Eric Rockey's RTW Trip

Chandigarh

2009-11-12T23:47:00.000-08:00

After Srinagar, I flew to Jammu, and took the train to the modern city of Chandigarh. A little adventure on the train - couldn't book any seats so I ended up in a 2nd class chair car, sharing a long bench with about 5 other people on an overnight trip. Although uncomfortable and sleepless (I envy some Indians' ability to sleep in nearly any situation), this turned out to be one of the most incredible train rides I've had. You were forced to get to know the people around you, and everyone was so caring and bent over backwards to help each other. This young guy across from me, after putting up a little fuss for letting this poor old grandma share his extremely small sitting space, doted on her the entire trip. He would push others out of the way to give her room, and help hold her stuff. I made friends with a couple of Sikh military guys who were on some special forces in Jammu (also a heavy security area).

Chandigarh is a very unusual Indian city. It was planned by the French architect Le Corbusier in the 1950s as a symbol of the new, post-Independence India and has many aspects of a modern, Western city. There are wide leafy avenues, a grid system, and a lot of malls. It's a strange juxtaposition to see what would look like any major arterial road in LA, lined with trees and grassy parking strips, with bicycle rickshaws and horse-draw carriages driving around.

Le Corbusier not only designed the city, but also contributed sculptures and architected many of its major buildings. The signature piece by him is the "Open Hand" sculpture, meant to symbolize the new, open, non-corrupt Indian society (though honestly it looks like someone is saying "talk to the hand").

Pretty much the only thing I did in Chandigarh besides go to malls was to check out Nek Chand's Rock Garden. Chand, who was a government official, surreptitiously created the garden in his spare time, starting in 1957 and using only garbage and industrial waste. The authorities discovered it in 1975 and it's become a big attraction since then. The garden is huge, and contains thousands and thousands of sculptures of people, animals, gods, and amorphous blobs of concrete and tile. Tori, this is another place I think you would love.

Srinigar

2009-11-12T20:28:00.000-08:00

After a 19-hour bus ride, I always ask myself, "where's the angry mob to harass me?" Srinagar did not disappoint. Located in the perma-problem area of Kashmir, Srinagar has had its economy hit pretty hard by the instability, with many tourists avoiding the place due to the potential for violence (though there haven't been any attacks on tourists since the early nineties). So the locals were, um, very eager for our business when we got there. In fact, they mobbed us. As our bus arrived at the parking lot, some of them grabbed the door handles and tried to actually get in the bus. Failing that, they ran alongside the vehicle as it moved forward and parked.

The big draw in Srinagar is to get a houseboat out on Dal Lake. As we got off the bus, Erez and I found ourselves surrounded in a circle of aggressive touts trying to get us to go to their uncle's/brother's/cousin's houseboat. As you can imagine, after the long bus trip, we weren't exactly in peak condition for dealing with this. I think we kept our cool, and just said, "thanks but we are going to get a taxi and go look at houseboats ourselves," which did nothing, and lead to "please leave us alone". Eventually, the mob actually got angry with us for not engaging, and started yelling things like "Get out of Srinagar then!", which was a little creepy.

We finally made it to a taxi and of course, even he tried to get us to go see his father-in-law's houseboat! It was like in "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" when the fleeing characters finally find someone they think is still human, breath a sigh of relief, and then that person lets out the blood-curdling scream to alert the other aliens of their presence. FINE, we'll go see your father's/uncle's houseboat! So we rented a little water taxi to go see it and a few other choices, ending up taking another one.

Our houseboat was sweet - kind of like an auntie's victorian drawing room on the water, and we had the whole thing to ourselves. After our warm welcome to town, we didn't really feel like going to the mainland for the rest of the trip. The man who ran it was friendly but sad, cooked us delicious meals, and evidently played a the best banjo in the area.

The lake is one endlessly unfolding photo opportunity, with floating markets, well-dressed ladies floating by, little boat stores pulling up to see if you need anything, and lots of channels in the reeds you can paddle through and get lost in. Erez and I spent quite a bit of time just doing that.

The people reminded me a bit of those in Cambodia - there is a heaviness to them you can see in their eyes, from living through a prolonged period of violence and loss. Though very friendly once you get past the aggressive sales pitch.

After a couple of relaxing days, Erez took off to go to a Vipassana meditation retreat in Delhi, and I stayed on for a little while longer (shopping mostly), eventually flying to Jammu. The Srinagar airport was one of the most locked-down security zones I've ever been to. They search the entire car, inside and out, even underneath, before you are allowed to drive up. I was security scanned a two or three times in the airport itself.

Leh and the Dalai Lama

2009-09-24T22:46:00.000-07:00

Wow, it's been a long time since I've been able to blog! Been in some places where the internet was slow or non-existent. Here's a brief rundown of what I've been up to in the past few months:

Leh

Leh itself reminded me a lot of Tibet - whitewashed buildings built into the sandstone hills, a huge and vibrant Buddhist culture, chortens and gompas surrounding the city. It was much more developed for tourism than I expected, with an entire section of the town devoted to rows of garden restaurants featuring all your favorite Thai and Italian dishes.

The old market still had an atmosphere of a meeting place between cultures, and you could see native Ladakhis from all over the region mixing with Tibetans and Indians. I came during the Dalai Lama teachings, so many many people appeared to be making their annual trips to town to stock up on athletic shoes and other supplies (everybody seems to like Nike, even the monks).

For a traveler, Leh is mostly a base from which you can do excursions out into Ladakh. I can't picture staying very long in the town itself. I hurried to Leh to see the Dalai Lama at the nearby Tibetan refugee colony. This was one of the most amazing experiences of my trip. There were between 20,000 and 30,000 local Ladakhis and Tibetans at the large outdoor field, all in a peaceful and joyful atmosphere.

Native Buddhism was said to have disappeared in India before the Tibetans sought refuge here in the 1950's, but that's not really true for Ladakh (it wasn't really part of India until the 20th Century). It has had a thriving Tibetan-style Buddhist culture throughout. So for the Dalai Lama to show up here is like the Pope coming - it's the biggest event of the year. Entire extended families walked or climbed aboard seriously overstuffed buses to make it out to the 4 day teaching - every day was like a huge pilgrimage.

It was incredible to be able to sit in the Dalai Lama's presence for such a long period of time and hear him teach, but I found myself more amazed by the crowd I was surrounded by and the intense devotion that pervaded the place. I had some great meditations sitting on the lawn with them for hours, and met some cool Buddhists from around the world. I made friends with this guy from Israel, Erez, and we decided to do some excursions together when the teachings were over.

Renting bikes (and teaching Erez how to drive a motorcycle), we headed out on a series of three trips to see local monasteries, ruins and remote villages. The first day we went out to Shey Palace, an old home of the Ladakhi royal family and the incredible Tikse Monastery, me riding an Enfield for the first time (kinda like an Indian Harley - very butch).

One of the highlights of Ladakh is that the Buddhist monasteries and temples are so well-preserved, having avoided the upheavals of those in Tibet. Tikse had a wonderful atmosphere about it and we were tempted to come back and stay a night at the monastery.

Next up was Alchi, a very old Buddhist monastery and temple, with some of the oldest and best preserved Buddhist paintings in Asia. The place itself was a bit underwhelming, but the drive out and back was spectacular - going through enormous winding valleys and flat, barren plains.

Finally we drove over the highest motorable pass in the world (which evidently is up for debate) to Nubra Valley, a little oasis in the high altitude desert served by a couple of rivers. Erez and I had an excellent time driving the bikes (though his first gear decided to stop working at the big pass and he had to push it Flintstones-like with his feet to get going into 2nd).

We continued to travel together out of Leh, on the 19-hour bus trip to Srinigar. People say the Manalai-Leh route is worse but I'd lay my money on this one. The roads wash out and are unpassable every winter and have this feeling of being barely patched together enough for the trucks and buses to get over them for the rest of the season. After hours of this (including another roadblocking landslide!) suddenly the scenary changes and we found ourselves in green, beautiful Kashmir. Lush and full of a surprising number of goats.

Manali - Leh Highway

2009-09-22T07:24:00.000-07:00

The highway between Manali and Leh is famously bad - a 20 hour slog on pavement that is almost impossible to maintain given the punishing elements. It's closed a good part of the year for this reason. The first three hours out of Manali going over the first pass lived up to the hype. The road was so full of potholes and big stones that it felt like an amusement park ride gone terribly wrong. Another 17 hours of that would have been pretty tough, but thankfully after we got over the pass the road improved considerably. I mean, it was still 20 hours in a jeep, but other than that...

And the scenery was truly unbelievable - some of the best I have seen on my entire trip. My pictures unfortunately don't do it justice as I missed some of the fantastic parts: huge fields of fairy chimneys carved out of the rock, and enormous ornate "palaces" that looked man-made but were far too large, being slowly revealed by sand eroding away from the stronger rock underneath. The colors of the different minerals and the scrub grass made mountain-sized designs that followed the melting paths of the snow. On other hills, different sedimentary layers had been pushed around by geographic forces, and forced into wave or even swirl patterns. This landscape was similar to the Mustang area of Nepal or the Tibetan Plateau, but with more beauty and diversity.

For most of the way, there were no villages at all to speak of. We stopped for meals in these little tent restaurants that had been set up on the side of the road - if you asked them where the bathroom was they just giggled and pointed to the hillside. The trip went by fine (a bit dusty perhaps - that swine flue mask the Tibetan lady gave me came in handy) until about the last hour, when some food in my stomach felt like it was planning to make an exit in any number of directions. Luckily right then a nice Belgian guy traded me his super comfy seat, and as I started to doze off my symptoms almost completely disappeared. Proving once again that most things are just in my head...

Manali

2009-09-13T03:01:00.000-07:00

After Dharamsala I took a night bus to Manali. It's a bit of a crazy drive on a windy mountain road, and we were blocked in the middle of the night by a rockslide on the roadway. Looked liked we were going to be sleeping on the side of the road, but after about an hour and a half, enough drivers were fed up enough to start hauling the rocks away by hand. Then our driver accelerated and we drove (ye-haw Dukes of Hazzard-style) over the smaller pile of remaining rubble.

I only spent a couple of days there as I wanted to get up to Leh quickly to catch the Dalai Lama's teachings. Manali is a gorgeous area - lush, green, a few rivers flowing through, and lots of tucked away secluded guest houses. Mine was called the Rock Way and up on a cliff over one of the rivers, surrounded by gardens and fruit trees. You could totally hide out there for a week or two, reading and playing chess with the fiendishly good guest house manager. He would make a different fresh curry every night using stuff from his garden or wild mushrooms he found in the hills - delicious.

Manali also has the dubious honor of being both a big Indian middle-class tourist / honeymoon destination and a hippie backpacker hangout. It's a strange combination...

Leaving Dharamsala at last

2009-09-11T22:50:00.000-07:00

I spent about 7 weeks total in Dharamsala, during which time I kind of settled in a made myself at home. I stayed out in the quiet nearby village of Dharamkot, moving around between a few guesthouses but ending up staying at Paul House, which was run by my friend Naushad. One of the best parts about my time there was getting to spend so much time hanging out with him - he's really an amazing guy, and very focused and mature for 22 years old. I had visited him earlier in March of this year and he was just beginning to get the guest house and restaurant in shape - he had a lot of ideas for what he wanted to do to make it an inviting place to stay. Coming back it was great to see his vision become a reality.

Over course of the weeks I had a lot of different experiences. I took a couple weeks of Iyengar Yoga classes, some Indian cooking classes, and did a lot of hiking in the surrounding mountains. The monsoon was in the process of coming when I was there so it was always a crap shoot whether you were going to get dumped on. But my luck was surprisingly good and I was only caught outside a couple of times during the real deluges. On the Fourth of July there were some cool Americans at Paul House, Josh and Tristan, who happened to have a fireworks fetish, so we enjoyed some crazily powerful $2.50 rockets.

Most of the time I was there I found myself kind of unexpectedly working full time. I started volunteering at the ANEC Organization and redoing their website took a lot of time (plus I didn't really know what I was doing for a while). I even had a daily commute down the mountain into Dharamsala proper; it was an amazing walk through the forest and the central Tibetan government-in-exile buildings. The people were wonderful down there and we had a Tibetan cook come in every day to make us these great lunches. They even threw me a going away lunch with homemade momos (including sweet paneer ones).

When I wasn't down at ANEC, I was hurrying off to do a series of interviews with Tibetan refugees for a documentary project. As you may or may not know, in March 2008 there was one of the biggest series of protests in Tibet since 1959. It was brutally cracked down on by the Chinese. The stories of bravery and sacrifice I heard were inspiring and of course very sad.

I met a ton of great people during my stay - Levinia and Ross, Josh and Tristan, the two Ilans, Leighton, Kimberly, Susie, and randomly ran into my friend Christian who I had met at a yoga retreat in Nepal. I stayed longer than pretty much everyone else (except this Australian guy who I think was running from the law - shades of Shantaram!). After my last interviews wrapped up, it was clearly time to go.

What a good day looks like in India

2009-08-02T03:51:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago we had a total solar eclipse in these parts (not sure how much you could see it where you are). Turned out to be one of the best days I've had in India for a long time:

A group of us (Josh, Ilan, Ross, Levinia and myself) wake up at 4:30 am in Dharamkot to hike up and see the eclipse. After some difficult pre-caffeine discussion, we decide the view would actually be worse up in the mountains as they were enclosed in clouds. Instead we head down past McLeod Ganj to try to get a clearer view out in the open. The monsoon had been coming to the area and we'd had a couple of weeks of intermittent rains. It was pretty cloudy, so our chances of seeing the eclipse appeared slim.

We walk out the back road from McLeod and find a nice open part with very little around - basically in the middle of nowhere. A very closed-looking tea house is the only thing around. Still cloudy. We sit on a bench and wait for things to clear. One thing you can count on around here is the weather changing quickly. Suddenly out of the blue a taxi pulls up and this slightly drunk-looking Irishman jumps out. He offers to sell us some welder's glass to look at the eclipse, which is funny because I'd just been reading about that online and wishing I had some. Still very cloudy and no eclipse in sight, I optimistically plunked down 200 rupees (enough money for a very nice dinner) to get a piece. Everyone is looking at me like "I don't know, Eric".

As the taxi pulled away, as if on cue the sky gets very dark and it started pouring in that monsoon-y way I've never seen before this trip. It rains so hard that umbrellas make little difference - you get soaked from the water splashing up from the ground. We look around and there is an abandoned half-finished building nearby that happens to have a great balcony on it. We hurry up there, interrupting the morning routines of the Indian construction workers who are sleeping there. They don't seem to mind at all. We hang out on the balcony to wait out the rain and take photos.

After about a half hour the rain dies down but things are still overcast. Around that time an old man comes and opens the tea house. At this point we're pretty resigned that the eclipse is not happening, so we go down to see if we can get some tea and breakfast. The tea house is like a little wood cabin with huge stacks of egg crates as the only decoration. After a lot of back and forth with the owner, we realize that aloo paratha (like a thick potato naan) and plain omelettes are the only things on the menu ("scrambled eggs?", "no", "fried eggs?", "no", "masala omelette?", "no", etc). Takes a while but by the time they come they are some of the best food I've had in a long time. Doughy eggy goodness (plus having been up for almost 4 hours didn't hurt).

We're happy sitting there eating, and forgetting all about the eclipse. Then one of us looks back out the window and says, "Hey, the sun's out!" We all look and the clouds have parted just enough to see the sun. No moon though, so we are wondering if we had missed the eclipse. Then I hold up the welders glass to the sun, and whoa, there it is! Like a magic trick. Not a total eclipse because I think we were a little late (and Dharamsala wasn't on the direct path anyway). But very cool to see.

The clouds stayed away for just long enough for us to go outside, take turns with the welder's glass, and get some photos through it as well. Then, just like that, they closed back up and the sun was gone. We felt extremely lucky for those few minutes!

After that we hiked up the back side of the Dalai Lama's temple, and walked along the kora, or religious path. It started to drizzle again and just as the rain was really letting loose, we came to a big rain shelter with a couple of small shrines in it. We stayed out of the rain with a bunch of Tibetans who had been walking the kora as well, and after about a half hour made it the rest of the way around.

I spent the rest of the day getting a Tibetan massage (this guy really knows how to stretch out your back and neck and has helped my back pain go away), and then heading down to Dharamsala proper for my volunteering job down there. I'm working at ANEC, a non-profit which educates Tibetans on effective nonviolence resistance strategies. My main job is to redesign their website but since the power was out all afternoon, instead we had a great discussion on which strategies are appropriate for the Tibetan cause.

Later that night I saw Josh and Ilan off as they took the bus to Manali. All of us had been staying in Dharamkot for many weeks, so it was a bit sad to see them go. But we were in good spirits anyway because of our day. So that's what an excellent day in India looks like. Things rarely go as you expect them to, but somehow you end up with many beautiful moments that you are thankful for.

Dharamsala

2009-07-13T10:55:00.000-07:00

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Quick trip to Europe

2009-06-24T02:44:00.000-07:00

A couple of months ago I found a cheap ticket from Delhi to London, and decided to take a little detour from my Asia trip to visit some folks back in Europe. This turned out to be a bit of culture shock for me, for sure, and definitely a little more expensive than what I was accustomed to. Going into a coffee shop and paying more for a coffee as you'd pay for dinner over there takes a bit of getting used to.

I started in London on May 22nd, staying with my friends Mark and Lee. Another couple of friends, Gay and Troy (and their cute kids Havana and Hudson), happened to be coming over to London to visit. I surprised them by showing up at their hotel one day (I thought Gay was going to pass out from the shock). The five of us had a fun week of just hanging out, walking around town, and having some good meals together. Besides that I spent a lot of time getting a new camera. On my Tibet trip almost everyone else had a digital SLR and I could see the difference between the pictures they were getting and the ones I was with my lowly pocket Lumix (which is a great camera). So after much research and shopping I ended up with a Nikon D90. I'm not on a huge materialist kick right now (carrying my possessions on my back most of the time) but I am in gadget love with it.

After London, I flew to the Czech Republic to visit my friend David, who I had met on my Annapurna trek in Nepal. I spent a few days staying with his wonderful family in Humpolec, which is a small village about an hour outside of Prague. We went around and saw some of the local castles and villages. I was also able to go to a bachelor party out in the woods for a friend of his and experience some real Czech camping cuisine (it's a blur of sausages and beer at this point).

I was surprised at how expensive trains are in Europe and how cheap it is to fly. Most of my jumps between places were by EasyJet for about $70, but I did find a reasonable train ticket from Prague to Berlin, my next destination. Really loved Berlin - it's a relatively inexpensive place for people to live right now, so there is a vibrant arts scene going on and lots of young people from across Europe. I wandered around looking at galleries, stopping at cafes, and going out quite a bit. Mark's friend Allesandro took my out one night to a hipster East Berlin gay bar that was huge amount of fun. The picture above is of the new Holocaust Memorial near the Brandenburger Tor.

Next up was Amsterdam, where my friend Jordi and my meditation teacher Mark both live. I stayed for a night with Jordi at her brother's girlfriend, Gwendolyne's apartment, right on the Amstel River.

Then Jordi set me up with the coolest place to stay so far on my trip: a shipping container that her brother Ivar was renting but not staying in. Amsterdam has a major housing shortage right now, so these containers are used as temporary housing for students. They stack a bunch of the containers up on top of each other and add some basic scafolding to get around on them. The insides are like little IKEA showrooms, with full kitchens and bathrooms. My neighbors were the Hells Angels, who evidently have been heavily involved in some shady dealings in Amsterdam's red light district.

Amsterdam is one of the easiest cities to get around I've ever been in. As long as you don't try to drive - there are very few parking places anywhere in the city and it costs like 5 Euros an hour to park. It's the ideal place to ride a bike though - completely flat and compact. You can basically get across the city on a bike in less than 1/2 hour. I rented a bike and felt an incredible sense of freedom.

I was able to spend a lot of time with both Jordi and Mark. Jordi and I cooked a big Indian dinner for about 14 people (that took about 2 days) and Mark had a special meditation and teaching session on night when I was in town.

The last weekend I was there, Jordi and her friends took me down to Paris for an impromptu road trip. Lots of quality wandering around and I was able to charge up on steak tartare and roast duck before returning to my vegetarian ways in India.

My last couple of days were spent chilling out at my friends Shannon and Richard's house in Egham, back in England. I also met up in London with my friend Pete from the Tibet trip. Refilled on ear plugs, moisturizers and shampoo, I was ready for Asia again. Thanks to everyone for the hospitality in Europe!

Lhasa

2009-06-14T04:42:00.000-07:00

After Gyanze, the next day we drove for about 5 hours into Lhasa itself. I had heard reports that Lhasa was disappointing and that much of the culture was gone, but I found it a rich and fascinating place. It was easy to get off the main drag a bit, duck into a Tibetan tea house, and have a real encounter with Tibetans. I made a couple Tibetan friends this way, which really opened up the city for me.

The official tour lasted for two more days in Lhasa, and was packed seeing the major sights of the city. The first day we went to the iconic Potala Palace, which looms above the city and is the universal symbol of Lhasa. It used to be the residence of the Dalai Lama, but obviously that's not an option anymore, so it has been turned into a sort of museum. Though definitely not a living religious place, the riches and history contained inside are pretty amazing. There is just room after room of Buddha statues, huge and ornate tombs of previous Dalai Lamas, libraries of ancient Buddhist scriptures, and the preserved living quarters of the Dalai Lama.

Next up was the Jokhang Temple. This is the spiritual heart of the city. Although the interior had been mostly destroyed by the Cultural Revolution and was rebuilt basically new, it is still immensely important to the Tibetan people.

There was always a group of people performing prostrations on the pavement in front of the temple, and the central kora around the temple was constantly full of devout Tibetans swinging their prayer wheels. The people watching was just out of this world - Tibetans from all of the different regions, each with their unique traditional clothes: Kham, Ando, and others. I found myself returning again and again to this area to soak up the atmosphere (and eat some great mo-mos).

The final day of the tour we went to the two major monasteries near Lhasa: Drepung and Sera. These were largely rebuilt after the Cultural Revolution as well, so it was less interesting to me to see the temples themselves. We were able to see the debating monks at Sera, who were much more animated and exciting to watch than those at the earlier monastery in Shigatse.

The last night of the tour, a bunch of us went clubbing to celebrate our friend Art's birthday. Going out in Lhasa was like nothing I've ever seen - though I think it was more of a Chinese experience than a Tibetan one. The first place we went had a huge stage where professional performers would come out and sing karaoke songs to us (my group went wild when this Chinese guy sang the 4 Non-Blondes song, "What's Going On", and "La Isla Bonita"). The karaoke was interspersed with large dance numbers featuring a ton of people in ethnic costumes, and also Chinese line-dancing where the audience came up on stage. We all went up to dance to one number and the police evidently came in and surrounded the stage - don't know what that was about.

The next place was more of a proper dance club, complete with stripper poles, rapping Chinese girls, and a ladyboy dancer behind the dj. I found myself dancing with a good-looking, extremely tall Chinese guy (as tall as me, how refreshing!) though he was too hyper of a dancer and I had to step off. At the end of the night there was a tent set up outside the club where you could have anything you imagined fried up: pork, chicken, liver, yak (of course), cauliflower, corn, etc. A little (deep-fried) slice of heaven.

After the tour ended and I slept off my hangover, I spent the next few days on my own exploring the city. I made friends with a super-nice guy, Pon Tsok, who made Tibetan tapestries. I would go and visit him every morning in his shop and he would practice his English on me while feeding me tsampa and pouring me an ungodly amount of tea. To eat tasmpa, you start with barley flour and add a little yak butter tea to it. Then you work it with your fingers into a ball of dough and put it in your mouth. Not bad, though messy for the clumbsy Western fingers. Pon Tsok invited me to his English class one night, which was fun. I had other students passing me notes asking me to define what penquins and dolphins were (not sure if my drawing of a penguin helped - I think they thought it was a duck). After class a bunch of them took me out to dinner to practice more English.

One my final day before I took off, I took a taxi out to the Ganden Monastery, about an hour outside of town. My taxi driver stopped off at a store to buy some juice and fruit, which seemed like a bit of a strange time to do some grocery shopping. Turns out that he's friends with the head lama at the monastery, and brought the food up to him as an offering. He led me into the lama's private apartment and I was able to have an audience with him for over 2 hours! This was the most amazing experience of the trip. The lama didn't speak much English, but we were able to communicate fairly well with gestures and a few words. He was very curious about life in America, and had such a joyful presence that I enjoyed simply being around him. His assistant cooked a delcious meal of stirfried vegetables and tofu, which I shared with the lama, the assistant and my taxi driver.

Afterwards, I walked around the monastery, which though much has been rebuilt, still shows the ruins of buildings that had been destroyed by the Chinese. Very sobering to see this reminder of what happened across the country to nearly all of the monasteries.

I was reminded throughout my trip, but especially in Lhasa, that this was a country under occupation. Many small groups of Chinese soldiers marched around the city center making their presence known - you would run into them every few minutes. I talked to a number of monks and other folks during the tour, and was frequently made aware of the threat of speaking out against the Chinese government, even among friends. One monk at a monastery knew no English but was quite good at pantomime. He mimed a monk talking too much, and then being led off in handcuffs. Other folks I talked to in a restaurant pointed at the ceiling and made the "shhhh" sign - there were microphones everywhere. I was told that the police had a habit of suddenly showing up and carting someone off if they talked about the Dalai Lama or the current political situation.

Another monk pointed at numerous places around a monastery, make a flattening motion with his hand indicating buildings being destroyed, and say one word: "Mao". Someone else told me of the visa system for monks: I was wondering why so few monks were living at the recently renovated monasteries, and it turns out it is because you need to be granted a "monastery visa" by the Chinese government. So the number of monks is strictly controlled, as is their make-up. We heard stories of informant monks who were planted by the Chinese inside of the monasteries.

All the while that the Tibetans communicated these stories of terrible destruction and repression to us, their eyes gleamed with good humor and happiness. Such was the contrast I saw over and over, where Tibetans would bear witness to the awful things that had happened to their country, but endure their hardship with pride and grace.

On the flight back to Kathmandu I randomly ran into two Austrian guys who had rescued me when I fell ill on the trail of the Helambu Trek in Nepal. A cool coincidence and good to catch up. We flew over the Himalayas and had a close, clear view of Mt. Everest as a conclusion to the trip.

On the road to Lhasa

2009-06-08T03:56:00.000-07:00

Tibet only recently opened after being closed to tourists due to the one-year anniversary of the unrest that occurred there last spring. When the ban was lifted, in typical fashion, China issued a press release saying that visitors had never been barred from entering the area in the first place! Things are pretty locked down right now and the only way to gain entry is to go on an organized tour. I booked the standard 8-day overland tour from Kathmandu, and was able to extend my stay for a few days afterwards in Lhasa. The trip had a great mix of people, most of whom were backpackers who would never of their own free will go on an organized tour.

We started early in the morning from Kathmandu and reached the border after about 4 hours driving along a windy mountain road. It took about a half hour to get through the Nepal side, and another 3 hours on the Chinese side. The swine flu scare had just hit and there was a hastily set up health checkpoint where we all had to get our temperature taken (and answer some questions about our health: were we "snivelling"? How about "psychotic"?). I was surprised by how disorganized it all was - I was expecting some kind of severe efficiency.

In a strange, welcome-to-Tibet moment, while it had been sunny when we went into the border crossing building, we came out into torrential rain. Our tour guide hurriedly divided us 4-at-a-time into Land Cruisers, which are the standard form of transportation in this area of the world. Evidently the roads used to be really bad around there but other than the first half day they turned out to be nice and new. China is investing a lot in infrastructure, at least on the route from Nepal. After some road construction delays, we pulled into a basic hotel in a truck stop of a town late at night.

The next morning, after a breakfast of omelettes and Tibetan bread, we set out. The goal for that day was to make it to the small town of Lhatse. We climbed for a couple of hours through the mountains, crossed the very high (5,400m) Lalung-La pass, and found ourselves on the Tibetan Plateau. The scenery was unbelievable - flat barren plains for miles around, and mountains in all directions in the distance. The sky was enormous.

We stopped for lunch in a small village, and had our first real encounters with Tibetan culture. The people were extremely friendly, though shy and not terribly fond of having their picture taken. The women wore colorful patterned skirts and generally frumpy sweaters and jackets. The men dressed ruggedly in dark greys and purples, and had a bit of a cowboy look with wide-brimmed hats and boots. Horses and ox-drawn carts were common, as were enormous tractor-pulled flat beds.

At lunchtime, we made the decision to continue on past Lhatse to spend the night in Shigatse, which was originally supposed to be our stop for the third night. This was great news, as I'd heard reports about how gross the hotel in Lhatse was supposed to be. Along the way, the Himalayas were in the distance, and were even able to see Mt. Everest (looked pretty small from there). After a brief stop in Lhatse to check it out, we continued on. It was in Lhatse where I noticed the strange effect my height had on people up there. The difference between my height and the average Tibetan´s was even greater than in India and Nepal. I attracted a giggling crowd of kids who couldn't stop pointing at me. This would become a bit ridiculous by the time I got to Lhasa! Nearly everyone would look at me, smile and chuckle, and often comment to me about how big I was. It was a good ice breaker if nothing else.

The rest of the day was a long drive through the plateau. We went through another mountain pass, and passed some nicely done-up yaks who were plowing a field. Our hotel in Shigatse was pretty plush - double rooms with a Western style bathroom complete with a bathtub. After dinner in a nearby restaurant, I called it a night, though evidently some others on the tour found a crazy karaoke nightclub. Shigatse was the first place where you could really see the extent of Chinese influence in Tibet. Tibet's second-largest city, it boasts a large, modern Chinese section of town, as well as a Tibetan old town. This pattern was repeated in the other cities we visited as well. The wealth on display in the Chinese area (huge stores full of motorbikes, appliances, etc) was in stark contrast to the modest means of most Tibetans we ran into. Many of the Tibetans had a weathered look about them, as if they had been through a lot of hardship, though almost universally the Tibetans had a cheerful attitude about them.

The next morning we visited the amazing Tashi Lhunpo Monastery, traditional home of the Panchen Lama. Monasteries in Tibet are bittersweet experiences, as many of them had been partially or completely destroyed by the Chinese during the excesses of the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s. Some had even been shelled by the Red Army, either during the initial takeover of Tibet in 1959 or later. In an ironic turn of events, Tibet has developed into a significant tourist draw for Chinese, and the reconstruction of the monasteries has been receiving quite a bit of funding. Many of the temples in the monasteries we visited were re-creations of the originals, including rebuilt Buddha statues and wall paintings. The main temple at Tashilhumpo, fortunately, had escaped destruction and we were able to view it as living and intact. Large bowls containing yak butter lamps illuminated an enormous Buddha overhead, as monks seated in one corner continuously chanted Buddhist prayers aloud.

We wandered through this and other temples at the monastery, before stumbling upon a courtyard where young monks were practicing their knowledge of Buddhist scriptures by debating. Some of the arguments would get pretty lively, and be emphasized by loud claps of hands followed by a pointed hand gesture as one of the monks asked or answered a key question. Towards the end of the debate session, monks appeared dressed in the yellow robes and large plumed hats of the Gelugpa Buddhist sect. Afterwards, we were lucky to be allowed to sit in the back of a gathering hall as the monks had their lunchtime meal of tsampa (barley flour dough with yak butter tea) and prayers. One monk was designated as the entertainment for the session, and would pace back and forth making jokes and comments, punctuated by more claps and pointing. We had a strong suspicion that many of the jokes (in Tibetan) were directed towards us, but still felt very priviledged to be able to watch this.

In the afternoon, the tour group split up, and I ended up having a great time checking out the area with Brit Pete Barlett. We completed the kora, or holy walking path, around the monastery and up into the hills, accompanied by an endless stream of local Tibetans. Also checked out the Tibetan old town, with its many white-washed houses and ornate wood-carved windows.

That night I had dinner with Raffaela from Italy, who was determined to try as many local specialities as possible - nearly all of which involved yak. It's hard to overstate how much yak is eaten up in Tibet. Luckily it's not that bad. Fairly close to beef unless you get some of the tougher parts. Raffaela ordered yak lung, and I ordered the rather pedestrian grilled yak. The waiter placed a dish in front of me, so I assumed it was my meal. After eating about a third of it, my grilled yak meal actually arrived and we realized I'd been tucking in to a big plate of lung! Kind of fatty, but otherwise pretty good.

On the grand scale of all things yak, yak cheeseburgers were the big winner, followed by yak steak, yak sizzler, and yak curry. At the other end of the spectrum would be yak butter tea, which is a staple drank often by most Tibetans. Salty, fatty and hard to describe, it doesn't taste at all like tea. The closest I can come is that it's like drinking a potato chip. I learned that if you finished a cup to be polite, Tibetan hospitality would ensure that your cup was quickly refilled again. So I had to avoid my natural tendency to clean my plate and empty my cup in order to avoid yak butter tea overload.

The next day we were off to the town of Gyanze, home of the Palcho Monastery. It seemed much less lively than the Tashi Lunpo Monastery, though I did get into a fight with a monk who wanted to make me pay twice to photograph inside the temple. Highlights were a cool, creepy room devoted to some of the darker Tantric deities, and the enormous Khumbum stupa. This is the largest stupa in Tibet - a nine story structure with over 70 different rooms full of paintings and sculptures of deities. It was pretty mind-boggling and beautiful. On top was a huge pair of Buddha eyes looking out on the nearby fortress.

Annapurna Circuit Trek: Dal Bhat, Apple Pie, and deep-fried Mars bars (oh, yeah, and the Himalayas)

2009-05-01T04:38:00.000-07:00

I spent almost a week in Kathmandu, in-between sight seeing, getting ready for my trek. I made trip after trip to the tourist ghetto of Thamel, searching for size 14 hiking boots (suprise success!), haggled endlessly over North Fake clothing, discovered secret sources of trail mix, and on the back burner discussed possible Tibet treks with travel agents. Finally, my pack full of much warmer clothing, I was ready.

A couple of days before I was heading out, though, my intestines staged a revolt. Amy and I had an abortive trip to the medieval village of Bhaktapur thanks to my stomach, and the day before I left it wasn't much better. So, weak on antibiotics, I decided to get a porter/guide. Kumar came with me from Kathmandu, on the recommendation of my Tibet travel agent. He was quiet but nice, and full of stories about the mountains (some of which he swore me to secrecy).

We start the Annapurna Circuit in Besisar, about 5 hours bus ride from Kathmandu. A sub-tropical climate, we are surrounded by banana and other leafy trees, and low, green hills. Terrace farming is everywhere, growing corn, barley and winter wheat. Also stone houses, goats and the ever-present Marsyangdi River, which we will follow all the way up to the Thorong La pass. It is eerily quiet, though, and we meet only one or two other trekkers the entire day of hiking.

Over the next few days, we fall into a pattern of getting up early, enjoying the relative cool of the first few hours, and stopping occasionally for tea along the way at the numerous tea houses. I realize how much I enjoy Kumar's quiet friendliness - he is quick to point out mountains, plant species and saucy mountain rumors but leaves me to myself for good chunks of the time. I spend a lot of this time being quiet and walking meditatively, which soon has me in pretty blissful state (I think it's hard not to feel this way with so much beauty around you).

The landscape gradually change from the lush green of the lowlands to more scattered trees and rocky cliffs. A large number of landslides mar the hills along the way, caused by deforestation and also construction of a new road. The road is a bit of a tragedy for the area, as it will continue to the district capital of Manang, which is three-fourths of the way to the Thorung Phedi Pass. It addition to the ugliness it is causing, many people I talk to along the way fear that it will ruin the business of the many tea houses along the lower part of the trek.

Kumar and I occasionally pass directly underneath the road workers, perched on tiny outcroppings above sheer stone dropoffs. They are chisling out big chunks of rock and dropping them below (the trail was littered with them). Kumar would call out for them to pause while we walked underneath but the pounding continued. We instinctively duck our heads, hope for the best, and hurry on our way. Around this time I have my first experience with the apple pie that is famous on this trek. This one looks like a homemade version of a Hostess apple pie, but is delicious.

After the barren rockslide area, the land again changes into a temperate forest, with deciduous, pine and rhododendron trees, gooseberries, and orchids. The Annapurna area is home to the world's largest rhododendron forest, as well as a couple of the world's tallest peaks (Annapurna and Dhaulagiri), the world's deepest gorge, and a bunch of other things that Kumar told me and I forgot.

We also pass many trains of donkeys as they carried supplies up to the villages. The "leader" donkeys of some trains had special harnesses and headdresses indicating their seniority. Kumar tells me that the donkeys are frequently angry at having to carry such heavy loads and had been known to nudge a hapless trekker off a cliff if they weren't careful. They seem nice enough to me but I don't push it.

Trekking business is way down due to the financial crisis, and we continue to be the only guests at our tea houses at night for the first few days. Gradually as we got to some of the larger villages closer to the pass, other trekkers start to show up. It becomes much more social, as you see the same people again and again as they arrive at the next village for the night. I meet great people from America, Germany, the Czech Republic and England, plus some hot Brazilian surfers.

The people in these small mountain villages are friendly, with everyone saying "Namaste" to you as you passed. The villages themselves are a mix of completely traditional living based on farming, alongside more wealthy tea house owners catering to tourists. The kids are open and friendly, grabbing your hand and walking with you for a while, only occasionally asking for a "one school pen, one rupee, one bon-bon" ("Bon-bon"? I wonder who taught them such a bad habit? Hmm, French trekkers?).

Although Nepal itself is primarily Hindu, Buddhism was the dominent religion in this area, with prayer flags, chortens, monasteries, and prayer stones at nearly every village.

Making our way to the traditional village of Pisang, the landscape again changes to be more deserty as the altitude rose. The pine trees grow shorter and juniper bushes started to dominate. Himalayan mountains (including Annapurna II, III and IV) dominated the skyline. The villages around here are quite old, and built in the traditional style of closely fitted stones with wood roofs. Hundreds of stones lined the top of the roofs, protecting them from the high winds. It starts to get colder and night and guests and porters alike huddle around the wood fire stoves in the dining rooms of the tea houses.

The most beautiful day of the trek is the journey along the Upper Manang Trail connecting Pisang to Manag. This trail starts with a 2 hour steep ascent, and then follows a small path hugging the sheer mountain face for hours of incredible views.

Manang is the "big city" of this area, with standalone restaurants, internet cafes, bakeries and places to buy that last piece of warm clothing if you forgot something. The internet is as expensive as a costly overseas phone call. It's customary to stop for an extra day in Manang to acclimatize to the altitude, and to attend a free mountain sickness class to put the fear of God into you about climbing the pass.

The landscape past Manang becomes even more barren, with only juniper bushes competing with the striking browns and tans of the dry hills. We saw blue sheep today way down below by the river (quite rare) and our first Yak! Yaks are huge, and kinda ornery. Kumar and I were walking back to our hotel after dark and a male yak made a lot of threatening noises toward us like he was going to charge - scary! Much more of a threat than the donkey menace Kumar had described to me. Yak butter, cheese and yogurt are everywhere. Not bad, but not that tasty either.

Finally we reach the Thorung La base camp. The land at this point has become almost completely bare, and you can really feel the altitude as you climb. Even the smallest physical activity leaves you panting. Evidence of people falling ill with altitude sickness is frequent - helicopters flying overhead once or twice a day (I watched a German woman being airlifted out of base camp) and donkeys with zonked-out looking trekkers slung across their backs heading down the mountain. Kumar and I complete the hardest climb of the trek, from base camp to high camp. You have to go very slowly to help your body acclimatize as you make the steep ascent.

Thorung High Camp is where most people will base their pass attempt from. Starting up there instead of the lower base camp shaves two hours or so from an already long climbing day. At the camp we huddle in the dining room for hours with all of the other trekkers we've met along the way. There is only one tea house up there, it's a monopoly, and it knows it. Everything is twice as expensive as before. The food's actually pretty good, but the Dal Bhat was evidently tainted (three people who ate it fell ill with food poisening, including myself a day later). At the high altitude, it's difficult to sleep, and I am up much of the night. I have a little bit of an altitude headache, and drink water like mad to stay hydrated.

Next morning at 5am we start our ascent. The wind picks up on the pass after about 10am, so you want to be over by about that time. The hike up to the pass is long but kind of spooky and cool in the dark. After an expensive cup of tea and some celebratory pictures at the top, Kumar and I start the long journey down to Muktinath. The descent is actually tougher than going up - an endless steep rocky path, very hard on the feet and knees.

After the pass we find ourselves in the Mustang region of Nepal. Mustang used to be an independent kingdom and has a heavy Tibetan influence. The high mountain desert landscape consists of enormous rock formations and there is almost no vegetation - a very different kind of beauty from the greenery and snowy peaks of the other side.

Muktinath itself is also a change from the villages we have been used to before. An important Hindu pilgramage site, I'm startled by the mass of people, honking trucks and other signs of "civilization". Kumar takes me to an important temple where Hindus from Nepal and India come to wash away their sins, following the example of Lord Krishna (at this point I've been hiking for hours and am just thinking about lunch).

The days after crossing the pass are a bit anti-climatic, and I find myself wondering if I am done with the trek - many people are either taking buses down at this point or flying out from nearby Jomsom. Most of the friends I'd met and been hanging out with disperse, either taking these quicker journeys down the mouuntain or stopping at different villages than I was. My attitude doesn't improve the next day as we slog from Muktinath for seven hours to the cute little village of Marpha, through the dusty wind tunnel of the Kali Gandaki River Valley (note to future trekkers: jeep this part).

Gradually the surroundings become more lush and less windy as we descend further and vegetation starts to reappear. Pine trees first, followed by rhododendrons, leafy trees, and green terraced fields. I'm happy to have continued - as we arrive in Tatopani by some coincidence many of the trekkers I'd met along the way end up at the same tea house for the night. We have a soak in a *hot* hot springs pool near the river - sweet!

Finally we make it to the last stop on the trek, Gorepani. A solid day of climbing stone steps to get there, Gorepani is perched on a hill between the massive mountains of Dhaulagiri and Annapurna I. One final night hanging out with the trekker gang (staying up drinking rum tea with the Czechs, finally giving in and trying the Mars Bar roll on the menu - not bad), followed by an early morning hike up to the top of Pune Hill for the sunrise. The final views of the Himalayas are the best of the trek. After that, we spend the day descending down stone steps to reach the end point of the trek. 17 days and many miles after starting, Kumar and I arrive at Birethanti and catch a bus to Pokhara.

Kathmandu

2009-04-25T23:39:00.000-07:00

Kathmandu was not at all what I expected it to be. The consistent story I heard from other travelers was that it was a crowded, busy, polluted big city. When I arrived, the traffic didn't seem *that* bad and I found the old, city center area to be nice and walkable. Then I found out that it was just because of a petro strike! Evidently gas hadn't been trucked into the city for about a week, so the cars and pollution were way down. Lucky for me (not the city!) the strike lasted most of the time I was in town :).

The 16-hour power outages that I faced on arrival also made things interesting. The city basically shut down after about 8pm. The Maoists are in power now here in a coalition government (after democratic elections) and the combination of drought and mismanagement have left the country with a severe shortage of power generating capacity. People are not happy, with this and with the fact that many economic reforms have not occurred as the government had promised. There were marches, strikes and protests every day that I was there. It was confusing to know who was protesting. Many times they were Communists, and I kept thinking "what are they protesting? Aren't they in power?". But evidently it is often the 18 other Communist parties in the country that are complaining about not sharing the Maoists success (plus the Maoists marching occasionally to show their strength). It doesn't feel dangerous here for tourists, and after the first few days of protests, my reaction when running into one was "Communists *again*?". (Update: having the Prime Minister resign earlier this week didn't exactly ease the tensions, either)

Trekking is the big reason many tourists come to Nepal, and the Thamel tourist district in town resembles nothing if not a gigantic REI store. You can get anything here related to hiking and outdoor activities. Some of it might even be real! Nepal is famous for selling locally-made rip-offs of outdoor clothing company wares, especially The North Face. My Isreali friend Arial likes to call them "The North Fakes". The funny thing is they are pretty well made. I had a very warm North Fake "super down" vest, sleeping bag and fuzzy cap that did me well on my trek. You start looking at the logos on the clothes, to see how close they are to the real thing, as if that's some indication of quality ("The font is a little off on that one" or "The real North Face wouldn't use such a big type face there"). The clothing rip-offs make for some interesting shifts in what brands represent over here. For instance, Dolche and Gabanna is so ubiquitous on the t-shirts, caps and cute little jackets of Nepali youth that it is more like The Gap than haute couture.

In addition to my friend Jordi, I had the good fortune of having a couple of friends living in Kathmandu that I could stay with and see different aspects of the city. My friend Nick, who I met in Mexico last year, is staying in Kathmandu studying on a scholarship. We had a great time going to an Osho Commune up in the hills outside of town for a weekend. Unlike the high-end spa setting of the Osho Ashram that I avoided in Pune, this place had a much more down-to-earth feel. The commune offered a full-day's schedule of meditations that ran the gamut from an hour of continuous dancing to Osho's famous "Dynamic Meditation". Dynamic Meditation involves breathing as deep and as hard as you can for 10 minutes, primal screaming for 10 minutes, then jumping up and down chanting the Sufi matra "Hoo! Hoo!" for 10 minutes before collapsing into 15 minutes of meditation. Osho's idea with this was to get your body as tense and exhausted as possible before going into meditation so that you would have no thoughts at all to disturb your peace. It strangely works - after that routine my mind would be eerily silent, and those thoughts that I did have would be faint and quiet. It seemed like a lot of work to get to that state though! A fun weekend, but not really my thing...

Nick lived in the historic town of Patan, above a well-off Nepali family who had kind of adopted him and invited him down for dinner often. The parents were a kick and two of the sons were famous Nepali musicians. We made jackfruit curry one night and brought it down to share with them (note to future curry makers: jackfruit is nasty to work with. It gives off some sort of white latex goo that sticks to everything when you cut it). I loved the family, the mother especially. She didn't speak a word of English but was one of the funniest people I've ever met. She would ply me with the potent local Nepali wine, raxi, fill my plate with a ridiculous amount of food to eat, and then make fun of me.

After staying with Nick, I moved back to central Kathmandu to stay with Amy Paro, sister of my good friend Erika. Amy and her husband Adam work for USAID in the US Embassy in Kathmandu and were wonderful hosts. They have a sweet house near the embassy with internet access, lots of power thanks to a generator, and all the amenities. This was a good break from my backpacker lifestyle. They were also trekking pros and hooked me up with some essential supplies for my trek.

Dharamsala and on to Nepal

2009-04-25T02:37:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the delay in posting - I've been up in Nepal for a few weeks and the power situation has been a challenge (when I first arrived, the power was *off* for 16 hours a day). Just got back from trekking too, which as you can imagine is not an oasis of internet connectivity. With that...

(Feb. 28th) After Amritsar, Jordi and I made our way to Dharamsala to attend a Buddhist meditation retreat. Normally you take a train to this town called Pathankot, and then a 4 hour bus ride through the mountains. But we had made friends with this nice guy from Austin, Quentin, who was also attending the retreat and had his heart set on the taking the toy train (a small-gauge train that goes most of the way up the mountain). The ride was beautiful, but packed with people and long. Jordi and I had unwittingly created a barrier with our packs so people couldn't crowd us, and sat there playing with a cute baby that the woman next to us had. But poor Quentin was squished in a corner - I think at some point he had a man sitting on his lap.

After some hassle getting a taxi for the rest of the way, involving a very drunk Indian intent on telling us the true secret of meditation, we arrived in Dharamsala the night before our course began. We had signed up for the "Introduction to Buddhism" course at the Tushita Meditation Center. The class turned out to be a great overview of Tibetan Buddhism, and best of all, prepared us for a public teaching by the His Holiness the Dalai Lama to be given the day after the course was over.

Going to the teaching and being in the presence of the Dalai Lama was a big highlight of my trip (much better than seeing him pass in a jeep like I did the last time I was in Dharamsala!). The ceremony around the DL's entrance was incredible. Two enormous 10 foot-long horns were blown, a procession of elder monks filed in, and then the Dalai Lama arrived with an enormous yellow plumed helmet on. Next the chant master started singing, remarkably close to the noise of the horns - a very low chord-like sound like a human didgeridoo. Then we all tuned in our little handheld radios to hear the English translation of the Dalai Lama speaking. The teaching was a fairly technical explanation of the Buddhist understanding of emptiness, which would have been completely mystifying before the class. The inherent emptiness of existence was my favorite part of the Buddhist teachings (really!) so both Jordi and I went in for a second course focused on that topic. Altogether we spent about 3 weeks up at Tushita - with excellent teachers both times. I don't think Tibetan Buddhism is exactly my path, but there is a lot about it that I admire and can see the truth in.

We were also in Dharamsala at the time of the 50th anniversary of the Tibetan uprising against China in Tibet. Candlelit vigils up to the Dalai Lama's temple were held every night, which were moving and sad to watch. Though at the vigil I saw, they had these guys from an autonomous region in Italy offering to give China some advice on how to have a peaceful and successful autonomous region (note to Italy: don't wait up for that call from China). After the violent protests in Tibet during last year's anniversary, things were very subdued this year.

After Tushita, Jordi, myself, and this other Dutch guy Mart that we had met at the courses traveled to the India/Nepal border. Taxied down the windy mountain roads to Jalandhar (sorry Jordi!), and then took an overnight train to the border town of Gorakhpur. It was fun traveling with Mart because he was new to India and everything was fresh, exciting and photo-worthy to him.

First stop in Nepal, right across the border, was the weird, relatively newly created destination of Lumbini. The historical birthplace of the Buddha, there wasn't much there except a small village until some years ago when planning began on a series of stupas and gompas in the area. Now there are many monuments from Buddhist countries around the world (China, Japan, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam, Korea, etc). Interestingly, the most beautiful building was from that powerhouse of Buddhism, Germany (though Myanmar's golden stupa is a close second). My favorite moment was going to see the exact location where Buddha was born, and having this guy in front of me not even get off his cell phone while he was looking at it.

Amritsar

2009-03-13T03:57:00.000-07:00

The final leg of my whistle-stop tour up to Dharamsala was Amritsar, in the state of Punjab, close to the Pakistan border. I met up my friend Jordi there (while I took about 2 weeks to make it north, being the super trooper that she was, it took her one 50-hour train ride). The main (some would say only) attraction of Amritsar is the Golden Temple, which is the center of the Sikh religion.

We were both amazed at how peaceful, clean and quiet the temple was. It's enormous, with a wide white marble walkways surrounding a water tank containing the actual temple. Tons people are pouring in and out at any given time, and the line to get into the temple itself is always huge. But everyone seems calm and happy. There is a 24-hour free canteen that anyone can eat at, and no beggars are around the temple at all. It felt like the Sikhs took care of each other very well, and were also welcoming to visitors. Everyone regardless of religion was able to go inside the temple (as long as you cover your head and wash your feet!). It *is* spectacular - literally covered in gold (100 kg) on the outside and opulent on the inside as well, with more gold, crystal chandeliers, and intricate marblework. And definitely a living place of worship, with continual readings from the Sikh holy book all day and people filling every nook and cranny sitting and meditating.

Orchha

2009-03-13T00:52:00.000-07:00

Continuing north, I took another night train to the village of Orchha, which is the site of a large number of palaces, temples and cenotaphs (tombs for kings). These were built between the 15th and 17th centuries and have a combination of Hindu and Muslim architecture due to invasions and power changing hands back and forth.

I happened to be in town during the important holiday of Shivratri, dedicated to the god Shiva. There was an enormous parade (for the size of the town) featuring men with flowing white beards on horses, women dressed up like dieties, young guys throwing paint at you and kids dancing wildly to techno music. And lots of people carrying what appeared to be large floor lamps powered by these scary looking generators (they resembled large sewing machines).

I didn't run into a lot of tourists in Orchha, so I was surprised to see Chris and Lisa, some lovely people from England that I met in Hampi. They had just made friends with this local farmer who invites people over to his fields to cook them dinner. I had a super rustic meal with them out there which was a lot of fun. Fortunately they were out of the 35 rupee (about 75 cents) bags of wine that they had the night before. Evidently hangover central...

Ellora and Ajanta Caves

2009-03-12T01:06:00.000-07:00

Next up were the Ellora and Ajanta Caves. These are a series of Buddhist, Jain and Hindu caves that were carved completely out of the sheer stone faces of cliffs in the Indian state of Maharashtra, near Mumbai.

The Elora Caves were created between the 5th and 10th Centuries, and reflect the shifting of religions in the area over time. The Buddhist caves came earlier, in the 5th to 7th centuries, and then the Hindu ones were created later, as Hinduism resurged and largely wiped out Buddhism in India. These caves were used as monasteries to live and worship in, and the craftsmanship is incredible. All of the statues, columns, etc were carved directly out of the rocky cliffs.

All of the caves are pretty awe-inspiring to imagine how they were created, but the main Hindu temple, called Kailasanatha Temple, is just out of control. It looks similar to other Hindu temples around the country, but it and everything inside of it is carved out of a single piece of rock. It's difficult to get your mind around how the carvers could plan and execute such a feat.

The Ajanta caves were a bit further north and are famous for having paintings on the walls and ceilings that have survived since ancient times. Some of the earlier caves are dated back to the 2nd Century BC.

Pune

2009-03-12T00:35:00.001-07:00

From Hampi I wanted to find a place that was a reasonable train distance away, and a night train took me to Pune, home of the world-famous Osho Ashram (that's the Bhagwan Shree Rashneesh for those who remember him in Oregon). This wasn't really on my list of places I was excited about but it turned out to be my favorite larger Indian city so far. It was clean, had nice architecture and good food due to all the ashram attendees. I stopped by the ashram but didn't go in - it cost $30 a day and they seemed really into primal screaming and dancing. Instead I had another unexpected and surreal experience.

I was walking by this building and saw what I thought was a political poster on the wall. You see them everywhere in India, a big picture of the main guy in a white robe, and then a bunch of smaller mugshots of the other people in the party. But when I looked at the mugshoots, I was like, "That's funny, it's all these beefy shirtless guys holding sceptres". Just then, about 10 heads popped around the corner of the door and invited me inside. Turns out I was standing in front of the practice gym for an Indian wrestling club!

They were very excited to have a guest and proceeded to show off for me for over an hour - doing endless pushups and burpees, as well as lots of practice rounds that got pretty violent. Indian wrestling evidently takes place in a pit whose floor is full of crumbled red clay. When someone loses a round, they take fistfuls of the clay and throw it on themselves and the other wrestler. After a while everyone starts to look completely red, like Hellboy or something. Very unexpected and fun experience!

Back to India, Hampi

2009-03-11T03:54:00.000-07:00

I've been so busy these past weeks that I've gotten a bit behind in the blogging. I've actually been back in India since Jan. 26th! I spent a little over 2 weeks back in Tiru, going to a spiritual intensive from my teacher Mark, and then another week catching up on things and waiting for my debit card to get mailed from the States. I stayed with another student of Mark's, Tom, who had a great house next to a rice paddy out in the country a bit. Other than the quick trip through SE Asia with Cindy, I'd been in this area for almost 3 months now and was ready to see some more. Moving on from Tiru, I made my way north, with the goal of making it to Dharamsala as the south of India started to heat up. It was already getting into the high 80s by the time I took off. I wanted to travel by land the entire length of the country to get a feel for it, as I had flown down last November.

On Feb. 16th, I took a 5 hour bus to Bangalore, and then immediately a train to Hampi, which is in the Indian state of Karnataka. Hampi is one of those places in India where you go to and then end up staying longer than you thought. I planned on being there for a couple of days and finally drug myself out of there after a week or so. It's a bit like India's Angkor Wat, with a huge number of old Hindu temples constructed in the 14th and 15th centuries, spread out over a large area. But it's also just a pleasant place to hang out for a while - a big backpacker destination. The landscape is a wild combination of huge boulders, rivers, along with rice paddies and palm trees. With a practically infinite supply of rocks, Hampi is the bouldering capital of India, which means that there were these people walking around with enormous mattresses strapped to their backs. There is an idealic area across the river from town (you have to ride a little boat to get out there) full of cheap guesthouses and restaurants. I stayed in this little paradise across a tiny path in the middle of a rice paddy (I only fell in once) called Manju's.

Manju, the owner, was one of those everyday saints that you just loved the minute you met him. He had little mud bungalows with thatch roofs, and a big gazebo restaurant where you could just hang out all day. The people there were wonderful, and I met some folks that I would run into later on in my trip. I rented a motorbike to go tour some of the local villages and a nearby reservoir, ended up taking a wrong turn, and found myself on this Indian highway with enormous trucks on all sides of me - kind of like a final exam for Indian driving. On the way back to town, I gave this Indian guy a ride to his house, and he invited me in for a drink of water. His entire family gathered around me and sat and watched me for about 10 minutes - very sweet and curious, and then it was time for them to get back to work and me to be my way. On the final day I went to the famous Hanuman temple up on a hilltop, supposedly his birthplace, and appropriately full of monkeys. Sunsets on the hills were a big event every day, with many people making the pilgrimage up for the amazing views.

Luang Prabang

2009-02-16T05:34:00.000-08:00

A 6-hour bus ride north took me to Luang Prabang, which is a cute little town on the river with a lot of colonial architecture. Like Vang Vieng, it has been pretty much overtaken by tourism. But it is still pleasant with lovely just-so restaurants and guesthouses. Kind of like the Napa Valley of Laos (without the wineries). My ATM card had been cancelled due to some security fraud issue, so I was almost out of Lao Kip by this time in my trip. The only place that would take my credit card was the plush Ancient Luang Prabang hotel. Alas...

Vang Vieng

2009-02-14T04:54:00.001-08:00

Next I took a bus north to Vang Vieng, which a few years ago was a sleepy river village. Now it's backpacker central, with tons of drunken 20-something kids floating on innertubes between bars on the river. The town has been completely taken over by tourism, with restaurants, thumping techno dance clubs, internet shops and some sketch massage parlors vying for attention.

The area around my bungalow down by the river, though, was beautiful and serene. Surrounded by mountains, rivers and rice paddies, the scenery is still worth going to see. And it seems like every nearby village has discovered a cave in the mountains that they tout as a must-see destination.

I went to see a cave with a Buddha shrine inside of it (complete with a slightly lame "Blue Lagoon" out front), and met intrepid Scottish white-water rafting tour guide Amon there. We ended up taking a motorbike tour through the jungle countryside, getting lost for a couple of hours looking for the road back to town. The minute you get out in the country you can really get a feel for the level of poverty that exists in Laos, hidden from view in the tourist-oriented cities. The countryside was just amazing though. The mountains just shoot straight out of the ground and the scenery alternates between browned-out dry rice paddies and lush jungle.

Vientiane

2009-02-07T01:36:00.000-08:00

I took a couple of weeks off posting, so now I'm catching up with my Laos trip (which happened in late January). After Hanoi, I had about a week to spend in South East Asia before heading back to India for a spiritual retreat. I really wanted to get to Laos, even for that limited amount of time. You hear a lot about Laos when you are traveling - how it's not very touristy (false), how it's pretty but there's nothing much to do (false) and how it's changing fast (true!). Laos was great and I enjoyed my time there, but it was surprisingly well developed for tourism. It takes a bit of time and effort to get out of the tourist bubble. I'm hoping to be able to go back and do so later this year. BTW, did you know Laos was still communist? I didn't!

I flew into its capital, Vientiane, and was struck first by how clean and modern it was. The streets were wide, clean and tree-lined. Underground sewers! Grocery stores! But not much traffic or crowding. Vientiane is probably the laziest capital city I've ever been to, but pleasant nonetheless. Though it did feel like there was not a lot to focus on there as far as a city center. It has a lot of guesthouses and tourist restaurants, but Vientiane is big enough to not feel completely taken over by tourism, as were Vang Vieng and Luang Prabang.

I spent a bit of time sightseeing, a lot of time eating, and also got an incredible massage from a clinic of blind masseuses. Lao massage is all about applying lots of pressure to pressure points, and at one point my masseuse had me screaming as he stood on a special spot on my thigh.

The main attraction in town is the Golden Stupa, or Pha That Luang. This is the most important temple in Laos and is blindingly gold in the sunlight.

By far the most interesting and bizarre sight is the Buddha Park, about 25 km outside of town. I rented a motorbike and drove out there on my last day before my bus left. Built in 1958 by a priest who attempted to integrate Hinduism with Buddhism, it contains over 200 statues from both religions (and some strange demons). Tori, I think you would have liked this park!

The food is similar to Thai food, with an emphasis on curries, and there are a number of dishes that both countries seem to lay claim to (like green papaya salad and laap, raw marinated meet like ceviche). I couldn't get enough papaya salad, but even my fondness for steak tartare couldn't get me to try laap in its pure, raw form. My stomach was just feeling healthy after weeks of problems, so I didn't really feel like pushing the envelope. The Laotians also have tons of sticky rice, which I love. I went down and ate at a seafood shack by the Mekong River, where I met the very drunk but very funny Richard, an economics professor teaching in Shanghai. I asked him how he thought the economic downturn would affect China and he said "Oh, definitely, they might only grow at 7% this year." Jerk.

Ha Long Bay

2009-01-22T20:59:00.000-08:00

After a few days in Hanoi, Cindy and I took a bus out to Ha Long Bay for a 3 day boat tour. This was our last destination together and it blew away our expectations. Ha Long Bay is an enormous body of water containing over 1,900 islands. These islands shoot straight out of the water, barely any with beaches or walkable access, and no land inhabitants. The beauty is on a different scale than most places I've been - it reminded me of seeing the enormous glaciers in Alaska.

Thanks to a recommendation from Steve McAdoo, we found ourselves on a great boat, with only about 6 other passengers, and wonderful tour guides, food, and cabins. This is a huge business in Vietnam - the harbor where we took off must of had over 50 "junks" for touring the bay.

We didn't know what the actual tour was going to be like and pictured just cruising around among the islands for a couple of days and getting shown floating gift shops or something. The first day out, we spent a few hours chugging out to what turned out to be the main tourist area of the bay. First stop was an enormous cave, complete with theme-colored lighting, that was truly spectacular (it didn't hurt that this was also our first encounter with Oreos on the trip).

Across the harbor from the cave is one of the few islands that you could actually walk on, with a man-made beach and a pagoda on top that you could climb to. The views from the top were I think the highlight of the trip for me - 360 degrees of gorgeous. Of course where there are tourists, there are hawkers, and here they followed us around in rowboats (we started calling them the "Oreo Ladies"). We dropped anchor at a nearby cove for the night, ate a fantastic dinner and turned in early (after trying some squid fishing off the back of the boat).

The next day was completely different. We went a couple more hours into the bay, leaving the other tour boats behind, and took of on kayaks for a few hours. Nearby was the largest floating village in the bay, and a number of aquatic caves. The caves ranges from simple passageways to one called the "scary cave" that was something straight out of Scooby Doo - long, windy and at points almost a low as the kayak. I was getting to the limits of how much I could scruntch my body down towards the end of that cave. On the other side of the caves were often completely enclosed lagoons - it was so amazing to be inside of them, usually the only people there, with no sounds of the outside world.

The last day we went for one last kayak to another lagoon, and then cruised slowly back to the harbor. Feeling completely satisfied with our Ha Long experience, we headed back to Hanoi for one last night before Cindy headed back to Bangkok, and I went on to Laos. We had one of the best meals that night at this Hanoi institution called Cha Ca La Vong. This place only serves one meal and has been doing it for almost 100 years. It's fish fried in oil at your table with basil, scallions, chilies and peanuts. Served over noodles with a stinky fish sauce. The whole thing together is unbelievably tasty! (I had to go back for seconds the next day for lunch before I flew out.) Cindy and I said good bye, sad to see her go after so many adventures of the past few weeks!

Hanoi

2009-01-21T22:17:00.000-08:00

After our great night hanging out with Cambodian breakdancers and a sobering morning learning about the Khmer Rouge regime, Cindy and I bid fairwell to Phnom Penh. We took a flight to Hanoi, which was a shock to the system on a number of levels. We had strange mojo with the taxi driver from the airport, our hotel didn't have enough rooms for us, and it was cold - much colder than we expected. Evidentally central heating is an Imperialist concept because our hotel was actually colder inside than out.

The city itself is very crowded and chaotic. Vietnam has about 10 times as many people as Cambodia and it shows. For traffic lovers, it's a bonanza. There are so many motorcycles whizzing by at any given time that just crossing the street is a major accomplishment. After a while you learn to just start walking and keep going.

I had such a fond impression of the southern Vienamese from an earlier trip ten years ago, remembering them to be some of the loveliest people I'd ever met. So I was pretty shocked by those in Hanoi. A crass commercialism, combined with a seeming lack of social skills, made them seem obnoxious and annoying. The vendors on the street wouldn't smile at you, but just yell: "You buy from me?! You buy from me?!" The worst were the pineapple ladies, who would follow you around relentlessly, putting their balancing pole on your shoulders and trying to get you to pay for a photo op. And everyone in the city with a motorbike (all 3 million or so), had gotten the same idea that they could be an impromptu taxi for tourists. Which is awfully convenient and the best way to get around, but overwhelming when you have literally the entire city yelling "Motorbike?! Motorbike?!" at you.

These were our first impressions, and of course after a we became acclimatized and bought some more appropriate clothing, we um...warmed up to the city. Hanoi is quite beautiful and walkable, with a compact, largely preserved old town core, many picturesque lakes, great restaurants and amenities. The residents have a certain kind of big city, Communist chic going on. Women wear high heels and drive motorbikes, with their fur-lined jackets and face masks. I found a sweet, excellent tailor to get some suits made, a friend of a friend of Cindy's ran an alternative movie house where we saw a great documentary on Saigon, and our hotel did have its chilly charms (mainly delicious pho for breakfast and the internet in every room). The cinema owner gave us directions for an awesome walking tour: we ended up going to see Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum (from the outside, it was closed), the lake where John McCain was shot down (he's actually very popular in Vietnam and was a favorite here for the election), and on a fairly posh island of apartment buildings on the lake, a cockfighting ring (okay not awesome but interesting). Aside from it being pretty awful, the location was so weird - it was as if someone had decided cockfighting would be a good addition to the Kirkland waterfront back in Seattle.

Phnom Penh

2009-01-16T19:04:00.001-08:00

After four days, we finally tore ourselves away from lush Kep and made our way back to Phnom Penh. We found the city to be quite charming - bustling but not too chaotic, tourist savvy but not too in-your-face, and offering great food. Our hotel, the Boddhi Tree, was a converted colonial mansion and super pleasant. We had about a day and a half here, having stayed longer in Kep, and could have easily stayed longer.

We had an wonderful and unexected experience at Wat Ounalom, which is the traditional home of the head of Cambodian Buddhism. It was here that the Patriarch of Buddhism at the time was taken away and murdered by the Khmer Rouge. We were looking around the grounds when an old man gestured for us to follow him, and he led us into the central stupa of the temple. He said it was as old as Angkor Wat, and the stones had a similar character. The man blessed us with some holy water and then we all three fell into meditation for a few minutes - the energy in the stupa was quite intense!

The majority of the sights in the city are concentrated around the river, with the royal palace, Silver Pagoda, and the main tourist area situated there. We spent an afternoon touring the palace/Pagoda complex, which is quite large and full of examples of those swoopy Cambodia rooftops. One of the more unusual buildings is the Napolean III Pavilion that Napolean had built for Empress Eugenie near the Suez Canal. She then proceeded (after a fight?) to ship it to Phnom Penh as a gift to the king.

At night, with a bit of detective work, we tracked down Tiny Toones Combodia, which is a breakdancing school for at risk kids. Kay Kay, the founder of the school, is such a great guy with a huge passion for helping kids. He is a former gang member and breakdancer in Long Beach, CA, who got into some trouble and was deported to Cambodia. Through his programs he has reached over 3,000 kids, and now has a few touring dance troupes that perform all over the world. Kay Kay welcomed us into his studio and his home, and then took us out for a night on the town at a local club where his kids were performing. We were all treated like royalty at the club, with waiters constantly refilling our cokes, and Kay Kay being presented with an enormous bottle of Johnny Walker Red. Cindy and I had a great time watching the local Cambodians strike a pose, and are determined to help Kay Kay with his non-profit in some concrete way (we've got a few ideas).

The next day, we dove into the horrific history of the Khmer Rouge, going to see the nearby S-21 prison and taking a journey out to the Killing Fields. Not going to try to rehash what happened back then, but suffice to say that the experience was extremely sad and sobering (Cindy brought an excellent book on this period called "Stay Alive, My Son", by Pin Yathay, that we both read. I'd recommend that for a first-hand account of the tragedy). Estimates range from 1.5 million to 3 million people that were killed by Pol Pot's murderous regime. One thing we learned was that many more people died from the ineptitude of the regime to provide adequate food or medical aid to the people than from executions. However, it is still thought that at least 500,000 people were killed directly by the Khmer Rouge.

S-21 was the prison inside of Phnom Penh where enemies of the state were tortured and frequently forced to write fake confessions implicating family members in crimes so they could also be arrested. Nearly all of the residents of this prison were eventually sent to the Killing Fields outside of Phnom Penh for execution. The Killing Fields was particularly disturbing, with its contrast of a peaceful, natural surrounding and the presence of numerous mass graves. The sole monument is stark and powerful: a glass tower full of skulls of the victims. Many of the senior Khmer Rouge leaders have never been brought to justice (though there are some trials going on in Cambodia now), leaving a sense of lack of resolution to this genocidal period.

Kep

2009-01-16T18:34:00.000-08:00

Luckily for my ankle, next stop on our trip was the chilled out and relaxed beach resort of Kep. We shared a taxi down to Phnom Penh with two friendly middle-aged Australians, Tony and Wendy, who schooled us on the many ways that you could die violent deaths in their home country (shark attack of course won). This was on Cambodia's only real highway, and the entire way was lovely - with rice paddies, rivers, lakes and mountains. Picturesque now, but chilling to think that these were the fields where the residents of Phnom Penh were forced into labor camps by the Khmer Rouge, many dying from hunger, disease or execution. There is that constant memory lingering over much of Cambodia, contrasting with the natural beauty and friendly people.

From Phnom Penh, we took one of the more frightening taxi rides I've had the remaining distance to Kep. By now I'm used to near misses with passing trucks and motorbikes, but this guy was going so fast we barely made it through turns on the road without flying out onto the fields.

We stayed at the Veranda Resort in Kep, which consisted of a bunch of sweet bungalows connected by raised wooden walkways. And a delicious restaurant that had ice cream. We were pretty much in heaven. I spent the next four days moving as little as possible, never leaving the resort, reading, relaxing and recovering. Cindy took a day trip to the nearby Rabbit Island for a little beach action, but I was very content to be immobile. This was the "vacation" part of our vacation.

Tonle Sap Boat and Battambang

2009-01-12T18:49:00.000-08:00

Next we took a scenic boat trip from Siem Reap to Battambang. The boat goes along the Tonle Sap Lake and then a river, mostly via narrow passageways through the reeds. Along the way we saw floating villages and the traditional fishing methods (including the giant Chinese-style fishing nets). Passing a boat in the narrow lanes was always an adventure, and when we took corners the entire boat leaned like it was going to tip over. Cindy and I were continually planning our escape routes in case the boat sank, while I fantasized about the tasty fish dinner our floating village rescuers would cook as as we dried our cloths in their huts.

We didn't know exactly what to expect in Battambang. Cambodia's second city, it's much smaller than you would think, with a charming mix of French colonial architecture and a Wild West feel. It's a good town to wander around for a day and take in the atmosphere - I felt that we were able to start to see much more authentic Cambodian life here. Like every place we went to in the country, it was very clean and had many new modern buildings. There were also a surprising number of ritzy houses along the river and in the countryside, mixed up with the basic huts. And of course weddings weddings everywhere! Always in a big colorfully decorated tent along the road.

We took an outing in the afternoon on motorbikes, with a wonderful guide, Mr. Soon. First stop was the circus school at the edge of town that Cindy had heard about. This is a free school that kids can come and learn both their normal coursework as well as circus act skillz. At first it looked like a bust because it was Saturday and many kids were gone, but turns out there were some classes in session that we peeked into (though no circus practice). We were able to hang out with friendly art students who showed us around, as well as see some cool animation work that had been created in their computer lab (the topics were on public service messages such as drinking safe water and child sex workers). The highlight was seeing a practice of a high school musical about the dangers of heroin use. It was good to see that drama nerds were the same the world over!

Next we took a *gravelly* road out to a nearby Muslim village to meet some of the locals. Boy, did we meet them! As we were stopping in the village, the bike I was driving skidded on the gravel and slid out from under us, falling on top of Cindy and I. Luckily: a) we had helmets on and b) Cindy escaped with just a minor scrape on her knee. But I did end up with a bloody gouge on my ankle. The entire village came out to watch the tall American bleed all over their road, and in my state the overriding goal was not to throw up in front of all them due to the shock. Mr. Soon disappeared, and as I was trying to fashion some sort of bandage out of Kleenex and hand sanitizer, he reappeared with the local village medic. They quickly had me drenched in iodine and bandaged up with cotton balls. Needless to say, the bike trip was cut short!

On the way into town we bought a ton of medical supplies, and Cindy did a professional job getting my wound disinfected and dressed. That night we went out to a restaurant/cooking school, the "Smoking Pot", and sampled the local Amok (Cindy had some chicken dish that defied the "not so spicy" rule).

Flying to Cambodia, Siem Reap, Angkor Wat

2009-01-11T18:42:00.000-08:00

Before I left Tiru, I celebrated my birthday by climbing up Mt. Arunchala with Jordi. We started fairly early in the morning but it still got pretty hot by the time we reached the top. The entire peak is black and slippery with burned ghee from the Deepam Festival where they lit the mountain on fire, and there were piles of ghee urns used for the fire.

I travelled from Tiru to Chennai on a De-luxe express bus, otherwise known as the World's Most Air-Conditioned Vehicle. A/C represents luxury over here and evidently more A/C represents more luxury - everyone on the bus was bundled up and shivering. It wasn't really that hot out even. Flew from Chennai to Bangkok, and met my friend Cindy, fresh from her stint at the Elephant Park in Thailand. Wonderful to see her and hear about her adventures! Together we flew to Siem Reap and checked into our lovely little hotel, the Bopha Angkor. This was the big splurge of the trip, and worth it. They had that lush "Buddhas in the Garden" feel with lots of carved wood furniture and moody colors in the rooms.

Siem Reap itself was surprisingly well-developed and comfortable. There were a ton of restaurants, bars, hotels and foot massage parlors (which are great - Cindy is developing a bit of a habit). And any type of food you might want, though the Khmer Cuisine was all that we wanted - the curries are delicious, a bit deeper and not as spicy like Thai food. The signature curry dish is "Amok", which is tasty and just fun to say ("I'd like the Chicken Amok").

Angkor Wat was awe-inspiring, huge, and incredibly touristy. It's actually an enormous set of temples spread over a large area outside of the city. The namesake Angkor Wat Temple is gigantic, covering God knows how many square kilometers, and having a moat around it that looks like a large river. I had the same reaction I had when entering it that I had when I first came to Manhattan - it's so large you have a hard time getting your head around it. Created in the 1100's, it's a Hindu temple, with that religion having spread from India over through Cambodia. My favorite part of the temple were the huge carved murals representing the Hindu epics, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata - the details and sheer size of them was incredible. There was also a carving of the Hindu legend of "Churning of the Sea of Milk", which involved gods and demons playing tug of war with a big snake wrapped around a mountain (long story). This image is a bit of an obsession in Cambodia, and the scene was replayed over and over in temples and buildings throughout the country. Although Angkor Wat Temple has the famous 5 towers that grace the Cambodian flag, it's not the most photogenic temple due to its size. You can't really capture it very well. Though it's extremely popular for Cambodian wedding parties to go there for their post-ceremony pictures. The parking lot looks like you could be going to the Cambodian version of Lollapallooza, with an endless supply of stalls and restaurants, plus kids trying to sell you books, water, hats, etc.

Much more managable and gorgeous is the Bayon Temple, in the nearby ancient city of Angkor Thom. This is the temple with the famous faces on its towers, and it's easy to go into a camera frenzy here. One thing we learned about the temples is that they were a mix of Hindu and Buddhist. They were built over the reigns of many Khmer kings, and the kings tended to convert back and forth between the two religions. The sons of kings would convert to Buddhism after their fathers had built some beautiful Hindu temple, and then do bitchy things like scrape all the faces off of the Hindu gods in dad's temple. Or plop a big Buddha in the middle of it to make a statement. The Bayon Temple was originally Buddhist (then Hindu, then Buddhist again), and it is speculated that the faces represent the faces of different incarnations of Buddha.

Next up was the even more photogenic Ta Prohm, which was still partially overgrown and had trees growing out of it. We had a guide for the first day, Mr. Leon, who loved to take our picture, but from a very far distance. So you can kind of see us among the tree roots in some of the pictures (it was a major victory when we got him to go vertical in his orientation). Mr. Leon was super knowledgeable but hard to follow, so by the end of the day I had this hazy dreamy sense of Khmer history (and a headache). After Ta Prohm we ended our day of touring, and celebrated New Year's Eve with a delicious eight-course khmer meal at our hotel.

The next day Cindy and I decided to get up early and greet the sunrise of the New Year at a peaceful temple in Angkor. Cindy even suggested that maybe I could find a quiet place and meditate out there for a while. Little did we know that half the city had the same idea. All of the Tuk Tuks were already engaged when we started on our way, but luckily we eventually found the wonderful Mr. Bich, who drove us around that day. He was the sweetest man ever, and we liked him so much that we even stopped making fun of his name about half-way through the day. We arrived out at the temple, a little late for the sunrise, and to a crush of tourists and an army of little kids trying to sell us stuff (which led to our favorite quote of the trip: Little kid: "You want books, water, tea?", Cindy: "I want nothing", Little kid: "Nothing? 10 dollar!"). The place was so crazy and unpeaceful that we fled immediately. Luckily there was a little temple across the street with almost nobody else at it, and we were able to have some quiet time over there.

Next Mr. Bich suggested we get out to the outlying Banteay Srei temple before it got too crowded later in the day. This is reportedly the most scenic temple and is 20km north of Angkor Wat. We enjoyed the drive out through a number of small villages, where we learned that gas stations in Cambodia frequently look like a row of Johnny Walker Red bottles filled with petro. When we got to Banteay Srei, there was tour bus after tour bus unloading Japanese and Chinese tourists. If this was the unbusy time, I can't imagine it later. It was a crazy crush just trying to get in to see the temple, with Japanese tourists snapping thousands of pics with their cellphones that have more megapixels than my camera. The temple itself is very small but exquisite - almost every square inch of it is carved ornately.

After that Cindy and I had had our fill and rapidly lost our temple endurance, catching a few more on the way back in to town. We climbed a couple that were very steep pyramid shapes, which offered wonderful views of the area. Then back to town for rest and more foot massages. Fantastic experience!

Tiruvannamalai

2008-12-26T22:57:00.000-08:00

I've been living in Tiruvannamalai for about 3 weeks now. I wasn't expecting to stay so long, but liked it so much I extended my stay. I came here to visit my friend Devi who was on Gina's tour with me earlier in India. I knew nothing about Tiru, just happened to be in the area and stopped by. This has been the most intense and amazing place I've been so far. I've been having a great time here, as well as feeling at home and kind of moving in.

I met Devi and her friend Yordi (from Amsterdam) when I arrived, and we had a great time together. They were going to see this spiritual teacher, Mark Hans, and I also started attending. Meditation in the morning and teaching/discussion in the afternoon. I lucked out and found Mark to be an excellent guide. I really developed my meditation practice with his help.

Tiru is next to a very holy mountain, Mt. Arunchala, which has immense spiritual power. You can literally feel the mountain when you are here, especially when you are meditating. There is a huge Western spiritual teaching community sprouting up here because of the energy of the mountain, and it's also an important site for Hindus as well.

One of India's most famous holy men, Sri Ramana Maharshi, came here and is said to have experienced enlightenment on the mountain early in the 20th Century. He lived in a couple of different caves on the mountain for years, and these are now holy sites that you can visit and meditate in. He founded a huge ashram that continues to be an important spiritual center. Ramana's body is interred in a shrine in one of the ashram's rooms and people come from around the world to circle it and pray in front of it.

Mt. Arunchala is a major pilgrimage destination, and I was lucky enough to be here for the most holy day of the year here, Deepam. The mountain is the legendary site where the god Shiva showed his dominance over Vishnu and Brahma by turning into a tower of flame or something. So every year they set the top of the mountain on fire with huge vats of burning ghee, and over 1.5 million people come to walk the 10 km or so around the mountain. You wouldn't believe how many people there are. The road around the mountain is just a river of people, so thick that's is a big challenge just to cross it. We woke up at 2am and did the walk under the full moon. People were piled everywhere on the side of the road and around the main temple in town sleeping off their walk.

Things just kind of happen in this town. I soon found myself with this sweet room in a big house for about $4/night, kind of out in the countryside. The houses are all painted these crazy bright colors and look a little bit like doll houses or something. Rented a scooter for a while to get around but got tired of that and moved up to a motorcycle, which is so nice! Getting used to driving on the crazy Indian streets and being part of this chaotic flow.

We spent Christmas over at Mark's house, and had a surprisingly complete proper English dinner, including flaming pudding. Instead of turkey we cooked a chicken, as that was the biggest thing we could fit in the toaster-oven like cooker that Mark has. Mark's friends from England, David and Paul, showed up with a ton of decorations and supplies, so it was a bit like being home. Not what I envisioned for Christmas over here!

Well I'm off to Bangkok tomorrow night to meet my friend Cindy, and we'll continue directly on to Cambodia (I extended my stay here by a week and missed the elephant park volunteer work that we had been planning). I'll probably be less connected for a while and not post often for the next few weeks.

Pondicherry and Auroville

2008-12-16T23:54:00.000-08:00

A week of massive temples was enough for me, and I moved on to the more wordly pleasures of Pondicherry. When you first arrive in Pondicherry, it looks like a typical busy Indian city. But when you take a rickshaw out towards the beachfront area, suddenly it transforms into this cute little French seaside town. Pondicherry was a French colony up until the 1950s, and it still has an enormous French influence, with many French people living there and more importantly, excellent French food. I ate so well the few days I was in town - excellent croissants, chocolate mousse that almost made me pass out, and the first red meat I've had on the subcontinent (steak smothered in roquefort). Much as I love Indian food, it's nice to get a break once in a while.

My hotel, Qualithe, was this super atmospheric 40's era place that was basically a large bar with rooms attached. You would literally go up to the bar and pay for your room to the guy who was busy pouring out dark rums to the Indian customers. Although I wasn't drinking I met some great bar flies who showed me where everything was in town (thank you, Babu!). Other than eating, there's not a ton to do in Pondicherry, but just hanging out soaking in the atmosphere is pretty good for a few days. The tailors are excellent there (big surprise) and I had a couple of shirts and inadvertantly a really nice pair of dress pants made (little communication difficulty).

The town is dominated by the Sri Aurobindo Ashram, which was started by one of India's most famous gurus in the 1920s. Aurobindo's stamp (and image) is everywhere in town, with many businesses named "Auro" this or "Auro" that. Aurobindo's life companion, a Frenchwoman called simply "The Mother", is responsible for the creation of the ambitious Auroville community just outside of Pondicherry.

I was excited to go visit Auroville and, overcoming my fear of driving on busy Indian roads, rented a scooter to get me out to there. Auroville is difficult to describe. It's a self-proclamed "universal" town, which aims to bring together people from all nations, religions, and creeds to live in a way that transcends these divisions. A mix of about 40% Indians and 60% foreigners, the town combines the traditional Indian village way of life with more modern Western housing and technology. No one owns anything in Auroville, Auroville owns it all. You can build a house in Auroville and live in it, but if you leave, it goes back to Auroville. There are plenty of different jobs that you can do in Auroville and people earn a fairly modest stipend for doing them (earning money is not one of the reasons people go there - my impression is that it contains a lot of people who have made money in some way before). There is quite a range of light industries in Auroville, as well as many traditional Indian crafts when are sold on site or in stores throughout India. Auroville is famous for producing healthy organic foods and some of the best chocolate I've had in a while. Also (near and dear to my heart), it places great importance on sustainable energy and generates about 30% of its needs from those sources. I'm considering going back to see if I can work in that area for a little while.

The most famous symbol of Auroville is the Matrimandir, a large golden sphere at the geographic center of the community, sitting right next to a beautiful old Banyan tree. The Matrimandir is a meticulously engineered meditation space that is just gorgeous inside and out. The outside is covered with huge discs whose surface is gold leaf encased on glass. The inside looks like a set from "Space 1999", except not cheesy, with orange light eminating through what looks like the inside of a geodesic dome. Everything is white marble - stairs, railways, benches. Inside of this is the inner meditation chamber, where you must put on little white socks so as not to disturb the absolute whiteness of it all - white carpet, white marble, white ceiling. In the center of the chamber is an enormous crystal sphere. An opening at the top of the Matrimandir, combined with some sort of computer controlled mirror, continually sends a pure beam of sunlight directly through the crystal (that is the only light during meditation). The light continues down through the entire building and ends up striking a smaller crystal sphere in a beautiful lotus-shaped pool underneath the structure. I extended my stay in the area for an extra day so that I could experience meditation in the Matrimandir. I don't think I could get my mind off of the amazing space long enough to go into a meditative state!

My barfly friend Babu got me in contact with an old-timer out at Auroville, who I had lunch with at the Solar Cafe. The first thing I noticed was the confusing sign "Money absolutely not accepted!" I found out that this meant you had to get an account # and pay for everything through your account (sort of like Disney Dollars). Or sweet talk some nice Frenchman with an account into ordering your food for you. The vibe was interesting in Auroville - definitely lots of smart people were staying there and it appeared that they were actually getting things done. One of the most impressive things I saw was how they transformed the natural environment in the space of 40 years. Evidently when the community was started, it was pretty much a dirt plain, with no trees or large vegetation due to bad land management. There had been a forest a couple hundred years ago but it was completely gone. Since then, the area has been replanted with millions of trees and now it is forested and green. The man I had lunch with, David, was one of the primary guys in charge of the replanting. It was an enormous job and something that they are looking at exporting to other areas in India.

Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple, Srirangam

2008-12-14T02:58:00.000-08:00

Next up on the Tamil Nadu temple tour was the Sri Rnganathaswamy Temple in Srirangam, near the major city of Tiruchirapalli, or Trichy. I literally only had time to get a room, go to sleep, and then go see the temple the next day before my train, so I have no idea about the rest of the town. I thought the other temples were big but this one is enormous. Dedicated to Vishnu, it's the largest temple in India and one of the largest religious centers in the world. The temple has 7 concentric walls leading to a sacred inner gold temple (open only to Hindus). Each wall is capped by a large gopuram or tower.

The temple did not have as many shrines and icons as the other temples that I'd been to but was full of amazing sculptures and paintings. It's famous for its "Hall of 1000 Pillars" (actually there are 900-something but who's counting) and the huge statue of a reclining Vishnu on top of a bed of cobras (so I've heard - that's in the inner temple).

Rameswaram

2008-12-09T21:46:00.001-08:00

Next on the temple tour was Rameswaram, a small island off the southern tip of India. Part of the rock formations that form a trail of islands and reefs leading to Sri Lanka, a long bridge connects the island to the mainland. Rameswaram contains the Ramanathswamy temple, which is a one of the most important Hindu pilgrimage sites. The small town is entirely centered around this temple and the nearby beach area.

I took a room on the beach-side Hotel Tamil Nadu, which had the feeling of an out-of-season resort. I felt like the only person there other than a very large Indian family. There was a central dining hall that served decent Indian food, but it had this abandoned, David Lynchy feel to it. I walked in to the empty hall, silent save the loud whirring of ceiling fans overhead, and this bent over old Indian man moving in slow motion, straight out of Twin Peaks, greeted me and told me the restaurant didn't open until 7:30. "But it's 7:45" I protested. He didn't seem phased by this and waved for me to sit down "if I liked." He expressed similar disdain when I wanted to see a menu. The meal itself was fine, and no dancing midgets were in sight (though I swear there is a man who looks exactly like "Bob" here in Tiruvannamalai where I am now).

Ramanathswamy temple is quite large, and famous for its bathing tanks and extremely long columned hallways (one of which is the largest columned hallway in the world). Bathing is a major spiritual activity here. Pilgrims start with a dip in the ocean at a beachside ghat, and then in each of the more than 20 tanks inside the temple itself (there are a lot of dripping wet pilgrims wandering around). I was lucky to find a temple guide who allowed me to enter even the Hindu-only parts of the temple, so I felt like I really was able to experience it in its entirety. The temple is also famous for two lingams, icons containing both male and female symbols joined together, which I was able to see. These particular lingams are said to be from the Indian epic, The Ramayana. The story goes that Rama, the hero of the Ramayana and a worshipper of Shiva, was told by seers to install a Shivalingam at this site. He sent his trusted follower, Hanuman, to get the lingam from the Himalayas. Hanuman evidently took forever to come back, so Rama's wife Sita made a second lingham out of sand. Hanuman finally returned with his lingam, and to ensure that he did not feel bad, Rama insisted that Hanuman's be worshipped first.

Because of his importance to the area, there are also a number of Hanuman temples, which I was able to visit on my way out of town. Hanuman is one of my favorite Hindu gods, representing the overwhelming power of love and devotion.

Tamil Nadu Monster Temple Tour, 2008: Madurai

2008-12-06T01:40:00.000-08:00

I finally bid goodbye to Kerela after almost a month there. Much as I liked it, I was ready for some new scenary and eager to check out neighboring Tamil Nadu. Tamil Nadu is the other state at the south tip of India, on the east side. A much more traditional Indian state, it is full of many deeply important temples and pilgrimage sites for Hindus. The signature sight in Tamil Nadu are the enormous, brightly painted temple towers, or gopurams, which mark the walls of the equally huge temple complexes. I visited three cities with major Hindu temples, Madurai, Rameswaram, and Srirangam (Trichy).

Madurai was a shock after Kochi - a typically noisy, busy Indian city. Very crowded and full of pigrims en route to the Meenakshi Amman Temple in the center of the city. I "splurged" and got a rooftop hotel room with a view of the temple complex, in place recommended by the Rough Guide. I don't think they'd been there in a few years, because it was pretty dilapidated and gross (they described is as perfect place for a romantic getaway - yuck). It looked like a wild animal had tried to escape my bathroom - the door was all shredded up. I stayed a couple of nights out of laziness and due to the convenience of being right next to the temple. But when I developed a stomach issue, the bathroom scene did not cut it and I really splurged, moving to a nicer "business class" hotel for $20. Wow - I was in heaven! Super clean sheets, a nice bathroom, good looking wood furniture, and cable tv including HBO. I spent a fairly blissful sick day napping and watching the Da Vinci Code (hey I was happy for any English language tv but, really, I wish Ron Howard had stuck to acting!).

The temple itself is a bit of a sad sight from the outside right now. The huge gopurams are all covered with bamboo as they are being re-painted in preparation for a big festival in January. Now they look like that mountain from "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" - vaguely Aztec or something. Inside the temple, however, it's business as usual and the place buzzes like a small city. I was amazed at how much is going on at any one time and how many beautiful, ancient shrines it contains. The central temple area is off-limits to non-Hindus, so I wasn't able to view it. I was able to see quite a bit outside of that area, including being blessed by the temple elephant (you stick a rupee in its nostril and then it touches your forehead). The hallways are truly huge, and there is a large water tank that people hang out around. And the variety of shrines and statues to worship is beyond anything I've seen.

Other than the temple, I took an afternoon and had a rickshaw drive me around to some other sights in town. Saw the Gandhi Museum, with a good history of his works and a gruesome finale of the blood-stained clothes he was shot in. A large flower market serves the temples in town, a huge operation to keep up with the needs for ceremonial flowers. I also visited a 17th century palace of the king of Madurai, Thirumalai Naik.

Kochi

2008-12-01T06:47:00.000-08:00

After an ashram and a week in quiet mountain villages, I was ready to face a city again. I took the bus to Kottayam with Luka, and then he headed south to Varkala Beach while I took a train north to Kochi.

Kochi is Kerela's main tourist destination, a cute and photogenic port town with a huge amount of Portuguese and Dutch influence. There are a few different districts, separated by water, and the ferry system is cheap and efficient. It also has one of the best stocks of colonial architecture in India, as well as many important early Christian churches (Kerela has many more Christians relative to other parts of India).

The historic part of town is called Fort Cochin, and you can while away a few days here wandering down narrow European-feeling streets going from coffee house to art galley. It's another one of those places that is a relaxing break from the hectic streets of other Indian cities. I met my friend Matthew, who I got to know in Varkala, for breakfast one morning in a lovely cafe/gallery run by an American expat. This is one of those towns foreigners fall in love with and move to.

I only stayed a couple of days as I was eager to start exploring the nearby state of Tamil Nadu. In that time I went and saw many of the churches and temples in the area. The Dutch Palace Museum was also very good, primarily because of a room full of fantastic fresco murals. But the primary attraction is the places of worship. In addition to some great Indianized Christian churches (including one where Vasco fr Gamma was originally buried), there are some important Hindu and Jain temples.

The Jain temple was my favorite, with its beautiful marblework and an obsession with pigeons from its patrons (Jains are famous for celebrating every living being and not wanting to kill a single one, the most devout even carrying brooms to sweep any organisms from in front of them when they walk).

Other than that, I took an excellent Kerelan cooking class from the jolly woman named Leelu at her guest house. Everything was delicious (fish and various veg curries, chappatti) and it turned into a romantic candlelight dinner as the power goes out everywhere in Kerela for a half hour every day at 8pm.

On the way out of town, in the hectic, modern district called Ernakulam, a short ferry ride across the harbor, I also caught a performance of Kathakali. Kathakali is Kerela's ritualized dance theater. The dancer is dressed up in an elaborate costume and has his face painted with bright coconut oils. The actual performance is a religious ceremony where the dancer goes into a kind of trance and acts out traditional Hindu stories.

Periyar Tiger Reserve

2008-11-29T01:21:00.000-08:00

Staying in the mountain region of Kerela, Luca and I traveled by bus to Kumily, which is just outside of Periyar Tiger Reserve. I had been continuing my meditation practice (twice a day for an hour) and on the 5-hour bus ride had the feeling of most intense happiness and calm (very nice!). Sitting for an hour at a time is getting much easier as well. We were greeted by a super nice Muslim guy named Abbas, who our hotel in Munnar had called ahead about us. Abbas drove his own autorickshaw and was everywhere in town. We'd turn around and he'd be there - it was eery. He drove us to his new homestay, which was rustic, friendly, and at the edge of the jungle. The hot water heater was broken though, so you had to heat water up on the stove to take a hot bucket shower.

Periyar comprises an enormous protected area dedicated to stabilizing the remaining tiger population in the area. At the center a large dam creates a man-made lake, tendrils of which snake throughout the reserve. The latest census puts the number of tigers at 50, so the odds of seeing one is very small. Nevertheless there are tons of other animals in the Reserve to see, so Luca and I booked a 2 day, overnight camping trek.

It was out-and-out pouring when we booked the tickets, and I was a little skeptical. I had a light rainjacket, but that was it. It looked like I should be wearing a dry-suit or something. Luckily the next day, we had only moderate rain, with the more heavy showers happening at night when we were safe in our tents. As we started the trek, they gave us each knee socks, which I had never seen before but they go over your normal socks, inside your shoe and then up your calf. "Great!" I thought, "they are thinking of my dryness." But then they started pouring brown powder on them and it turns out their purpose is to protect us from the numerous leeches that infest parts of the forest floor. Leeches! They make all of the giant spiders, cockroaches, man-eating mosquitoes, snakes and rats seem tame and cute in comparison. Looking like ravenous little worms, they were soon crawling all over my poor Echo walking shoes, which had no idea what they were in for on this trip.

The Periyar program employs local village people who used to earn money poaching tigers or stripping bark from rare trees. Now they lead ecotourism expeditions into the same forest, and they are bad-ass! We had 5 people with us during our trek, complete with one expert tracker who was constantly looking at broken branches and sniffing droppings, and a bear of a man with a rifle who was our "elephant enforcer".

I seem to be toughening up as a result of this trip. There I was, in the rain, with a case of food poisoning from something I ate the night before, throwing up on the trail, and still enjoying myself quite a bit. We saw a ton of wildlife, including wild boar (every time our guide would yell that out all I could think of was that Duran Duran song "Wild Boys"), bison, black monkeys, Sambar deer, fruit bats, giant squirrels (my favorite), kingfisher, cranes, and something called a hawk eagle, which looks like a smaller bald eagle (or a white dove body with huge brown wings).

The highlight, though, was finding some wild elephants the morning we were returning from camp. Our tracker heard some elephant trumpeting in the distance and led us out through the brush on an exciting hour and a half hunt before breakfast. Alas, we never caught up with the beasts, though we did find fresh elephant and tiger tracks (!). He was visibly upset when we came back to camp only to find out that a group of elephants had just walked by on an opposite bank! Luckily he redeemed himself on the way back and we found them, about 7 animals in all, including a little baby elephant and a huge bull. Our gunman made us keep our distance, and we were told stories of other guides getting kicked to death by elephants as tourists got too close. Everybody went bonkers with their cameras, of course. This Polish girl had a Nikon digital SLR, which was the envy of everyone on the trip (you really notice the limits of the point and shoot cameras when you try to zoom in and catch wildlife). It always cracked me up when she would get really worked up about a shot because she would go into continuous shooting mode (kshhhttk kshhhttk kshhhttk), which sounded so serious and was an audible cue to her level of excitement (reminded me of that Duran Duran video, "Girls on Film"). There was a lot of kshhhttk kshhhttk kshhhttk with the elephants.

Luca and I returned to town, completely soaked, tired, and satisfied. Being a little cold and wet, we kinda snuck out of Abbas' place while Abbas was not around (paid up of course), and sought out another guest house that had warm water. Tourism is down right now due to the continued bombings (and I'm sure will fall off a cliff after Mumbai), so we were able to negotiate down these very nice rooms for almost 1/2 off. For the rest of our time in Kumily, whenever I heard an autorickshaw behind us, I expected to turn around see Abbas bearing down on us, but somehow, he disappeared. The next morning, Luca and I took a bus to Kottayam, where we went our separate ways, he going to Varkala and myself to Kochi.

Thinking of all those who lost loved ones in Mumbai...what a tragedy.

Munnar

2008-11-27T03:55:00.000-08:00

I wanted to continue to avoid bigger towns and do something mellow after the ashram, so I headed to the hill station of Munnar, up in the mountains in Kerela. Munnar is tea growing country - tea plants cover every available piece of land. Tea plants looking like nothing more than a well-tended hedge in the shape of a human brain. One of the prettiest Indian towns I've been to, Munnar is mainly an Indian tourist destination, though foreign tourism is picking up. The British cultivated the tea trade here in the late 1800's, and it was gradually brought under Indian ownership after Independence and now, in good Kerelan fashion, is owned mostly by the workers (they're a little bit Communist down here). The other thing I love about Munnar is that they have great homemade chocolate here - the chocolate is so bad in most parts of India.

I arrived into town late at night with what I thought was a reservation at this cute home stay called Zina Lodge. When I got there, this strange old Indian man kind of chewed me out for not calling again when I got to town, and then revealed that he had overbooked the rooms and that I might have to sleep on the living room floor (or go to his brother's lodge). If he hadn't been so cranky and annoying this probably would have been fine but as it was I wanted to get away from him as soon as possible. It was pretty funny because he is written up in all the guidebooks as a local treasure, and he did make me a cup of tea and give me some biscuits. But everything about the man was not friendly underneath and I couldn't wait to leave. So I called up my rickshaw driver who had conveniently given me his cell phone #, and had him take me to the next hotel that looked good, which turned out to be a fairly expensive splurge called the Hillview. This is where Indian couples go for their honeymoon, I think, and it's nice with lots of dark carved wood and enormous rooms. It reminded me (like so many things) of the hotel in "The Shining". I stayed for two nights and then moved to the cheaper and friendlier Green View hotel, which was all about trekking and backpackers like myself.

There's not a ton to do here other than learn about tea and go trekking. Luckily, the trekking is fantastic, with amazing views from about 5 peaks in the area. I went up with a group of a couple other travellers, and we had sketchy weather - not raining yet, but it looked like it might be going in that direction. We had breakfast up above the clouds and watched them pour over the mountains like a river. Our guide kept on checking the weather carefully and calling his cohorts on his cell phone. Finally, he turned us around and we made it off the mountain and got to our shelter just as it started to pour hard. Which was lucky for me because for some reason I forgot my raincoat that day...I met a super nice Italian guy named Luka on the trek and we ended up hanging out and then travelling together to Periyar Tiger Reserve.

I'm fine (not in Mumbai)

2008-11-27T00:51:00.000-08:00

I'm down south in Kochi, still in Kerela. Everyone is glued to their TVs here watching the news about the blasts and hostages - truly awful.

Kerelan Backwaters and Amma's Ashram

2008-11-20T20:44:00.000-08:00

A group of us made friends and decided to travel together to the Amma Ashram to hopefully get one of the famous hugs from Kerela's resident saint. If you haven't heard of Amma (http://www.amritapuri.org/), she is really remarkable. Her hugs are supposed to fill you with positive energy and be healing, and she also has a huge charitable organization that does a lot to help India's poor. For example, she was able to mobilize over $22 million to help the tsunami victims in India, and has built over 10,000 houses around India to shelter the homeless. The trip to the ashram was through the Kerelan backwaters, which is a lovely journey through inland water channels. It reminded me of the Mekong Delta in Vietnam, though that was a little more wild (and a bit like Hong Kong harbor, Mark, they had... HOUSEBOAT! HOUSEBOAT!).

The ashram itself is very large (around 3,000 people are staying there at any one time and every day it looks like maybe 50 people were arriving). And this was the off season - we got the dates wrong and Amma was not there right now (she's off hugging in Europe). There is a nice Hindu temple in the middle, but many of the buildings look like public housing apartments. When Amma is in residence, there are many more people there and tons of classes and things to do (yoga, massage, aryuvedic healing, music lessons). But many things shut down when she is away and the crowds are not there. I found the people that lived and worked there to be clearheaded, lovely people, who were quite helpful. Many of the guests though had a funky energy - very sad people coming to have Amma save them. From everyone I've talked to, including Gina, Amma is the real deal - someone with almost boundless love for humanity, but you have to wade through many of her followers to reach this love. She is supposed to be back on Dec. 8th and I may stop by and get in the hug line if it works in my schedule.

I was still in the mood for something mellow and quiet after my meditation retreat, so I cut the ashram visit short and headed up to Munnar, which is at the center of Kerela's tea plantation industry up in the mountains. It's beautiful and green up here, and also cooler. Just arrived last night so I'm off to explore the area now...

Survived meditation, moving on!

2008-11-20T19:40:00.000-08:00

Wow - the 10 day Vipassana meditation retreat was very tough but I got a lot out of it. We meditated for 10 hours a day and for 3 of the 1-hour sessions had to remain perfectly still the entire time. That is tougher than it sounds and involves a lot of pain. I had some kind of old knee injury that would start to spasm after 35 minutes, so a big part of the retreat was learning to deal with that. Which was cool - the technique teaches you to not react to pain (nor to overly crave pleasant sensations), and once you get the hang of it, you realize that most of the pain that you feel is your own reaction to the initial sensation. You start to think, "I will not multiply my suffering", which is pretty effective. Vipassana itself involves a deep investigation of the sensations of your body, and your reactions to them, and I found it useful. At the end of the retreat I felt light and happy - I plan to continue to practice it.

The location was quite beautiful and peaceful, in the middle of the Kerelan jungle, and we looked out onto a rice plantation and coconut grove with mellow grazing cows. Lots of birds, huge snakes, mongooses (which look like sleek, cute squirrels), turtles, frogs, armies of ants and enormous spiders. They tell us that animals don't disturb meditators because we don't give out panic reactions, which was tested when we found (toward the end of the session) a wasps nest in my neighbors bunk. They didn't seem to be bothered by us at all so we left them alone.

Many people at the retreat were on the verge of leaving at some point in the middle of the session, but only one did. We were all glad to have stayed. Not least because on the 10th day you could start to talk to each other, and it was interesting to find out what people were like after you spent so long imagining their personalities from their appearance.

Downtime in Kerela

2008-11-07T22:08:00.000-08:00

After a few months on the road, I needed a little break, so I headed down south for a week of R & R in Kerela. Flew down from Delhi (via Bangalore - nice new airport) and suddenly in the space of a few hours I was at the tip of the subcontinent. I immediately took a tuk-tuk to my little beach paradise, so I can't say I've seen much of Kerela. But from what I have seen, it appears much better off and mellower than up north. I rented a scooter and drove around some nearby neighborhoods and beaches (my first time driving one, which was exciting when I had to go to town to get gas). Many people seem to have decent-sized houses out in the jungle. It's not like people are rich here, but it seems more stable and less desperate here.

The beach town I'm staying at, Varkala, is supposed to be one of the less busy/touristy places but it basically consists of a cliff-top path full of restaurants and tourist shops, with a nice, smallish beach below. So I was pretty much in tourist-land the entire time I was here. It's one of the more expensive places I've stayed as far as food costs, but mostly because you can get fresh seafood here so you end up paying $4 for a meal instead of $1.50. Not that I'm complaining - it was a perfect place to unwind and relax. The Indian Ocean is warm, but super rough, and the riptide is very strong. You have to stay at the south end of the beach and a lifeguard will lay into you if you drift too far north. One of the folks I was hanging out with, Bill, got pounded by a wave and it looked like he'd been in a fight or something. I met some great people (locals and tourists) and ended up hanging out with them most of the time I was here.

The big draw at night here is the "Funky Art Cafe", which is a decent restaurant that has some live entertainment each night. One night there might be good classical Indian musicians, and the next might be 6 year olds dancing to Bollywood music (I wish I had my camera for that!). The power goes out every night at 8:30 for a half hour, which tends to put a damper on the festivities.

North of Varkala are miles of undeveloped beach, lots of canals and saltwater inlets, and tons of fisherman. A couple friends and I walked up towards there and helped the fisherman pull in their nets one day (they invited us to come out fishing at 6am the next morning but we passed). Once you get out of the developed area it's stunning here.

I did a lot of reading here, sitting in cafes sipping mint lemon tea and chatting with the locals. Read "How to See Yourself as You Really Are" by the Dalai Lama, and also "Hot, Flat and Crowded" by Thomas Friedman (the guy who wrote "The World is Flat"). Both were great but I can't recommend the second one enough - it very clearly lays out the enormous challenges we as a world face in the next 40 years (mostly the growth of people around the world that are starting to consume at the rate that Americans do, but also political instability, global warming, and ecological devastation) and how they mostly boil down to the need to move our energy system over to being sustainable and non-fossil fuel-based. It was inspiring to me as I start to think about what I want to do next...

Today I'm off to a 10-day Vipassana Meditation retreat here in Kerela. No talking, no exercise, no reading! Wish me luck!

Back to Rishikesh

2008-10-31T22:45:00.000-07:00

My last few days in McLeod Ganj were a combination of highs and lows. I found a great non-profit to volunteer for, Rogpa, that helps Tibetans become self-sufficient, and worked with them in their cafe for a while. It instantly felt like home and I met a lot of sweet and committed people. I might go back in the spring and stay for a longer period of time - this place has a very good vibe to it.

However, while I was working there, I ordered a bowl of soup from a nearby restaurant, and then was too busy to eat it for a while. By the time I got to it, it was cool, and I unwisely ate it anyway. Bad move! I had some of the weirdest, full-body-infection feeling food poisoning I've ever had. I walked around like a zombie for a day and a half until the antibiotics I took kicked in. After that I felt better rapidly.

Gina and I had made plans to meet back in Rishikesh to do some filming. I was pretty apprehensive because this involved a 11-hour bus ride, but was feeling a lot better so I took the leap and got on the bus. The first 4 hours or so were on this windy switchback road getting down the mountains, and I thought I'd made the biggest mistake of my life. To fend off nausea, I had to put on my headphones and listen to mellow music like "Amplified Heart" by Everything but the Girl, and try to get to my happy place. After we got off the mountain, the road turned pretty manageable and I even was able to sleep for a couple of hours on the trip. At some point a bunch of college kids filled up the bus, and a very nice guy named Sanjay sat next to me. He invited me to his family's house for Diwali (couldn't go) and ended up saving me and a group of other Westerners when we got lost looking for a bus station in Dehradun.

Hanging out with Gina in Rishikesh was a lot of fun and we had an awesome day of filming up at the Visistha Cave, an ancient holy site where the Gayetri Mantra was originally received. We went into the cave to do some chanting and some monkeys evidently got inside one of our closed bags and stole some bananas. There were tell-tale banana peels under the tree when we came out and some of the monks were chuckling about it. Filming went well outside of the cave, in spite of monkeys dropping things behind Gina and cows weighing in with their opinions once in a while. Afterwards an Indian group that had come to see the cave saw Gina's harmonium and asked her to sing a song for them, which was a big hit. On the way back, the government was blasting a section of the highway with dynamite to widen it, and our taxi driver had to get out and clear rubble so that we could pass. Just another day in India!

Gina left for Japan the next day, and I was in Rishikesh on my own for a few days, which included Diwali. Diwali is the biggest holiday of the year for Hindus, a bit like Christmas and New Year's rolled into one. It's a celebration of Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth and beauty. Everyone lights candles, puts up Christmasy-looking lights, and gives each other gifts, which are often sweets. It was beautiful to see the city all lit up with tons of lights and candles, and to see all of the families who came to Rishikesh to celebrate dressed up in their finest. I went to the Ganga Aarti ceremony that night, which was lovely and a bit like midnight mass on Christmas (the whole town seemed to be there). Jeesh they have lound firecrackers over here though! They really sound like dynamite.

Just saw the Dalai Lama

2008-10-20T04:29:00.000-07:00

I've been up in McLead Ganj for a few days now (this is the town that you really go to when you go to Dharamsala). Tucked up on a mountainside, it's a small and beautiful Tibetan enclave that houses both the Dalai Lama and the government-in-exile of Tibet. The scenery is lovely here and it would be a good place to hole up for a while and hide from the world. Which is what quite a few people seem to be doing. There is quite a community of long-term expats here, and many different volunteering and teaching opportunities to keep busy. Also tons of yoga, meditation, message, etc which makes it a good place to rejuvenate and reconnect. I've found a great yoga teacher and have been taking classes from him.

The other major attraction here is trekking into the mountains. There must be 20 different companies leading treks in this tiny town. I went on an intense day hike by myself. Starting in this nearby village, I stumbled on a path that led up a steep mountain to this stone tower on an outcropping jutting out into thin air (on three sides there were cliffs falling hundreds of feet). In front of the tower lay a flat slate area that was perfect to sit and meditate for a while. A very spiritual place.

Today I was coming out of a Tibetan message when I saw people drawing these elaborate symbols with chalk on the road. A crowd was gathering to watch them and I thought - must be for some ceremony or something. Then as I was walking back to my hotel I saw monks start to gather in front of the entrance gate to the town and a news reporter talking into a camera and it suddenly clicked for me that the Dalai Lama was arriving in town! He had been previously in Delhi recuperating from an illness and it had been unclear when he might be coming back. I rushed to get my video camera and waited in the crowd for and hour and a half. Tibetans were waving their flag, or white silk scarves, and burning incense. The crowd got very tight, and huge tour buses kept on having to drive right through the middle of it (there's pretty much one main road in McLeod Ganj). Then suddenly he was there, smiling and bowing to everyone in the seat of his SUV. I was probably about 5 feet away from him. What an unexpected blessing!

Udaipur

2008-10-17T08:44:00.000-07:00

The last stop on the River of Sound tour was Udaipur, in Rajasthan. Beautiful city surrounding a lake with floating palaces and hotels in the middle of it. We totally scored with the hotel that Gina picked, the Wonder View. It's name does not lie - the rooftop restaurant has practically a 360 degree view of the lake, palaces and the main city across the water. And the rooms were huge and palatial.

Udaipur reminds me a little of Venice, though they have opposite problems. In Venice the water levels are rising, while here the lake is drying up. Although there was some water when we were there, evidentally earlier in the year they had to start driving people by car to the posh "island" hotel in the middle of the lake.

We spent 4 days in Udaipur, the highlight of which was meeting a family of Qawwali musicians that were friends of Gina's. We had a lesson with them (tough - their vocal range was just a wee bit larger than ours) and they also gave a full-on concert in one of our hotel rooms. It was pretty incredible - the emotional intensity of the music practically knocked you over. And loud too - evidentally people in the hotel were hearing echoes of them from across the lake. I think they played like two songs and that was about two hours. Unbelievably moving.

On Sunday, Muhammad, the leader of the group took us to his mosque. The men in the group were able to go in and have him show us how they worshipped - the women had to stay outside. This was a bit uncomfortable. You also had to have your head covered inside the mosque, and as I had no hat, Muhammad provided me with what looked like a dirty dishrag that kind of floated on top of my curls (hot!).

After praying, the entire family came by and we had a picnic in the shaded area behind the mosque. Finally the Qawwali group performed at the entrance to the mosque - I could watch those guys for hours.

The grand finale of the tour was a camel ride through the Rajasthani desert, followed by camping out under the stars at a ranch outside of town. It was a great ending to the trip as we were able to spend a lot of time with the other tour folks in a relaxed setting. The camels were so sweet, though the riding itself is like doing a yoga stretch for three hours. All of the other animals we encountered, including the normally unflappable water buffaloes, were visibly freaked out by them. The ranch, owned by our host, Dinesh, was really chill and had incredible, fresh-off-the-farm food.

I come away from the tour with a new way to meditate (mantras), much less fear of singing, a lot of memories and a ton of tailored clothes. But the other people on the tour turned out to be the highlight. It was just an amazing group, supportive, generous, good-hearted but also fun to hang out with. I miss them already!

Gina did a terrific job making our time in India as smooth and spiritual as possible, and it was so cool to see her in her natural element. It's no exaggeration to say that in the cities we went to, she was well-known by most people we would run into. We would find ourselves saying to each other, "I found a shopkeeper who hasn't heard of Gina!", like that was some sort of miracle. She also guided us on the best ways to do our part to help out people in the places we visited, so that we were leaving behind us goodwill and compassion.

I got so much out of the tour on so many levels. I was able to experience some moments of deep spirituality and start to understand how to respect and to access that here. It also whetted my appetite for more and I feel ready to dive into the rest of my time in India. I'd highly recommend the tour to anyone - you don't have to be a singer to go (trust me!). Check out Gina's website for details: http://www.ginasala.com/

I've spent the last couple days catching up on things in Delhi (like uploading 40 billion photos). Delhi's hectic, polluted, and the touts here are more intense and trickier than in the other cities I've been to. I've gotten used to them, but it takes a lot of energy to be here. I am now in the station for my overnight train to Dharmasala. Can't wait!

Thanks to Elizabeth for some of the photos on this post!

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Rishikesh

2008-10-12T05:00:00.000-07:00

After our hectic taxi ride here, Rishikesh was a cool, peaceful paradise. Situated further up the Ganges at the foothills of the Himalayas, Rishikesh is renowned for yoga, healing and ashrams. Definitely my favorite place in India so far, Rishikesh has much calmer, more outdoorsy vibe. We had a relatively mellow time here, with no master musicians to meet or classes to take. Instead most of us took the time to get some Aryurvedic messages, hot oil treatments and doctor consultations. I learned I'm a Vata and am not supposed to eat much ice cream or oily, spicy foods (there goes all of those curries I've been eating!). And I had hot oil poured on my third eye for 45 minutes, which was an unbelievably relaxing experience.

The Ganges is very clean at this point and we did quite a bit of swimming in it. The highlight of this segment was going up to this ancient spiritual cave where the Gayatri Mantra was first received, chanting and meditating in the cave, and then having a picnic and swimming in the river. The Ganges Valley is green and lovely up here, and the road has quite a few places where you are inches from a 300 foot drop.

Monkeys roam freely throughout the town, and particularly on the two "walking" bridges that connect the different sides of the river (walking bridges in India include bicycles, motorcycles, and the occasional cow). I was walking with another person on the tour, Elizabeth, on the bridge and she literally had a monkey jump on her back after she took a picture of it. Luckily it didn't bite her or anything...

The Taj!

2008-10-08T23:45:00.000-07:00

Truly beautiful, though not as huge as I imagined. I guess seeing all those pictures from clever angles made me think it towered above everything around it for miles. It was more along the lines of St. Peter's in Rome. Very big, but not freaky big. And so gorgeous it kind of hums.

After the Taj Mahal, we took a 12 hour taxi ride from Agra to Rishikesh in these really nice SUVs that were made to seat about 4 fewer people than the 13 in the tour. The entire way we were bouncing around in heavy traffic, passing cars while enormous trucks were blazing towards us head-on, or having to swerve to avoid cows. Sometimes the highway would suddenly drop 6 inches and turn into a dirt road full of huge potholes. Have to say though that the drivers here are amazing and while it looks like any moment could be a huge catastrophe, things seem to work out. This was good mental training for any other driving adventures I might have in India (right now we are on a 5-hour jeep ride back to Delhi - no problem!) and also made me want to take the train whenever possible.

Along the way we stopped in Vrindavan, which is home to the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, or the Hare Krishnas. We joined in on the Hare Krishna chant that keeps on going every day forever there. You know, a lot of people shave their heads and wear saffron robes over here so this place didn't seem unusual at all.
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Train station hoe-down

2008-10-04T01:51:00.000-07:00

We took the overnight train from Varanasi to Agra, and it was probably the most intense experience so far. The minute we arrived at the train station platform, a crowd surrounded us, just to stare at us. Thirteen Westerners with a mountain of luggage became the entertainment for the evening. There must have been a tight crowd around us for over two hours as we waited for our (late) train. Not threatening, more curious, but very close.

After a while Gina brought out the harmonium and we started singing and chanting to the crowd. This instantly lightened the mood and everyone became noticeably friendlier. Three women dressed in beautiful saris returned the favor and sang us a few songs as well. Suddenly I felt like I was in a musical or something. Like so many things here, this could have been a drag and turned out unexpectedly beautiful.
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Varanasi

2008-10-01T10:28:00.000-07:00

First stop on our trip has been Varanasi, which we flew to after one night in Delhi. We have been so busy for the past few days I haven't had time to blog - so much to see and do here. Varanasi is one of the oldest continually inhabited cities in the world and it is also one of the holiest for the Hindu faith. Ritual affects every aspect of life here and it's an amazing environment to be in.

The center of spiritual life here are many bathing areas or ghats where you can walk down and bathe in the Ganges river. This is a major pilgrimage site for Hindus, who believe the Ganges is literally a goddess, the "Mother". Bathing in the river cleanses you of your sins, and the most holy event would be to be cremated at one of the burning ghats along the river. This is believed by the Hindus to stop the cycle of continual rebirth.

We have been getting up at dawn and walking down to the river to observe the morning rituals. It's beautiful early in the day here (plus it gets too hot and sticky to do much in the afternoon - not as hot as Dubai but more humid). While we were here we witnessed the end of a three week ceremony honoring your ancestors by fasting and doing rituals in the water. They also hold very large nightly ceremonies to the river at the main ghat (pictured above). The road to the main ghat is a huge bazaar, and really the biggest sensory overload I've ever experienced.

Gina's River of Sound tour has been a truly amazing experience so far. She has arranged for us to meet with a number of master musicians and spiritual teachers that she has studied with. This has been a privilege - the gurus are some of the best musicians in India, and just wonderful, good-hearted people. We have had a packed schedule of classical Indian singing and dancing lessons or concerts, as well as going to some of the local temples and doing some chants there. I'm not an experienced singer at all and I've discovered that I really like it. I'm thinking of pursuing more lessons in the future.

The other people on the tour are all great and we've been getting along easily. Many people are on a similar voyage of self-discovery. I was a little worried about the transition from solo backpacker to organized tour but not a problem.

We took a river boat out to see the ghats at dawn, and on the way back the oarsmen couldn't row all of us against the current and we kept on running into bathers on the ghats. Gina's advice was to keep chanting this friendly local chant - she said "if we are going to run into them we can at least sing them a song" - which worked surprisingly well. The Indian temprament in general has been incredibly patient with us so far. There are of course the constant beggars, requests to take rickshaw rides or "come see my friend's garment shop", and that can be get overwhelming sometimes, but by and large it's a pleasure getting to know people over here.

Varanasi's also known for its silk and textiles so we've been getting some clothes made here. Which is a relief because my wardrobe wasn't really humidity-friendly. Been averaging about four showers a day...

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Delhi

2008-09-25T11:39:00.000-07:00

I don't think I could have found a more perfect opposite to Dubai if I had tried. Everybody warned me that Delhi would be an overwhelming array of sights and particularly smells: poverty, garbage, pollution. It's true that the city has all that, but even so I'm really enjoying it here. I'm finding the chaos and busyness energizing, with so much to stimulate and challenge you here. And the people are beautiful - very open and willing to engage with you.
The city has such an old soul, and even with all of the modenization happening, you can still feel it everywhere. Cows roam freely here even in busy streets, eating garbage and slop buckets that people put out for them. The traffic is unpredictable, with bikes, bicycle rickshaws, and autorickshaws competing with pediatrians and cars for space on the road. Lanes are a much more fluid concept over here, with a typical two lane road turning into three or more real lanes. Honking is "compulsory", as my taxi driver told me - a friendly reminder that you are behind or next to someone. Nice houses sit next to falling down tenaments and piles of rubble.

I'm meeting 12 other people here, including my friend Gina, who is going to lead us on a three week spiritual tour in northen India. Most of the others are coming in from Seattle late tonight, but I met up with the other early guy, Thomas, and we did a little sightseeing. New Delhi has a new Metro which made getting around pretty painless for us. I think things would have been much more difficult before.

We went to see the Red Fort, which is an old 1600s Moghul palace in Old Delhi. The trip there, including walking down a crammed, busy main street, was as interesting as the fort. The slices of life here are amazing - the sheer mass of people and storefronts (some no bigger than cubbyholes): sari shops, shoe repair, flowers, street food, welding, auto parts, just about everything. Hard to describe how vibrant and intense the scene was. This was on the main road to a major tourist attraction and it felt totally authentic and focused on Indians.

We discovered a famous food stand on the way that made Bhalla, a spicy bread covered in sweet yogurt and tamerind sauce. The strong spice and sweet created a combination of flavors I've never encountered before - delicious! And our hotel makes surprisingly good dinners for about $6 - dangerous when I love Indian food so much...
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Fun in Dubai

2008-09-24T03:31:00.000-07:00

Fun in Dubai seems to be mostly around shopping and going out, and with Ramadan that second option is pretty limited. Not feeling very in sync with the glitzy lifestyle anyway, I had a pretty mellow time here. I did go to see the world's biggest (only?) indoor ski area, Ski Dubai (inside the Mall of the Emirates), but didn't buy a ticket 'cuz it looked cheesey.

The downtown area called Deira does have some charm. It's bustling at night with lots of neon-lit shops selling everything and some great hole-in-the-wall restaurants. I had an amazing Persian meal at a place that looks like a Dunkin' Donuts.

The heat is crazy here - you really don't want to be outside walking around from noon to about 5pm. Spent a lot of time at the pool, though even there it's uncomfortable before about 3pm. I totally understand the whole mall thing now and have a new appreciation for A/C. Some of my fondest memories of Dubai have been: getting a smoothie at the mall, going to the internet cafe at the mall, and "Tropical Thunder".
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Dubai #1!

2008-09-23T08:25:00.000-07:00

The scale of building here truly is awe-inspiring. The entire city appears to be under construction all at once. I kept running into different pockets that on their own looked like the urban core of a major city. The towers shown above are in Dubai Marina, which is a completely new development away from the original downtown area. My hotel is on Sheikh Zayed Road, which is a highway lined with an unbelievable number of cool looking towers. Looming in the distance is the Burj Dubai (Dubai Tower) which is already the world's tallest building and isn't even done yet. The Burj won't reveal its final height until the last minute so other buildings can't scoop it. It makes a pretty good symbol for all of Dubai - obsessed with being #1 (and still under construction).

Dubai's planning a bunch of coming soon #1s including: the world's biggest mall, airport, theme park, manmade island and camel race track (okay not sure if that last one is the biggest but they do have one). And the world's first underwater 5-star hotel. 5-star hotels are like Starbucks over here - they are everywhere. And of course they have the world's only 7-star hotel, the Burj Al-Arab, the famous sail-shaped building. You've gotta wonder if there is any capacity planning going on here or if things are going to end up wildly overbuilt.
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Dubai impressions

2008-09-23T00:49:00.000-07:00

Ah, Dubai! From all I'd heard, I thought it was going to be a cross between Las Vegas and a small Middle Eastern country, but it's more like a cross between Bellevue and a small Middle Eastern country. It's all about the shopping here. There are over 30 shopping malls, and the two major annual festivals revolve around shopping. Also a little bit of LA in the DNA - it's so spread out you can't walk anywhere and there's no good mass transit system (yet - coming next year). I guess that makes sense for a country that has some of the cheapest cars (no tax) and gas (water is more expensive) on the planet. I took the Big Bus Tour to get an overview of the areas and about half of the stops were malls.

I'm here during Ramadan, and the difference between here and Turkey could not be more striking. In Turkey you wouldn't really notice Ramadan, at least in the more touristy towns where I was. All of the restaurants were open and there was no preceptable change in behavior.

In Dubai, restaurants are closed from sunrise to sunset, outside of hotels and a few restaurants in a high end malls. In those malls, Starbucks remained closed but scrappy Seattle's Best Coffee kept their door discretely half open. There are expectations to be more modest and unassuming at all times. It's recommended to wear more conservative clothing, not to sing or dance in public (all of the clubs are closed for the month), not to chew gum or spit, etc. Then at sunset (Iftar) there are many big celebration feasts to break your fast, or if you are like me you can find the nearest possible Indian restaurant the moment the sun dips.

The Indian population here is quite large as they are drawn here for work opportunities. Dubai in some ways feels like a melting pot of Middle Eastern, Asian, and African people, resulting in some great authentic restaurants and shops. Though of course culturally things are kept strictly Islamic and Arab, combined with a heavy emphasis on Western luxury brands and Disney-like attractions.

Westerners tend to keep to themselves. Wandering around town it felt like I was the only Westener in the city. Until I'd go into a hotel, where they all seem to hang out around the pool and in the bars and restaurants.
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Ephesus

2008-09-21T23:48:00.000-07:00

(I hope the photos come out -my access to Flickr is denied in Dubai!)

My last few days in Olympos were very relaxing and mellow. I continued to meet great people at my pension, including Egor, a Dutch journalist who had covered Beirut and had just been to the Kurdish part of Iraq, and Ursula, also Dutch, who sold everything she owned two years ago and travelled the world teaching diving. I hiked around and swam a lot (had an hour plus swim looking for an elusive water cave). Also went up to see the Chimera, which are mysterious eternal flames up on a mountain. Today they look like a bunch of built-in gas grills, but you can imagine how magical they must have been 2000 years ago.

After some downtime in Olympos, my last hours in Turkey were a bit of a sprint to the finish line. I took a bus on Thursday to Selcuk, got up early in the morning, toured Ephesus for a few hours, and then took a flight to Istanbul in the afternoon followed by one to Dubai at night. Whew! It was the only way to fit Ephesus in, which was definitely worth it.

Ephesus: the capitol of Roman Asia, most complete Roman ruins in the eastern Mediterranean, and freakin' huge! It's an experience to be actually surrounded by ruins like this, instead of just viewing a few isolated examples. The theater and the library are the highlights, though I was surprised to learn that the library entrance (the iconic image of Ephesus) was reconstructed and basically had a wall of concrete behind it. I guess that makes sense if you look at it - it's just sitting there with no apparent support, kinda like Ralph Nader.

I knew coming in that 9 days in Turkey was pretty quick, and this trip has only whetted my appetite to come back and see more of the country. I would have loved to have seen Cappadocia, with its fairy chimneys and underground cities, as well as a lot more of the Mediterranean coast and eastern Turkey. But I'm really happy with what I was able to see in my time here.

One of the highlights has been the food here: kebaps, koftes (meatballs), mezes (little dishes like tapas but usually delicious things you can spread on bread), the billion and one ways they prepare eggplant, and the traditional breakfast of tomatoes, cucumbers, eggs, meat, olives, bread, cheese, jam, and butter. Along with small tulip-shaped glasses of tea (chai) at every possible moment. It was so good I couldn't get enough of it and found myself trying to find one last Turkish meal (instead of a turkey sandwich) at the airport before my plane flew out.
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Olympos

2008-09-16T02:11:00.000-07:00

I think I only scratched the surface of Istanbul but after 4 days I headed out to the southern coast for a little bit of relaxation. I took the overnight bus from Istanbul to Antalya, whıch took about 13 hours all told. Turkish buses lived up to their reputation of being super deluxe and comfortable, includıng beverage and snack service on the bus. The landscape down here is rugged and beautiful, wıth pine trees and scrub on striking rock formations. I'm staying at this unexpected backpacker camp rıght next to the ruıns of the cıty of Olympos and lovely beach. The big thing here are treehouses where you can stay off the ground, and there are literally hundreds of them ın camps spread around the valley down here. Luckily it's not peak season so things are pretty mellow right now. Met some great fellow travellers and ended up havıng a mıdnıght swım and rock dıve in the Mediterranean under a full moon. It was so brıght and warm that we hung out sıttıng in the water for over an hour. The night ended up with our German buddy Tino folk dancıng to traditional Turkısh songs at a bar set up between two rocky cliffs. A bit of a different side of Turkey from Istanbul!

Istanbul

2008-09-13T04:18:00.000-07:00

Landed in Istanbul on Wednesday afternoon and checked into my hotel in Sultanahmet, which is basically ground zero for all of the World Heritage sites. Right out of my window is the Blue Mosque, (lovely but they have 5am prayer chants over a loudspeaker). Once I figured out to close my windows at night I grew to like it a lot more. The mosque is gorgeous inside and out, and the calls to prayer on the loudspeaker during normal waking hours are hypnotic and transporting. The Hippodrome next to it is a bustling street fair and park area with tons of kebap vendors and grilled corn (very big over here).

Also next door is Aya Sofya, whose history mirrors Istanbul's. It started off as a Christian church built by Emperor Justinian in 537AD (the largest, most important one for hundreds of years) and for over 1000 years was the largest enclosed space building in the world. When Istanbul fell in 1453 to the Ottomans, it was converted into a mosque, and remained so until 1935 when it was turned into a museum. Pretty much the definition of awe-inspiring when you go inside.

Finally right next to that there's Topkapi Palace where the Sultan and his harem used to live. This place is more open air than Aya Sofya but ginormous as well. As the treasury of the Ottoman Empire, it holds a huge amount of priceless objects, including crazy jewel-encrusted daggers, diamonds as big as your eyeball, and some of the most holy relics in the world. I saw Mohammed's footprint, his tooth, locks of his beard, a couple of his swords, and St. John the Baptist's arm and skull. Or so they say - I have to admit I got a little skeptical at Moses' walking stick.

The harem area was beautiful as well: wall-to-wall tile and gilted domed ceilings for the ladies in waiting (who evidently wielded great political power as sultans started out pretty young). Fun fact: if you were in the harem and bore a son for the sultan, you got upgraded to a room with a nice view of the city.

One of my favorite things so far has been walking along the huge pedestrian street
Istikal Cad over in the more modern part of town near Taxim Square. It seems the whole city shows up to show off around 4PM or so. Excellent people watching and cafes.

With so many sights right out of my front door, I've turned into a turbo tourist for a few days. At night I've tried to find a few gay bars with mixed success (first night: one bar, closed). The medieval streets in the city are so windy and partially unnamed that even taxi drivers don't seem to know where a lot of addresses are.

Friday night I tried again and had much better luck. Met this very fun couple from Milan, Luigi and his boyfriend, who were celebrating his birthday. They whisked me away from the rather tragic bar I was at and took me to a great dance club, "Love". Luigi is a kinda comic dancer (would be a good match for Brian C. on the soccer team in dance chicken) and he either impressed or scared the locals with his moves (hard to tell). Fun and late night.

The people here are extremely warm and friendly. My hotel receptionist spent a long time explaining to me how everything around the hotel was over-priced (not exactly selling the area to me). Taxi drivers have gone way beyond the call of duty to help me find (possibly non-existent) bars or streets. But they can be too friendly as well when it comes to business - every shopkeeper or restauranteur strikes up a conversation ("My friend! Where you from?"). For some reason everyone thinks I'm French, which is weird. Though at least the Biblical references have gone down...

Last days in London

2008-09-12T02:52:00.000-07:00

I've had a very mellow last few days which was just what I needed but made me into a lazy blogger. After Cornwall I spent a few more days with Mark and Lee. The weather was pretty wet, so I stayed close to home and caught up on laundry etc. Lee made another delicious dinner and I was able to sample that last Cornish taste that I'd somehow overlooked on the roadtrip: Scrumpy Jack (a traditional hard cider-not bad!).

On Monday, Lee took me on a great walking tour of some areas of East London (Shoreditch and Clerkenwell). I really love those parts - a bit more laid back and edgier at the same time, with tons of little hipster cafes and galleries. Plus the pub where most of Jack the Ripper's victims were last seen.

Monday night I took the train out to my friends Shannon and Richard in Egham, near Windsor. Great to see them and catch up. And to see how much their little girl, Maddie, had grown since I'd been there last! We kicked the ball around in the yard and for an almost-3-year-old, I can tell you Maddie has a mean right foot. Spent my time out at Shannon and Richard's chilling and getting ready for my next destination, Turkey, eating fantastic curry from their local takeout, and watching that crazy Formula 1 race from Belgium. For my first race it was evidently a doosy. I still can't believe they stripped Hamilton of the win.

Anyway, onward to Istanbul! Thanks Mark and Lee and Shannon and Richard for all of the hospitality in England!
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Tintagel and Bath

2008-09-06T03:21:00.000-07:00

Finished our tour of Cornwall today with a trip up to Tintagel castle. Supposedly the birthplace of King Arthur (you can imagine the giftshops), there are the ruins of a 13th century castle on a huge rock jutting out over the water. We watched a very "Search for the Holy Grail" introductory video, and basically this castle sounds like it was the summer home for the Earl of Cornwall. Regardless of the Arthur connection, the whole area is unbelievably beautiful, both the ruins and the rugged coastline. It's hard to describe, but there is some power to this place, whether it is simply the stunning views or something else.

We spent the rest of our day making our way back to London, during which I became obsessed with getting the ultimate hedgerow photo.

Our last stop of the trip was in Bath, which is pretty, restrained, and beige. The posh restaurant where you can drink a glass of the famous Bath water was closed but Mark sweet-talked his way in and we were both able to have a glass (tasted vaguely of feet but actually not that bad). Also were able to get a glimpse of the Roman baths, which were amazing.

Back to London, a tasty roast dinner by Lee and my introduction to The Catherine Tate Show (how very dare you!).

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St. Michael's

2008-09-04T14:54:00.000-07:00

Touring around with Mark today and seeing more of the Cornish coast. The countryside is just amazing around here. The grass has an intense vibrant green color, and there are beautiful tin mines dotting the hills, which look like old ruined churches.

Walked through St. Ives, which is a cute village (a bit like a British seaside La Conner), where people used to be very short.

Then on to St. Michael's Mount, which is a former medieval monastery on an island (and has since been occupied by the same family since 1647). You can walk to it from the mainland at low tide but have to take a boat back at high tide.

Also drove through Penzance and saw Land's End (well, from a distance. You evidently can't set foot near without paying an admission fee).

All of the roads here are lined with hedgerows, which means you are driving around in a really pretty maze all the time. I found myself thinking from time to time, "if I could see over the hedgerows, there would be a gorgeous view of the ocean here". Mark said it reminded him of driving through the labyrinth in "The Shining".

Had my first fish and chips with mushy peas of the trip, which was tasty. Mark also convinced me to get some Cornish clotted cream on my ice cream cone which he really talked up but turns out is basically just butter - mmm mmm! I'm still recovering.

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Newquay

2008-09-03T14:10:00.000-07:00

Mark and I drove out to Newquay, a coastal town in Cornwall, last night for a couple days quick vacation. The plan was to do surfing lessons but I have a pulled hamstring from the tournament and a bit of a cold, so we are going to do some exploring of the coastline.
It's gorgeous out here and not what you think of when you think of coming to England. The weather is either beautiful and sunny or pouring buckets - the wind moves so fast it seems to change every few minutes. The beaches are pretty, enclosed by rocky cliffs, and huge. Mark took a surfing lesson and promised it wasn't really cold, but I don't believe him.

Evidently rowdy Australians like to stay at our surfer hotel. We had to put down a security deposit and then had to run through a damage checklist for our room like we were renting a U-Haul. "TV, check. Remote, check" etc. "Walls, check" cracked us up. Front desk wasn't amused when we said we were down one...

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Stonehenge!

2008-09-02T10:57:00.000-07:00

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Next up

2008-09-01T02:42:00.000-07:00

With the tourney done, I'm off to stay with my friends Mark and Lee in Tooting for a few days. We had Sunday lunch at a friend's house and toured around Windsor a bit (the Queen was not in).
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Closing ceremony party

2008-09-01T02:16:00.000-07:00

Saturday was the finals and the closing ceremony party. London Stonewall won in the finals with a beautiful game against the Argentinians. Very inspiring to watch! We had a great (and late) night at Area in Vauxhall. Here's Sean with a super witty volunteer from the tournament.

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What we did last night

2008-08-29T04:23:00.000-07:00

As you can imagine, we all had a bit of steam to blow off last night after the tournament. A bit of steam and a lot of duty-free alcohol. The resident extrovert on our team, Bill, choose to do so by crashing this poor drag performer's show at a soccer event. She took it all in stride and they ended up having a charming duet - I think the only thing she said about it was "honey, you're on my cord".
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Tournament wrap-up

2008-08-29T03:46:00.000-07:00

We are done with the soccer tournament now-played our last matches on Thursday. Our team qualified for the playoff rounds, which felt good, and although we didn't win that many games, all of them were extremely close. We went against two very good teams for our last games (Denmark and the very hot Czech team) and both times held our own and dominated the ball a good part of the game.

The Czechs were one of the top seeds in our division and I think we were all surprised at how well we did against them. Even though it was a loss, it was the best game of soccer we've ever played and we came out of it on quite a high. We didn't have a single blowout against us in the entire tournament, which was a big improvement from our seasons in Seattle.

Had Wednesday off and did some sightseeing in London: Tate Modern (they had a great Cy Twombly exhibit), Hyde Park, and the Serpentine Gallery, which is sporting a new Frank Gehry pavilion in front of it. Also went to Billy Elliot (the musical) which was a treat from Mark and Lee. It was fantastic - I'm not a huge musical fan but loved this one.
Today we have another free day and then will probably go watch the finals tomorrow. I think I need to go find a beard trimmer. Some guy at a bar the other night said I looked like Moses - not really the look I'm going for!
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London games begin

2008-08-25T14:55:00.000-07:00

My team and I started playing in our IGLFA gay soccer tournament in the heart of London today. This is a pic of the opening ceremony/party last night. There are about 32 men's teams and 5 women's, so that's a ton of gay soccer players! About half of them seem to be Brits and they've been pretty friendly to us Americans so far. As long as we don't use the word "soccer" instead of "football" - that seems to drive them crazy.

We tried to be good and get to bed at a decent hour but ended up having a little adventure trying to get home. Picadilly Circus isn't the easiest place to grab a cab at night after the Underground closes, though we did manage to find some great gyros.

First game today was a ton of fun - we tied 1-1 but also really gelled as a team and dominated the second half.
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The march on Paris

2008-08-22T08:15:00.001-07:00

Our time in Paris is coming to an end - everyone's either flying or taking the train to London tomorrow to start the soccer tournament. We've walked miles and miles through the neighborhoods around Le Marais and alternated between totally lazy, hang-out-at-cafe days and turbo tourist days (Tuesday we were the anti-tourists, Wednesday we went to Musee de l'Orangerie, the Catacombs and the Rodin Museum).

Nights were pretty hit or miss for us. We weren't sure if everyone was really gone for August or if we had the uncanny knack for hitting exactly the wrong night at each bar we'd try. I had become the default night time navigator and took us on a few wild goose chases throughout the city. Though on one of these death marches we did stumble on an amazing black French rapper at this closed cafe in the middle of nowhere rapping to a couple of his friends. Pretty magical and for me I think that was the highlight of the entire week. Thursday night we finally found a dance club that had people in it (CUD) and stayed out late dancing. That was our 3rd time trying to find the place, so it was a victory of sorts.

Other things I'll remember on this segment: our foie gras fest escaping the rain at a restaurant off Place des Voges, Centre Georges Pompidou, the nights we spent eating, drinking and talking at our apartment, the Catacombs and that apple bread pudding tarlet at our local bakery.

Landed in Paris

2008-08-15T18:14:00.000-07:00

After months of planning, I finally took off on my first leg to Paris on Aug. 14th! Staying in a sweet apt in Le Marais with a few players from my soccer team. Paris seems quiet and empty this time of year - nice and relaxing so far. A bit of a jet-lagged zombie right now so more later.
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