First Day in New Delhi

So, we did quite a bit today.....first off, we went to Connaugt Place for some shopping. Ashley bought two shirts and I bought one, all from Fab India. Rebecca, my cousin who frequents and studies India, recommended the store. They had nice stuff, but we thought the prices would be lower. We had an awesome lunch at a place near by....I had the grilled Veggie Kebobs and Ashley had Navartma Korma (sorry for the bad spellings). It was one of the best meals I have had on our trip, yeah it was spicy, but very tasty. From there, we walked around a little bit and window shopped. We also checked out Jantar Mantar, which is a observatory built by Maharaja Jai Singh II. It was very peaceful and interesting to look at. Although it had English descriptions of what each building was, we couldn't exactly figure out why it was built in 1725, other than to study astronomy. It seemed like a lot to do to study the sky. The scenic salmon colored structure had a variety of city wildlife running around - lots of strange looking birds (and the obligatory pigeon) and tons of chipmunks.

After Jantar Mantar and a drop in at the Tourist bureau, we headed to the train station to buy our tickets to Agra. What an experience! We actually never got our tickets (we can't decide how early we want to get in), but we were hassled by 5 people trying to steer us towards their travel agency instead of the train station. Friendly people try to become your "friend" and "help" you out. They are not what they appear, and luckily our guidebook told us what to look for. But one of the con men was very good. Their travel agency was named the same thing as the official booking area, along with being on "the first floor" as our guidebook says. However, after checking it out, we quickly realized that it was not what he claimed. We went back to the train station, and went to buy a ticket but realized that we didn't have enough cash on had. So we elected to weight until tomorrow to pick it up.

After that exhausting experience, we had a nice dinner. Again Indian food, much cheaper than lunch but not as tasty (still pretty damn good though). I have a feeling Ashley and I will gain weight if we don't get sick.

Other musings:
- Poverty. We knew it would be poor, but were never sure what to expect. We have seen the odd beggar and low quality housing, but its actually a little better than I imagined.
- The smell. Besides the smog, the smells are not quite as overpowering as I was under impression they would be. Yeah, there are some stinky spots (just as their were in Rome), but not too bad.
- Wireless. We have a wireless connection in our room (crazy) but its not working right now. I get connected but it doesn't get any data. If and when I can get it work, you will get some pictures.
- Stares. Everywhere we go people stare at us. They glare at you. Rebecca said to just to think you are a super model, but its somewhat creepy.
- Friendliness. Besides the friends mentioned above, everyone is very interested in talking to you....asking where you are from, why you are here, what you will see while you are here, etc. Its quite refreshing as that didn't really happen that much the last two months.

Ok, that is a long post and I am sure boring to most. But so far, so good on India, but it has exhausted me. Thank god they speak English....yeah its hard to understand sometimes, but they speak it!

Passage to India

Yesterday morning I awoke at 5am filled with thoughts of all the things that could possibly go wrong.....such as a missed connection, lost luggage, hotel problems and the like. I couldn't get back to sleep despite knowing that I had a very long day in front of me. However, as the day wore on, the dread turned to excitement and as we left the Delhi airport customs at 1:20am, both Ashley and I were positively giddy.

To avoid delay and frustration, we arranged for a driver to pick us up from the airport and take us to the hotel. The ride into Delhi, which is quite polluted, was insane. The driver zigged, zagged, honked, flashed his lights, and drove where I didn't think there was actually a road. Ashley likened it to Mr. Toad's Wild Ride at Disney. I can only imagine what it would have been like if there had been serious traffic, and cows present.

Anyway, after a nice ambian sleep in, we enjoyed a breakfast in our courtyard. Today we are going to buy some clothing, and the like.

To India

After 64 nights, 7 countries, 6 currencies, 26 rooms, 4 airplane, 27 trains, 19 buses and a whole lot of fun, we head to India tomorrow. We are both nervous and excited about India. It will be nice to see a different culture, namely one not based on Judeo-Christian thought patterns. At the same time, India is till developing and I have heard that the poverty can be crushing to visitors.

I would expect our updates to the blog will be slightly sparser and fewer pictures, but we will try to record our thoughts as we go along.

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American Football

We have been in Prague for the last few days with a low key attitude. We are not forcing in a lot of sights, instead focusing on preparing for India. We have been doing a lot of shopping for India - we bought me some new shoes and some medical supplies along with a travel guide to Thailand.

One thing we did do was try to catch some American Football. On Saturday, we headed to a sports bar and watched Arkansas-Bama. It was nice to see some football (I am jonesing for LSU football)....and there were even three SEC fans in attendance. We had a lively debate on why we were rooting for the pigs over Bama and some beers. Overall a good time. Last night, we went and watched the last half of the Steelers-Bengals matchup at a different bar. The ambiance at this one was much nicer, as the were the prices for Pivo. But NFL does not draw me in like college football.....but still a nice change of pace.

This afternoon, we wandered around Prague catching Hrad Castle, Wasinlinsky Palace, and Charles Bridge. All of them were nice sights, but seriously touristy. Nonetheless Prague has a certain old world enchantment to it.

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Some Good Europe Memories

There are some stories of things that have happened to us that I would like to codify for myself, so I don't forget. Here they are:
- Ashley the navigator. Normally, I do the navigation in cities but one night Ashley used her crafty ability to guide us home. It was in Eger and we had visited Valley of the Beautiful Woman (cheap wine), and we were a little tipsy. Anyway, we get near our apartment but we can't find the building I was walking around in circles trying every door, Ashley insisted we try a path, I just knew was the wrong way. Turned out to be the right way....
- In Prague, we needed to buy some mosquito repellant (additional supplies, we have plenty but just to be safe for India). Anyway, we went to a few sporting good stores and looked. We couldn't find any, so we asked the sale clerk where we could get some. He said "In Czech Republic, we have very special mosquito repellant. Its called Off."
- Ashley and I have some code names for different types of people. For instance, when anyone packs a lunch we say they must be Dutch as the Dutch are notorious for not buying anything when they visit. Whenever we see people making out, we call them Hungarians. All over Hungary, we saw people making out.....but not really anywhere else. If we see really drunk people, we call them Slovakians. As one day we saw a passed out man when we arrived in Levoca and he was still there when we left.
- We don't cram in a lot of sights when we travel, but we do wander around a look. I call this wandering aimlessly. We took this to a new level in Rome, as we were on a tight budget and the metro system sucked.
- Trying to recreate American foods. Sometimes we both wanted something familiar....so we tried to find it or recreate it. It almost always came out terrible. We have given up on some things.

I am sure there are other stories that I would like to remember.....but I can't.

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Italia

As you may have gathered from our blog entries, both Ashley and I really like Italy. We are so glad we added it. Of particular note is the historical aspect. Everywhere you turn there is something major related to western history. Its truly astonishing that this small country could have so much to do with the way we live, act and think today. But it does. In addition, we loved the people. They have a zest for life that is infectious - and its a joy to interact with them. Finally, we also really liked the food and wine.

On the negative side, the transportation system is not the greatest. Every train we rode on was at least 10 minutes late, many over an hour late. The Rome mass transit system also seems to be in a sorry state of repair and doesn't connect the pieces efficiently (at least for a tourist). Also, the Euro wreaks havoc on budget minded travelers.

Things that only interest me
- Books I read. I polished off a Dick Francis novel along with Donna Leon's Death in a Strange Country (thanks mom).
- Music I listened to. The inefficient Italian rail system gave me plenty of time to listen to music including Camera Obscura, Clap Your Hands and Say Yeah, Decemberists, Busdriver, DJ Shadow, Jackie Brown Soundtrack, Built to Spill, Radiohead, Rage Against the Machine, and probably a few others I can't remember.

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Updated Itinerary

I wanted to provide an updated itinerary so the family will have some travel details.
- Tomorrow (Sept 22) we head back to Prague for 5 nights.
- On Sept 27th our destination is New Delhi via Frankfurt. On Oct 1, we jet to Agra to see the Taj. On Oct 3, we take off for Jaipur and then Mumbai on Oct 6. From their our schedule can take two different paths depending on what happens with us being able to change our flights on Indian Air.
- On Oct 17th, Bangkok is where our flight lands, but we will probably head to north Thailand. On the 25th, we have 5 nights at a resort in Hua Hin. We are keeping an eye on the situation in Thailand to determine whether its safe to head there. From what we have seen, we think it is; however, if violence breaks out we will change our destination.
- From there, its off to Australia on Nov 1 (arriving on the 2nd), then to New Zealand on Nov 21st.

Just wanted to provide an update as we have no idea what the internet situation in India will be like. We suspect internet access will be readily available, but are not 100% sure.

Finally, I want to say thanks to Maria....yet again. She was the one who said we HAD to go to Rome. We followed her advice and are glad to see all of this great old stuff (Ashley uses a different word, but this blog is meant for family reading).

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