March 4th, 2013 – Sickie

I totally forgot to post in my last blog post about what happened late at night. When we got back to the hostel, I had a really long conversation with this woman in the lobby. Turns out she is a professional sky diver and got married in a hot air balloon. How cool! She decided to be a sky diver because it is illegal in India, so she figured that she would win all the awards because she would be the first to do anything. And because of that, she has met the president several times and received special permission to sky dive in India on a few occasions. She has sky dived over 700 times (and she’s super young). We are friends on facebook now…no big deal.

Today was not eventful because I had a fever. I woke up at 8 and ate breakfast with everyone, thinking that I would just ignore the fever that I had all night and go to class and it would all be ok. False. I didn’t end up going to class, which was a great decision. I was sicker than I thought I was. I went back to sleep from 9 til 2, took some Advil, and did some homework, sent emails, etc. I ate dinner at the hostel and went to bed really early. Not an eventful day. But I promised to blog every day…so here it is. 

March 3rd, 2013 – The Best Hospitality

Today I woke up around 10am and did some homework. The morning was very relaxed. Lucy had invited everyone who went to the Taj to this man’s house who is a friend of her dad’s and lives in Delhi. Her dad does something in the study abroad world, and this man is his contact in India. He got us a bus to pick us up from the hostel and bring us to his house! So at around 3:30pm we got on the bus and headed there. It was about 30 minutes away.

When we got there, we took our shoes off, and all of the girls were given a bindi (the dot that goes on your forehead) and a bracelet. The boys were given a flower and a red line on their forehead. This is a traditional Indian welcome. Their house was beautiful. We all sat in a room together, ate delicious snacks, and talked about religion, Indian culture, etc. There was a person doing henna, so we all got some. And this man’s wife showed us all how to wear sari’s, so we all tried them on and took pictures. At around 8pm we ate dinner, which was so yummy. It was one of the best nights I have had in India.

We came back to the hostel and I wasn’t feeling that great. Hopefully not getting sick.  

March 2nd, 2013 – My First World Wonder☺

Not sure if anyone is aware, but I am not the friendliest in the morning. Especially on 3 hours of sleep. But worth it for the Taj Mahal! We woke up at 5am and met in the lobby of the hostel. We had a bus to take us for the 200km journey to the Taj. In theory, 200km is about 100 miles, so not that far away. In India, traffic is absolutely ridiculous. So it took us 8 hours to get there this morning. Did I mention that it was ridiculous?

Also, the ride in the bus was anything by relaxing. We had to take a detour through a rural village for about 3 hours. The most bumps I have ever experienced in my life. Like imagine driving a toy car over a cheese grater, but the huge holes rather than the small ones. Sometimes the toy car would fall into the holes and get stuck. And it would make a lot of noise. It was that, except we were the toy car and the ground was the grater. There’s one roller coaster I never want to go on again.

But then we got to the Taj! YAYYY! It was amazingly beautiful. I took a lot of pictures, don’t worry. After we explored the Taj we ate lunch in the area and then headed home. Again, a 7 ish hour journey. Same roller coaster on the way back. But worth it. I saw my first world wonder!!! 

March 1st, 2013 – Kingdom of Dreams

No need to worry…I’m alive and well. We got back to Delhi at around 10AM and headed back to the hostel. Then we slept, showered, unpacked, etc. We ate lunch at the hostel around 2 and we were all super hungry because we barely ate anything on the train. Aka I ate some bread and butter for dinner and nothing until 2pm the next day. That’s ok though because I don’t think my stomach could handle anything else.

My host cousin, who I have still been keeping in touch with, picked me and 3 of my friends up around 5:30 so that we could go to Kingdom of Dreams. You should google that. It’s like the Magic Kingdom Castle at Disney World. They have a ride outside, food and shops inside, and a really cool show. We saw the show, which was in Hindi, but my host cousin did his best to translate. We also recognized one of the people in the show from a club!

We ate dinner after the show and then dropped some people back at the hostel. They were going to a club after, so I decided to join, and it was so much fun. Got back at 1:30am. Good thing I have to wake up at 5am for the Taj Mahal tomorrow!!! 

February 28th, 2013 – There are some things you just can’t blog about

Today was our last day in Ahmedabad. We met up in the morning at school and had a “check in” with everyone. We all shared stories about our Ahmedabad experience, and we all seemed to have a really great time. I talked about riding in a rickshaw alone with no phone and no watch, which is something I never would have dreamed that I would have been able to do…or decided to do. After that, we went to a restaurant for lunch. It was a buffet and was super delicious, except it made everyone sick after. Cool. Right before a 16 hour train.

Then comes the 16 hour train story. This train was different than the one we took to Ahmedabad. This one was a three-tiered train, so three beds on top of each other instead of two. Aka no personal space. Luckily, my train car had all IHP kids on it, so that was fun. We talked for a while before everyone went to bed. And then for the fun part. We noticed a lot of men with guns all around the train, and my one-month-ago self would have been freaking out about it. But my new-desensitized self only got slightly concerned. Why were they on the train, you may ask. Well…I’m pretty sure I can’t post about it for the public to see. So when you see me, just ask me why they were there and I will explain the whole story.

February 27th, 2013 – Typewriters Under Trees

Today we had the whole day to catch up on work and do whatever we want. Lucy, B, and I decided to wake up and eat breakfast around 10 and then head to the old city. We got in a rickshaw and asked to go there, but he dropped us off in the most random place ever. We ended up in the Wall Street/Lawyer-ville of India. There were a million and a half men in business suits with type writers under trees doing work, and then a bunch of law buildings and signs everywhere. Not the shopping we were looking for. But it was cool! Then we walked back over the river towards our hostel. B needed to interview a guy for her project about food justice, so after we walked over the river we set out to find the place. It was really hard to find because it is in this guy’s house and is a family run restaurant on like the third floor of a complicated gated community home. But we found it! They started this business so that working people could get a family meal in the middle of the day. The same people have been going there for like 8 years straight, every day for lunch. Crazy!!

Then we went to Ahmedabad Central which is a huge department store that has the comedy central logo on the front…no one knows why. I didn’t end up getting anything because everyone follows you while you shop and it freaks me out. They also take the hangers from you while you are shopping, which doesn’t make sense because when you try things on there is no where to put things except on the floor.

After the failed shopping trip I came back to the hostel to do some work before dinner.

Back to Delhi tomorrow! Won’t have internet for a while but hopefully will when we get back to Delhi.