No More Monkeys Jumping on my Head

As Erik and I patently waited at the Agra station for our train to Jaipur, we watched a large group of monkeys eating, playing, climbing through the rafter, and generally going about their monkey business. I suddenly left something heavy hit my head and a monkey dashed in front of me. Apparently, she thought my head would be a good stepping-stone between the rafters and the ground.

Back of the Taj

Erik and I visited the Taj Mahal on a hot August day, which happened to be the birthday of the guy who built is so we got in free, along with swarms of other people. The sun beating down and heating up the ground made walking (barefoot according to Taj rules) around the building less than pleasant. The best part about seeing the Taj Mahal is getting that post card view when you walk in the main gate, with all the tourists in front, giving you a true perspective on the scale of the monument (its huge).

After much anticipation and discussion, I am now able to repot that the back of the Taj Mahal looks exactly like the front. Each face of the building is the same, in fact. The back of the Sphinx is far more interesting (it has a tail, who knew).

Karaoke Queen

For my last night in Hyderabad, Erik and I made our way to the 10 Downy Street Pub to hang out with group of Googlers. Much to our delight, it was karaoke night. Then we learned it wasn't just karaoke, it was a karaoke multi week karaoke competition with some serious prizes (round trip tickets to Sri Lanka!). So, anyone could sign up to sing, and the best male and female of the night would be selected to showcase their talents a few weeks later in the finals. Erik didn't like the idea of competing so he gracefully declined the opportunity to entertain his friends, but I have no reservations about performing in karaoke competitions, having a history of winning prizes at karaoke purely for being entertaining. I didn't see any reason why I shouldn't enter the competition, just to entertain.

Sadly, the DJ did not have my usual standard (These Boots Were Made for Walking), so I had to settle for (gasp) Queen's "I Want to Break Free." Given that I was out of my comfort zone for this performance, you can imagine my surprise when I received notification that I had made it to the final. Unfortunately, the final is this week, and I am already back in California. Maybe I will win that trip to Sri Lanka next time.

Bad Blogger

I have been a horible blogger recently, but that is not because nothing happened, I just lost my mojo. Here is the readers digest version of what I have been up to:

Erik and I left Hyderabad last Friday for our tour of the Golden Triangle (Delhi, Agra, and Jaipur). We spent three nights in Delhi, one in Agra, and two in Jaipur. After Jaipur I returned to Mumbai where I cought my flight out of India. I stopped in Hong Kong for two days, and then returned home.

For more detail on our day to day experiences, check out Erik's blog, indiabeans.blogspot.com.

Munchkin Bowling

Erik and I went bowling this evening at one of Hyderabads many malls.
The ceiling of the bowling alley was so low I felt as if I was bowling
in munchkin land.

On our way back to the car in the middle of a monsoon downpour, a guy
approaches us trying to sell Erik a pair of sunglasses. I am thinking
it's raining and after dark, if he were trying to sell an umbrella I
might be willing to talk.

Independence Day

I was in Egypt on the 4th of July on a cruise in the company of people from all over the world, but no Americans other than Michele. Needless to say, I missed the fireworks. What a lucky coincidence that I am in India for Indian Independence Day. We had our own little fireworks display at the guest house.

Happy Suprise

After recovering my baggage on my return to Hydrabad, I wandered outside to find myself a cab to take me to the guest house to meet up with Erik. Immagine my suprise to find Erik standing outside the entrance waiting for me, with a car! And then, to learn that his plans for us for the evening were to check out the mall!

Back to Hyderabad

I decided to cut my stay in Goa short since the place is dead in the rainy season, and the yoga course I found to keep myself occupied there for the week turned out to be a disappointment. So, I figured, why sit in my hotel room in Goa reading when I can just as easily do the same in Hyderabad where I know a few people.

You Aren't a Monkey

Saturday evening at dinner Erik and I engaged in a raging game of cards. As I whooped his booty, he complained, "It's because I'm a monkey." Being the loving girlfriend that I am, I immediately responded "You Aren't a Monkey." Just as I completed the sentence, I realized that over the din of the restaurant, I had misheard Erik's lament, what he really said was, "It's because I'm unlucky."

Lighthouse Hunting

On Friday Erik and I flew to Goa. The next day we engaged in our favorite travel activity, lighthouse hunting. You may be wondering how one would hunt a lighthouse, given the stationary nature this prey. For Erik and I, the thrill lies not only in finding the lighthouse (or in the case of Goa, two light houses), but also in finding the most difficult possible route to the lighthouse. In this case, we decided that we would embark on the two kilometer hike over the hill to the lighthouses instead of taking a cab around the hill like most tourists. Then, despite our gut telling us that the right fork in the trail led to the lighthouses, we took the left because it was more scenic. When we came around a the corner we had a great ocean view, and could also see, atop the hill, one of the lighthouses we sought. To get there we could either go back to the fork in the trail, or scramble up the side of the hill. Being the more difficult option, we went straight up.

The lighthouses were great. The older of the two was enclosed in a 400 year old Portuguese fort surrounded by a moat.

Magic Dance

On Wednesday I took a tour of Ramoji Film City, the location where
many Bollywood movies are made. The place was like a low tech, low
budget version of Universal Studios.

I started the day with a show that featured lifeless circus like acts
and samples of dance from all over India. After that I took the bus
tour of the various areas used for sets, which included a mock
airport, train station, and Taj Mahal, in addition to 50 gardens of
differing themes.


After the bus tour I explored by foot, and found the highlight of the
city, the dancing fountain. At the fountain, music from Indian
musicals blast while men strip down to their undershirts and dance in
the showers of water.

You Remind Me of the Babe

Monday night, Erik and I, along with another googler, visited Hyderabad's Golkonda Fort. The fort is over 800 years old and predated Hyderabad, which was founded when the old fort could no longer sustain all its inhabitants. The well preserved stone structures and narrow walkways bring to mind the Goblin city of Jim Henson's "Labrynth," but the bats flying around reminded me more of "The Dark Crystal." And what a coincidence that the other googler who joined us is named David (as in David Bowie).

Kerela

I left Mumbai on Thursday and met up with Erik at the airport where we hopped a plain to Kerela. It was great to see Erik again after 7 weeks of being apart. The rest of the weekend was romantic as we were also celebrating our 18 month anniversary.

Kerela was a very interesting place to visit because the high mountains around the province made it relatively isolated from the rest of India until Europeans began to trade and colonization. The Christian influence on the area is strongly felt. Our first night in Kerela we ate at a fantastic fusion restaurant called History whose menu actually chronicled the history of the region through food. The perfect spot for an aspiring epicure.

The second night we spent in a small mountain town completely surrounded by tea plantations called Munar. While the 3 hours of site seeing we did there did not warrant the 5 hour drive each way, it was beautiful. If we had another day we could have gone for a hike or visited one of the near-by wild life sanctuaries.

We spent our last night in Kerela on a houseboat in the "backwaters" which was a body of water speckled with a series of man made islands of fields ringed by small houses. Like the other boat rides on this trip, the houseboat was a great place to kick back and relax.

The last morning in the Kerela we explored one of the older sections of the capital city Cochin, which included a palace and synagogue that had a strict dress code for entrance that we had to improvise to meet.

Link to India Blog

I just wanted to point everyone to my India blog. It is located HERE if you want to get a fresh perspective on the adventures Liz and I are having in India. Toodles....

Budhist Caves

From Lunavla I took an auto rickshaw to visit two sets of caves carved into Buddhist temples 2000 years ago. The hikes up to the sites in the pouring Monsoon rains were invigorating, and the views of the waterfalls and valley below work every drop of rain that hit me. The caves themselves were not impressively ornate, but certainly reflected the solid and peaceful spirituality of Buddhism.

Monkey X-ing

Yesterday I took a break from Mumbai by catching a bus to the nearby hill station of Lunavla. As the bus plodded along I spied two monkeys sitting on the side of the road gazing at the passing vehicles. That was cool. Then suddenly, a whole group of monkeys darted across in front of the bus, and frogger like, made their way across the entire 6 lane highway. I was shocked. You rarely see animals cross US freeways so boldly. I couldn't decide if these monkeys were very stupid for not fearing the cars, or if they were very smart and had learned to safely cross the road. As I debated with myself on the topic the bus reached my destination. The driver stopped to let me off, right on the side of the highway, with my destination across all 6 lanes, and down the on-ramp. As I dashed across the street in flurry of monsoon rain, I finally decided that the monkeys were very stupid.