couldn’t sleep any longer. I had to pee. Right now. Like, RIGHT NOW. Foolishly, there had been a day many moons ago where we actually thought the luxury buses here might have bathrooms like the ones in the States do, though we’d abandoned that thought long ago. Still, we still held the illusion that given their proclivity to stop every 50 feet for a 20-minute chai break, an emergency bathroom stop would be no big deal, especially since I’m not picky and asking for a fancy, clean bathroom or anything. A rock will do just fine.

Illusions be gone!

They wouldn’t stop! “5 minutes,” he said. 5 minutes. Ok, ok breathe, I can wait 5 minutes. Since I didn’t know the Hindi translation for “if you do not let me off of this bus I will be forced to use my Ziploc bag for reasons it was never intended for”, I had little choice but to resign myself back to my seat with a mumbled “ok” and a look of what I hoped to be a quiet panic and exasperation enough to communicate the direness of the situation.

Well whether they forgot my necessity, or are just working their way towards some seriously bad karma in this life, five minutes became 20 minutes, and I went from urgent to nearly comatose. As it was, not wanting to interrupt the journey, I’d waited as long as I possibly could before asking them. I have never had to pee so bad in my life. Why won’t these evil people STOP!?

Then finally, they did – but only to let people off! They wouldn’t let me go! I think it was another five or ten minutes before they stopped again – I’m not really sure, as I was no longer a fully functioning human being – and finally one of the guys up front ushered me off.

It was a gas station, and instead of bathrooms like we know it, it had an outside…thing…that functioned as a urinal with (disgusting) walls. Fine. Whatever. Sign me up. The guy just pointed me over there and made to leave, but seeing as how it didn’t have doors and being a female I’d not be visible to someone coming up to use it, I asked him could he please stand there so no one else walked in on me (duh?) thanks? He did, but not five seconds later he started with a repeating chorus of “Excuse me! Excuse me! Hurry!” to which I responded “Just a minute!” and he continued again “Excuse me! Excuse me! HURRY!” and I thought to myself are you serious?! It’s been THREE SECONDS!, and responded “JUST A MINUTE I AM STILL GOING I TOLD YOU I HAD TO GO” and he continued on but I couldn’t deal with him anymore, I had to focus on the disgustingness of this urinal….thing…and not letting any part of my body touch ANYTHING.

So finally relative order is restored to my world and I will be able to live at least one more day. I emerge from the urinal…thing…and we dash back to the bus (pants falling down along the way as everyone peers out of the windows at me, as I’d not had time to do up my belt, thankyouverymuch). It’s not like I’d taken a long time, but fine, I dashed anyway.

Meanwhile, Ray’s standing there with this somewhat frenzied, somewhat super pissed look on his face, saying that he had to practically lie down in front of the bus to keep them from LEAVING. He said the driver had actually turned around and said to him, “one minute”, as though Ray in turn would what, say “Ok, that’s fine, go ahead and go” even if I wasn’t back yet? SERIOUSLY.

Ray sat there in incredulity and with one of his little black clouds over his head for a while still as we started moving again, but I could do little more than sit there and try to recover from the trauma of it all. Who would have ever thought that one of the simplest things in life could get so complicated? But I guess that’s India for you!

Evil bus rides with evil people that don’t let G do what she’s gotta do is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

When we got to the fort, we armed ourselves with the included audio tour –which was absolutely excellent- and began our narrated wander through the massive and fascinating fort. We even ran into our host Ramniwas as he was giving a tour to someone important, like a diplomat from the Czech Republic or something. We split up after that so Utxin could go at a leisurely pace since he wanted to stay all the way through til sunset and Ray and I still had errands to do like seeing the town and arranging our bus ticket to Udaipur for the next day.

The best parts of the fort included a spot where a man had actually been entombed alive into the wall of the fort as a (voluntary) human sacrifice to counteract the curse the “crazy bird man on the mountain” had placed upon the city when the fort was built on his mountain; the handprints, or sati marks, of the maharaja’s widows, who committed suicide by throwing themselves upon his funeral cremation pyre. a large display of the different kinds of Hathi Howdahs, or elephant seats, that people used to ride in and on,

and the Palanquins that ladies used to be carried in to keep them obscured from public gaze when traveling.

We also got to see the fabled Damascus steel that Ray had hoped to see while we were in India. In addition to the marvel of Damascus steel itself, the weapons were ridiculously intricately carved, especially since they weren’t designed to be displayed (rightly) in a museum or art gallery, rather plunged into the body of an enemy. But no square inch of this weaponry was denied the chance to be a veritable work of art; from the handles of the daggers to the blades of the sword, to even the border of the shields, these instruments of death and dismemberment were sculpted, carved, and painted into immortal artistic beauty.

Even the cannons were fun!

Exploring the Mehrangarh Fort in Jodhpur is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

Since Dhanna is a member of the Brahmin caste, which is the highest, even though he believes in greater equality, others in his neighborhood disagree and hosting strangers in his house as he originally did brought a lot of harassment to his family. He finally had to start putting couchsurfers (even foreigners) in his guesthouse to protect his family. As such, legally we now had to fill out the official check-in paperwork and plus we lost a certain degree of that personal interaction that couchsurfers usually have with their hosts, typically being thrust right into the heart of the host’s home and lives and all. So even though it had been our intention to stay on our own again and get a hotel after we left Jaisalmer, it turned out to be a good thing that Dhanna and Jamin championed the idea of us staying with another couchsurfing friend of theirs in Jodhpur.

One easy (all things being relative) 8-hour bus ride later found us at our first residence here in India. When the door opened and we were ushered inside to join our new moustached host, Ramniwas, his wife, his 2- and 4-year-old daughters, and another fellow couchsurfer, Utxin from Spain, who were all crowded around a small table in a big room adjacent to the kitchen, it felt a lot more like the more typical CS experience.

They all went about with what they were doing so seamlessly and without hoopla at two backpack-laden travelers arriving at their house at 10:30 at night, it was almost disconcerting. They just handed us some plates and said to dig into the spread that was laid out on the table, apologizing that much of it was already gone. Coming from a culture that is so suspicious of strangers and when encountering them, it’s almost a compulsive need to make the requisite small talk, it felt strange to just dive right in like that. But what could we do but start eating and go with the flow!

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We eventually pieced together names and that Utxin had only arrived a few hours before us and various other miscellaneous information about our host and each other. The funny thing about couchsurfing in India that I’ve not experienced in other countries before is that even though it is we who are entering and infiltrating their (the hosts’) personal lives, it can be hard to shake that wariness that maybe in the end, they’re going to end up wanting/demanding something from us. It seems so hit and miss since we’ve been in India; sometimes someone will be really nice and friendly and helpful and then it ends up they want you to go to their shop or something and when we don’t want to buy anything, all niceties are dropped and we get what almost undoubtedly is a (very audible) muttered curse that we can’t understand. But then at other times, sometimes someone will be really nice and friendly and helpful and then it ends up…that we go on our way, and they really were just super nice and friendly and helpful. But as it seems to be in no way evident by appearance, station in life, profession, age, or gender, there is no way to know which Jekyll or Hyde you might reasonably expect the person to be.

It’s quite possible that maybe Americans are exactly the same way and it’s just hard for us to tell because it’s our own culture and we’re not at strangers’ mercy quite the same way. Personally, I think Americans are statistically more uniformly genuinely cordial and helpful, and certainly more predictable based on at the least the job in which you encounter them (as waiters depend on tips which depend on some degree of pleasant disposition, they are a good example).

Of course, if you ever do encounter that rare bad seed in the Western world, they are probably more apt to shove you into the back of a van and kill you.

At any rate, Ramniwas’ geniality and the presence of his wife and two young daughters helped put us pretty quickly at ease, lack of compulsory introductions and getting-to-know-you small talk aside. After chilling downstairs for awhile, he took us all up on the roof (not to kill us) and pointed out the neighbor’s cement yard down below with the cows and horses, and we gazed out over the rooftops at the illuminated Mehrangarh fort on the hill.

We oohed and ahhed and made plans to go check it out with Utxin the next day when Ramniwas went to his job as a tour guide. I was especially excited to see the very unique blue houses of Jodhpur that we had seen before in the movie The Fall and that I had read about and seen pictures of in my research from back home in Tucson of where to go and what to see in Rajasthan. And now we were here! And there were blue houses and fairy tale forts to go see!

Check out the album and come spend the night with all of us at Our Second Couchsurfing Stay

Surfing Couches in Jodhpur is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

I’ve experienced it for almost 5 full months and I still can’t quite come to terms with how crazy insane, and crazy cool this place is. Maybe it’s the multitude of things going on, the busy-ness of everyday life, the crazy feel of a big city and its people rushing like worker ants getting daily chores done. Maybe it’s the distinct cultural difference between the West that rakes in all unfamiliarity of ‘normal’ life here. It doesn’t matter how long I’ve stayed in my dungeon-like room, whose walls echo the chants of funeral processions, I am still struck by the complete strangeness of this place. It only takes walking down the streets of Varanasi to once again remind me how different this place is.

I walk through the labyrinth of buildings and experience the crowds of people migrating in different directions while dodging bikes, rickshaws, motorcycles, and sleeping dogs. You can have a fully humbling experience as you see homeless people welcoming sacred cows not only for their holiness, but for the mere fact that they hold in the warmth given off by small fires lit on the bricked pathways. Shop owners hail me with “Come sir, look my shop” or a multitude of shady characters stop to question, “you want hash?”

This city has a life of its own and a heart that seems to beat to a macrocosm much larger than anything I can witness by simply stepping outside my door. It is a feeling of chaotic harmony, the countless directions working toward something that makes sense. A social entropy, if you will.

Within moments of stepping off the hotel steps, my walkway has been impeded by one of many funeral processions. A body lay wrapped in orange and gold, carried on a stretcher by pallbearers whose faces bear no more sadness than a shopkeeper tending his customers. Death is just another phase, and it is plainly written on the expressions of each individual in the procession.

Yet, through all of this strangeness and chaos, there is a certain charm that bleeds through. Where else can you walk ancient pathways and easily see how it must have been centuries ago? It is as close to stepping into the past as you could ever get. You can easily imagine city patrons opening their shops and selling handicrafts or chai just as they might have long before our grandparents’ grandparents were even born. That alone amazes me. This city is so old, and yet has so much life.

So what else can be seen in this holy Hindu city? Well, that I can’t tell you yet since both G and I are recovering from a nasty bout of Indian bronchitis or worse. However, if this city is anywhere near as warm and welcoming as our restaurant Chef–who welcomed us warmly after a couple of days of bed-ridden confinement to our room–then we will have some wonderful stories to share. After all, we have an ancient, holy river about 300 feet from our hotel that is sure to paint us again another story, adding even more colors to our now vivid picture that is India.

But first, we have quite a few stories to share with you before continuing our journey from here. So, starting tomorrow, we are going to take you on a little adventure with us and get you caught up by taking you back to our time in a pretty little city called…Jodhpur.

Soaking up the haunting streets of Varanasi is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

When we began this trip – and this site – we had nothing to offer but some hope, and a desire to share some wide-eyed experiences with you as we went and got our socks knocked off by things we knew we couldn’t begin to fathom from back home. What we ultimately wanted was to have some great experiences, gain some good knowledge, and live to tell about it so that we could encourage and help others pursue their dreams.

Five months into it, and we are still getting our socks knocked off every second that we are on this side of the planet. We have seen much, done lots, and have learned tons that we hope might be able to help others as they consider the leap from the familiar into the great unknown.

The site has changed thus to reflect a shift from only Us, to try to reach out to others as well and try to provide some concrete, practical advice, tips, and information that might assist others in enhancing and optimizing their own journeys: through life, through travel, and certainly through Asia. This is perhaps first and foremost reflected in the name change from “two kids and a dream”, to Operation Backpack Asia. This journey isn’t just for us anymore; it’s for anyone who wants to see and experience this incredible land of adventure, mystery, and intrigue.

Some of the changes and additions to the site that have taken so much time to create and implement include:

Creating and linking social media accounts. LOTS of them.
In several cases, this meant learning of, and then learning how to use, new services to make ourselves more accessible and available to others, such as: Twitter, StumbleUpon, TravelBlog Exchange, Digg, Reddit, and Delicious. We are also now easily reachable with accounts on Facebook, Myspace, Feedburner, and Youtube. We want to connect with our readers, and we want our readers to be able to connect with us, especially if they have questions. So come be our friend! Similarly, we spent time…

Adding a Latest Tweet feature at the top of the site
So you always know the latest even when we haven’t posted yet

Adding a Where are Ray and G right now? feature
So you can easily keep tabs on at least where we are

Making it easier to share your comments more places on the site
Hopefully, anyway. That’ll be up for you to decide, we guess.

Tagging all of our blog posts
This also required the lengthy process of learning what tags were even for, other than just looking annoying, even spammy, at the end of posts. Turns out, they’re actually very useful when used correctly. Instead of leaving it as “Tags:” and listing a bunch of words that just look annoying, hopefully we’ve made it easy for you to understand how they work too. Basically, they get all stories on a similar topic together for you. If you want to read all the stories on animals we’ve had, you can. If you want to see how each couchsurfing experience went all at once, or get the raw edit and just read the entries posted directly from our personal journals all in one go, now you can. Pretty cool, huh?

Writing Gear Reviews
Those three tabs that just used to promise “coming soon” now have some hard-earned, detailed content. The blog posts used to be all that carried the site. Now they will also serve as a deeper context for the travel information we have now to share, like what you can’t live without if you’re doing a trip like this, what will be the first thing you ditch, and how we really ARE living comfortably and hygienically with only three pairs of underwear each.

Writing Travel Reviews
So many things to see, do, places to go. Such a short life to live. Sharing our hard-won information to make it that much easier to find the best places to spend your time and the best things to do with it!

Writing Travel Tips
Because omg, we sure could have used some of these when we were planning this trip. There are several articles now and many more yet to come.

Implementing “bread crumbs”
So you can easily navigate back to the main page of a section, for example the reviews and tips

Updating the Map
You can practically see us waving at you!

Naming our photos. ALL of them.
That’s more than a two thousand photos to go through and painstakingly change from “P1000109.jpg” to meaningful names. This makes the photos findable for people searching for images like them, and makes the site more user-friendly  and accessible for those with disabilities.

Adding a get updates by email feature
All the news and updates delivered right to your inbox at the click of a button!

Implementing a star rating system
A quick and easy way you can tell us what you enjoy most and what is most useful.

Adding sharing capabilities
After you say you like something, now you can easily retweet it, share it on facebook, and more.

Adding a Most Popular Posts feature
So you can easily see what others have found most interesting or useful. It’s based on the star-rating system so be sure to rate what you read!

Adding a Related Posts feature at the end of individual blog posts
So if you click on an individual post that you enjoy, you can easily be taken to others you will probably like too.

Adding a search bar
The site has grown a lot now, and we don’t want you to have to spend a lot of time looking for what you need.

Adding a Ray and G author account
So you can tell at a glance that the post was written by both of us, and/or so we don’t have to post two back to back entries about the same event from our different perspectives.

Adding a couple of videos and a YouTube account
Even the videos tab got some lovin. The slow internet in India is severely curtailing our ability to add much in this arena right now, but there are a couple of short and very amusing videos of a few things that put life here in a 20-second-or-less nutshell for you, and you can now subscribe to our channel for easy access when we get the necessary bandwidth to add lots more.

Setting up an Amazon Affiliates account and linking our reviews
So you can make your purchases easily and even help out the site when you make your purchases at Amazon from our site.

Linking ALL photo albums to a blog post
No album exists all by its lonesome in cyberspace (or our gallery, anyway) anymore. Every album can be opened via its corresponding blog post, even dating back to the pre-trip days.

Updating The Trip description
We don’t have to defend our decisions to live out our dreams and our passions and pack up and go see amazing things anymore, and our new description reflects that. So does our state of being, at that.

Updating the Join Us! Page
Just a few small wording changes…but they’re there.

Updating the donate button text in the sidebar
Hey, the new text speaks for itself.

Making it no longer necessary to register to have your comments show up right away
You want to see your comments go through right away, and so do we. Registering with the site will still customize your experience more and make it better for you, but we’ll leave that up to you to discover.

Enabling photos to appear with your comments
Enter the email address you used to sign up for your Gravatar when you submit your comment and your picture will show up now too. If you don’t have a Gravatar, it’s quick, secure, free, and worth getting one! Please do! http://en.gravatar.com/

Linking to a fantastic ebook and fellow travel blogger whose work both inspired and assisted with countless things that are easily visible as well as behind the scenes
NomadicMatt’s ebook “How to Make Money with your Blog” has been instrumental in helping to get us going with a lot of the steps we’ve taken and we highly recommend it to anyone who would like to begin a blog with the aim of eventually making income with it, or to take their existing blog to the next level.

And, last but not least…in fact, probably biggest of all!

New name and new look
…So??? How do we look??!

Welcome to Operation Backpack Asia! is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

G first told me about couchsurfing a couple of years ago after she had used the site extensively in New Zealand and the Netherlands. The idea was simple. A person puts up a profile on couchsurfing.com that lists their city and various other personal info. Somebody that wants to travel to a particular town could hop on and find a Host offering their couch (or spare room) for the traveler to stay at free of charge. Similarly, for people who aren’t out traveling at the moment, or maybe can’t travel for whatever reason, but are interested in learning more about other cultures and sharing their own, connecting with new people, and showing a visitor around, it offers a way to continue to have a chance for cultural exchange, even when you are at home.

One of the most important features of this website is the ability for individuals to place references on other peoples’ profiles. Surfers could ‘vouch’ for hosts and hosts could ‘vouch’ for surfers. Since its inception, other forms of validation have also been added, like using a credit card or bank account to verify that you are indeed a real -and authorities detain-able- person. Having eased up ever so slightly about the notion, I decided to give it a look. After seeing our prospective host’s reference page of over 50 people (all leaving great remarks, and all who had good references themselves), I decided to give it a go. That decision proved to be one of the coolest experiences yet.

After some email correspondence on G’s part, we scheduled to stay with a fellow named Dhanna. He even said he would pick us up from the train station when we arrived in Jaisalmer.

Off the train, we were surrounded by touts, and I started to give them the Delhi-D (Delhi-Denial as G and I refer to it) when I saw a guy, about our age, holding up a sign that said “Welcome G.” With a sudden shift from the Delhi-D behavior, I greeted him. We had found Jamin, Dhanna’s brother, who helped us with our bags, and got us into (and paid for) a rickshaw to the fort of Jaisalmer.

Within moments we were at the front door steps of Ishar Palace, and found Dhanna sitting behind a reception table. We introduced ourselves, and he welcomed us into his guesthouse while Jamin went out to grab us some “welcome drink” sodas. Dhanna apparently had two guesthouses. One guesthouse was for paying customers, and this one was used, almost primarily, for couchsurfers. Since it was still a guesthouse we had to check in (for legal reasons), and were then showed our room.

After situating ourselves, we went up top to catch a glimpse of the fort from the roof. This is where we met Hannah, a couchsurfing Irish girl, and Andy, a British fellow staying at a guesthouse a little down the way. They were sitting on some cushions underneath a colorful tarp when we introduced ourselves. After a few minutes of chatting, G and I took in the gorgeous scenery and then went downstairs to get lost in the 800-year-old fort.

During our time with Dhanna, I had more of an introduction to Indian culture than I had seen since arriving. He graciously answered any of our questions, taboo or not, about his culture. This was the first time we felt free to ask about the Indian caste system, and we learned far more than we could have imagined. From him, we booked our camel safari and our bus ticket to Jodhpur, and learned of another couchsurfer in Jodhpur that we could stay with. He even helped me find, and have customized, a camel-leather briefcase I had been looking for since arriving in Rajasthan. The experience was extremely rewarding, and Dhanna and his brother had everything to do with it. Sadly, our time in Jaisalmer seemed to rush by up until the end when we didn’t get a chance to say goodbye to Dhanna as we raced to the bus stand (we had to catch the bus earlier than we thought in order to arrive at the next host’s place at a decent hour).

It was sad to leave such a warm home, but I was infinitely more happy to learn that in a place so crowded, and with so much poverty and so many scams, you could still find nice and extremely generously people to learn and grow from. That was the couchsurfing experience. It was my FIRST couchsurfing experience and it had allowed me to stay with locals inside an 800 year-old fort. I was blown away.

We waved goodbye to Jamin and to Jaisalmer as we rushed to the stand in a rickshaw. Now sold on the idea of couchsurfing, I was looking forward to meeting Ramniwas, in Jodhpur, for my second couchsurfing stay.

You can see where we stayed in the photos of Jaisalmer and also check out the photos of the Jain temple that was also inside the Jaisalmer fort with us.

I sleep with people for free, or: My first experience Couchsurfing is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

The warp-7 went on for about ten minutes before we slowed down again, and it was just in time to see some wild antelope running off in the distance. We caught a couple more glimpses of antelope herds before we reached the dunes and settled down for an evening under the stars.

With just enough daylight left, G and I frolicked in the sand, taking pictures of the serenity and eventually the sunset. The dunes stretched about a half a mile, and were surrounded by a more familiar landscape of cactus and desert foliage. This gave us very picturesque portrait studio to work with.

As the day came to a close, and the stars started to peek through the curtain of night, we all sat around the fire, drinking chai and awaiting another Rajasthani meal. During this time we were joined by Dhanna, our CS host, and Hannah, a fellow couch surfer.

Having eaten about 5 chapatis, a plate full of rice, and a splash of lentils (called dhal), I’d had my fill. The evening was starting to come to a close. G and I, situated on a blanket around the fire, laid down and watched the night sky while our guides entertained. Breaking into song, our guides started to dance, bobbing up and down and making wave like motions with their hands. It was only after two songs that another guide from a nearby camp came within shouting distance to yell at our cheery entertainers. I couldn’t understand the Hindi that was being shouted, but the expression change on the most vibrant guide’s face said it all. One moment he was grinning brightly ear to ear singing a traditional Rajasthani tune, and the next he was sitting legs crossed on his blanket with shadows covering his face. All was soon silent, and we were sent to bed with two sheets. A thinner one to lay on, and a thicker one to pull over us.

Laying down fully clothed helped a bit, but the desert got chilly. It was a night of little sleep, and we awoke many times to the cold, only to try and clutch one another for warmth. [ngfilename filename='P1110451.JPG' float=right w=240 h=180] Just before sunrise, G decided to get up to make use of our outdoor studio. Grudgingly I followed, barely awake, only to be scared half to death by one of the camels who had decided to sleep five feet from me. Looking back down the hill we just climbed, we saw that our camp was still fast asleep while the two nearby camps were up and moving around. It was perfect timing since the sun hadn’t yet started to peek above the horizon. G got the spectacular three minutes on video for the lazy few still stuck in their Zs.

About half an hour later, our camp decided to make use of the light. The eight of us, including Dhanna and Hannah, huddled around a serving blanket where chai, toast and jam, boiled eggs, and papaya were served. After breakfast, Dhanna and Hannah decided to head back to the fort, but their jeep, unfortunately, wouldn’t start. A majority of the group got behind it, and tried to jump start the engine by pushing it along. Nothing happened. A few more people gathered around the jeep and we pushed again with more force. With a “putt putt putt VROOM” the jeep’s engine started, and we waved goodbye to Dhanna and Hannah.

Since the novelty of riding a camel had worn off after the first day, the group, almost unanimously, decided to reach our destination the ‘fast way.’ Some of us were unaware that this would result in a sustained gallop, and soon realized that ‘fast’ might not have been the best description to use!

While this was fun, it was exceedingly hard to try and direct the camel without any proper instruction. Having only just received the reins for the first time, I started waving the rope around, throwing my left-hand’s portion up above the camel’s head and then doing the same with my right-hand’s portion. Understandably, the camel had no idea what to do, so he started to gallop in whichever direction he saw fit. After the guides caught up to me, and my eyeballs were carefully seated back in their sockets, I was reintegrated into the camel conga line for the remainder of the journey.

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Lunch again was served under an enormous tree and consisted of chapati, instant noodles, curry, and chai. Since we chose the fast route, we had plenty of time after lunch to rest in the shade before our jeep back to the fort arrived. Realizing the coolness of the trip, and taking a final few pictures of the silly camel faces, we departed our friendly animals in favor of a shower and bed.

Be sure to check out the photos of Day 2 of the camel safari.

Warp-speed camel to the dunes! is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

The last, and youngest camel, was still in training, and found the discomfort of the saddle and the piled-on blankets to be disagreeable. He made all of us very aware of his situation by bellowing a series of loud and disapproving groans. It reminded me somewhat of an adolescent talking back to their parents with each audible noise translating to “I don’t wanna.” After about five minutes, the reality set in. The young one was “coming with us whether he liked it or not.” Further complaints would continue to be made known throughout the remainder of the trip from this guy – loudly.

Looking around at the terrain, it was, by definition, a desert. There were cactus, and there were desert trees. Oddly enough, it looked a lot like Tucson. Down to a cactus that looked very similar to a cholla, and a tree that was strikingly similar to a mesquite (including the nasty thorns). After taking in the scene, camels in the foreground and desert spanning miles, we all grabbed our thrones upon the camels.

When I went to mount my camel, I found that he was so tall I had to kick the sky to get on. I basically touched my left foot’s toes with my left hand, while swinging my right foot in a motion that almost hit the nearby camel guide. Feeling a bit sheepish by my maneuver, a motion which my groin had an exceeding distaste for, I repositioned and was centered upon my brown desert beast. Seconds later, the camel rocketed into a standing position. His back legs went forward first and resulted in a quick jerk that almost knocked me forward onto his neck. Then, as his front legs got up, I was sent flying backward in another jerk with as much abruptness as an unexpected incline on a roller coaster. Readjusting my hat, and loosening the death-grip on my saddle, I was ready to go. It took a minute for everybody else to assume their riding positions, and, as scary as it was, I tried hard to hold back my laughter as each person held on with a look of terror as their beasts got up.

[ngfilename filename='P1110188.JPG' float=left w=240 h=180]Moments later, we were trotting along. The desert wind was in my face reminded me of home. Though, as much as it did, I don’t ever recall being able to ride a camel in any of our deserts. Especially not for a meager $14 a day! Our first stop on the trek put us at a mud hut (home rather, it was much bigger than a hut) out in the middle of nowhere. Staring blankly at each other, G and I, and our fellow tourists got off our camels and had a look around. It was more of our guides’ wishes than ours to stop there, but we obliged.

Walking into the front yard of this mud gated home, we got to see firsthand what a desert person does. There was the quintessential half-naked baby in a cradle, and a child, barely walking age, being watched by his mother. Both stared at us as we walked the front yard scrambling for a bit of shade. We eventually found some under their thatched roof porch. After about five minutes of awkward stares, and being ushered to ‘take pictures’ (of what?) we hurried along back to our camels. After a quick couple of jerks, which are much more tolerable when you know they are coming, we were back trotting along.

The novelty lasted for quite some time, but quickly started to wear off as a punishing soreness began to creep in along the inner thighs. Thankfully, we stopped for lunch just before my loins really started to complain. The guides had chosen a spot underneath a very large tree and, after a moment of gathering firewood, began to cook right up next to it. Within a couple of moments we were all served a cup of freshly cooked chai. [ngfilename filename='P1110220.JPG' float=right w=240 h=180] A few minutes later we were given our first plate of food. The dish was an interesting plate of what seemed like malt-o-meal. I’m sure there is a more accurate description for such a thing, probably something with a more desert-sounding name, but we were more interested in how the six of us were going to eat it with two spoons and one plate. After asking for some more spoons (they only gave us two more, but close enough) we started tackling the grit-like substance using the previously chai-filled cups as bowls. It was sweet like the green corn you’d have in a tamale, and it had about the same consistency.

Next up was a dish one of our guides called ‘chips’. Andy, a British fellow, asked “American style chips, or British style chips?” to which I, looking at the plate, proclaimed, “Neither.” It was an interesting sort of fried substance that G now describes as “crunchy.”

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Last up was the typical Rajasthani meal: curry and chapati. The curry had bits of vegetable that I couldn’t recognize, but I think were okra. It also had a slightly bitter taste which evened out the bland chapati for a rather tasty meal. If you were one of the courageous few you would have also agreed to ‘some spicy’ in the form of ‘pickle.’ Pickle, as you might assume being a westerner, is not actually the friendly cucumber-turned-deliciousness we all know and love. Instead, it is a condiment born of the seventh circle hell fires that, I think, is used to put westerners in their place when they request “spicy.” Surely no dish could possibly be enjoyed as it singes lips and mouths for tens of minutes. After agreeing to a small, and I mean small, spoonful of ‘pickle’, I frantically guzzled half my liter of water.

About an hour later, things were packed up, mouth-fires were extinguished, we mounted our camel-steeds, and were on our way to the dunes.

Come see the photos of Day 1 of the camel safari.

Mammal travel get on your camel! Goin’ on Camel Safari in the deserts of Jaisalmer… is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

Despite the warnings of other travelers, we initially looked into a two-night trip. One night would encompass the pure tourist attraction of staying in a fully-furnished tent or in a traditional mud hut while the last night would plop us in the middle of a secluded Rajasthani desert for an evening under the stars. The research, however, proved the two-night trip to be far more expensive than what we originally planned. So, to avoid the extra expense, we settled on one night of seclusion under the stars.

After a quick breakfast of curd and tea, we were whisked away, Indian fashion (like sardines), in a small jeep-like car. While the locals might have stuffed 10 or 12 people in this space, we only managed 8. That was still more than enough for the 6-person capacity vehicle we actually had. At least this allowed for a very ‘intimate’ (arms in face, feet on feet) atmosphere to get to know our fellow travelers….

Before going to meet and greet our camels, there were a couple of tourist sites to stop at along the way. The first site was a sort of cemetery for the Maharajahs of old. There was an entry fee of 50 rupees per person as well as a camera charge that caused everybody but G and I to stay in a safe fee-free zone. But we figured that’s what we were here for, so we paid and went to check it out.

[ngfilename filename='p1110106.jpg' float=left] G and I walked around the site, and while I fiddled with the GPS, G took some awesome pictures. The architecture and carvings around the epitaphs were absolutely stunning. It amazes me still how something so exquisite could be done with a chisel and hammer, and, in some instances, a chisel alone!

Unfortunately, the epitaphs were all in Hindi, so it left us wondering what they said.

The next couple of stops were a couple of Jain temples, a ghost town, and a painted village. Now, I must say that once you see one Jain temple in the middle of the desert, you’ve seen them all. However, the one G and I looked forward to most housed a famous BEARDED black cobra. This fabled cobra is said to be a reincarnated priest who continues to look after the temple.

We have heard that the cobra does indeed have a beard, and we have also heard that he actually has an oh-my-god-it’s-not-still-the-80s hairdo. [ngfilename filename='p1110135.jpg' float=right] Imagination going wild after hearing the stories, six of us huddled around a small hole in the side of a beautifully carved Jain temple, all trying to catch a glimpse.

For the first couple of minutes we all stood looking at the hole. After that, and for the next 10 minutes, we individually walked the complex, went back to the hole, walked the complex, and then checked one last time. We were all a little disappointed, but we hopped back in the jeep and were on the road to the ghost town, knowing that at least a bearded cobra exists. Rest assured, I’ll be keeping my eyes peeled for any type of hair-sprouting reptile for the remainder of our trip!

The ghost town was situated out in the middle of nowhere, and sat as a huge pile of rubble where houses once stood. It was a village long since deserted, but whose story is that of campfire legends:

It is said that long ago, there was a politician with an insatiable lust. He took a young girl every night for carnal pleasure, and, when the night was over, had the girl executed. As it had happened elsewhere many times before, the politician visited this village and found a particular female to fulfill his carnal desires. Fortunately for the girl, the family caught wind of the politician’s plans. They conspired with all the villagers to pick up and leave town before the politician returned to steal their daughter. Having to desert town on such little notice, the villagers left most of their belongs behind. However, before vacating the town, the villagers placed a curse on it. Anybody who removed an item would be dealt a sad ending.

[ngfilename filename='p1110166.jpg' float=left width='300'] As with all ghost stories, I took it with a grain of salt (but quietly hoped we’d find an interesting treasure). We were deposited at the surrounding wall of the now crumbled town, and walked among the rubble. Cactus, sandstone, goats, and sheep were all that could be seen, but a certain eeriness remained as we walked the village roads. It was like an echo from the past that bounced off the sandstone walls.

After searching a couple of would-be rooms and imagining the grandeur that once was, I started to head back. I was caught off guard by how far I had walked and was amazed at how far the town stretched. I could only begin to imagine how it must have looked when people filled the streets with fruit carts or craft shops. I climbed back into the jeep, and we were on our way to the last stop: the painted village.

The jeep stopped in the middle of a small “village” that contained about six mud huts. On the right, three of the mud huts were painted with floral designs, and surrounded by a three-foot tall, similarly painted, wall. On the left were some plain mud huts of equal design, but lacking the colorful exterior. At this point I think we were all a bit more excited about the camel part of our safari so we only spent a couple of minutes looking at the village from a distance before piling back into our vehicle.

After about 20 minutes of driving we stopped, and met our seven groaning camels.

Before you grab a hump and hop on, take a pre-camel desert tour through the cenotaphs, Lodhruva – home of the bearded cobra, and the abandoned village in the pre-camel safari tour photos.

Beep beep all aboard the fun jeep! is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia

After we’d had enough camels (like THAT’S possible!), we got dropped off by our rickshaw at the station as planned and happily, the driver didn’t try to extort an additional fare as we feared he would, feigning ignorance to the fact that we had in fact wanted to go to the world-famous rat temple in Deshnok, not…some random building in the middle of the desert with three rats. So no harm no foul, and we thanked him for the rides –and made mental notes to ourselves that despite rickshaws being fun to ride, two hours in a row is a bit much- got our train tickets with considerably less fuss than it took in Agra, and readied ourselves for Jaisalmer. An overnight camel safari in the desert sand dunes awaited, as well as our first couchsurfing experience in Asia – and Ray’s first one ever.

It was something he’d once considered with a sort of horror – trust…a STRANGER?? Why would anyone let you stay with them for free? They must want something from you. I had had some great experiences with couchsurfing all around the world since the site first started up several years ago. I had found that people do let you stay with them for free, but they DO want something from you – the chance to show some hospitality to a visitor and guest, and some cross-cultural exchange. I’d stayed everywhere from a mattress on the floor in a basement in Rotterdam (but with fresh sheets and blankets!) to a van going through New Zealand with a Finnish guy who had broken his back and was never supposed to walk again (but does!) to an air mattress on the floor of the newly-moved-into apartment of Mansquito himself, and I had some really interesting, different, offbeat experiences (and friends!) to show for it. I hoped Ray’s experiences with CS would prove as different, unusual, and interesting-friend yielding. But…this is India.

With any plan, like a rickshaw ride through the city, you can really only just close your eyes and hope for the best.

But check out the album of the Bikaner Camel Research and Breeding Farm first!

So Much for Our Perfectly-Timed Arrival to the Camel Farm! is a post from: Backpacking Travel Stories from Asia