I am going to blog a little out of order since Japan is fresh in my head, then I will write to you about China and all of the fun me and Katie had traveling China. So anyway, Japan.
Well it is the height of Cherry Blossom season, there are official scientists who declare each year when the blossoms are all at their best, and it just so happened that that was exactly while we were there. It is the peak travel and tourist season in Japan. I can see why, it was beautiful, the striking yet mild colors of the blossoms adorned the trees of each zen garden we visited and path we walked down, it created a world that was peaceful and uniquely gorgeous in its simplicity.
A major part of my time in Japan however was rain. It rained all the time, it didn't stop, but it was still fantastic and I have travelled for months with amazing weather so it was about time we had rain. Oh and it was cold, so rainy and cold, but still unbelievable. Now for what I actually did. I hope that is of interest to all of you, because I feel like it is all I talk about on this thing. If anyone has anything they would like to say about what they have been up to, feel free to comment or just email me at joshua.best.s12@semesteratsea.org, I would like to know what is going on in your lives. Anyway back to Japan.
I travelled with two of my good friends Adam and Emily. We backpacked from Kobe, to Kyoto, to Tokyo and finally Yokohama. I am not really sure if "backpacking" has any requirements, but we traveled to those places and we had backpacks on so I think it counts. We left Kobe on the first day. They do not have Kobe beef because they had to kill all of the cows because of a disease that was spreading among them. Too bad but apparently it is like 300 dollars for a steak so that was not going to happen anyway. For those of you who do not know, Kobe beef is beef that comes from fancy cows that get massages everyday and eat the best grasses and are fed beer and wine, apparently it is delicious. We ended up in Kyoto the fist night after figuring out the train system which is fun since all of it is in Japanese. This was really the first time that there was important information that was not doubled in English, some of it was, but not all of it, and we looked lost a lot of the time, but we got everywhere without much trouble, my Mom's and Grandpa's intense training of map use came in handy quite a bit on this trip. My first night was in a hostel, first time I have ever done that and I would do it again , it was clean and the atmosphere of a hostel is much more fun than that of a hotel, it didn't hurt that it was only 40 bucks a night.
The next day was intense. My friend Adam is also a film major and decided to make a travel show / travel log of our adventures and so for most of what happened both Emily and I are wearing microphones under our shirt and have a camera on us.
We started out by getting ourselves to the golden pagoda. This is a three story pagoda that is entirely decorated with gold leaf, it was the home of the third Shogun, but after his death, and upon his request it became a zen temple. I know that because I was the host of a travel show when I was there. It is amazing how simple everything is. It is awe inspiring to see the ponds and the trees and the zen temples that are all built with the idea of controlling nature and using empty space as an art form. The concept of shibusa was very evident, that is the style of simple, subtle beauty. After that we went to one of the most famous zen rock gardens. People spend hours looking at these 15 larger rocks surrounded by white gravel. I must admit I do not know why contemplating these stones was so interesting but we sat there for a long time just looking at them. It had been raining all day, but it was really pouring then and it just looked so beautiful. For most of the time I was there I could only count 14 rocks, so I spent most of my time contemplating over why they said there were 15.
We then traveled to the Philosophers path, this is a small path that runs along a winding stream, along it are homes and little shops, as well as a plethora of temples. The most stunning aspect of it however were the hundreds of cherry blossoms that lined the walk way. Unfortunately by the time we got there it was raining hard, and we were soaked. We had our bags with us the entire day and everything we owned was wet, I mean everything. So we were huddled in the entranceway of this little flower shop and this florist came out and handed us all umbrellas, when we asked him how much he just signaled for us to go without paying, it was a gesture that made our day, we were pretty down about having nothing that was dry, but this one stranger turned that around for us.
We took a bullet train to Tokyo, a two hour ride going nearly 200 MPH, it was an expensive ticket but worth the ride if you're ever there. Sure enough we got to Tokyo and it was raining, We ate McDonald's, since it was the food that was in the station, (FYI a Big Mac tastes like a Big Mac). The station was like a maze though and it took us a long time to figure out how to leave. We found our way to a hotel, thinking we could stay there, as we walked in however Adam pointed out the chandelier in the elevator and it was clear we could not afford it. We ended up taking a train to Shibuya which is where the famous scene of the crosswalks in Tokyo are. No surprise there were no open hotels there either, (again, the height of Japan tourism). I don't know who's idea it was to wing it, but it lead to some interesting turns that ended with us in a small room in a hotel far from downtown.
The rest of Japan was great, and mostly dry. We ate the best sushi ever, complained about how expensive all the gifts were, but it was really not that bad, we are just used to things costing around 50 cents. We met up with friends to do Karaoke, and then we ended up on the ship bound for the US. I can't believe it is almost over, Only two weeks left of my voyage, and then I get to see all of you for real. Take care, make it count.
P.S. one of the most noticeable things is that people in Japan are quiet. No one makes noise. We were in a crowded intersection, and it was silent except for cars. In the trains and subway cars, no one made a sound. Even the announcements that told you where you were were in a whisper. very calming, but kinda creepy. Think about being in a full subway, you are shoulder to shoulder in the entire car, professional pushers are shoving people onto the train, and it is silent. Very odd.
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
Monday, April 9, 2012
Sorry it has been a while
Hey everyone, sorry i haven't written About China yet, I had a blast with Katie, it was awesome to see her and catch up with some family. I will not be able to blog now either because I'm on my way off the ship to Japan, I will be going from Kobe to Kyoto (it is the cherry blossom capital of the world and it is peak season). Then we will be going to Tokyo and doing big city stuff, then finally meeting up with the boat in Yokohama. It will be awesome, it is too bad that my cousin Andrew already left, he was here for two years, it would have been nice to see family in two countries! I will write more about my amazing time in China after Japan, but I also have 6 papers to write, and I have to edit my film, so it may not be very fast coming. I hope everything is well with everyone, I will be home in about three weeks, this trip is flying by. Take care, make it count.
Saturday, March 31, 2012
big mistake
I just deleted all of the pictures from my Safari in South Africa..... I just thought you all should know.....
Friday, March 30, 2012
Good Morning Vietnam
For some reason every port we visit is my favorite port and vietnam was no different. It is a beautiful country with a very unique culture.
One of my good friends on the ship, Chi Chi, is from Vietnam and she took me as well as 15 other kids to her house on the first day. Her mom made us so much food it was insane how much we ate. Fruit is a big deal and just about everywhere we went including Chi Chi's house they had us try all of the unique fruits of the area, such as dragon fruit, jackfruit, rose apples, durian, and a very interesting fruit called breast milk. Food was an adventure here they serve dog and rat as well as many snakes, unfortunately I did not find a place to eat dog or rat, and I really wanted to eat a cobra heart, but Chi Chi said I had to go down a dark ally to find that so I thought it best to leave that for my return visit. I did however try the snake wine, this is a beverage that consists of rice wine, or rice moonshine that ferments for three years in a jar that is full of dead snakes. It wasn't terrible, someone else described it as a whiskey flavor, but I don't think I will be drinking a snake-and-coke any time soon.
I had no idea but apparently getting a suit is just a thing you do in Vietnam so while we were at Chi Chi's house they had their personal tailor stop by and all the guys got suits made for us, I got a navy blue suite, it's pretty awesome.
Before I get to far into what my trip was like I should describe how one crosses the road here so that you can picture how exciting it was to even walk down the street to go shopping. How it works is that the cars never stop, and the majority of vehicles are motorcycles and scooters. What you do is simply start to walk across the road slowly and never changing speed. The motorcycles and cars part around you as you cross and you find yourself in the middle of a four lane road during rush hour as vehicles fly past you and you are terrified hoping that everyone gives you enough room, it is actually really fun once you get the hang of it, and it is nice because you never have to wait for a light to change, you just cross when you want and where you want, very different from Singapore where there was a 1000 dollar fine for j-walking.
On the first night we decided to go to Karaoke, but half the group got caught up at Chi Chi's house so me and three friends decided to go do our own thing. We ended up having a very interesting night. First we stopped by the wedding reception of two students who got "married" really they just wanted the cheap open bar that accompanied a wedding ceremony, it was not exactly our crowd so we left rather quickly and went in search of another place, little did we know that we would be leaving the next place even quicker.
We were walking down the road and saw "billiards" outside this little bar, so we thought we would go in and see what it was like, we all liked to play pool. Well, funny how it works, because it turns out that we walked into a brothel. Ya, all we wanted to do was play a game of pool and have a beer, but this institution was designed for much more than that. Being the naive people we are we didn't get the hint until several girls asked us if we wanted them to go back to the hotel with us, and we quickly caught on. None of us were interested in what they had to offer but as we stood there I asked them about their life and how they got involved in this job, did they like it, were they happy, that kind of thing, but apparently one of the girls started answering to honestly about her "boss" and another girl started yelling at me, so we quickly made our way exit and avoided the three "bosses" that were at the door. Just so you know, Vietnam is one of the largest countries for human trafficking in the world. The rest of the night was much smoother and we all made it safely back to the ship.
I went on a trip to the Mekong Delta, There we stayed in a local house on the water and visited the worlds largest floating market. It was amazing to see how similar life was to the backwaters of India and the small tributaries of the Amazon. One night we had dinner on a river boat, there were professional singers entertaining the whole boat which was filed with not only our group but several other Vietnamese groups celebrating an occasion, somehow I ended up on stage singing "as long as you love me" by the Backstreet Boys, it was a pretty big hit, the funny part was that there was a piano player who didn't know the song, and he was the only accompaniment, so it sounded nothing like the song and I could not even think of the words or tune because he was just playing whatever he wanted on the synthesizer, nothing like embarrassing yourself in foreign countries. We visited a brick manufacturing facility and I helped put the mud into the machine that shaped the bricks, it was a good time, very messy and hard work, I could not imagine doing that for 10 hours straight.
We did a lot of shopping, Vietnam is a big place in the knock-off industry. You can buy anything you want there. One of my favorite stories happened on the last day. I had been looking for dress shoes for two days since I didn't have any to wear with my new suit. Shoes here are very European and come to a very odd point, shoes should be shaped like a foot in my opinion. I finally found the perfect shoe, I tried on a size 42 but needed a 43 (european sizes). As the woman was talking to us trying to distract us you could see in the back another worker stretching out the 42's with a piece of wood, really working the shoe to make it bigger, and then they brought out the same pair of shoes with a sticker over the original size that said 43. We all started laughing and even the workers laughed when they knew that we had caught onto their game. I almost bought them because of their ingenuity, but 40 dollars for a knock-off shoe that didn't fit was just to much.
The trip was not all fun however. One thing that caught me off guard was how prevalent the Vietnam, or as they call it the American war still was. Kids are still being born with birth defects from the agent orange and other chemicals we dropped over the land. Whole areas of farms are still toxic and the effects of the war can still be seen everywhere you look. Just a few years ago someone was killed by a land mine that was left over.
I visited the war remnants museum on the last day. I have never had a physical response to movies or sights, but I felt like I was going to throw up the entire time I was in this place. It was honestly sickening to see the images, the preserved fetuses and the rubble from the war. We dropped millions of gallons of toxic chemicals, the effects of which are still felt today. Seeing what happened from the other perspective was very emotional. Seeing language like American Imperialists, and other choice words used to describe the USA made me step back and think about everything in a new light. One thing I found interesting was that throughout the entire museum they made it very clear that it was not the American people, but the American government that was to blame, on ever wall was another example of how Americans protested the war and disliked the war. Generally we don't think of the government and the people as two separate entities, we are a government of the people, by the people and for the people, we are the government, at least that is how I generally see things, but from their perspective of their own relations between government and peoples, they could easily draw that distinction.
I learned a lot in this port and I will always remember what visiting here made me feel. One of the big things I have been trying to do is to make it count, in everything I do I want to make it count. Each experience and every moment can teach you something and make you realize something, it is very easy to let things flow over you and not think twice about them, but I have made it a point in my trip and now in my life to have all of my experiences flow through me not over me, and by doing that and by being present in the moment and paying attention to what every minute can teach me I am trying to make it count.
So I will write again after China and after I see Katie! ( I am so excited she has a lot of stuff planned), take care, and make it count.
One of my good friends on the ship, Chi Chi, is from Vietnam and she took me as well as 15 other kids to her house on the first day. Her mom made us so much food it was insane how much we ate. Fruit is a big deal and just about everywhere we went including Chi Chi's house they had us try all of the unique fruits of the area, such as dragon fruit, jackfruit, rose apples, durian, and a very interesting fruit called breast milk. Food was an adventure here they serve dog and rat as well as many snakes, unfortunately I did not find a place to eat dog or rat, and I really wanted to eat a cobra heart, but Chi Chi said I had to go down a dark ally to find that so I thought it best to leave that for my return visit. I did however try the snake wine, this is a beverage that consists of rice wine, or rice moonshine that ferments for three years in a jar that is full of dead snakes. It wasn't terrible, someone else described it as a whiskey flavor, but I don't think I will be drinking a snake-and-coke any time soon.
I had no idea but apparently getting a suit is just a thing you do in Vietnam so while we were at Chi Chi's house they had their personal tailor stop by and all the guys got suits made for us, I got a navy blue suite, it's pretty awesome.
Before I get to far into what my trip was like I should describe how one crosses the road here so that you can picture how exciting it was to even walk down the street to go shopping. How it works is that the cars never stop, and the majority of vehicles are motorcycles and scooters. What you do is simply start to walk across the road slowly and never changing speed. The motorcycles and cars part around you as you cross and you find yourself in the middle of a four lane road during rush hour as vehicles fly past you and you are terrified hoping that everyone gives you enough room, it is actually really fun once you get the hang of it, and it is nice because you never have to wait for a light to change, you just cross when you want and where you want, very different from Singapore where there was a 1000 dollar fine for j-walking.
On the first night we decided to go to Karaoke, but half the group got caught up at Chi Chi's house so me and three friends decided to go do our own thing. We ended up having a very interesting night. First we stopped by the wedding reception of two students who got "married" really they just wanted the cheap open bar that accompanied a wedding ceremony, it was not exactly our crowd so we left rather quickly and went in search of another place, little did we know that we would be leaving the next place even quicker.
We were walking down the road and saw "billiards" outside this little bar, so we thought we would go in and see what it was like, we all liked to play pool. Well, funny how it works, because it turns out that we walked into a brothel. Ya, all we wanted to do was play a game of pool and have a beer, but this institution was designed for much more than that. Being the naive people we are we didn't get the hint until several girls asked us if we wanted them to go back to the hotel with us, and we quickly caught on. None of us were interested in what they had to offer but as we stood there I asked them about their life and how they got involved in this job, did they like it, were they happy, that kind of thing, but apparently one of the girls started answering to honestly about her "boss" and another girl started yelling at me, so we quickly made our way exit and avoided the three "bosses" that were at the door. Just so you know, Vietnam is one of the largest countries for human trafficking in the world. The rest of the night was much smoother and we all made it safely back to the ship.
I went on a trip to the Mekong Delta, There we stayed in a local house on the water and visited the worlds largest floating market. It was amazing to see how similar life was to the backwaters of India and the small tributaries of the Amazon. One night we had dinner on a river boat, there were professional singers entertaining the whole boat which was filed with not only our group but several other Vietnamese groups celebrating an occasion, somehow I ended up on stage singing "as long as you love me" by the Backstreet Boys, it was a pretty big hit, the funny part was that there was a piano player who didn't know the song, and he was the only accompaniment, so it sounded nothing like the song and I could not even think of the words or tune because he was just playing whatever he wanted on the synthesizer, nothing like embarrassing yourself in foreign countries. We visited a brick manufacturing facility and I helped put the mud into the machine that shaped the bricks, it was a good time, very messy and hard work, I could not imagine doing that for 10 hours straight.
We did a lot of shopping, Vietnam is a big place in the knock-off industry. You can buy anything you want there. One of my favorite stories happened on the last day. I had been looking for dress shoes for two days since I didn't have any to wear with my new suit. Shoes here are very European and come to a very odd point, shoes should be shaped like a foot in my opinion. I finally found the perfect shoe, I tried on a size 42 but needed a 43 (european sizes). As the woman was talking to us trying to distract us you could see in the back another worker stretching out the 42's with a piece of wood, really working the shoe to make it bigger, and then they brought out the same pair of shoes with a sticker over the original size that said 43. We all started laughing and even the workers laughed when they knew that we had caught onto their game. I almost bought them because of their ingenuity, but 40 dollars for a knock-off shoe that didn't fit was just to much.
The trip was not all fun however. One thing that caught me off guard was how prevalent the Vietnam, or as they call it the American war still was. Kids are still being born with birth defects from the agent orange and other chemicals we dropped over the land. Whole areas of farms are still toxic and the effects of the war can still be seen everywhere you look. Just a few years ago someone was killed by a land mine that was left over.
I visited the war remnants museum on the last day. I have never had a physical response to movies or sights, but I felt like I was going to throw up the entire time I was in this place. It was honestly sickening to see the images, the preserved fetuses and the rubble from the war. We dropped millions of gallons of toxic chemicals, the effects of which are still felt today. Seeing what happened from the other perspective was very emotional. Seeing language like American Imperialists, and other choice words used to describe the USA made me step back and think about everything in a new light. One thing I found interesting was that throughout the entire museum they made it very clear that it was not the American people, but the American government that was to blame, on ever wall was another example of how Americans protested the war and disliked the war. Generally we don't think of the government and the people as two separate entities, we are a government of the people, by the people and for the people, we are the government, at least that is how I generally see things, but from their perspective of their own relations between government and peoples, they could easily draw that distinction.
I learned a lot in this port and I will always remember what visiting here made me feel. One of the big things I have been trying to do is to make it count, in everything I do I want to make it count. Each experience and every moment can teach you something and make you realize something, it is very easy to let things flow over you and not think twice about them, but I have made it a point in my trip and now in my life to have all of my experiences flow through me not over me, and by doing that and by being present in the moment and paying attention to what every minute can teach me I am trying to make it count.
So I will write again after China and after I see Katie! ( I am so excited she has a lot of stuff planned), take care, and make it count.
This ship is awesome
Before I talk about Vietnam I just wanted to point out one of the reasons why this ship is awesome, I am sitting down in the piano bar attempting to write eloquently about Vietnam, and all around me there are people talking in Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, a South African and a guy from New York are talking about chess, and other people are passed out on the couches, a kid from Texas is teaching a man with multiple Ph.D's to play cribbage and a Pulitzer Prize winning poet just agreed to be in my documentary. It is such an awesome experience just to be on the ship, not even considering the ports we stop at. I love this trip.
Saturday, March 24, 2012
Singapore
Singapore is very clean. It is incredibly modern and developed. The big thing everyone knows about Singapore is the rules, $1000 fine for chewing gum, fines and caning for littering or jay walking. It is pretty strict country but you can easily see that it works. The roads and sidewalks are impeccable and the MRT or subway system is very clean, it is like the train in the Atlanta airport, but it goes all over the city. We were only in Singapore for a few hours, so we had to make our time count. We walked around the downtown area, we found the merlion after a long and hard trek around the city, it is a statue of a half lion half fish that spits water, it is a big spot for pictures. I had some amazing food, that was a fun experience too. The street vendors were all taken off the street and put into areas that look like food courts, called hawker centers, they are very cheap and very good. Each place has a letter grade given to it by the government that denotes its cleanliness, so you know what you're eating. While we were there we had the first thunder storm of the trip, it was a good one too, plenty of thunder crashes and lightning strikes. For dinner we went to an American bar, I had pizza and we played pool, it was nice to have a little shot of home in the middle of a major asian city. Vietnam tomorrow, as you can probably tell I am a little distracted while I write this. I will write again in a week when I'm back on the ship. Take care.
India
Hey everyone, I am sorry you haven't heard from me in a while, I had a lot of school work all due at once again and I had to make sure I got all of it done before I did this.
India is an incredible place, honestly everyone should go and spend at least a few weeks there. It was probably one of the most transformational places I have visited because it is so different. All the other cities had western influences, the food, clothing, movies and music were all westernized. India however was much different. Bollywood, Indian music, Indian food and dress were everywhere. It was fun and interesting to be in place so very different, especially at a time when one of the major things we were realizing is that a lot of the world is similar. We docked in southern India in the port city of Kochi. Here the backwaters are a major attraction. Small canals and streams that connect lakes and estuaries along the south west coast of India. Fishing was at one time the biggest business here, chinese dip nets and specialized boats were all over the place, but now very few people actually make a living fishing. Now tourism is the major industry. The area has been majorly effected by environmental degradation as well as overfishing. They say that at one point the nets were used to make money, but now people coming to see the nets is what makes money. I went on a river boat cruise down the slow canals of the "Venice of the east" and I didn't see a single fisherman, but I saw plenty of tourist boats.
I went on a big trip with SAS while in India. I flew from the south all the way to the north to visit Delhi, Agra and Varanasi. Delhi is a big city, it is the capitol and actually very similar to Washington D.C. in fact our guide had spent 6 months backpacking the U.S. and knew all about our major sites and related it all back to what we were seeing. There actually is a lot of things that look identical to Washington. the capitol and that white house, the washington monument complete with reflecting pool were all there, with different symbolic meaning and made out of red sandstone. New and old Delhi are the same place and there is no real difference, it is just a way of explaining the city to tourists. The old Delhi is the area that is within the ancient city walls, and new delhi is built around the wall, also the new one has a lot to do with the British.
We took a train from Delhi to Agra, where the Taj Mahal is. The train was awesome, We sat with a lady who happened to teach english in a university and knew all about storytelling and folklore, everything I was interested in. Also the bathrooms on the train were labeled, Indian style and Western style. The western style is the throne we are all used to, the Indian style toilet, which was very popular in every public place was a hole in the ground, it was a modern hole, that flushed, but it was in the ground and you squatted over it to use it. Apparently this is healthier for your bowls and creates less pressure than the western style. Another interesting bathroom feature was similar to a european style bidet, but it was just a hose next to the toilet. I know many of you are thinking it, but no I did not use either of these bathroom features.
In Agra we visited several sites that were incredible. We saw Fatehpur Sikri. THis was a marvelously built palace constructed by Akbar (his grandson would build the Taj Mahal), the palace however was abandoned after several years of use and no one really know why, several reasons may be possible, for starters the water was not drinkable, and it was crazy hot. All we know is that once Akbar left, he never returned. We also swung by the Agra fort, a place that I would have sworn was impenetrable, until I was told that it had been taken over 6 times by various groups the last of which was the British with muskets and canons, I would call that cheating, but I guess imperialism doesn't play by the rules. A fun fact about it, from one of the rooms you have a beautiful view of the Taj Mahal. The man who built the Taj Mahal was over thrown by his son, and his son was not happy with all the resources his father put into building the Taj, so he had his father imprisoned in the fort (in extreme comfort) in the room that had a marvelous view of the Taj. This kid had some daddy issues.
Our next stop in Agra was the Taj Mahal. The Taj is a mausoleum for the wife of one of the rulers of India. THe pictures of the place do not do it justice. The size is immense, when we first walked in through the gates and saw it, I was taken aback by its beauty, but not by its size, until I realized that we were still really far away from it and I could only see dots that were people on its steps. It is a massive structure, and at the same time it is so graceful that you do not feel threatened by it. Inside the ornamentation is incredible. There is not much inside, just the tomb of the builders wife, and he himself was laid there after his death. The art work is incredible, millions of semi precious stones are laid into the marble. We visited a workshop where they do work identically as how it was done in the Taj and the process is painstakingly difficult. pieces of stone a tenth the size of your pinky nail being filed and shaped to be laid into the marble as part of a flower, it was really incredible.
The Taj was beautiful, but my favorite place by far was Varanasi. Varanasi is the holy city of Shiva, the destroyer. It is a city where thousands of pilgrims travel to each day. We went to the Ganges early in the morning to witness the ritual bathing in the Ganges. We lit candles and Placed them into the warm Ganges river as the sun began to rise. people lined ever ghat, or staircase going into the river. People meditating, washing, praying. It was so interesting to see religion displayed so proudly and openly, especially coming from the U.S. where most people do not publicly display their beliefs. In Varanasi however people paraded down the streets singing and beating drums to worship their god. We also went to the most holy of the ghats and watched a ritual in which 7 brahmans pay homage to Shiva, it was a beautiful ceremony that happens every night, and 4,000 Hindu pilgrims traveled to see it as well.
Varanasi was very crowded. People everywhere. It seemed like you could do anything on the streets, get a hair cut, a shave, cook, eat, buy and sell, urinate or sleep. It was as if you took Time Square and filled not just the sidewalks but the streets, and alleyways with people. We took a rickshaw ride to the ghats the first night we were there and it was chaos. The rules of the road are drive on the left...most times. Some cars but an endless supply of motorcycles and bikes, rickshaws and people. The horns never stop sounding and when you want someone to move you just grab their bike and move it. Our rickshaw was hit by a motorcycle, smashed between two other rickshaws and nearly ran over a small child. I'm just saying that I'm glade I wasn't driving.
Another shocking thing about Varanasi is that dogs are everywhere, hundreds of dogs everywhere, they are not seen as pets and they roam the streets, with plenty of food from garbage heaps. Another animal reigns supreme in the area however, the cow is sacred. No one eats beef. The cows literally walk anywhere, they are allowed anywhere. They walk down the streets, down sidewalks. There was a cow in a store, a cow nearly ran me over on the ghats, and we had to divert our route back to the rickshaws because cows were in the alleys. It was insane to see so many cows just doing whatever they wanted, and no one thought twice about the cow in the store. Over all India was amazing. I'm sure there is more but I'm out of time. Tomorrow I will be in Vietnam, so I still have to tell you all about Singapore which was awesome and really clean. Take care.
India is an incredible place, honestly everyone should go and spend at least a few weeks there. It was probably one of the most transformational places I have visited because it is so different. All the other cities had western influences, the food, clothing, movies and music were all westernized. India however was much different. Bollywood, Indian music, Indian food and dress were everywhere. It was fun and interesting to be in place so very different, especially at a time when one of the major things we were realizing is that a lot of the world is similar. We docked in southern India in the port city of Kochi. Here the backwaters are a major attraction. Small canals and streams that connect lakes and estuaries along the south west coast of India. Fishing was at one time the biggest business here, chinese dip nets and specialized boats were all over the place, but now very few people actually make a living fishing. Now tourism is the major industry. The area has been majorly effected by environmental degradation as well as overfishing. They say that at one point the nets were used to make money, but now people coming to see the nets is what makes money. I went on a river boat cruise down the slow canals of the "Venice of the east" and I didn't see a single fisherman, but I saw plenty of tourist boats.
I went on a big trip with SAS while in India. I flew from the south all the way to the north to visit Delhi, Agra and Varanasi. Delhi is a big city, it is the capitol and actually very similar to Washington D.C. in fact our guide had spent 6 months backpacking the U.S. and knew all about our major sites and related it all back to what we were seeing. There actually is a lot of things that look identical to Washington. the capitol and that white house, the washington monument complete with reflecting pool were all there, with different symbolic meaning and made out of red sandstone. New and old Delhi are the same place and there is no real difference, it is just a way of explaining the city to tourists. The old Delhi is the area that is within the ancient city walls, and new delhi is built around the wall, also the new one has a lot to do with the British.
We took a train from Delhi to Agra, where the Taj Mahal is. The train was awesome, We sat with a lady who happened to teach english in a university and knew all about storytelling and folklore, everything I was interested in. Also the bathrooms on the train were labeled, Indian style and Western style. The western style is the throne we are all used to, the Indian style toilet, which was very popular in every public place was a hole in the ground, it was a modern hole, that flushed, but it was in the ground and you squatted over it to use it. Apparently this is healthier for your bowls and creates less pressure than the western style. Another interesting bathroom feature was similar to a european style bidet, but it was just a hose next to the toilet. I know many of you are thinking it, but no I did not use either of these bathroom features.
In Agra we visited several sites that were incredible. We saw Fatehpur Sikri. THis was a marvelously built palace constructed by Akbar (his grandson would build the Taj Mahal), the palace however was abandoned after several years of use and no one really know why, several reasons may be possible, for starters the water was not drinkable, and it was crazy hot. All we know is that once Akbar left, he never returned. We also swung by the Agra fort, a place that I would have sworn was impenetrable, until I was told that it had been taken over 6 times by various groups the last of which was the British with muskets and canons, I would call that cheating, but I guess imperialism doesn't play by the rules. A fun fact about it, from one of the rooms you have a beautiful view of the Taj Mahal. The man who built the Taj Mahal was over thrown by his son, and his son was not happy with all the resources his father put into building the Taj, so he had his father imprisoned in the fort (in extreme comfort) in the room that had a marvelous view of the Taj. This kid had some daddy issues.
Our next stop in Agra was the Taj Mahal. The Taj is a mausoleum for the wife of one of the rulers of India. THe pictures of the place do not do it justice. The size is immense, when we first walked in through the gates and saw it, I was taken aback by its beauty, but not by its size, until I realized that we were still really far away from it and I could only see dots that were people on its steps. It is a massive structure, and at the same time it is so graceful that you do not feel threatened by it. Inside the ornamentation is incredible. There is not much inside, just the tomb of the builders wife, and he himself was laid there after his death. The art work is incredible, millions of semi precious stones are laid into the marble. We visited a workshop where they do work identically as how it was done in the Taj and the process is painstakingly difficult. pieces of stone a tenth the size of your pinky nail being filed and shaped to be laid into the marble as part of a flower, it was really incredible.
The Taj was beautiful, but my favorite place by far was Varanasi. Varanasi is the holy city of Shiva, the destroyer. It is a city where thousands of pilgrims travel to each day. We went to the Ganges early in the morning to witness the ritual bathing in the Ganges. We lit candles and Placed them into the warm Ganges river as the sun began to rise. people lined ever ghat, or staircase going into the river. People meditating, washing, praying. It was so interesting to see religion displayed so proudly and openly, especially coming from the U.S. where most people do not publicly display their beliefs. In Varanasi however people paraded down the streets singing and beating drums to worship their god. We also went to the most holy of the ghats and watched a ritual in which 7 brahmans pay homage to Shiva, it was a beautiful ceremony that happens every night, and 4,000 Hindu pilgrims traveled to see it as well.
Varanasi was very crowded. People everywhere. It seemed like you could do anything on the streets, get a hair cut, a shave, cook, eat, buy and sell, urinate or sleep. It was as if you took Time Square and filled not just the sidewalks but the streets, and alleyways with people. We took a rickshaw ride to the ghats the first night we were there and it was chaos. The rules of the road are drive on the left...most times. Some cars but an endless supply of motorcycles and bikes, rickshaws and people. The horns never stop sounding and when you want someone to move you just grab their bike and move it. Our rickshaw was hit by a motorcycle, smashed between two other rickshaws and nearly ran over a small child. I'm just saying that I'm glade I wasn't driving.
Another shocking thing about Varanasi is that dogs are everywhere, hundreds of dogs everywhere, they are not seen as pets and they roam the streets, with plenty of food from garbage heaps. Another animal reigns supreme in the area however, the cow is sacred. No one eats beef. The cows literally walk anywhere, they are allowed anywhere. They walk down the streets, down sidewalks. There was a cow in a store, a cow nearly ran me over on the ghats, and we had to divert our route back to the rickshaws because cows were in the alleys. It was insane to see so many cows just doing whatever they wanted, and no one thought twice about the cow in the store. Over all India was amazing. I'm sure there is more but I'm out of time. Tomorrow I will be in Vietnam, so I still have to tell you all about Singapore which was awesome and really clean. Take care.
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