Finding yourself in less than 72 hours

This morning Ale and I woke up early (930 am) to check out of The Unnamed Hotel and go to High Bank Peasants Cottage in The High Bank. We quickly acclimated to our new environment and enjoyed breakfast with our fellow hippy backpackers. Ale had to jet out early because she had signed up for a massage class the previous night. She really wanted to learn how to perform proper massages. When we were in the shop, the guy was trying to convince me I should also take the 2 day course, I kept saying no as he dropped the price lower and lower. Lets be honest, this girl loves getting massages, not giving them. So Ale headed off for her first class solo and just as I was leaning back a little farther into my chair, enjoying my chai and book (Life from Scratch), Ale comes back and asks me if I want to be the model for her massage teacher to show her how to massage.

The next hour consisted of me being massaged as Ale took notes. I'm a good friend, I know.

After my massage, Ale and I headed down to our favorite restaurant, The 60s Cafe, for some relaxing. Then we crossed the Laxhman Jhula pedestrian bridge and explored a whole new world! Ram Jhula is on the other side of the Ganges and I started to (almost) feel like I was in my zen zone. All it took was a couple shops playing Enya type music. We explored the next 3 km of shops and guest houses and realized that this side of the river (Ram Jhula) is where it is at. At this point, we decided that maybe we should stay in an ashram and really experience Rishikesh.

So, since apparently this side of the river was where the ashrams are at, we went searching. The first ashram we stopped into, was really dirty and men were smoking and I didn't think I could find my zen there. Ale and I discussed our expectations again and I told her about the happy, clean little yoga studio in Amelia Island that I frequent when I visit Marshall, that is decorated so pretty and plays pretty music and has pretty people teaching yoga. After once again realizing this was not what Rishikesh was about, we boiled it down. We were about to graduate medical school and we both wanted to find ourselves. You know, that whole "I'm finding myself" while doing yoga and meditating. Preferably in less than 72 hours.

So we continued on. Next, we found this really touristy (Parmath Niketan) ashram that I had read about that had good reviews. Except, have I mentioned that The International Yoga Festival starts March 1? Because this ashram was not accepting their normal crowd and instead had sold out their entire ashram to tourists who dropped $600 US dollars for a week. And it's not like we could sign up then or would have ever shelled out that much mula.

We then saw a sign for "Phool Chatti" ashram which also had decent tripadvisor reviews and called them. They had a 7 day retreat starting at 3 pm the next day that sounded like our best option yet. It was a little more than we wanted to spend at 8000 rupees($160) and we would have to miss a couple nonrefundable days because we needed to be back in Delhi for Norah (!!!) but it definitely sounded like what we wanted (over the phone.)

While we were perseverating about Phool ashram, we got a phone call from another ashram we had seen a sign for while we were walking. We had just briefly seen the sign. The ashram itself was up the hill and looked a little more secluded. The sign had said "by appointment only", so we had called. The lady on the phone was a little bit (aka totally) unfriendly and was asking what I wanted. I said we were interested in a 3-4 day retreat type stay and she said their minimum was one month. We had completely forgotten about this until she called back several hours later, saying she had been busy at the time we called and that we could come on over to see if we liked the ashram. Hmm.

So we headed back towards that ashram and found the random sign again, and made our way up to this really neat old building. First, we were greeted by a man dressed in a long orange robe. He asked us what we wanted and at this point, Ale and I realized we were being interviewed. He explained that this ashram is for experienced yogis who want a retreat. No cell phones or wifi, probably not even any books. This was about meditation and yoga. He talked with us for 20 minutes and then after possibly passing the test, he brought us to his daughter who then explained more to us about this ashram. She showed us photo books of his crazy yoga poses, letters from places he had studied across the world. Ale and I gave each other looks... Maybe we can find ourselves!!!

They eventually agreed to show us one room that was available and despite it not being exactly what I had envisioned (which is nonexistent), it was quite cozy (I'm being generous). They still were interviewing us, not convinced we were serious about this. Ale gave them a very good sob story about us graduating medical school soon and that we would working so much next year and we really want to come to grasps with this. It was quite beautiful.

So we agreed to come back again tomorrow at 3 pm to practice yoga with him. At this point we will all reassess and see if this will be a good fit for us both. It sounds quite possibly, exactly what we want. I'm almost positive I want to stay there, but Ale is a little unsure. So only time will tell...will we even pass the final interview? Are we flexible enough?

Pictures:
In the picture of me on the massage bed, please note the brown box in the background. This is the infamous steamer from my post in Kerala about our massages. Remember, I sat in one of those boxes with my head sticking out for 20 minutes? Also, the next two pictures are at Parmath Niketan. They have this touristy ceremony each night where they put flowers in the river as offerings to the gods and we happened upon it after being rejected from the International Yoga Festival.

Yogafest

We have officially arrived in Rishikesh, the yoga capital of the world, where the Beatles wrote the White Album.

The train ride really wasn't that bad. I read the first book of The Hunger Games. Even though I had seen the movie (and loved it), the book was still fun to read. I like the book and movie equally, which is unusual for me, but I think it might be because I saw the movie first and so my imagination of the hunger games couldn't be tainted. I also got kicked out of the seat I stole around 730 pm, so I got a good 9 hours of alone time. I went back to my real seat and then got to share it with the newlyweds. They were really sweet and shared their dinner with me. We even talked marriage. Since I'm so used to telling everyone in India that I'm married, I had accidentally told her I was married. This led to me giving her marriage advice. Enough said.

So after dinner, I wanted to curl up in bed and finish the hunger games. My seat had been dolled out to an older woman with a knee problem, but at least I got to sleep up top on the 2 high and close the curtain for some privacy. That awesome seat just wasn't meant for me (and I'm not bitter at all.)

I actually slept really well. I got a solid 9 hours in. I had 2 sheets, one between me and the blanket, and a NorthFace on to prevent any unneeded face touching. I didn't even get up to pee since I had not allowed myself much water since getting on the train (a healthy tactic I've learned from my OR days- no way can you ask to scrub out of a 10 hour case to pee when the surgeons don't.)

When we arrived in Hardiwar at 1030 am, Ale and I were both relatively alert. We had planned to stay in Haridwar for the night, but decided we could stomach the one hour vikram ride north to Rishikesh. We called ahead of course to see if we had a place to sleep, and Swiss Cottage, where we were going to stay the next night was full. Luckily, I had a backup saved in my ipad (I'm getting good at this spontaneity)- Divine Ganga Cottage. They happened to have their budget room open this night, so we headed over there. An hour or so later, we got dropped off on a tiny road with signs to Divine Ganga Cottage and as we were walking up, we get offers for a room in a bunch of yucky looking places. I had in my mind that Rishikesh would be this zen zone where I could do my yoga with views of the ginormous Ganga River, with Enya playing in the background. Let's just say, Rishikesh is not exactly what I imagined. It's actually one of the dirtier towns we have stayed in. The views are sort of nice, but it's not really my idea of "finding myself." So a short walk later, we get to Divine Ganga Cottage and are showed to a 1133 (1000 plus taxes) rupee dumpy room. Ale and I look at each other and read each others minds. If I'm gonna stay in a gross room, I'm not spending more than 500 rupees for it. So we head back down the little winding road and end up in one of those dumpy looking buildings. When we see the room in this family run guest house/hotel (that looks like it saw its better years about 100 years ago) it's actually a little bit nicer (it wasn't hard) than Divine Ganga Cottage. For 450, we were sold. This gave us a day in between getting to my zen zone Swiss Cottage with yoga and meditation and pretty views. The good news is that the shower was burning hot for my whole shower. This was a first for me in 6 weeks in India. I enjoyed it so much, I actually took a second shower that evening (which is saying a lot considering sometimes we don't shower for days.)

We headed out to the middle of Laxman Jhula (the part of rishikesh that we were in, on the west side of the river) and found ourselves at a decent little hippy cafe where we got some lunch. The views were spectacular of the Ganges, so things were looking up. When we were connecting to wifi, I saw The60sCafe as a network and got excited. We had been told by our SanFran friends in Jaisalmer to go there. So after lunch, we walked outside and realized The 60s cafe was next door. And it was awesome. It's had even better views and even better seating. Big day beds that you can lay on (we like to lounge while we eat) and comfy little tables - all open air. The service was really awesome and we found ourselves wishing we could sleep there. Since we didn't have much planned for the day, and the 23 hour train ride was starting to hit us, we spent most of the day lounging. Eating rice pudding and banana fritters (ale ordered and I ate way too many of these little fried banana heaven fritters) and Lassis and tea. Wifi is kind of bad here in Rishikesh, and by bad I mean you can maybe read one email per hour. So I mostly read and laid and ate.

Around 5 pm, Ale and I decided we should probably go get my cell (I had left it in the room to charge) and maybe figure out where we wanted to go after Rishikesh (as in I volunteered to take an overnight bus out of here ASAP.) We called Swiss Cottage to confirm and found out that the person that was supposed to leave, didnt, so we didn't have a room. We both proceeded to whine and then decided since we had about 2 hours before it got dark, that we should head up to The High Bank (where Swiss cottage is) to find a new zen zone. We found out The High Bank is just a 10 minute walk up and west. I soon realized this is the backpackers zone, not the zen zone. We checked out a few places and found the best gross room for 500 rupees. But this cottage had yoga and meditation and a rooftop restaurant and wifi. Ale convinced me that Rishikesh is all about a vibe and that we were not getting any vibe at our yoga lacking unnamed hotel (not unnamed because we don't want to name it, unnamed because it was unnamed.) So we booked a room for the next night. This area also had more restuarants and touristy stuff like yoga and meditation, massages, and travel agencies. With a room booked, our next decision to make was about which hill station to go to after Rishikesh. We went to a travel agent to find out how to get to Shimla. We usually type in a destination in makemytrip.com and it tells us our bus options, but Rishikesh to Shimla was not showing up. Hence the travel agent, who confirmed that the only way to get to Shimla would be a combo of 3 buses or trains and about 10 (aka 15) hours. So this made our decision to go to Musoorie, a hill station just 3 hours away, that much easier. So much decision making in just 2 hours!

We then headed back down to Laxman Jhula for dinner at our fav- The 60s cafe followed by round 2 of burning hot showers at unnamed hotel.

1320 minutes

That's how long our train ride is.

We got on around 1030 am and it's already 1236 pm. I don't think this is going to be as bad as it sounds. For one thing, we are in AC class. That means not only is the temperature controlled at about 78 degrees, but that everything is cleaner. Clean is, of course, all relative. I've only seen 2 baby cockroaches.

Ale and I managed to get take-out from our hotel before we left. We ordered 6 rotis, 1 palak paneer, 1 gobi aloo masala, 3 aloo parathas and 1 Rajasthani roti to go. We hope this lasts us 23 hours, but considering I already ate my 3 rotis and gobi aloo masala, and now i just have 2 aloo paranthas left - it looks maybe only Ale has this figured out (she's sleeping.)

Our bags have somehow managed to enlarge. I'm very impressed with my backpacks capacity. It was about 2/3 full on arrival to India and I think I've doubled it's capacity. It has so many hidden spaces and extra pockets that can expand infinitely. I have endless new things inside. Mostly presents for other people (you're welcome) but plenty of things I loveeeeee for myself. I probably look ridiculous, but it's worth it.

Yesterday, our 2nd and last day in Jhodpur, was pretty relaxed. We'd done most of the touristy things the day before, so we walked the 30 minutes from our haveli to the clock tower market. The streets here (and really all over India) are so narrow. In Jhodpur, the streets are really messed up and so theres lots of potholes and sharp turns. You can barely fit one rickshaw in the whole street, so getting anywhere is an adventure. Ale and I have really learned to trust Indian drivers. their depth perception is amazing. I would have knocked both my side mirrors off and probably decapitated a cow if I was driving in India. Speaking of cows, cows also sit in the middle of these tiny streets to make more obstacles for rickshaws and motorcycles. Yesterday I was walking by one, obviously really close to him since he was taking up the whole street, and he, get this: head- butted me into my side. Luckily he didn't have horns, but ohmygod I got head-butted by a cow. I told him that in my country we would eat him.

After I lost all dignity by getting head-butted by a cow, Ale and I managed to stuff our faces with more fried chilis, pani poori, and omelets. We also managed to do some shopping which was quite challenging given the shopping situation (lots of cheap ugly shoes, produce, western baby clothes, and junk junk junk.) The highlight of the day was going on our rooftop for sunset and capturing some beautiful pictures of the blue city. We would have left yesterday morning if we could have, but the trains were full until today. We've gotten good at relaxing and eating so this was not too hard on us.

And now we are on the train. The way it works on the train is that there are stacks of 3 beds on one side (3 face in on another 3 with an aisle between and they are all perpendicular to the window) and then there are a line of beds 2 high along the other side of the train that are parallel to the windows. I'll add in a picture below to understand. I luckily got the bottom of the 2 bed side, parallel to the window with a big window, it's own plug and easy access to the bathroom (which is super gross and basically a hole in the ground.) Despite it being at the other end of the car from Ale, it was perfect. The only minor problem was that 2 people were sitting on my bed. Usually the people on the top bunks sit on the 3 sided bottom one and fold up the middle bunk as a seat back during the day. I just wanted to lay in my bed with my curtain closed for the next 23 hours. I explained to the girl that she was in my bed and she told me her "hubby" was in the top bunk. The girl asked me if I could switch beds with her. "Where is your bed?" I asked. She pointed to a middle bunk in the sea of 6. Oh heck no. "We just got married feb 6, see pictures." And that's how I got guilted into giving away the best bed/seat ever. Well I haven't officially given it away. Since the car we are in is pretty empty, I agreed to let them sit there until people get on. And since we have 23 hours for people to get on, my hopes aren't high. And then I'm not sure how to boot them out of my bed, so ill probably end up sitting up for 23 hours because there will be little old ladies using my bed as a seat back. Poor me.

But since right now I'm in someone else's lower bunk of 2 with a plug, curtains, and a big window, I guess I'll just count my blessings.

The first 2 pictures are Ale eating an omelette and the omelette man. The third picture is my lunch on the train. The last 3 pics are of the train seats. The first shows the difference in head space between the 3 high and the 2 high. The middle seat of the 3 high is pulled down as a seat back currently so if you were in the bottom your head would not go past the top of the seat back. The next picture is of the 3 high by 3 high side with an aisle in between. The last is of the 2 high side-obviously the winner for a 23 hour journey.

The Blue City

Jodhpur has charm. We are staying in an adorable little haveli, Singhvi's Haveli, with our list of must-haves: 1) a rooftop with a good view 2) wifi 3) food on premises 4) a clean sheet between me and the never-cleaned comforter.

We arrived this morning around 615 am, just an hour late. Both Ale and I did not have our best night's rest as it was a bit chilly. She shouldn't have kicked me out of her bed, just saying. Luckily it was a short train ride, so it was over before we knew it and we took a rickshaw to our little haveli. Most of the time, we can check into our room early when we arrive after a night journey, but today there weren't any available rooms. So they let us rest in "The Camel Lounge" which was actually awesome. It was in the middle of a square of rooms and it was dark and they had chaise lounges for each of us and a blanket. I got a solid 4 hours in. We didn't end up getting our room until about noon. I had been itching for a shower since I boarded that sleeper train with my dirty NorthFace on at 1030 pm the night before so the fact that the water wasn't warm didn't phase me. I've learned that as long as I have good pressure or hot water, I'm happy. Both is like winning the lottery.

After getting clean and having a quick breakfast Ale and I headed over to the fort. It's a popular thing here in Rajasthan. This fort was gorgeous! I went into the palace museum and took my usual 5 pictures/second. Ale wasn't interested in going in, which was fine with me until I realized I had to switch the lenses on my camera every 5 minutes. Having two cameras is nice. The views of the city were beautiful. Jodhpur is called the blue city because many of the houses are painted blue. Originally this was to show a Brahmin lived there (the upper caste) but eventually everyone was painting their houses blue. It's a really cool sight to look down on. Our haveli has some beautiful views from the roof so we've been having fun capturing this town.

After spending the afternoon in the fort, Ale and I headed over to the clock tower which is in the center of the town surrounded by markets. We had a butter cheese omelet from "The Omelet Man" who makes 1000-1500 eggs a day, 7 days a week. He has this little stand as you enter a gate into the clock tower square. He's in lonely planet and we've heard lots of good things about him from other people. I tried not to paint a ridiculous expectation of him making the best omelets in the world, but I kind of expected it. It was good, don't get me wrong. For 25 rupees I got basically 2 sandwiches of omelet with ooey gooey cheese and the man was very nice. Again this is one of the experiences where you have to close your eyes and enjoy, because if you open you won't like what you see.

Ale and I also tasted (aka Ale ate 16) pani poori and then I got a mirchi bhaji (a samosa-esque fried chili.) I'm getting pretty good at eating spicy things. We did our usual browsing, but luckily this market was more geered to the locals so since we weren't looking for baby clothes, saris, or produce, our wallets were spared. There were a bunch of spice shops but I had no clue who to trust, so I did my research tonight and will be returning tomorrow to get some goodies.

Otherwise, we plan to eat a lot tomorrow and see where the day takes us! We've realized we have only 2 weeks left. Not only is it sad (though we aren't going to talk about it again) but that also means that in 3 weeks I find out where I go for the next 4 years. Kind of overwhelming!

Sleeper class

After our camel safari, Ale and I had another 2 days and 1 night in Jaisalmer. We have found that we both enjoy lounging more than seeing temples. So after another round of banana pancakes (this is the day we started eating two each. Ale by the way, never ate breakfast before India.) and a nap, we spent most of our day on the rooftop of our hotel. We did venture out to The Trio for dinner and I had a decent thali with some decent pickle. It had a very nice view of the Mandir Palace which I think is an old haveli turned into a fancy hotel. We of course did a little shopping and wandering and then headed in for a good night's rest. Since our room has no windows and we had slept in the freezing desert the night before, we somehow woke up at 11 am. Whoops. Luckily we could still enjoy our last round of banana pancakes (plural.)

We spent a good part of our waking daylight hours on the rooftop again but finally ventured out around 3 pm. The view is just so neat and pair it with chai ... heaven! We managed to get in one last round of shopping- some more shoes, another scarf for Ale, an unneeded but beautiful pillowcase for Lauren. We walked as far around the fort as we could -and ended up inside a pretty legit Indian restaurant for cold packaged apple juice (yes I might have reverted to a 5 year old.) The restaurant was full of Indians eating Thalis. Unfortunately we were full from breakfast but we drank our apple juice anyways. The waiters were fascinated with us (white girl and Indian looking non-Indian) and even some of the patrons of the restaurant. We managed to meet the only American Indian in the restaurant who I then had a conversation with. He happened to go to UF for an MBA in the 80s and gave me his card if I'm ever in NYC.

So after our apple juice break, we decided to go back in the fort and walk around. We got to see the Jain temples and shop more. Then we saw a group of middle aged Indian men sitting in a circle on the ground inside the fort having a little meeting (Ale and I don't understand Indian dialects so we aren't sure what the meeting was about) and I asked them for a good restaurant with a good view. They pointed to this restaurant right next to their pow-wow. As we were walking up, Ale and I exchanged thoughts "I bet one of them owns this." The restaurant did have an awesome view, and I asked the waiter if the Indian food was good. "Of course, my mom cooks it." Obviously people give whitey the answer she wants to hear. The food ended up being decent (probably better than the touristy place from the night before) and during our meal, we met a really cool couple from San Francisco. These two will have been traveling for 2 years come April. They were probably in their mid to late 30s and had jobs in the Silicon Valley and had never traveled before they started their trip. When they started their trip, they were thinking they'd be gone a year, 2 years later they aren't sure if they will ever be done. They have a blog - intrepidmotion.com. Really neat people. We exchanged tips since they had been to the places we are going and are going to places we are going. Also they speak at a workshop on travel hacking in Portland, Oregon each year about traveling on the cheap so they gave us some good ideas. Omg I want to travel like them someday!

After dinner it was time to say goodbye to Hotel Victoria. Of course, they gave us chai as we hung out on their rooftop one last time (have we mentioned they have awesome service!?) We've realized that the best way to stay at hotels is to stay in the cheapest room at a place where you can't afford their standard room and definitely not their honeymoon suite for 9000 rupees/night. They still need the same tripadvisor reviews so they give you the same service and perks (Banana pancakes, chai, bottled water.) A rickshaw picked us up and we were delivered to the train station at 1030 pm for our 1130 train. Since this train starts in Jaisalmer, we could board it early. This was our first experience in sleeper (non-AC, the Indian experience.) Our new friends Marvin and Jo from dinner had prepped us on sleeper class- expect it to be cold (the windows are all open) and to smell like the toilet (there are no doors closing off the car) and no blankets/sheets/pillows provided like AC. Knowing this was helpful because that meant Ale and I put on long sleeves before leaving hotel victoria (luckily I could finally use the only thing I'd packed for India.) Unfortunately my only warm thing was my NorthFace which was in my dirty pile from the desert. Fortunately, I've learned it's worse to be freezing than dirty, so out of my laundry it came. This was also fortunate because then I didn't feel the need to shower before the train ride. Win-win.

Since Ale and I had beds that weren't right next to each other, and we haven't not shared a bed in 6 weeks, we decided we needed to squeeze into one bed. In the picture below, you can see Ale sleeping. We were both in that bed for an hour. I found it quite cozy, but when the train guy was checking our tickets, he said one of us could sleep in the empty top bed next to us (the sweet old ladies below had rearranged for us.) I was actually quite content snuggled up with Ale. Apparently Ale was not, because she pointed to the free bed and kicked me out of hers.

So here I lay, snug on a really dirty bed with a really dirty NorthFace on. I must say, overall, I'm getting used to being uncomfortably dirty. Immersion therapy. We arrive in Jhodpur tomorrow around 515 am (this is just a 5 hour ride.)

Pics: on the sleeper train and one from Hotel Victorias rooftop (I spy with my little eye someone who is in love with wifi)

W and Captain

Ale and I just got back to Hotel Victoria after spending the night in the Thar desert. We left yesterday around noon and were taking by jeep to a tiny village an hour away from Jaisalmer. First though, we made 4 stops at various historical sites- a Jain temple, ruined villages, etc. Since we didn't know we had signed up for this, we hadn't read anything about the places we were visiting so we kind of weren't too interested. We did get out and take some pictures at the two deserted villages. Any opportunity for a photo shoot is worth our 20 rupees.

We arrived in the little village around 230 pm and got to meet our camels and tour guides. We had 2 tour guides and 4 total camels. Sumar was my camel guide and he was riding Captain. At first I got to go behind him on "W" (who is roped to Captain) but then I got on Captain and got to steer him like a horse. Sumar even let me drive Captain while he was running. Then I got scared because I couldn't multitask and steer and sit without falling off and so Sumar took over. This camel riding lasted a good 3 hours and it ended on the top of a sand dune looking down on more sand dunes and no Ale. I had thought she was right behind us, but apparently she wasn't interested in riding on a running camel because she wanted to sit sideways instead and go slow. So then Sumar, Captain, W and I waited for slow poke Ale, her tour guide, and Alex and David (their camels.)

This was about the time I realized that 3 hours of camel riding was more than enough. Originally our hotel owner had given us the option of starting at 6 am or noon. I immediately agreed to 6 am since the more time the better?! Ale wanted the noon (she needs her beauty rest) and I decided she could decide since I didn't really care. For that I am thankful. It's not that it wasn't fun to ride a running camel in the desert, it's just 3 hours is a long time. The only other time I've ridden a camel was in Israel 2 years ago. It had seemed cool but in comparison to this, it was lame. The camels went in a circle and they definitely didn't run and I didn't get to steer and I had to share my camel and it lasted like 5 minutes. But still, 6 hours would have been really long.

So finally Ale and her crew met up with us and our camel guides picked a spot to set up camp. They put out a blanket for us and then started cooking. First we had a chai break. Then they started cooking dinner. They made such a delicious meal with just a few pans and pots and a fire. We had such a good veggie masala and a really nice thick chapati and some rice. It really was one of the best dishes I've had in India, especially considering we were in the middle of the desert. Of course, I had to pretend like I had not seen how dirty the pots and pans were and the lack of cleaning their hands with soap. At least they used bottled water!! The good news is that we aren't sick yet.

Of course throughout the course of dinner being prepared, Ale and I managed to take about 300 photographs as the sun was setting.We got some amazing shots, if I do say so myself. Of course you can't see those anytime soon (and if Ale gets her hands on my SD card, maybe never. Jk, we were both sitting there when the computer freaked out.) Ale and I then proceeded to enjoy ourselves and the beautiful (slightly cooler) desert. We talked to Sumar a lot. He comes from a villages called Donnie. I'm not sure if that is how it is spelled, but I told him my "husband" and I have a dog named Donnie and Sumar loved it. He told me one of his first camels was named Lauren. Needless to say, we bonded. It's actually my boyfriends dog but I figured it made me sound less murderable.

Sumar started working as a camel guide when he was just 8 years old and has been doing this for 20 years. He never went to school and can't read or write, so he doesn't have many job options. He does however know a good bit of English, Korean, Hindi, and Japanese from all the tourism. It is pretty amazing. He was a really neat person to talk to but it just broke my heart. He spends 6 months a year in the desert working and then when it's too hot he goes back to his village and helps his parents on their farm. He doesn't own his camels , so he gets a monthly salary from his boss for the 6 months of the year that he takes care of W and Captain 24/7. He told me he has started saving up for his own camel. If I had 40,000 rupees on me, I would have given it to him right then. Camels are really friendly when you get to know them. At first they wouldn't let Ale and I pet them, but then they realized we wouldn't stop trying and they started to enjoy their fa massages. Captain was my favorite. He was pretty cute (aka he let me pet him more.) W is actually the winner of last years Camel race at Jaisalmer's Camel Fair. This years camel fair is actually feb 23-25 but it didn't work with our schedule.

When we finally wanted to go to bed around 1030 pm, we asked Sumar to set up our bed. He threw a couple of blankets (the same ones we had been sitting on top of on our camels and then again all night as dinner was being prepared) on the desert and then gave us 4 equally dirty blankets to use to keep warm. Luckily, I had brought my north face fleece jacket and so I used that to cover my upper body and then since I had on leggings and socks, I used one blanket to cover my legs (and it was very far from my face.) I fell asleep staring at the stars and moon and the silhouettes of our camels standing against the horizon (they only sleep for little naps of 10-20 minutes throughout the day.) When Ale and I woke up two hours later the air suddenly frigid with howling winds, I had no choice but use my dirty blankets. Ale had even covered her entire face with a shawl. I thought this was because her face was cold, but it turns out it was because she had so much sand blowing in her face. She must have been protecting me from it, because I never felt it. It was at this point, when I reached into my backpack to get my extra clothes and realized I had grabbed the wrong bag of clothes and now had an extra pair of jeans and corduroys, neither of which seemed worth shimmying on (and let's be honest, who knows if they fit anymore.) Despite the fact that I was now covered in 2 dirty blankets, which I'm positive hadn't been cleaned since they had been bought 10 years before, I somehow managed to fall asleep and wake up to the sunrise.

We got to ride our camels back into town and take a jeep back to Jaiasalmer. Despite it being way dirtier than I am normally ever comfortable with, I rose to the occasion and Ale and I managed to have an unforgettable night in the desert. I've officially spent more time in my life on a camel than a horse.

Sometimes it's more than the memories

Ale and I love to take photos. Luckily Ale likes to take photos even more than me and so she has some awesome lenses-a fish eye, a wide angle, a 18-200mm zoom, and our tried and true 35mm/f-1.8. I love my 35mm and then steal all her other awesome lenses. When one of our cameras runs out of batteries, we always have the other one. We switch off using each others cameras a lot because we are too lazy to switch lenses. Her SD card has a good quarter of my photos and mine has a good quarter of hers.

And then tonight, her SD card had a malfunction as we were trying to upload them to facebook on the computer here at Hotel Victoria. We think we might have lost everything on it. We are in mourning right now. She is on the rooftop, I'm in our room. We have no words for this emptiness. I know it's just material images of good times we have had, but it feels like so much more. Half our days are spent behind our cameras. I can't even begin to imagine how Ale must feel, because I'm pretty sad thinking about all the photos I've lost and she has lost even more. Tonight, if you all don't mind just saying a prayer that this can be fixed. It would mean a lot to us.

It's hard to write right now about today, knowing how sad Ale must be, but I know she would want me to...

We arrived this AM at 530 to Jaisalmer by bus. Our hotel owner was supposed to pick us up so we called him on our arrival and after 5 minutes we had no response. He ended up calling 5 minutes later but it was too late, because we had already taken matters into our own hands. A guy (lets call him Guy1, who we thought was the driver or the drivers assistant- which now makes no sense. Why would a driver have an assistant?) came down the aisle of the bus right before the last stop and told us all about the touts who try to rip off tourists and he said he would bring us to our hotel for 20 rupees a piece. I had read about this is my lonely planet, so I was glad the driver was looking out for us. Then another guy (Guy2) walked down the aisle and repeated a similar story and told us it would be 100 rupees total. I was confused. "But I thought it was 20 rupees?" Guy2 said. "Oh no" and then when we got off the bus and our hotel owner was not there, we had no choice but to go with Guy1 or Guy2 since all these touts were now trying to bring us on their vehicle! And then it clicked. Guy1 and Guy2 were touts!!!! They had gotten on our bus not the stop before the last bus to rip us off! However, it was 530 am and we wanted to get to our hotel and we had ginormous backpacks. So we followed this 30 year old Japanese tourist guy who we had talked with in Udaipur before getting on the bus and decided he was pretty big and could definitely take this thin Indian guy, so I grabbed Ale and we went with the 20 rupee guy. He brought us to the front of the gate and then told us cars can't drive into the fort (which I had read about so I kind of expected) and then he showed us to a rickshaw. We complained about not being brought to our hotel (since it was inside the fort and this driver knew where our hotel was and had told us he would bring us there) and the driver didn't make us pay and somehow got the rickshaw driver to only charge 30 even though he wanted to charge 50. We somehow avoided being completely ripped off and I was proud.

We found our way to our hotel and magically got into bed. I even took a shower, albeit a low pressure and luke warm one (no big surprise there.) I happily slumbered and the next time I woke up, it was noon. Whoops. I was able to still get banana pancakes and chai on the house. <3 Hotel Victoria! The view from the rooftop is really neat. We are inside the fort but on one edge so we got some neat pictures looking down on the city this evening. We planned our camel safari which we will be going on tomorrow from noon until the next morning. Then we did some shopping. Surprise. The tapestries we bought in Udaipur are cheaper here, so that meant we had to get more. I also got a really neat painting of Ganesha, the elephant goddess of luck.

Then I saw a shoemaker on the street who redid the soles of my favorite FabIndia shoes! So we paid an absurd price- 1000 rupees for these adorable little flats and then it turns out they are all over Rajasthan for 200 rupees. Story of our life. However, I'm reassured in that I haven't seem any that are as pretty and as good of quality so that at least helps me sleep at night. Since I haven't found any 200 rupee ones that look like mine, I decided I'd get my soles redone in the US. Well turns out I can get it done in the streets of Jaisalmer for 100 rupees ($2). Maybe I should have just bought a cheap pair? Whatever, I'd rather invest farther into my 1000 rupee shoes.

Pics: a view from our rooftop, Ale in our haveli/hotel, me prepped for our camel safari with my cool hat, banana pancakes (more like creeps)

Traveling through India: bus, train, plane

Alas, we must leave our beloved Udaipur. We are on our sleeper AC bus to Jaisalmer now. 5 pm to 530 am (which probably means 9 am.) Ale and I immediately fell asleep when we got on, and then I woke up around 730 to eat my two parothas which I had brought for dinner.

I just wanted to write about how reasonable it is to get to different cities here in India, if you don't mind sleeper buses/trains. So far we have tried most of the travel options. We have done 3 bus rides in the reclining seats, 3 bus rides in sleeper (little closed off beds with a window), 1 train ride in sleeper 3AC (3 bunk beds on top of each other in the AC compartment), and 2 legs of a flight. Best one? Flight obviously, but our flights were during the day and that kind of threw us off. we much prefer sleeping our way through travel and then not having to pay for a hotel. So I might have to vote for 3AC train. Trains are so much smoother because the buses obviously go on roads and the ride is dependent on the driver and the roads and whether they like to honk. Luckily this driver isn't a honker!

We will be taking sleeper class train from Jaisalmer to Jodhpur in a couple of days and I'm interested to see the difference between 3AC. They both have beds (3 bunks) but sleeper lacks air conditioning. Also, the sleeper tickets are like 1/4 the price. You can open the widows and get good views. Lonely planet recommends it if you want to get an Indian experience. Luckily that drive is only about 5 hours so we can test it out and see if we like it. Then we take a 23 hour (yes you read that right) train from Jodhpur to Haridwar. That might be painful, but we are doing 3AC at least. It's definitely hard to buy train tickets just a week before, but bus tickets are much more available (hence why we are on a bumpy bus now!) We would have preferred to split up our trip from Jaisalmer to Hardiwar in Jaipur (making each trip about 13 hours) but all the trains and buses were booked. What can you do.

I just met a girl in the sleeper next to us who is a doctor in Ireland. She already finished her 2 years of internal medicine and then usually they go do a fellowship. She didn't really love anything, so she decided to do psychiatry instead. Since psychiatry is not very competitive in Ireland, she said it gave her a lot more leeway in terms of starting date and so she finagled 6 months off to travel. She is doing an around-the-world ticket and went from Dublin to London to Delhi, then Calcutta to South Korea to Perth, Australia then to Ecuador and maybe some other places in South America and then back to Ireland. Looks like I have a future dream vacation (aka buying one of these tickets!)

Chai breaks

These past few days have been a blur. Our activities are pretty simple- shopping, picking which rooftop restaurant to watch the sunset on, debating whether to get malai kofta for dinner again (I always do), deciding how many pieces of chapati, papad, or paratha I want, deciding if we want gulab jamon for the 10th time that day. The views are breathtakingly beautiful.

My day starts off with aloo parotha (potato stuffed Indian bread) and a sweet lassi. Sometimes i sub for eggs. Ale is not a breakfast person, so I get to enjoy myself alone on the rooftop. Well, with some other hotel guests. It's so peaceful up there and the view of Udaipur is so beautiful. I have moved to the floor tables, where I get to lounge on mats while delicately taking bites of my aloo parotha. It's a mix of sunny with a cool breeze.

During our shopping expeditions, we often get complimentary chai (-a tactic they use to guilt us into buying something. It works.) We've made a handful of shopkeeper friends. The trustworthy ones teach us how to figure out the cheats. I always use my go-to "is this hand done?" On an obviously machine done shawl. We were also taught that the liar pashmina sellers tell you the pashmina comes from the scruff of the neck (they do this little hand movement on their neck), so I also like to ask "what is pashmina?"

Everyone here looks at Ale strangely. She looks North Indian, though she is from Venezuela, but dresses like a tourist. They always look at her and ask "Hindi?" Or "you Indian?" One of our shopkeepers actually thinks she is Indian and that her name is Vanetta. He gives us Indian prices. And we help him sell his clothes. It's more like we hang out there when our clothes are being tailored, as his uncle tailors some of the clothes we buy, so while we wait the 30 minutes for it to be done, we drink chai in his shop and sit on little stools. We have noticed the shops attract more buyers when there are happy looking tourists inside the shop already. Our shopkeeper friend has taught us a lot about which tourists get which prices. Ale bought a dress from him for 220. He sold it to another lady for 450. I bought a dress for 600, he started at 1200 with another lady. When you show too much interest in a product, they won't go down. As soon as you leave a store saying "too much", the best price suddenly drops down.

In another shop, while drinking chai and buying tapestries we didn't intend to buy (but they were so pretty!), the shopkeeper even offered us a shot of whiskey. We told him we don't like whiskey, but actually could use some rum since our hotel only has whiskey and beer. We drank our chai as we waited for our shop delivery of rum. It was unopened, don't worry, and we enjoyed it in our drinks with dinner last night.

We went to The City Palace two days ago and took a boat ride to view the Lake Palace up closer (of course we couldn't go in, since they don't take casual lunch reservations) and then got to go to the other island to see the gardens and another hotel. I believe this used to be the Mahara's garden island. We took a tour of the palace on mainland and got to enjoy using all Ale's different lenses to get some beautiful shots.

We will be leaving at 530 tonight to go on a sleeper bus to Jaisalmer, a city built inside a fort. We will be staying for 3 nights there. We plan to do some Camel riding through the desert. Other than that, we have just been living the good life.

Pic: sipping chai in our rum-buying shop.

Princess palace

After sleeping relatively well through the night, given that I used a north face jacket as a blanket, I woke up 30 minutes before our alarm so excited to get out of lal ghat guesthouse and move to our princess palace. I tried everything to accidentally wake up Ale who lay dreamily wrapped up in the cesspool blanket. I started opening the creaky windows, jumping over her and then flushing the toilet in the bathroom (door open), and even blowing on her face. No go. She was sound asleep. So I impatiently waited for the alarm to go off and then when it did, I proceeded to jump on the bed and scream "princess palace" for the next 5 minutes until Ale begrudgingly agreed to get out of bed. When she realized I was begging to go to our new hotel and not The Princess Palace, she was a lot more willing to pack up and move to the hotel 2 minutes down the street. See, Ale doesn't always listen to me when I ramble on about our activities, so all she really knew about Udaipur is that it has palaces. She assumed I was dragging her out of bed at 830 in the morning to go to The Princess Palace, not Lauren's self proclaimed princess palace. In case you can't tell, I'm the planner in the relationship.

So after getting to our new, much cleaner digs, I headed up to the roof to enjoy breakfast (see pic) and Ale headed to the best spot in princess palace for wifi. Have I mentioned Ale has a new boyfriend (in the US) who she had only been dating a couple months and therefore she must always have access to wifi. I on the other-hand have a wonderful boyfriend who I have dated a little bit longer and therefore don't need wifi for. Sorry Marshall, but happy one year since you brought me on our way-too-fancy-of-a-restaurant-for-a-first-date first date. He's sweet and unfortunately feeds into my desire for the finer things.

So after I had my chai with a beautiful view of the Lake Palace (A palace built by a king hundreds of years ago that is now a hotel. It is in the middle of the lake on an island, but there is no land left so it just looks like it is floating), we set out for some shopping. By the way, Alexis, I think I saw that tapestry you wanted when we were driving in yesterday and if I can find it on foot, it will be all yours (price depending.) Ale and I made several purchases throughout the day. I have several favorites. First, we bought these really pretty dresses. They weren't a perfect fit, so the shopkeeper offered to have them tailored for us. So we waited while drinking our complimentary chais and then had the dresses fit to our bodies. I love mine. It's black and gold and really pretty. I can't believe I don't have a picture for you guys. Ale and I will fix that soon.

My other favorite purchase of the day was a shawl. I've been dying for this one type of shawl that has really pretty embroidery. My grandmother has one from when she went to India on a business trip with my grandfather years ago and I've wanted one ever since I borrowed hers. Unfortunately, in southern India they are always way too expensive. Like totally out of my price range. They are originally made in Kashmir (far northern India), so the price gets more expensive the farther they travel. Well, here in Rajasthan, they are a bit cheaper. I started asking around at some of the various shops as I like to get a feel for how cheap I can bargain down. If you walk away without buying, they will usually drop as low as they will go. Eventually, one of the shopkeepers taught me there are several kinds of these shawls. They can be made out of all sorts of quality of wool and then the embroidery can be either hand-done or machine-done. He taught me how to tell the difference and this was sure helpful in bargaining. It made me look like I knew what I was talking about. So although I obviously love the more expensive hand done ones, I was looking for some machine done ones. I found a shop with a really pretty mint one, and started my bargaining. He started at 4000 which i knew was way too much. I had been quoted 1500 for a similar machine done one. I asked him if it was hand embroidered and he said yes and I pointed out that it obviously was machine done and that he was totally lying to me. He ended up giving it to me for 600. Booyah.

Other then that, we had a really nice lunch at another rooftop restaurant overlooking Lake Pichola and the Taj Lake Palace. Same view as ours, but the main reason we chose this restaurant is because we can pick up their wifi from our roof and since our roof doesn't have wifi up there, it was imperative we get someone else's wifi password so Ale could use her iPad on the top of the princess palace. I guess I don't mind being able to plan the rest of our trip with that view.

Speaking of the rest of our trip , we canceled our bus to Puskhar since we have fallen in love Udaipur. We decided maybe we want to ride camels in Jaisalmer instead of Puskhar. Although it is farther away by an extra 15 hours roundtrip it sounds cooler. The whole town is built inside of an old fort. Also, Ale accidentally scheduled the bus for Sunday morning and we had planned to leave Monday morning. So since we love Udaipur and want to stay longer, and we might go to Jaisalmer to ride camels instead of Pushkar and since Ale booked our bus for the wrong day, canceling for a small fee was the obvious thing to do. Sorry mom, dad, and Marshall for changing the itinerary I haven't given you yet. The good news is that Parul is our Indian mother and she insists on 1-2 phone calls daily to keep her updated. So if you all have any concern, she knows exactly where we are!

Ale and I just finished dinner on our rooftop. Such a spectacular view and meal!

The most romantic city

Ale and I woke up bright and early (6 am!) to have our final helpings of idly and coconut chutney and say our goodbyes to The Thackers. It was sad.

We took a cab to the airport and took a flight from Bangalore to Delhi to Udaipur. It was nice to bypass 50 hours of buses and arrive in Udaipur 9 hours later, door to door. We made our way to our hostel in Lal Ghat and I got to see just how much shopping there is in in Udaipur. I'm so excited for tomorrow!

So our hostel was nothing to write home about and so we went searching for something a little but cleaner (princess Lauren). I just can't sleep in a bed with an obviously never cleaned comforter and no clean sheet in between me and said comforter. We went to a couple other similar places with similar prices but that I agreed would be better and then we walked by a pretty hotel. I told Ale we shouldn't go in, because it was obviously too expensive, but she insisted we find out the price. The price was definitely above our budget (not hard) but the guy was trying to drop the price for us and Ale somehow cut it in half. I was sold room unseen, but we went to see the room anyways and it was so pretty. I wanted to forfeit our rupees for the hostel we had already paid for tonight, but decided I needed some more character building. So 9 am tomorrow I'm dragging Ae out of bed and we are going to our princess palace in Udaipur!

Since today is valentines day, we wanted to go out for a special diner, especially considering we are in such a romantic city. The biggest palace in the state of Rajasthan is in Udaipur, called City Palace, and we decided tonight we would have a special fancy dinner there. Unfortunately we called and all the reservations were full, but we made one for tomorrow night. It should be pretty romantic. So our next option was to go to the rooftop restaurant at our princess palace. And we fell in love with our princess palace even more. It had started raining, so the rooftop restaurant (overlooking the city with Lake Palace and City Palace) was out of commission, but they set up several tables on the floor below, unfortunately without the view. Then the rain stopped a little bit, and so they set up a little table lit with candles for Ale and I on the roof. With our umbrellas in hand, we got to enjoy the beautiful view and enjoy our wine and chicken briyani and malai kofta! It really was perfect. I'm excited to get to eat breakfast up there tomorrow morning.

Tomorrow we plan to tour the city palace and crystal museum, take a boat ride to go see the Lake Palace from afar, and get some shopping in. Now time to get a good nights rest!

Good-bye Bangalore

The royal wedding was a blast! Ale and I got all glammed up in our sarees (just learned the correct spelling, please don't judge) and bangles and lots of eye makeup. We went to the Sanjeet (almost like a rehearsal dinner, but with the families choreographing dances and then a dance party) last night and the wedding ceremony this morning. We felt so incredibly lucky to be there and get to celebrate the marriage of our dear friends, Urvi and Pratik. Okay fine, we might have met them after they got married as we wished them congratulations and I sheepishly wished them "good luck in Seattle." (I'm a creeper and I'm at your wedding and know where you are moving to and you have no clue who I am. Congrats!)

Overall it felt like we were in the India we had been dreaming of these past several years. The dancing and the music and the jewels and just the extravagance. From Parul dressing us in our sarees to clinking my bangles all through the night, it just felt so India. Ale turned to me at one point and said "We are in India" and that just about sums up the wedding.

My favorite memory, however, was during the Sanjeet when Ale excused herself to use the restroom. Amoolya and Vishal asked me where she had went and I told them. The next thing I know, Amoolya says "she is not!" and that is when we all turned around and saw Ale stuffing her face with pani poori. Ale loves her pani poori.

In other news Ale and I had a spa day before the wedding. We got massages, our eyebrows "stringed", and then our legs waxed. Our personal masseuse/waxer/eyebrow stringer came over around noon. My favorite part of the massage was that I got to use my eye mask and play my own music. Since it was in my bedroom, I could be weird and get my zen on. It was my first time getting my legs waxed, but I couldn't pass it up since it was 100 rupees ($2). Also I had not shaved my legs in a long time and it seemed easier to have someone else do that, then me having to go buy a razor and then shave. I learned that waxing really hurts.

This morning I got to have idli and coconut chutney for my second to last time. Then after the wedding, Ale and I took really long naps. We squeezed in one last trip to FabIndia (aka I begged to go) and then we went out to dinner with our family for the very last time. It's amazing how my taste buds have changed in one month. We went to the same North Indian restaurant that Vishal and Amoolya had brought us on our first double date. I remembering enjoying the meal but feeling like it was so spicy and overwhelming. This evening, eating malai kabobs and kulfi and kofta and all the same yummy things, I came full circle. This meal was just delicious and perfect and tasted so much better than the first time. I could name what we were eating, I could use my fingers and lick them instead of wiping my napkin. I could appreciate the black Dahl and the time spent preparing it. And I could eat about 5 times what I could last time.

Our flight to Udaipur leaves at 950 am and then we spend 4 nights in Udaipur and then 2 nights in Pushkar and then we go to Rishikesh for some yoga and meditation (this is the yoga capital of the world where the Beatles wrote some of their music.) We then have given ourselves a little free time to spend time at the hill stations nearby Rishikesh. We are thinking Shimla, Manali, Mussorie. We take a bus back to Delhi on March 5 just in time for our NORAH JONES concert and then spend time in Delhi and then Agra for the Taj. I'll be flying out March 9. But not there yet!

A much more relaxing day

Monday

So yesterday after our not so relaxing massages and lunch at Thaff (a restaurant), Ale and I made our way over to our new residence, Palm Grove Lake Resort. Lets not get this confused with Palmy Lake Resort who we hate (except for Ale, who is a sell-out. see below.)This resort was on a nice canal and plenty of houseboats were driving by all day long. They were not only a nice backdrop, but they also provided a little breeze. Kerala is hot! Like Florida humid. Lets just say we should have sprung for the AC here. Jk, that would have been 2000 rupees more. But, alas, I spent the rest of the day curled up with a trashy novel as I gazed at the backwaters. Not too shabby.

Ale, meanwhile, completely gave up her first born to go use the wifi at Palmy Lake Resort which was nearby. The good news is that she says it wasn't as nice as Palm Grove and it wasn't even on the backwaters. I boycotted their establishment and couldn't even look Ale in the eye the rest of the day. We went back in town for dinner. The food was pretty good, but mid-way through my first bite, the electricity went off (which is not uncommon in India) and didn't come back on until 20 minutes later as we were paying our bill. Let me just say eating hot prawns while I'm sweating isn't my idea of paradise. When we got back to our cottage, we both proceeded to sweat ourselves to sleep. Luckily we had a nice mosquito tent around our bed, so I magically woke up unscathed from the Mosquitos. Take that dengue.

The morning was spent lazing around with my feet in the air (aka a palm tree) and a book (aka a kindle) in my hand. I forgot to mention, our bathroom was outside.Which was awesome. The bathroom could only be accessed through our little cottage and was blocked off by walls with some netting as a roof. My father has always frequented an outdoor shower (thankfully with walls) by our pool at home, so i kind of felt at home.

After checkout, Ale and I went over to the beach to go to what lonely planet called the finest hotel in Alleppey. We had lunch there, and omg was it awesome. I ordered a veggie kerala meal and it was mmmmm so good. It was a veggie curry with rice which was yummy, but my heart was really with the lime pickle. It competes with Mrs. Thacker's pickles (obviously hers win though.) It also came with pappad (a thin crispy bread) and a baby banana and along with my kingfisher I was in heaven. Oh ya and it had a pretty nice view of the beach and there was a fan and a breeze! I even went down to the bathroom and found an adorable little pool where the guests were all lounging. Inside backpacker Lauren is a princess Lauren who likes fancy Ritz Carlton massages and fancy pools. I tried to barter Ale's ipad for a stay at the resort- Please adopt me Rathaham Resort! Needless to say, Ale and I hung around there for several hours and then found our way to the beach to dip our toes in the Arabian Sea. We got to watch the sunset and eat some ice cream and before we knew it, it was time to go get on our train!

Which brings me to now, laying on my bed in the AC (glad we sprung for that!) in our first train ever in India!

First (and last) shower from a bucket (NSFW*)

Sunday

Today was interesting. Interesting as in omgwhathappened. Ale and I awoke this morning super excited for our ayurvedic massages. We arrived at a very nice looking resort and our glee was undeniable. As we were checking in, I decided to ask for a female masseuse. In the states, I really don't care but I just wanted to be safe here in India. Well the guy says "of course" so matter-of-factly, I probably should have realized this wasn't going to be like my last massage. Which by the way, was at The Ritz Carlton in Amelia Island. And with the massage, you get to spend the day using their hot tub and steam room, sauna room, relaxation room, and private spa pool. Now of course, I was not expecting this experience. More like the Thai massages I got twice daily in Thailand a couple years back. Nothing fancy, just clean sheets and some awesome hands and occasionally some good smelling oils.

So Ale and I are brought to our separate doors, we wave goodbye with silly smiles, having no clue what is about to come. First up, I survey the room. It's a series of connected rooms. There is a central room with a rope hanging down (luckily this was never used) and a chair, then off this room there is a bathroom, a tiny changing room (no door), a room with a wood massage bed?, and 2 other small rooms I can't decipher. They don't seem the most relaxing or cleanest. Not unclean, just not what i expected. First, I hear Ale say "my underwear, too?," since the walls dont go up to the roof. Hmm. Now I have no problem underdressing for a massage, but where is my sheet to cover up? "Undress and sit on chair for face massage." Okay, I convince myself to go with the flow and enjoy this experience. I do remember reading in some guide book to not expect an ayurvedic massage to be like a Thai massage. So I get fully undressed and sit on a chair that is luckily covered by a towel (clean, I pray). And I close my eyes to get my naked face-massage. Then I remember I hate oil on my face. Deep breath, Lauren, enjoy. At least it isn't in my hair. And then she dumps like a gallon of oil in my hair. Well, at least I don't have to go lay on that wood thing without a sheet.

And then she leads me to the wood thing without a sheet. I again, take a deep breath and pray this has been cleaned with bleach at some point in the past 5 years. I get to lay down on my belly first, so I am thankful for some modesty. She gives me a slippery rub down for the next 30 minutes, halfway through I have to lay on my back. It isn't half bad, but all I can think about is that a) I'm completely naked b) I'm on a gross wood bed god knows how many people have used c) I'm completely naked and d) she has touched my disgusting feet that are so dirty and now is rubbing them all over my entire body. It wasn't very deep tissue, more like a slippery rub. When she tells me it is time for the steam room, I get excited because I get to go see Ale and we can talk about how ridiculous this was while enjoying the steam.

She leads me to the room next door and points to a wooden box about the size of a dog house , opens the door, and points to the seat for me to sit on. There is no room for Ale. She then closes the door and with my head popped out of the cutout in the box, I get my body steamed. Only problem, I get a little claustrophobic. "How long?" I ask. "20 minutes." I can do anything for 20 minutes, so I talk myself out of kicking open the flimsy wooden door and running for help and instead let my body sweat with an obscene amount of oil (which I think might have been canola oil) layered onto my skin. I then get to stare at a wall covered in dirty oily hands, my body sweating in a box beneath me, and count to 60, 20 times. I am thankful at least my head is not being steamed. When she says "all done," I breath a sigh of relief. I've made it. I don't even care that I'm now not just completely oily, but also completely sweaty. I get up and she says "shower" and I get excited. As a matter of fact, I would love to shower, lady because I do happen to be sweaty and oily.

She leads me to the bathroom and shows me the buckets filled with warm water. Deep breath, okay ill just pretend like I'm using the dirty buckets and dump out the water and shower when I get back. "Sit." Oh my goodness. I then get "showered" by my masseuse out of a bucket as I crouch on my tiptoes of the bathroom floor (I have some weird OCD tendencies and one of them is the floor of public showers. I wear shower shoes when I'm not in my own shower or someone's house.) No way am I sitting down. Meanwhile, Ale relays to me later that at this point in her massage, she reverts back to her 4 year old Venezuelan self and is pretending it is her mother showering her out of a bucket in Venezuela. After I'm done being showered from a bucket by not myself, I get toweled off by not myself. I'm still wet but she sends me to get into my clothes. Yes, please. And it's over. I walk into the lobby and wait for Ale, who comes out 2 minutes later looking like she has passed out. "I had a vasovagal." Okay so she did almost pass out. We said our thank yous and got the first rickshaw we could out of there. It was time to drown our not-so-relaxed sorrows in prawns and fish and mango milkshakes. And that we did.

I'm realizing now nice it is to get to go on these little weekend excursions and then go back home. Hot showers, all our laundry cleaned, guaranteed clean bed. Ale and I are about to embark on a month of backpacking and we aren't going to be going home to freshen up every 3 days. I'm going to have to force myself to shower, even though the water isn't hot or the faucet looks gross or someone else is showering me. I'm probably going to have to rewear some of my clothes. Ewww. It's just a little hard to accept this, seeing how good we have it now.

Ale asked me the other day, "do you think 27 is too old to backpack?" I replied "no, you know you are 27 and you are backpacking?" Luckily she had realized this, she was just probing the subject I was just referring to.

*NSFW= not safe for work (per my sister)!

Lazing on the backwaters

I know what I want to eat: a big Publix sub with loads of veggies or a Greek salad. And I guess I could have a grilled cheese, too. I wasn't getting sick of Indian food, until I got sick and then ate Indian food for a week. I think I might need a little break this weekend. Not that ill find that in Kerala, which is supposed to have amazing coastal Indian food. But maybe tonight before we get on our bus (let's pray this bus ride goes okay) we can have some American food.

The plan for this weekend. Take an overnight bus to Alleppey (which is in the state of Kerala) and then stay 3 days/2 nights at Palmy Lake Resort (evil evil place, you will see in several paragraphs.) Kerala is famous for its' backwaters- a chain of inland lakes and canals parallel to the Arabian Sea. We will do what we do best- lay around in hammocks, read books, relax, eat, get some aryuverdic massages, spend some time on a houseboat. Then take a train back and arrive in Bangalore Tuesday morning in time for The Wedding!

So that was yesterday afternoon, and then I accidentally fell asleep for 5 hours and woke up at 530 pm and Ale and I had to get our lives together to go to Kerala. Blogging hasn't been the best this week.

The good news, I made some grilled cheese at The Thackers and it was delicious. Mmmmm. I had 2. I was kind of dreading the bus ride since I had accidentally taken the nap. But since I had no choice, it was off to the bus we went at 830. It of course didn't leave until 10 pm but it turned out to be nicer than the first bus we took to Madikeri in Coorg. This was a Volvo bus which basically meant it was nicer. It even had AC. Which then got annoying since the AC for the whole bus was right next to our seats and my nose was cold. So we got all comfy (in 150 degree backward position) and I started to daydream.

Now many people in India love using their horns, almost as a directional. Like "hey I'm coming up to your right" or "hey I'm passing you" or "hey I'm behind you" or "hey I'm driving". There are lots and lots of horns. But usually the buses don't use horns when they are outside of Bangalore. Well, that's hard for me to say since I'm usually asleep by this point in the bus-ride. But our bus driver, he was using his horn like he wasn't driving a night bus of 30 people trying to sleep. So it is just going on and on and since I'm not tired, it is making it hard for even me to sleep. I daydream a little longer and then all the sudden I had fallen asleep and it was now 1 am and we were at some bus stop station with a bunch of other buses and it was so hot (apparently the AC was now off) and all I could hear was the clanking of tools. I looked at Ale and we laughed. Apparently our bus driver decided the middle of the night was the opportune time for an oil change or to fix the brakes or who knows what. After what felt like forever, the bus finally starts up again and I magically fall back asleep.

The next time I looked at my watch was like 9 am. I took some more short naps and we finally arrived around 11 to Alleppey. As ale and I get into a rickshaw in Alleppey, we go to call the resort to give our driver directions and the lady proceeds to tell us she has given away our room. We booked it 2 weeks in advance, called to confirm the day before, and this witch gives away our room because our bus doesn't show up on time! What bus in India shows up on time?! So after some plots to ruin her tripadvisor reviews, Ale and I decide to get a quick bite to eat and them go find an Internet cafe so we could figure out where to stay. And by we, I mean Ale, since this type of scenario leads to panic attacks on my part.

We ended up finding a nice, beautifully preserved old homestay, Tharavad, with lots of teak everywhere and decided we would stay there for the first night and then head over to a more cottage-y place the next night (it was booked for tonight.) We organized a boat ride on the backwaters and were off at 2 pm to laze on the covered boat for the rest of the afternoon. We went in and out of lots of canals and lakes and saw lots of little houses dotted along the canals. The women were doing the washing in the canals in the afternoon and by the evening, the men were coming out to bath. We also saw a lot of houseboats strolling along. This is the real draw to Kerala, and if Ale and I weren't just pretending to be doctors, we would be staying in one of these. But since we don't have jobs, we are doing it the backpackers way. And it is still just as beautiful to be on a small little boat with chairs and chaise lounges and to get to see the beauty of the backwaters. At one point we stopped off at a restaurant (in the midst of the houses) and got some amazing prawns in some kerala curry with amazing coconut rice. I can see why everyone raves about the food here.

It is so neat to be able to visit such different towns in such different parts of India. Before coming to India, I was so naive. I barely understood the concept that India was made of a number of different states, let alone realize how completely different the cultures are in each one. Kerala is so different than Karnataka. And even in Karnataka, we have seen how Coorg varies from Hampi from Bangalore. Here in Alleppey, the men all wear these knee length skirts. These are rarely seen in Karnataka.

And on that note, I'm going to get Ale off the phone and to go get dinner!

Debbie-downer

Today was kind of yucky. My belly didn't like dinner last night, but on waking up this AM I knew I had to suck it up and go to work. There are only 2 days left of work and we need to get our ducks in a row. Aka I need to get my evaluation so I can get credit for this craziness. And since things in India seem to happen really quickly, I should have done that last Friday. But since I didn't, I had to go in today.

I decided I'd drop off the paper with the department head since she was in charge of me, although she really hasn't worked with me at all. I had tried to go to her OPD (outpatient clinic) but she had sent me to other rooms, so no one-on-one contact, this will make for an interesting eval. Well I handed it to her and she told me to meet me in the labour room at 10 to get the eval back. So I went to OPD (I figured sitting was the only way to learn) and then returned at 955. And then waited until 1120. In the midst of this hour , I got to listen to one woman howling in pain during her labour.

The women labour without pain meds, without their husbands or mommies (well occasionally the moms are there but I don't think they are allowed to stay for long.) Then they just get whisked away to the delivery room next door when they are about to push out the baby. All alone, in an old room, in agony, without their family (never seen a mom or husband in there) as an episiotomy is done and being told to "shhhh shhh" or "relax" and getting on and off a bed. I don't think I would become an OBG in India. Heck, I don't even know if I would become a doctor in India. Besides the obvious intelligence factor (aka these people are smmmaarrt), medicine just isn't the same here. At least for me. I know it is a different culture. But I want to help people by taking care of them. I want to make them feel as good as they can in a yucky situation. I'm talking rainbows and pansies. And here it feels like doctors know they are gods and this is their right (obviously a generalization on my part!) There is no asking permission to examine, there is no gentle words and soft touches. The women in labor are told to be quiet, eyes are rolled when they scream and yell. Pickups with teeth are used on unanesthesized perineum. Yes the doctors here know dosing by heart and can list off the differential for anything by memory, but I don't see the same the same connection to the patient. There is no talk about communication with patients. They don't put the patient on a pedestal like we do. And I'm acting like doctors in the US are all rainbows and pansies. Far from the truth. But that's what I strive for at least.

So as this poor woman screams in agony in a room of 7 other laboring women, is "shhhh"-ed and is all alone, my belly is rumbling, I'm sweating like a pig and am so nauseous, just listening to all this for an hour. And then all the sudden the doctors decide she is to deliver, she has reached the 2nd stage and we don't have time to roll her the 20 feet to the room next door this delivery is so imminent. So they break down the bed (the first time I've seen this in India, but what we do for every laboring patient in their private room when the baby is ready to be pushed out in the states.) And so she gets to deliver her baby in a room of 7 other laboring women, some with visitors, all these doctors and nurses and people she doesn't know. They give her the episiotomy and she screams in agony and then out comes the little baby. Not my idea of giving birth. I wish I could capture this moment and play it to every laboring woman in the US. Their complaints about needing more ice chips, when are they getting their epidural, about their birth plans. The documentaries about too many cesareans in the US. Enough. I'm not sure if I'll be more compassionate or less compassionate when I go back to the hospitals in the US. When the pregnant women hand you their detailed birth plan about what is to happen, that no pitocin is to be used and no cesarean done, that only Enya can be played, and that the temperature has to be 82.4 degrees. I mean I know that's what I'm going to do when I have a kid (in 500 years.) Lets hope I'll be more appreciative of the luxuries afforded to women in the US which will make me more compassionate.

So I obviously had a mini-melt down (no pun intended) as I waited in that room. A whole another point, why would she tell me to wait for her if she wasn't coming? I kept asking the secretary and different doctors if they had seen her and then I finally found her on the gyn side still doing rounds an hour and 20 minutes later. Now I completely understand rounds are important, way more important than me. But if she knew she was doing rounds why would she tell me meet her in the labour room? She didn't even mention anything about my waiting and told me to pick it up from her secretary later. I was so thrilled.

And since this has been a tiny bit debbie-downer. Here is a funny story:

When we first got to India, Ale used to be really shy when she went to the bathroom and would make me wear headphones. Then a couple weeks ago I noticed she had stopped even closing the door. Girls are confusing.

Shady's (half) back (knock on wood)

Not much to write home about here. I alternate between sleeping, moaning, and taking Tylenol. I look forward to my next dosage. I guess I could inform everyone about the one thing that is changing- my bowel movements, but I have a feeling that outside my med school friends, no one else cares and for that matter you are probably repulsed as of now.

The good news is, I wrote that last night as I lay moaning in bed and then I made it through the whole night without needing a Tylenol. I did wake up at one point and wanted to take one, but I have been very lethargic and I went back to sleep before the pain could wake me up again. Then I woke up this morning and I only felt about 50% like poo. Now lets not get crazy, I still stayed home from work and my accomplishment thus far is brushing my teeth for the first time in 3 days (ewwwww.) I did almost go to work and then Ale told me she wasn't going and I said "we'll I'm sick so I'm definitely not going if your not going." Ale has really embraced me being sick.

In other news, I ate breakfast but I was still not back to my pickle eating/shoving my face self yet. I really would like to be. I was thinking, what American food would I be eating right now? And I can't really tell you. Maybe a grilled cheese? Sounds kind of heavy. Or soup? But I don't like chicken noodle soup.

So I laid around in bed for a good 7 hours, feeling sorry for myself for not being able to move. Ale meanwhile was sleeping (I'm telling you, she has really embraced me being sick.) I told Amooyla that I (and Ale if she could get out of bed) would summon the courage to go shopping this afternoon, since we had bangles and shoes and earrings to get for The Wedding. (Ale and I act like the prince and princess of wales are getting married here in India.) I didn't feel quite better but I knew that tomorrow after going back to work and being there a whole 3 hours, I would need to nap the rest of the day. So I decided to break it up. Ale and I got out the door and walked half a block down the street before we realized we had left the bag with the sari tops we had to match our accessories to at home. By the time we got back in the house, I was laying on the couch sweaty and exhausted. "Good shopping, Ale, I'll be going up to bed now."

So we left the house again and got in a rickshaw and went to Amoolya's house. Luckily I got some water and another laying break and then we were off to Commercial Street. Amoolya's driver dropped us off (it keeps getting fancier!) and besides the bi-hourly gut strangulation, I felt pretty good. I definitely would have spent way more money if I had the stamina to try clothes on and actually look at things hanging on the shelves. I guess I have another month for that (If typhoid/dengue/malaria/polio hasn't completely destroyed me by then.)

So what did I buy: 2 sets of bangles, 2 pairs of sandals, 2 pashminas, 2 tshirts (because who doesn't only bring tight long sleeve T-shirts to India), and 1 pair of jhumkas (earrings). Apparently I like the number 2.

And since this was my first Indian meal back after having diarrhea for 48 hours, I consumed: pani poori as an appetizer while shopping, followed by dinner with Amoolya and Vishal (who joined us after the shopping) at a Mangalorian restaurant consisting of prawns, fish fry, ghee (butter) chicken, another chicken dish, red rice, and neer dosa, followed by another place for Kulfi (Indian ice cream.) We were keeping it light. The good news, I didn't poop my pants.

So in the past several days, I got mad at Ale because she wasn't carrying me to the toilet like Marshall would have and then I got mad at Marshall because he wasn't calling me every hour to check in on me. And then I waited by the front door because Marshall promised to send Donnie (his dog) to India to snuggle with me. He never came.

And now it's time for bed.