Rajasthan and a Funny Wedding

I'm in the middle of Rajasthan, in Jodhpur, known as the Blue City. Maja from Zurich arrived in Delhi about a week ago where I picked her up and now we are travelling together. Delhi was quite interesting and funny. With my couchsurfing-friend Deb we went to a very un-Indian modern and highly sophisticated cultural center called Indian Habitat Center where we visited an exhibition of an Indian experimental photographer. The 'scene' there was chic and looked cosmopolitan:-) we even met the artist and he -of course!- felt very honoured to have 'guests' from Europe (the privilege of white skin and western origin in this country - well... at least one privilege in contrast to being ripped off and cheated everywhere!!!). However, we suddenly were approached by an Indian who talked Swiss-German. We couldn't believe it. He was married to a Swiss woman and lived there for a while. So her learned the language. He has two kids in CH and goes there every now and then doing some 'business' as he says. He invited us to join a party at his place after the exhibition so we happily accepted his invitation. His place was 'de luxe' as expected. He proudly showed us around in his marble-floored roof-top apartment and served us the best Whiskey, Swiss Cheese, Italian Pasta (really Italian!!!), Salad with Olive Oil and Balsamico (things I'm dying for here in India!!!). However, it was worth to go there for the food at least:-)
The next day we headed to Pushkar, a popular traveller's hang-out about 6 hours from Delhi. The surrounding is already desert-like but also reminded me on mediterranean regions. The place was very nice and very Hippie-touristy with a lot of shops, German bakeries and chilling restaurants. We rented a motorbike and went on a short trip to the beautiful surrounding area. In a small village finally our motorbike got some problems wo we had to stop. We decided to take a short break when suddenly a car with some westerners passed by and stopped about 50 meters before us. They entered the door to a house so we thought it might be a restaurant or something like that. One western woman was dressed up in a sari and she was greeted by a lot of Indians inside the house. The whole thing revealed to be a wedding between this western -woman and an Indian. I asked where she's from and she said she's form the CZECH REPUBLIC!!! I couldn't believe it. When I started to talk to her in Czech she was very amazed and happy that she could talk in her mother tongue at this very important day (none of her relatives and neither her friends were there) so we were almost forced to join the wedding. An Indian wedding ceremony lasts several days with the last one as the most important one. We arrived at the second last one which I was actually quite happy about since I know how long-lasting and (almost) boring these wedding ceremonies can be. However, after having been invited to several Indian weddings in Bangalore and still not having joined a single one, this was the great opportunty; a Indian-Rajasthani wedding with a Czech bride. Fantastic!! However, the wedding turned out slightly tragic since Lenka (the bride) was in a very, very, very bad mood at the last and so important day; she refused to get dressed up properly, wearing the traditional jewellery and then she finally fainted when she was supposed to march out of the temple after the religious ceremony. Her new husband had to carry her home where she went to sleep and did not turn up anymore until the party was over. Yes, things happen:-) Yesterday we went ahead to Jodhpur where we are right now. The place is - or better- could be a jewel in India. The old city is interspersed with blue oriental buildings full of carvings and paintings. But the city is a mess! Definitely one of the dirtiest, if not the dirtiest place I have seen so far in India (and everyone who's been here knows how dirty India is!!!) The second malus-point are the poeple: hassles everywhere. Poeple penetrate you every ten meters trying to sell you every sh.. possible. And if you ignore them they can be rude and naughty; something I've never seen anywhere else in India. All the more, the cows are aggressive!! I was attacked by one twice today!! The first time of such an unpleasant confrontation with this animal after almost a year in this country of the holy cow. However, since I'm quite into architecture, the beauty of the architctural style compensates a lot. But poor Maja!!! So far she's mor suffering than enjoying. Yesterday she went ill (standard here as well, of course) and stays at the guest-house right now. She goes through the classic India-adjustment phase. Well, I know what she feels like and I try my best to cheer her up and cure her as soon as possible again.
So far so good. Next destination will be Jaisalmer, close to the Pakistani boarder with lots of camel-safaris. So more adventures are about to come.
cheers.
m i s c h o

Back to "India"

After almost 3 months in the Himalaya I am finally "back to India" again. Yesterday I arrived in Delhi and it's hot and humid, I am constantly sweaty and oily and my face starts to turn into a pizza. However, a week a ago I was still in Dharamsala - where I wrote my last post - where I attended some excellent Yoga courses. Furthermore, I visited Gyamay, the Tibetan refugee child my parents support. He lives in a SOS children's village close to Bir, around 50 km from Dharamsala (which takes 3 hours by bus - this is standard in India!!!). The visit was really touching and very interesting. It gave me an insight not only into Tibetan exile community life but it also gave me an idea what it means to support a child and therefore have a direct positive impact on the future and perspectives of a another human being. I was definitely very impressed by the dynamics and the organization of the village and the institution. Gyamay's carer Niyma granted me excellent hospitability and was almost sad to leave tha place again. However, back to Dharmasal I packed my things and left the day after. The place is nice for trekking, doing courses in Yoga, meditation, cooking etc. but it's alsways raining which can become quite annoying. The dry season starts only in October. So yesterday I stopped over in Amritsar, the capital of the state of Punjab where the Sikhs come from (the non Hindu-turban Indians!). And after 3 months break (verschnaufpause!!), suddenly, it felt like India again. The main attraction of Amritsar is its Golden Tempel, the holiest site of the Sikh-religion and I must say it really was spectacular. The scene is very exciting; white marble floors and buildings the holy pond and in the middle of it, on a tiny island the ornated, golden main-temple-building, shiny and sparkling in the sun. Moreover the hundreds of Sikh pilgrims, most of them wearing orange or blue turbans gives another colorfoul contrast to the picture. Another exciting part of my visit was the overnight stay in the pilgrims dormitory quarter within the temple complex. There are special rooms for foreigners, guarded by some turbaned bulldoggy Sikhs for that no 'locals' will enter this seperated area. the rooms are shabby and dull, full of mice and cockroaches, but there was this certain exciting atmosphere in the air and there are people staying from all over the world, all sharing and sleeping in one big room; so I kind of enjoyed it. Yesterday night I arrived in Delhi. I am staying at a couchsurfing-accomodation. I'm a bit in the outskirts but it's ok for now. Maja from Switzerland will arrive tonight at the airport and then we will plan our trip, presumably to Rajasthan.
So for now,
cheers.

still on the road

It's time for a new post after such a long time of absence. One of the reasons for my lat update were the very high charges for the use of the internet in Leh. However, what have I done the last few weeks??? After the Vipassana course I went on a 5-days homestay-trek from Spituk to Chilling, climbing a 4800m pass, with two guys from the Vipassana course, South-African Korver and Swedish Nadim. Jorrit headed down south, finally, after being my travelling-buddy for more than a month. Well, I'm used to saying goodbye in the meanwhile. However, the homestay trek was gorgeous. We trekked around 5 to 6 hours a day and stayed in little settlements in the mountains with private families. It gave me a very interesting insight into Ladakhi life. The trek was just perfect, not too hard and not too easy. On the trek we met Austrian Karlo and English Bec with whom we trekked the last two days until we reached our final target, Chilling. After returning to flooded Leh -it had rained for days like never before in the Ladakh- Karlo, Bec and me decided to do a meditation week-end retreat in Stok, close to Leh. But after spending the first night there in damp-wet tents the retreat was cancelled because Stok was going to be flooded as well - the rain had not stopped yet. However, we had to spend the following 4 or 5 days with doing dayly trips to the neighbouring villages, visiting countless gompas and doing small hikes. Bigger treks and other trips were impossible because of the floods which blocked various important connecting roads within the Ladakh. The following week the wheather calmed down a bit and we decided to do a motorbike tour to the Nubra Valley which is the most northern part of India, very close to the Pakistani and Chinese boarder. Well, about 30 km off the boarder line is military area and not accessible for tourists. However, I had never ridden a big motorbike before and it was quite a challenge because the road led over the highest motorable pass in the world, the Kardung La which is 5800 m/a/s. After a short introduction on riding a motorbike we - Bec, Karlo, Texan Mark and QQ (Quebecan Marc) and myself- headed up north. The road up to the pass was definitely a challenge because the road is very often not paved and partly washed away by streams or landslides. But we did it!! On the pass it started snowing and hailing. So we stopped at the first settlement down to the Nubra valley because we were all soaked and freezing. So we arrived in Kardung. The place consists of not more than 10 houses and some shabby tents the roadworkers use as their accomodation. And there was only ONE guesthouse which does not even deserve to be called so. The building seemed to have been under construction sometimes but in the meanwhile was abandoned. The ceilings were all leaking and the matresses were soaked. There was no restaurant but only a shabby tea stall where Maggi noodles were the only dish they sold. However, we survived and headed further to Diskit, the administrative center of the Nubra Valley. The ride became very nice and the valley revealed its famous sand-dunes. The views were stunning. The landscape is a mixture between snow-paeked-mountains, the Sahara desert and a green fertile belt of green vegetation with an icy stream flowing through. We also viewed some wild Camels living up there in this isolated valley. Alltogether we spent one week in Nubra and then returned back to Leh. The damages of the floods were still not repaired yet and there was only electricity every 2nd day for 3 hours in the evening between 8 and 11 pm. Indian efficiency:-) But after this long trip I felt that I was done with the Ladakh. It was time to continue my trip soon. Before leaving I still wanted to see the two salt-water lakes Tso Moriri and Tso Kar close to the Chinese boarder so Bec, Karlo and myself joined a Spanish couple renting a jeep and going on a 3 days trip to see these lakes. Tso Moriri was nice but not really mind-blowing but Tso Kar was stunning. Unfortunately the wheather was quite bad again. Back to Leh I decided to join Bec in going via Kashmere to Dharamsala and Mc Leod Ganj. Finally I left Leh and headed east. We stayed overnight in Lamayuru -another Gompa- and headed further to Kargil at the boarder from the region of Ladakh to the region of Kashmere. And again we got stucked because some landslides had blocked the road to Srinagar, the capital of Kashmere. So we had to spend three nights in Kargil, a quite poor but kind of exotic place in the Ladakh. The population is already muslim and ethnically and culturally they belong to the region of Baltistan which is now split up between Pakistan and India. Lots of local families have relatives in Pakistan. It already felt like Central Asia there and not like the Ladakh or India. However, the third night the bus finally left and we went on towards Srinagar. We arrived in the morning. Srinagar was not the way I have imagined it at all. From the media I figured up a quite negative picture of this region. Kashmere is more developped than most of the regions I have seen in India so far. Whether this is due to governemental support or the flow of money from exiled Kashmeris I cannot say. However, it does not really feel like India and the cultural ties to central Asia and the Persian roots of the population are obvious. The climate is comparable to the most southern part of Switzerland, the Ticino. The wheather is mild with a lot of sunny days, though not hot and the land is very fertile.
Bec and me did the traditional tourist attraction, we rented a houseboat. Houseboats were formerly introduced by the British colonialists and ever since exist and are rented out to tourists. Our houseboat was just great and since there are only few tourists right now in Kashmere, the prices were almost ridiculous. So we enjoyed a british-upper-class-sophisticated-colonial holiday on this gorgeous boat. after 5 days we eventually decided to leave. But again, we got stucked because the road to Jammu was closed because of landslides and floods. However, I was not too sad to stay since our accomodation was more than comfortable. After another four nights the bus finally left and we headed via Jammu to Dharamsala and Mc Leod Ganj where I am now. The place is nice, very Tibetan (biggest refugee community in India because the Dalai Lama lives here!!) but permanently enwrapped in a cloud. The monsoon has not left yet so the place is veeeery wet. However, that's the update for the las few weeks and I'll upload pics as soon as possible.
Cheers.
M.