“So, did you find yourself?”

When my friend returned from travelling her work colleague asked her, “So, did you find yourself?” The old cliché goes that you ought to “find yourself” somewhere in between the muddy litter of a Cambodian “slum”…or nestled in between the petals at a Thai water-festival. If you’re lucky, you might “find yourself” at the bottom of a very black coffee in a dirty, back street bar or somewhere on a sunset horizon in the middle of nowhere. Just maybe it’s in the eyes of an Indian boy or inscribed on the lovers tombs at the Taj Malhal? You get the idea. I know it wasn’t in the sky when I jumped from 15,000 ft, and it wasn’t on the floor either, when I drained the rum bottle dry. Everyone who travels (it seems) is searching for something. A better understand of life and often their purpose within it. (Or maybe we’re all just running.)

As my five months draws to a close I have been trying to savour every last minute. Travelling all over south India by public bus and public train has been easy and really cheap. (You can take a six-hour journey and pay just over one English pound.) At first we were told that it’s very hard to navigate yourself around India, especially compared to somewhere like South East Asia. It does seem that way if you attempt to book any buses or trains in advance. Trains and buses all appear to be fully booked for weeks. We found the only way to travel is to just turn up at the bus station and get on a bus. People hanging off the sides, not a westerner in sight, shoving amazing deep fried things in your face, it’s never boring. Train is my absolute favourite way to travel. The countryside is stunning, the greens of the rice field are almost too green, dotted with coloured shacks and women working in the fields. The windows and doors are thrown open and all you have to do is get the wind in your hair, sun in your face and the echos of “Chai Chai” in your ears.

From Varkala we travelled to Kumily by old Ambassador car, the only car we’ve had to take with just the three of us. We stayed right on the edge of Periyar Wildlife Park in a gorgeous home stay, with the best dosa meal so far. We did a day’s safari, an elephant trek and washed, and got washed, by the elephant. The elephant’s name was Lashmi and the Muhoot showed us how he could control the huge animal by impressive touch and voice commands.

From Kumily we took the public bus to Madurai, staying in the worst place I have EVER had to stay. An English prison cell would have been much nicer. (I will upload photos). We visited the coloured temple here (sorry, I have forgotten the name) and I found these even more impressive than the Taj Malhal. They were enormous, and intricately painted with thousands of coloured statues. We then spent the rest of our night drinking cold coffees on various roof top bars to avoid our rooms from Hell. At 200R a punnet of apricots was more expensive than that room… but however cheap, it should not have looked like “someone had blown their brains out on the walls” (Ryan’s pretty accurate description).

From Madurai we travelled to Munnar. The tea plantations were vast and stunning. We stayed with a curious old man called Joesph, who invited us into his sitting room for tea, biscuits and circular chat that revolved around who we were (as he kept forgetting) and us needing to be back before half seven to avoid being attacked by an elephant. We crept back past midnight on several occasions like naughty (slightly pissed) teenagers, but never once did we see the dangerous elephant that “eats everybody’s cabbages”. Joesph drew us hand drawn maps of walks to take around the plantations, and a few of us went for a lovely trek with breathtaking views of sprawling tea and mountains.

From Munnar we travelled back to Cochin to see our friend Louise, and then took the night train to Gokana, where we have been stuck ever since. A hut on Om beach costs 3 pound a night and a bottle of rum can be purchased for under one pound…the days have started to blur into one long, hot and sunny mesh of goodness. Tonight we are getting a night bus to Hampi, and after a few days travelling on to Goa, where we will end our trip. It’s been beautiful and we’ve met some lovely people.

It’s very surreal that my five months is almost over and I’ll be back in the UK all too soon. I expect your wondering; did I “find myself”? Nope, I don't think so...but I’m not exactly sure what that means. I wanted to gain a better understanding of life. I went into the homes of extremely deprived Cambodia children and families, and made friends with Cambodian girls and young men of my own age. I saw both Australian City life and life out in “the bush”. I observed life in towns with a three hundred population and cities with a 15 million population. I was invited into an Indian Slum, talked with people who had arranged Indian marriages and met other travellers with all sorts of “understandings” about life along the way. This has helped, but it’s also given me a lot more questions than before. One thing I know, I will never take the freedom I have as an English woman for granted ever again. And secondly, I will try to make the most of this freedom everyday and the opportunities that I have, and don’t necessarily deserve. The incredible people I have met and some of the things these people are doing with their lives is probably what has impacted me the most. I thought this five months would have cured the travelling bug, but it seems by scratching at an itch (that would have eventually gone away) I have just made it all the more itchy. (Which means I might now be screwed for life.) I hope this is just one of lots more travelling adventures...

I will upload more photos when I am back in England and maybe write again...Although I hope to see you all in person (I fly back on Friday 11th Feb). I am coming home! It's SO surreal. (I also want to say I am not tanned, I've been tanned at intervals but won't be returning brown).

My brain is just trying to process what happened in the last five months. So bring a jumper to the airport and put the kettle on...because have I got some tales to tell.

India - Part One:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=611986&id=554625160&l=eb58a2bdbf

India - Part Two:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=613149&id=554625160&l=dbf6a45c55

More India pics...

(to be continued when I'm back...)
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=613149&id=554625160&l=dbf6a45c55

Leaving the wildlife park tomorrow for Munnar. Washed and was washed by an elephant today. A good time was had by both of us :)

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=611986&id=554625160&l=eb58a2bdbf

Jaipur to Varkala

South India feels very different to North India. In fact every place I visit feels very different to the last. I said before that the rich are super rich and the poor are devastatingly poor but in Delhi (for example) you’d have to get right out of the city to see many rich houses. There are super plush hotels on the right side of a road and tarpaulin shacks on the left, but there aren’t many rich residential homes. I felt very rich in North India, compared to pretty much everybody else.

Mumbai is where the money is. Even just flying into Mumbai’s modern airport you feel like you’ve hit the Bollywood capital. Big buildings flank the sprawling slums like out of place older brothers. Beggar children tap on your windows at the traffic lights and look directly into your bag with practised expressions of pain (making me want to dig my own grave and curl up inside it), right underneath huge billboards advertising million dollar holiday homes.

South India is all together calmer and more relaxed than the North or Mumbai. It’s mellow by comparison. The poverty here is rural, in the form of farmers and agricultural workers rather than street begging. Sellers are a lot less pushy and aggressive. People take less notice of the long white girl with the gold hair.

Both the Ellora and Ajanta caves (out from Mumbai) were impressive, huge caves carved downwards into the rock. The Ajanta caves used techniques such as moving eyes and paint that is completely flat but looks 3D from as far back as second century BC. We got lots of attention there from school children wanting to poke Ryan’s tattooed arm and shake our hands.

Back from the caves to Mumbai we took an over night train. I befriended an Indian boy who had turned seventeen that day. He told me he had been watching me on the platform and his uncle had hit him on the back of the head saying, “You won’t meet her today”. He said it was fate that I was sleeping in the same carriage as him. He reminded me of Dev Patel’s character in Skins, with the same ears and grin (he was an avid Skins fan) and we sat up eating “Holy sweets” while he taught me how to hang off the side of the fast moving train, (extremely dangerous but extremely fun). He was a bit of a wild boy, wanting to know all the “wild things” I did in England. As I passed the night under the stars the sun started to poke up over the outskirts of Mumbai.

We flew to Kochi from Mumbai and met the family my Dad was going to visit. My family had met them two years ago when they came to Kerala. Rasack, Beema and their five boys (all with various names beginning with R) and their friend Rahim who is teaching Rasack English. They have just had a new baby boy, Ravish, who is so adorable. They spent two days showing us the sites of Kochi and cooking us amazing meals in their house. They cooked us a traditional Keralan meal, served on banana leaves while we wore flower wreaths around our necks and ate only with our hands. They also plied us with cakes, tea and this amazing green milk (Beema gave me a pot of the green liquid so I can continue my addition to the green milk at home.) Beema’s sister also did henna on Kate and I. While we were in Kochi we also saw some kathakali dance (a lot of eye brown moving and very strange expressions), which was very interesting. To be invited into the little home in such a warm way, and given so much, was such a lovely and memorable experience.

After leaving Cochin we hired a houseboat to take us on the Kerala backwaters for a day and night, and then took a day ferry up to Kollem. The backwaters are utterly beautiful, with huge wooden fishing nets lining the banks, palm trees and river side houses at every turn. Kate, Ryan and I are now in Varkala, a beach with huge red cliffs and lots of fairy lit places to get cocktails, whilst whiling away a lot of time and money. It’s less a matter of beer-in-teapots here and more a matter of bribing the appropriate people, as none of the bars are officially licensed. We need to be careful we don’t get stuck here (this is also the reason for doing Goa last). I am now writing this in a hammock, surrounded by shady coconut palm trees, feeling very relaxed. It seems impossible that in three weeks time it will all be over and I’ll be back in England after five months away.

Here is a link to a selection of my India photographs so far. It’s so frustrating that this is such a tiny amount of the thousands I have taken and there is so many more I want to show you. However, it takes way too long to sort through and upload them, the computers have failed on me about five times now too. These will have to serve as a little snap shot to my Indian adventures until I get back to the UK… I will upload lots more when I get back to England in three weeks time.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=611986&id=554625160&l=eb58a2bdbf

The plan between now and then is this: Travel from Varkala to Madurai. Spend a couple of days there, see the huge, coloured temples, travel to Thekkady where there is a wild life park, live in a hut on stilts in the trees, ride, wash and feed an elephant, go on safari, go stay in the tea plantations in Munnar, drink a lot of tea. Get a night train to Goa, party in Goa, go out to Hampi, see Old Goa, again party in Goa, cry, get myself back to Cochin for my flight home.

HOWEVER, since I wrote this three hours ago we have hit a massive amount of logistically problems and already revised the route to do Thekkady next. Also, we may fly to Goa or stay in Kerela... We are totally making this up as we go along, which I’m sure you can tell. I will write again…

The Kites of Jaipur fly high over “Real India”

The sight over Jaipur at dusk, at this time of year, is one of the most beautiful I have ever seen. It made a much bigger impression on me than the Taj Mahal, or even Angkor Wat. Jaipur is situated in a valley. Mogul forts and temples sit high upon mountainous thrones, surrounding the houses on all sides. Up one side of the valley a winding stone path leads to a fort and from here you can see out over the entire city. I couldn’t get a photograph to accurately capture this scene (very inadequate picture below) and I doubt that my description will do it any justice either, but I will try…

The buildings below are all different colours, dark reds, blues, yellows, but all the same dusty cubes with strings of colourful washing floating on top of them. Children are also out on every rooftop, and in the pink and white sky there are thousands upon thousands of coloured kites. At first the sounds of shouting children ("Hello! Hello!"), the eerie call to pray and noisy traffic drift lazily upwards with the kites. As does the smells of Indian cooking. Then, as we climb higher and the sun drifts lower, the kites become hundreds of black silhouettes beneath us.

There is a kite flying festival on January 14th and everybody is out practising. It’s exactly as is depicted in "The Kite Runner", if you have read the book or seen the film. The kite strings are covered with glass dust, and have huge spindles. The kites fight in the sky and cut each other’s strings. The children on the ground chase the falling kites for prizes or money. The festival is regional, to happen right across Rajastan. There are 300 kite-making families in Jaipur City alone.

However, it can cause chaos. Four children were killed on the railway lines while chasing kites the other day. Hundreds of kites are tangled in the trees and power lines as people practice for the 14th and boys run around in amongst the traffic, constantly looking up and not where they are going. There were some security guidelines for children in the newspaper, (do not chase kites in rush hour and do not fly kites from roof terraces, etc) but you just have to look outside to see that no one is taking any notice of these. Still, on the 14th they add music and traditional food to the kite flying and the picture of everybody out practising is an incredible one.

Jaipur is a lot less manic than Delhi and Agra. A Tuk Tuk driver said, "People in Delhi and Agra, they don’t know how to do business. People in Jaipur, they know better. They make friends with you first. Then they take your money." I suppose this is very true. Everyone from the Tuk Tuk drivers to the shopkeepers are less aggressive here. I read if you can survive Delhi and Agra, you can survive pretty much anywhere in India. The people are friendly, and some do end up taking your money, but I’m adapting to this. I will always pay "skin tax" here, and more often than not it’s just a case of knowing when your being ripped off and how far you’re willing to allow it to go.

I have even adapted to having my photograph taken. (Although there was one incident in the Janter Manter where people saw someone taking my photo and about ten people rushed out of no where with their mobile phones… I was mortified! After I wished I’d taken a photo of what was happening because I doubt anything like that will ever happen to me again.) I’m slightly disturbed at how many random people in India will have a photo of me but I am getting used to it. It’s hard to adapt to some things, like the street children (there were a lot of acrobatic children "performing" (begging) at the traffic lights on the way into Jaipur) but this is a big part of India. The rich are super rich and the poor are devastatingly poor.

There is also lots of wild live stock in Jaipur, from pigs and piglets, to goats, cows, dogs and monkeys, all of which happily make their way up the hill sides too. A little boy of about five years old saw my interest in the piglets and tried to sell me one for a few rupees! (I very much doubt they belonged to him but this was super cute.) There are also some stunning tombs, temples and very grand palaces in the city, each made by a Mogul Prince desperately trying to out-do the last. Jaipur is a network of amazing bazaars too and a lot of craftsmanship goes on here. Things like marble, silks and embroidery are shipped all over India and trade is big business. I also visited Pushkar (pictured below), for a day, the second most holy place in all of India, and made an offering on the river for my family, for good luck and health and for a sweet husband…apparently these things always come true!

A couple of local musicians, Goran, 25 and Ravi, 22 invited us to listen to them play music. They also invited us into a "gypsy and slum community" (their words) and, in a small room, some of the residents (pictured below) played music while everyone gathered around. Traditional Indian music, dancing, singing and puppets took place in this tiny room and it was a very memorable moment. Places like this are very close to my heart after teaching in Cambodia. This community was on the edge of a huge wasteland where thousands of people lived. Traditional puppets are the people’s trade and many make and sell to the nearby shops. Goran, twenty five, was volunteering by driving some of the children to school in his Tuk Tuk. He met us a few times and took me around Jaipur. He’s a very nice guy (pictured below).

And tomorrow I will fly to Mumbai to meet Kate and Ryan. Then we take a train to the Ellora caves and a night train back. Afterwards we are flying to Cochin to travel in South India… so next time I write it will be with tales of the South and different stories of different places! I will also post some of the beautiful India photographs I have taken so far. This is the immediate plan but there is a lot of room for things to go wrong… I might get caught up in Mumbai... I keep getting told I should go seek my fame and fortune there as a Bollywood actress …I can’t imagine anything less likely, but then lots of "unlikely" things have been happening lately, so you never know…

Jaipur Rooftops

Me and Govan

Pushkar

Musicians in the community

View of Jaipur

Delhi and The Indian People

Okay, it’s official. Disasters that are globally news worthy are actually following me around... First there was the awful event in Phnom Penh, now most of the places I stayed in Australia are under water and it’s just been announced on the global news that it’s so cold here people are dying in Northern India and lighting fires on the streets of Delhi. And indeed, you can’t walk down a street without a number of men crouching low around a hazardous pile of flaming kindling (one man actually lit one at his feet in the Restaurant where we were eating) and people appear to be wearing all their clothes at once… I certainly am. (I have also had to buy a very, thick fleece jacket, gloves and ear warmers). I didn’t anticipate anything like this. I have clothes made for a hot stint in Cambodia, for sunbathing on the Thailand islands (which incidentally were also flooded – although I am unsure if this made global news) and strolling along Bondi Beach. I wasn’t expecting to be running from fire to fire or crouching low in front of a 250 Rupee-extra broken heater wrapped up in several blankets, still shivering. And that’s when the power isn’t failing.

The power fails a lot (right now I am writing this in the dark!). It seems as well that I cannot enter a country without having a little drama. In Cambodia I had a mini breakdown on arrival because I didn’t realize I would be teaching English. In Thailand I couldn’t walk because my foot was so swollen I had to hobble from the plane to the hotel and stay there in pain with medicines and bandages. And in Australia I entered the country with no money, no bankcards and no mobile phone. I arrived in India, at 4am on New Years Day, at a pitch black hotel, down a dodgy dirty back street, with no explanation in English of why there was no power and no light to see a thing. In the dark the place looked very dodgy and AWFUL!

And it’s no wonder the power keeps failing. Delhi is home to more than 13 million people and you feel it. Everywhere you walk there are thousands of bodies. I have never been anywhere more populated, nor will I ever (I think) see anywhere quite as populated again. A mash up of crazy traffic, workers, random wild cows, dogs and pigs choke every street. Life is so fast, everyone is moving and everything is utterly INSANE. I want to photograph everything but in reality as soon as I see something to capture it is over. I want to stand on the street and watch the passers by but I am about to get knocked over by a woman carrying ten tons of flour bags on her head, or the mad Tuk Tuk driver with the family of twelve hanging off the back. (Or the crazy cow – you can’t touch them because they are sacred creatures so you just have to dodge well out of the way!). It makes the streets of London seem comparatively tame and boring.

The Hotel Rak (in the Paharanjin area) was in fact (in the light of day) not half as bad as how it looked in the dark. It does need painting and it’s pretty fading and basic (hot water lasts about ninety seconds after you request it) but what it lacks in style it makes up for in charm, through the guys who run it and it’s roof top terrace. The terrace looks out over the bustling street below and across the tumble down rooftops around it. Kids make japaits behind the wall below from 6am everyday. The boys here make a fire on the roof and travellers huddle round. Another traveler is playing a guitar and someone is always on hand with coffee or (under their breath) the promise of beers.

This huge amount of people must create the haze that surrounds the city. The sky is very white. A picturesque green field of boys playing cricket is in fact just a white haze with coloured jumpers darting around it. I actually quite like this. It makes everything feel rather “other worldly”. I couldn’t live in it though. Signs litter the roadways advertising “Road Safety Week” and this makes me laugh. Vietnam takes the very crazy roads of Cambodia, Loas and Thailand to a whole new level…but then India takes Vietnam’s levels of death defying driving and throws in hundreds more people, cattle, dogs, motor bikes, Tuk Tuks, cars and Cyclos just for fun.

In Delhi I visited the magnificent Red Fort, Parliament, India Gate, Humayun’s Tomb and various mosques and Temples, Jama Masjid and Lakshmi Narayan Temple among others. I also visited Raj Ghat where Ghandi was cremated and the Ghandi Museum, built on the spot where he was assassinated (I am reading his autobiography at the moment). What I was really fascinated with was in Old Delhi. Chandni Chowk, which has an amazing street market on a Sunday, was a street crammed with people and life like I had never seen before. Traffic grid locked, people shouting (because they had to) and rushing past with huge amounts balanced on their heads, shop keepers, food sellers all going about their everyday lives. I wonder what the people of the one-horse Australian towns would say if they could see this quite ordinary (to the Indian people) pandemonium.

It seems I attract rather a lot of attention in Delhi (and Agra). I get stared at A LOT. People often ask for my photograph. Families, even in tourist spots, ask if they can have a photograph taken of me with their children. (This even happened in the Taj Malhal, in Agra where there are more European tourists - photos to follow of Taj Malhal, very impressive and beautiful). Maybe they think I am someone I’m not? It’s certainly a taste of what it would be like to be semi-famous. I find it weird, and it makes me feel a bit uncomfortable. It’s even more uncomfortable when it’s a group of men blatantly discussing you or a group of stern looking soldiers holding guns and big, wooden sticks following you with unblinking eyes. There are not that many white people here; most of the tourists are Indian travellers or Asian. But the people are very nice about it and the Indian people do fascinate me too. I often photograph them; the colourful dress looks so stunning against the white marble temples or the grey smog. So I can’t complain if the fascination is mutual! We had no language to speak but two girls were in awe, pointing to my eyes and commenting on my “longness”, while I was pointing at their beautiful saris and gold jewellery, completely transfixed. We were the exact same though, laughing at the same things…we were just set against a completely different backdrop.

It feels like I’ve been in India for ten years now, when in reality it has only been a week. Kate and Ryan meet me in a few days to travel the last five weeks with me. My Dad is traveling for a short time to see a friend he made last time he was in India, two years ago. Another friend told me before I arrived here: one minute you will love India and then the next second you will hate it. This is so true. I do love India. I love the complete insaneness of it. I love the back street markets and the wailing calls to pray, which echo over the white haze. I love the beautiful women and all the little kids who break your heart with their matted hair and dirty faces. It should be illegal for food to be as good as some of the Indian curries and also for some of the dresses and markets to be this pretty. But things do happen in India to switch my affections very quickly.

We encountered “The Tourist Office Scam” on our first day and I pretty much guarantee all travellers to India will have come across this one. It was ingenious because it involved three levels. The first was early on, a guy who was seemingly minding his own business saw us consulting a map and planted the seed of the government tourist office where we could get a free map. Then later on, nearer the direction the first guy had pointed out, another man comes on the scene and talks to us and eventually leads us into the “official government tourist office”, which was of course just a random set up office. And these are all over the place with what seems like hundreds of guys deployed to divert you off the track of the real one and into the arms of the fakers. Throw in the Tuk Tuk drivers (and seemingly everyone you meet on the street) having some sort of motive for getting you somewhere and it can seem impossible to get to the right place.

In Connaught Place the hassle from the Tourist Office scam is especially bad (probably because a lot of tourists populate here). We went into a coffee shop just to shake off the CONSTANT hassle and still got targeted whilst inside, only by older and better-disguised versions of what was outside. It is also very tiring being asked to give money for everything, from someone handing you a napkin, to opening a door for you. I am particularly awkward with this; never having the right change or knowing how much (if anything) is appropriate. Throw in beggers and VERY persistent sellers, Tuk Tuk drivers trying to take you anywhere other than where you want to go (because they get commission), and people ripping you off left, right and centre and it can be utterly exhausting. (I watched a girl from the roof terrace get very skilfully mugged by the oldest woman I ever saw falling in front of the girl’s path). To be white is to walk around with a big dollar sign attached to your forehead, but at some point you have to be able to trust someone. The scammers trade on charm and it’s often hard to be rude. In the end all this will only serve to damage tourism. The word will continue to get out in guidebooks and amongst travellers, people will be a lot more wary, travel in packs and be more untrusting of locals.

But this is a huge shame! I don’t want to be sceptical of every Indian man who asks where I am from, where am I going or how am I finding India. Or any boy with his slicked back hair, hands in leather pockets who simply wants to practice his English. When you get off the tourist tracks the locals are often so friendly and lovely that it immediately cancels out all the obscenities you were muttering in your mind a moment ago. The children are so beautiful and the ones who beg or sell very often break my heart with their charm, wit and humour. They are incredible human beings (way too street smart!). One boy I was talking to was promptly chased away and kicked to the floor by a man with a stick just for hassling me, even though I did not mind him at all. I saw him later and he seemed unfazed by his assault. (I already have about fifty Cambodian children I think about everyday and don’t know how to handle anymore!) And some of the young men selling things are so charming and good looking it’s hard not to get caught up talking, even with no intention of buying. As much as I don’t like the attention, a positive aspect of being a tourist who does stick out is the keenness of people wanting to talk to me. And people here are so very nice!

And so the cycle continues…Someone scams you, and the next minute another restores your faith in all humanity, just for it to be pulled apart ten minutes later by a third. The scammers show a true entrepreneurial side of this growing economy. A hell of a lot of people are actively out on the streets of Delhi, whether it be called stalking, selling, begging, drumming up business or whatever, all after the same result: MONEY. And I can’t help thinking, what would Gandhi have to say about all this? Maybe I’ll ask that to the next guy trying his luck… “What would Gandhij do?”