Holy Cow

Let’s get something straight: cows are not holy. No one worships them. In fact, everyone pretty much ignores them. This is because the cows do not belong to them; they belong to somebody else. A lot of the cows seen roaming the streets are the property of someone. For a poor family, the cow may be their most valuable asset. That doesn’t mean that they take care of them. Usually, they can’t afford to feed them – especially when they are not producing milk. So, during the day, the cows are set loose to fend for themselves, usually eating garbage, or whatever else they can find. In the evening, they will find their way home again. If they are producing milk, the family will usually find a way to provide fresh hay and feed. Things are even worse for the bulls, who really only have one job to do, and it’s a part-time one, at best. The end result is that these animals wander the streets all day, clogging traffic, eating garbage, sitting in doorways, and generally behaving in ways that would make Gary Larsen proud. The free-roaming days of the cows may be coming to an end, however. At least in the big cities. There is currently a lawsuit pending in the Mumbai (Bombay) courts that will determine if the owners of new high-rise apartment houses can legally prevent renters from keeping cows in their apartments. I think it has something to do with the elevators.

Sorry 'Bout That

We have been in the internet wilderness for the past few days and have been unable to post (or read email). We have now come back to civilization complete with full wireless connectivity. We are, as I write, sitting in our lakeside room in Udaipur at the Fateh Prakash Palace, overlooking the lake palace. We have a bunch of things to write about but, for now, we are too busy spoiling ourselves with the view, the food, and the gin and tonics. We will have more posts for you by this evening.

Quick note to Erika: we have not seen any more Rhesus macaques since we were in Agra. The Langors, however, are everywhere. I got some baby pictures for you.

Tiger, Tiger, Wherefore Art Thou

Carol here, we are in Ranthambhore tiger preserve on our way to search for tigers the first night. Having arrived 2 hours late (bad roads again) for the afternoon safari, we dashed to our Condor ( a large open topped bus that seats 19) and rushed into the park barely missing a few cars, pedestrians and boars along the way. 1 hour of viewing beautiful lakes with ruins of a massive fort (actually, a royal hunting lodge) in the distance on the hills and we had to leave the park or get locked in with the tigers. We all opted to leave. But the next morning our group headed back into the park at 6:00am. The main group got zone # 3, Abo’s and Ross-Rainwaters headed off in a smaller jeep to go to zone #6 for bird watching. Only there weren’t many birds-it was a savannah environment with stone outcroppings that the jeep zigged and zagged over. Beautiful quiet morning ride. Then we came upon the hyena’s. Huge and prehistoric looking-almost the size of deer-they were beautiful. Our guide made hyena noises so that they would turn towards our cameras. They seemed quite serious. After they suspiciously wandered into the woods we went in search of other game. Saw Sambors(the largest Indian deer(kind of like elk) and much smaller spotted deer. The huge Blue Bulls-which is one of the world’s largest antelopes. Then more driving and strange animal noises from the guide. Lots of tracking (a tiger was in the area, but not to be seen yet…) We saw gazelle, crocodile, boar, and one fresh “kill” with tracks…tiger was not to be found this morning. (Mike here: We were not that disappointed in our morning’s outing until we heard that the rest of our tour group saw a female tiger close up. The tigress posed for pictures, gave a brief description of her life in the park, and then signed autographs. )

But we had an afternoon safari with the group still to come. Who by the way, all saw a female tiger walk along side their Condor vehicle that same morning, spray the nearby trees and wander over the hill-so the ross Rainwaters and Abo’s were feeling a little left out…We headed off with the knowledge that since the morning was a successful tiger safari, the early evening safari would primarily focus on birds. Heh, we love birds (but oohh that tiger spotting would be nice too). Lucky for us we saw owls, osprey, sea eagles, kites, furry necked storks, sandpipers, kingfishers, stilts, red wattled lapwing and yellow wattled lapwing, Indian Darter, crows, pond herons, vultures, pea fowl and of course peacocks. Thank god. The group was somewhat sated with their birding and the guide was able to listen for the Langer Macaqes danger calls. Of course I had a secret weapon in one of our group (Steve) who has wonderful tiger energy-spotted it the first day of the tour. I asked him to Please….get us another tiger-he offered the guide 1,000 rupees if he could find one. 1 hour before the park was to close on our last night in Ranthambhore we went speeding off to a lake filled with rushes and tall grasses. Inside this vegetation a large male tiger was wading, quietly approaching the far shore and some prey( well it’s a good theory anyway). First I saw the tail. Then one ear. Then part of a rear end with beautiful orange striping. Then nothing but reeds. Then part of Mike’s shoulder and then another ear of the tiger. As he moved through the grasses my mind filled in the gaps-he was huge and we were very happy. A wonderful day in Ranthambhore.

Tigers? Not So Much.

We spent a day in the bus, Mike and I, trading spots on the back bench for naps. Lots of small villages, bad roads, crops (mustard is a biggie) and women working. Everywhere the women are working, from hauling water in pots on their heads, to rock carrying for road work, weeding and hoeing the fields, tending the animals and making cow pies into wood stove fuel. The men sit in circles and smoke, hang around the shops and watch the village television and take naps on woven beds that sit outside beside the house doors. Occasionally you see the men urinating beside the road. We discussed the inequality of work at great length on the bus, but Mike and the other fellows thought we were being sexist.

8 hours later after a delightful potty stop beside the road in the bushes(only a few of those thistle thingies stuck to my pants) and a surprisingly good Indian lunch at a tourist bus stop, we arrived in Ranthambore and hopped on the condor vehicle for our safari into the tiger park. Unfortunately we were late getting to the hotel and so had to speed at breakneck pace through town honking at all traffic coming our way till we got to the park for a quicky 50 minute tour before dusk drove us out. I guess you wouldn’t want to be stuck in the park after dark so they have strict rules. Mike and I have arranged for a private jeep tour into another area of the park where we hope to have some photographic opportunities that might be a bit less hectic without our fellow 16 travelers along.

Right now we are listening to gypsies performing outside our room (we are so lucky to have drums and singing so close-yeah, ask me in an hour how I feel), we’ve had a very good dinner and have sorted the laundry for tomorrow. Off to bed. Hopefully will be able to post some delightful tiger shots or at the very least a few Sambor or spotted deer photographs that will take your breath away. Tomorrow we have a 6:30am safari and an evening safari with shopping and swimming in the pool in between. Kind of a relaxing day comparatively speaking of course. –Carol

Mike here: We just got back from our morning “safari” into the Ranthambore National Park. In order to keep the tourist jeeps from outnumbering the animals, each vehicle is randomly assigned a zone within the park in which may travel. We got zone 6. We did see hyena, antelope, gazelle, etc., but no tigers. Still, it was a very pleasant drive and we hardly saw any other vehicles. I will post again after our afternoon safari.

A Million Hindus Can't Be Wrong

Pushkar: where a million people come to party… without alcohol. The annual Pushkar fair is a seven-day event. The first five days are centered around the trading of cattle and camel races and the last two are devoted to deep spiritual worship. The full-moon of November is when Brahma created the world. It’s actually a very long and involved story (cows get a shout-out), and quickly gets very complicated and confusing. In other words, the Hindu creation story is a lot like modern India: chaotic. The town is arranged in a semi-circular arch around a small lake. In the center of town, facing the lake is the temple to Brahma. During the two days of the full moon, people come down to the lake to bathe and pray. Molahti (our guide) says that bathing once in the waters at Pushkar is worth ten times bathing at Varanasi. Up until now, I had not realized that there was a point system. In any case, about a million people take advantage of the 10-for-1 offer and descend on this town of 40,000 each year. Since there are obviously not enough accommodations for everyone, tent cities spring up everywhere in the countryside surrounding the town and the lake. Our little tent village is nicer than some most.

Because our camp is a couple of kilometers from town (and it’s 90 degrees), we have to take camels, or camel carts into the fair. I have never been this close to this many camels before. You begin to notice differences in them – some are definitely cuter and nicer than others. They actually have very soft fur, and the like to be petted (at least the nice ones do).

At the fair, it is shoulder-to-shoulder humanity. Most of the women (and some of the men) wear very bright and ornate outfits. This would be a great place to get some good people pictures, except that everyone is shoulder-to-shoulder and there is very little room to maneuver a camera. I tried my best.

We are now in Ranthambore (the tiger park). This is gonna be cool!

Into the Wilderness

Carol is supposed to write today's post, but she is busily repacking everything in the firm belief that this will create more room in our luggage for all of our recent purchases. BTW, this is the last time that I will mention shopping in any form. Carol says that it is no longer funny... OK, here she is:

Varanasi has a lot of pilgrims and holy men (thus the TWO photos of holy men included). They are different holy men, though Mike thinks maybe they just rotate from corner to corner. We spent yesterday visiting a bead factory (purchasing some items for Cathy B as well as xmas gifts) and then off to visit the inaugural Gandhi Arts and Crafts Fair. This mostly consisted of booths with assorted crafts from around India, though they looked fairly lonely and drab in the forced environment of booths as opposed to their natural setting of a street market. Of course the minister of Arts and Crafts was there to cut the ribbon and open the fair. some of our group were photographed shopping with the headlines "foreigners flock to the Fair" (though flocking was an overstatement-we came in groups of 3 or 5 at a time). there was a ferris wheel and some other children's rides, kitshy toys for the kids, food booths (dave K would have loved them) and of course the requisite porta potties (see photo of the cement cubicles freshly poured for the fair).

After dinner we had a birthday party for Donna Porter in the Kabob restaurant complete with a Japanese tourist that performed magic tricks with a string that he wrapped around the necks of females at our table. The waiters were all dressed in what looked like prison garb or plumbers uniforms, the group had a split opinion on that.

This morning I got up, got a taxi and went back to the Arts And Crafts fair only to find the merchants still asleep. So we wandered around the Muslim butchers quarter. Watched meat being cut into steaks, kabob and made into hamburger. Saw a string of hearts and one of livers. Even passed some goats feet that looked like they were on their way to soup. FORGOT my camera, so had a friend take a few shots. Mike would have loved the photo ops, but alas, he had decided to wander the streets around the hotell...boreing. But he did run across a snake charmer. I took all the above photo's except the top holy man. You are required to vote on which holy man shot you like the best...the donkeys and the dogs were all busy doing what they do best. Other photo's came out wonderful too, but Mike says I am not to spoil you all.
Tomorrow we have Pushkar and won't be able to post...tenting it a bit I hear. Having a wonderful time. Another great day planned for tomorrow.

Mike again: Today was another travel day (back to Delhi from Varanasi). Tomorrow we will be on the road again, this time to Pushkar which is eight hours away by bus. Pushkar is another religious center located around a sacred lake. I know this place is seriously religious because no alcohol or non-vegetarian foods are allowed in the area. I don't think there is a prohibition against wireless internet service, but since Pushkar is located in the high desert and we will be staying in a tented camp, I am not hopeful that we will be able to get online for the next few days. So, if you do not hear from us for a while, DON'T PANIC. Our next stop after Pushkar will be Udaipur on the 14th. I know they have the internets.

Morning on the Ganges

Our guide continues to remind us that Varanasi is one of the oldest cities on Earth. When I asked "how old?", she replied "very old." So, either it is so old that it pre-dates written history, or it should just be thought of as very old, and left at that. This is India, after all. In any case, this is one of the most fascinating places that I have ever seen. When walking down the very narrow back streets, you can see parts of very ancient temples melding in with more recent buildings (recent meaning anywhere from the 15th to the 19th century). In other places it can be seen where the construction of buildings was altered to make allowances for pre-existing trees - the buildings seem to bend out of their path. The whole visual effect of the place reminded me a bit of the drawings of H.R. Giger (the guy who designed the sets for Alien).

We started off this morning at 5am to take a boat ride on the Ganges to watch the sun come up. Dawn is a very spiritual time of day here. People come down to the river to bathe and to say prayers and make offerings from the shore. Out on the river are scores of boats, filled with tourists, taking pictures of the scene. It didn't feel nearly as tacky as that sounds; mostly because I was one of the tourists. The sun came up just after 6am, but we could not actually see the sun until it was well above the horizon. The smog is that thick. It does make for pretty pictures, though.

That Varanasi Feeling

It's been another 12-hour day, but we are now in Varanasi. Our one-hour flight from Delhi involved the usual dramas you may have come to expect, and took about six hours door-to-door. We are here during the Ganga Mahotsav festival that is held each year in October or November to correspond with the full moon. I'm not entirely clear as to the purpose of the festival, but it attracts gobs of people to this otherwise relatively small city. We spent the afternoon at some archaeological museum. Paul found it fascinating. I didn't go in. I stayed outside and photographer the hawkers that hung out to mob the tourist buses. This evening we ventured down to the banks of the Ganges to witness the nightly Aarti ceremony. This is a traditional event, but it has become much more elaborate in recent years. They even have fireworks now. Varanasi is one of the oldest cities in the world and is the religious center for India's Hindus. The vibe in this place is something special. It's gonna be fun, and a great place to take some people pictures.

Arts & Crafts

Above are the pictures from yesterday's arts & crafts adventure. Carol and I bought an elephant water pitcher from the world famous artist (I really should learn his name), and Dinu and Puki also bought a really nice piece. You can see our pitcher in one of the photos above.

Delhi Death March

Molhati (our 74 year-old tour leader) is trying to kill us all with 12-hour days - much of which is spent sitting in the soul-crushing traffic of Delhi. This is my whiny way of saying that we are just too pooped to write much of anything tonight. Most of the day was actually a lot of fun (until the I-don't-care-if-I-die numbness from fatigue took over). We spent the morning at the studio of a world famous potter that you have never heard of. He put on an amazing demonstration of pot making that made it seem so very easy to do. It isn't! Then the artists in our group (including Puki!) got to try their hand at throwing pots. I have the pictures. Later, we went shopping (blah, blah, blah) and then onto an artists colony. There is some amazing talent in this country. You will never hear about any of these people either. Pity.

Anyway, I will post pictures and more lively details tomorrow from Varanasi. Go google it - I'm too tired to tell you about it.

Good night.

PS: I found a charger for our phones... in case any of you were worried.

Back in Delhi

Ok. So, like the Taj Mahal is the most photographed building in the world (followed by the Eiffel Tower and Bill Gate's house). And, as many people have said (well. actually, just Bill Corr), it is much more impressive in person than in the pictures of it. My first thought on seeing it was that it was a lot bigger than I thought it would be. My second thought was that I had brought the wrong lens. There was no way that I could get the whole thing in with the telephoto that I brought with me that day. Fortunately, we also had Carol's camera with us. The rest of the day, including the seven hour drive back to Delhi was pretty much a blur as I was not feeling well. The good part about not feeling well on a seven hour car ride is that I slept through most of it.

Today was the first day of the "real" tour with the full group. We did the obligatory city tour of Delhi and took in a bunch of forts and monuments. Pretty interesting, actually. When your city is over 2000 years old, you tend to collect lots of old and interesting stuff. The only disappointment of group was the Red Fort. B-o-r-i-n-g. Tomorrow we begin the artsy-craftsy part of the trip where we get to play with clay and make pots at an artist's studio... or something. My main goal for tomorrow is to locate a Nokia phone charger to replace the one that Carol... I mean the one that got accidentally broken, somehow.

Out of our group of 18, there are four women named Carol. From now on Carol Abo's name is Puki.

Erika has identified the monkey as a rhesus macaque. She says they bite.

Road Rash and Radishes - by Carol

We started out this morning not at dawn as we had planned, but a little bit later to save us the 45 minute wait in line to enter the Taj Mahal at dawn. Instead we were able to walk right in, smell the frangipanni flowers, look through the mist and feel the warmth of the sun reflected off the white marble of the Taj. A lovely site and according to our guide the number one Wonder of the World thanks in large part to the 1.1 billion Indians voting on their cell phones for their "favorite" world wonder. Mike, Carol, Paul and I oohed and aahed over the inlay of semi precious stones in marble, and fought off the advances of "professional" photographers who did not seem to notice that Mike's camera was even more professional then theirs...
Then off to Fatre Sikre, a city of the same population as London that was built and lived in over a 14 year period only to be abandoned suddenly with no record of why, leaving it up to the imagination of historians. I took many photo's as "research" for my book club book "The Enchantress of Florence" by Salmon Rushdie that I am presenting this summer(highly recommended). The majority of the book takes place in this magical city. Carved sandstone walls, flower patterns in screens, of course some of the oohing was over the massive 6ft bees nests that had formed at the top of the mosque gate entrances. It was hot, hot, hot. But we found the city fascinating. Not to mention the incredibly poor roads that led to the city and out leaving us with a 7 hour drive back to Delhi.
Highlighting the drive back - a stop at the birthplace of Krishna thanks in large part to the adventurous nature of Carol Abodeely who said yes to almost all the drivers suggestions. We entered through a "Harvest Festival" experience of tall reeds and straw with stand up cut outs of Krishna and his parents and then moved on to swaying in a mass of worshipers in the temple as the crowd became overwhelmed at the appearance of a direct descendant of Krishna (at least that is what I think the guide said). Of course we were the only westerners to visit. Lots of flies. Lots of pilgrims. Lots of memories.
The road home was long and filled with near misses in the minibus, camels, dogs and people darting across the road. potholes and diversions b road crews. My favorite roadside spot though was the appearance of a Blue Bull and his "harem". These are native antelopes as large as horses, I have never seen anything like them anywhere in the world. The were a wild herd...

The Road to Agra

Carol and Paul arrived safely last night, and this morning the four of us began our four-hour road journey to Agra. It took six hours. There were plenty of sights to see along the way, however, (like cows, camels, monkeys, wrong-way drivers, etc.) so I don't think the anyone got bored with the drive until about the 5th hour. I spent most of the time on my phone checking out various websites (or mini-sites) for election news. Both Erika and Austin texted us the news when Obama went over the top.

After we checked into our hotel, we took a short ride to see the Agra Fort. I would give you a quick rundown on the history of the fort but, frankly, I wasn't paying too much attention. What I did learn is that the fort covers over 150 acres, it was constructed over 200 years starting in the 1500's, and that even though it looks quite formidable, it changed hands several times. The British ousted the last Moughal ruler without firing a shot in 1880. Actually, the British felt that taking a fort without firing a shot just wasn't cricket, so after the Moughal surrendered, they decided to fire a ceremonial shot to make it look good. They weren't trying to hit anything, but they still managed to put a ceremonial cannonball through an ornate marble wall. Modern day guides take great delight in showing off the results of their poor aim.

After the visit to Agra Fort, we stopped by the Oberoi Hotel for a drink. This is a hotel that is so fancy that they have managed to get the police to block off the public road in front of the hotel in order to keep the riff-raff (i.e. non-guests) from getting too close. We sat on the hotel balcony, which has a great view to the Taj Mahal, drank our gin and tonics and watched the sun set into the smog.

Tomorrow, if are off to see the Taj Mahal at dawn, make another stop at some other place (I really should read the itinerary), and then drive back to Delhi to meet up with the rest of our group.

Note to Erika: I need help identifying the monkey. It looks different from the Langor Macaques we saw last time.

Shopping? Already?

We had a driver pick us up from the airport last night to take us to the hotel. This is quite common here. In fact, there is the huge parking lot just outside the arrivals hall that is dedicated to hired car parking. Huge, but not huge enough, as there are always more cars than available parking spots. The result is that the cars end up parked bumper to bumper, two or three deep. The Indian solution to this problem is for the drivers to leave their cars with the brakes off and the transmission in neutral. When a driver needs to move his car from somewhere in the middle of this pile, he simply pushes one or two (or, in many cases several) cars out of the way until he has a path to the exit. Its sort of like those sliding number puzzles.

Carol did all of the planning for our first day of exploration in Delhi. Much to my surprise our adventure consisted entirely of shopping. Not quite true: as Carol patiently explained it to me, she was just "checking prices" so that she would later know what to pay when she got serious, later in the trip. So even though she didn't actually buy anything today, the net result for me was the same: no interesting photo ops. We did have some fun trying to get back to our hotel from the downtown areas where we spent the day... maybe I should back up. We started off deciding that we would not pay the hotel's exorbitant rate of $30 for the use of an air-conditioned car and driver for the entire day, but instead use taxis and tuk-tuks to get around. Getting downtown was easy - an hour in a taxi to go 10 miles cost us $4. It was when we tried to get back that it got interesting. Indian taxi and tuk-tuk drivers have always been an entrepreneurial lot. With the recent severe down-turn in the economy, they have become a bit more desperate and aggressive. After experiencing the less-than-honest navigation skills to two tuk-tuk drivers in our inter-city travels, we decided to call it quits for the day. We ended up in a rather serious negotiation with one driver and his agent (did I mention that all the best taxi drivers have agents?) over the cost of getting us back to our hotel. The bidding started at $12. Thanks to Carol's superior negotiating skills, that she honed in the small craft villages of West Bengal, we got the final price down to $5. Carol would like to add at this juncture that I totally wimped out during this critical process. I like to think of it as delegating responsibility.

Mandatory Arrival Post

As we began our descent into Delhi, The captain informed us that the temperature on the ground was 82F (at 10pm), the weather was clear, and the visibility on the ground was 1 mile... yes, it is very smoggy in Delhi. Much worse than two years ago when we were last here. Anyway, we have arrived and showered and are getting ready to turn in. Not much to report - too pooped. Tomorrow, we will take it very easy and just wander around on our own and try and get our sea legs. The Abo's arrive tomorrow night, and then it's off to Agra and the Taj Mahal on the 5th (or the evening of the 4th for you guys).

Gonna miss the Tsunami

I have just figured out that when the polls close on the east coast on Nov. 4th that Carol and I will be in a car headed to Agra to see the Taj Mahal. In fact, we are scheduled to leave from the hotel in Delhi at precisely 8pm EST, and will not arrive in Agra until 1am EST. If my predictions about this election are correct, it will all be over by then. I will have missed John King talking about an Obama tidal wave, and Chris Mathews calling it a blowout, and Bill O'Reilly saying it's the worst disaster in American history. My only consolation is that we are sure to make several stops along the way (it's a bumpy road) so I will have the opportunity to check out the score from the locals. The US elections are a hot topic in India, so everyone there will be tuned in. And, I have a dozen or so Obama-Biden buttons that I plan to hand out. Since recent polling in India has shown Obama ahead of McCain by a 60-point margin, I expect to be very popular... at least as long as I still have buttons.

If, somehow, McCain manages to win the election, then this will be goodbye. I won't be coming back.

Oh yeah - Carol and I have already voted. Have you?