TravelStream™ news feed for member kirby on TravelPod's free travel blogs service http://www.travelpod.com/syndication/rss/kirby en-us Copyright ©2009 TravelPod.com Thu, 08 Jan 2009 03:47:36 -0500 http://www.travelpod.com http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1231144320/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1231144320/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1231144320/tpod.html Thu, 08 Jan 2009 03:47:36 -0500 India!

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Eugene, Oregon, United States

As a final post for my India travel blog, I wanted to document the adventures since I've returned to the states in trying to build my own personal tandoor oven.For those that read the previous entries in my travel blog, you'll remember that towards the tail end of our trip to India, I was told that tandoor ovens are incredibly cheap to purchase over there. Like 500 rupees (about $10-$12 USD) but of course the problem is that they are very heavy, because they are essentially a giant chunk of clay. And on top of that, they are very fragile. So while I was able to find one at a very affordable price, by the time it was packed safely enough to ship somewhere, it weighed about 40-50 kilograms (90-110 pounds). That's way to heavy to check as baggage, and it would cost a fortune to ship back home by any method other than ocean liner. So my dreams of having a tandoor at home were dashed for the moment.But alas, I wasn't going to give up so easy. As soon as we got back to the states, Rebecca left again to go join her family. So I'd be by myself for a couple of days after christmas with nothing to do. So I decided to read a hundred articles on the internet about building a back-yard tandoor over, and devise a plan to build my own out of common items found at your local home improvement store.Looking back in hindsight, my first design was really lacking. I thought that a tandoor wasn't much more than clay (or stone) walls around something really hot. So my plan was to cut the bottom off of a cheap planter pot, attach the wide end to a metal BBQ grill somehow, then invert the whole thing and put it on top of one of those super-jet-burners that they use for boiling huge pots of water while camping. So I set out on the 26th of December to see what kind of after-christmas sales I could find on camping equipment. As luck would have it, I found exactly the kind of burner I was looking for at G.I. Joes (I guess it's now just called "Joes") which is a chain store in the pacific northwest that carries all sorts of camping, sporting, fishing and outdoorsing equipment... and car parts... ??? figure that one out. But whatever, it had exactly the kind of burner I wanted on sale for $34.99. Ok, the first part of the journey is complete, now lets see what else I can find.Next I run over to the local home improvement store "Jerry's", which I think is unique to Eugene/Springfield. (We've got Home Depot and Lowe's too, but I try to shop local when I can) And I head out to the garden center where I find that they've got a huge section of their pottery on 75% off! Score! I pick up this nice large white pot and a round BBQ grill that fits the mouth just about perfectly. At this point, I knew that I didn't just want exposed super-heated stone on the outside of my over, so I needed something to protect myself and others from touching it. I wandered around the store for probably an hour looking for inspiration. I asked a couple of store employees if they had any ideas for high-temp insulation, but we couldn't come up with anything. Then I started thinking "I just need a big can to throw over the top of it!" and then I ran over to the garbage can isle praying that people still carried metal garbage cans. Sure enough, there it was, the perfect-sized garbage can, at a very affordable price as well. So I purchases all my goods and returned to my garage to start construction.I get home and I remember reading all these stories about people that cut the bottoms off their pots with an angle grinder. So I whip out my trusty angle grinder and put wheel to pot and.... nothing happens. Sure, there are some sparks and lots of loud noise, but I'm left with nothing but a black smudge on my pot. What?? So I haul the pot over to my workbench and try the hack saw... and it can barely even scratch the surface, it's defenitely not cutting it. Then I realize that this super-cheap pot I got is an actual fired ceramic pot, it's not terra cotta like all those articles I've read. Ah man! I hope back in the car and run back up to Jerry's (luckily its pretty close) and I find this special hack saw blade for cutting ceramics. I also pick up a big terra cotta pot just in case the other one doesn't work. Well, it turns out that special hack saw blade works pretty good. It actually gets a purchase in the ceramic and starts cutting it. But it's sloooooow going. After about 2 hours of sawing back and forth, I haven't even made it 1/4 of the way around. So I finally just give up and go inside to watch a movie or something to give my arm a rest.At this point, I toy with the idea of giving up, but I decide to trudge on, and I go out to try the new blade with the terra cotta pot. Ahhhh! Much better! It's not quite like a hot knife to butter. It's more like a cold serratted knife to butter that's been frozen to absolute zero. Suffice it to say that I get the entire bottom cut off, but it takes about an hour to make the entire cut. On the bright side, you're going to slowly that the cut is very straight, and the edges are sanded smooth when you're done because of the way the blade works. Sweet! One step closer to the goal! I admire my handiwork for a moment, and then I remember an old rule about cooking on pizza stones: that they are prone to cracking if any part of them is wet. Well my half of my pot had been sitting out in the rain for who knows how long, and there was a defenitely wet spot all along one side. So I realized I couldn't go much farther with this pot until it dried out. I knew that letting it dry naturally would take forever, so I decided to help it along a little. I inverted the pot and placed it on top of the large burner on my stove turned to low heat (2 of 10), I places the decapitated base back on top as a lid to keep the heat inside and I'd check it periodically over the next couple of hours to make sure that the walls of the pot were warm, but not super hot. I left it that way for about 6-8 hours while doing other things. Sure enough, the water spot slowly dissappeared over that time.While my pot was drying, I decided to read up more on how tandoors work. That's when I realized that the tandoor is more than just a clay-walled oven, but they work by essentially building up and trapping the heat inside, and they can get up to insanely hot temperatures. Then I realized that there was no way my tandoor was going to get hot enough with a 17 inch mouth over the top of a 12 inch burner (due to excess airflow) and I also didn't incorporate any kind of insulation into my design. So I decide to increase the complexity of the project by a factor of 10, and come up with this plan to glue a second terra cotta pot of the same size onto the pot I currently have cooking on the stove. This would make the inside shape of the oven more oval-ish, which is a shape I'd seen on a couple of professional tandoor ovens. But more importantly, it would get the size of the bottom hole something small enough to fit over the top of my burner without a lot of excess airflow. So I ran back to Jerry's, picked up a second pot, some high-temp mortar used in fireplaces and kilns, some square-net chicken-wire type stuff, and giant bag of Perlite, which is a type of pummice rock used for drainage in the garden section. But it also makes a pretty good high-temperature isulation filling.I spend another hour cutting the bottom off the second pot, swap it with the pot that's drying on the stove, so it can get some of it's water out as well. I then mortar the top and bottom lips of the first pot and wait a while for everything to dry. After sufficient time had passed, I blob a bunch more mortar around the lip of the upright pot, and drop the second pot on top of the first. Then I commence in applying a nice thick layer of mortar to the inside and outside of the joint between the two pots. Around the outside, I cut the chicken-wire down to the right size, and I wrap it around the two pots at the thickest part. I use two pairs of small vice grips to make sure it's tight. Then I mortar over the top of that. I place the whole concoction over the top of my stove burner (set to medium low heat, maybe 4 of 10) place the lid on it, and leave it overnight (about 8-12 hours).The next day, I spend a little more time reading about tandoors and I discover all this information about curing your tandoor oven. Curing is something you do to the inside surface to give it the right kind of cooking properties, like you would a cast-iron pan. So I run out to buy the ingredients, which consist of spinach, jaggery (which is like a big block of raw sugar, latino markets have something similar called panela, which is what I used), some type of oil (mustard oil is traditional, but I used peanut oil, as it's very resistant to high temperatures), a pinch of turmeric (which probably doesn't contribute anything) and salt. I return home and throw it all in the blender and end up with a bright green liquid that looks like something Rebecca might try to drink for breakfast on a healthy day. I start applying this gunk to the inside with a spatula because that's what everybody else uses. But then I realize that a paint brush would work much better for the consistency that I've ended up with. So I get the whole inside painted, let it dry for while, then apply a second coat and put the whole thing over the stove again to dry.So far so good! Now it's time for final assembly! I measure the bottom mouth of the clay liner and cut a circular hole in the bottom of the garbage can that is about 1 inch narrower all the way around. That way I would have a nice little shelf to rest the skewers on when they are in the oven cooking. And I gotta say the garbage can idea is brilliant because the bottom has all these circular ripples in it for strength, so cutting a perfectly circular hole that is also exactly centered is really quite easy because you just pick the ripple closest to the size you need and cut along that, and voila! For this job I used tin-snips. I know a lot of people would use an angle grinder, but I keep finding that slow-moving hand tools almost always yield a better cut than high speed power tools. Anyway, I get my hole cut in the bottom of the can, apply a copious amount of mortar to the inside edge of the hole, and gently lower the clay liner into the can. I clean up a bit of the excess mortar with a putty knife and let it rest for a minute. Then I start pouring in the Perlite around the outside of the liner. The liner is a very tight fit, so I had to pour a bunch, then jiggle the liner back and forth a little bit at a time and the stuff would slowly drain into the open cavity below. This whole process was a little time-consuming, but it was the dust that's a killer. The perlite throws up a hell of a dust cloud and it's just nasty to try to breath the stuff. That's about the time I see on the package in big letters "Do not create dust" right next to "Breathing dust can be hazardous to your health". Oh great... So I run away and let the dust settle. Then I found a mask, and I'd run in, pour a little bit, then run back out of range again. I eventually got the whole can filled up and I moved on to the next step.I measured the lip of the liner at the top of the can, and I cut a nice circular hole in the garbage can lid. Again, using the ripples in the lid as a guide, I was able to cut a very round, very centered hole, but when I fitted it on the top of my contraption, it didn't line up! That's when I realized that all the jiggling around to get the insulation to drain down actually misshapes the roundness of the can a little, and the centered-ness of the liner a little as well. Not a big deal, I just ran a sharpy around the outside of my liner and trimmed the lid down so that there was a 1/8 inch gap between metal and clay all the way around. That way the lid has a chance of staying cool even if the clay gets super hot. Once I got the lid complete, I put it all together and looked upon my handiwork and was really quite surprised how clean and professional the whole thing looked. Now to see if it will actually do what it's supposed to do...I placed my tandoori-can on the burner and turned the propane on just a crack, and let it go for awhile. I've got one of those kitchen thermometers with a remote probe, so I dropped that inside to see how how it was getting. After about 20 minutes of running with the lid off, the temp had stabilized to about 180 degrees I think. But if I put the lid on, and dropped the probe in through the whole in the middle, the temp shot right up past 400 degrees (that's where my termometer maxes out) in a matter of minutes. If I took the lid off, the temp would slowly fall to some stabilized temp much lower. I also noticed when the lid was on, the outside of the can would get much hotter. After a little investigation I realized that with the lid on, the inside heats up, and starts pouring out the bottom hole of the clay liner and overflowing around the bottom of the can and starts climbing up the outside of the can. To test this theory, I took the lid back off and gave it 15 minutes, at which point the outside was cool again. I suppose it's also possible that with the internal temp climbing so high, the heat is actually reaching the outside of the can through the insulation. But it doesn't really matter... with the lid on, the outside gets hot to the touch, with the lid off, the outside stayed cool.I decided I needed to block the bottom hole a little and force whatever air is coming in to pass by something that is hot, and also give the heat rays inside the tandoor something to bounce off of and return back upwards instead of escaping. The solution proved to be very easy: I made a small basket out of the extra chicken-wire I used for reinforcing the joint, and forced that down to the bottom of the liner, and poured in a bunch of lava rock that they use for the bottom of normal gas BBQ grills. The instructions on the package of lava rocks actually says you need to fire them up by themselves for about 15-20 minutes. That is because on their first heating, they burn off their outer layer and that releases a bit of a smell which could possibly effect your food. So after dropping them in, I fired up the burner to low at first, then up to medium after about 4 or 5 minutes. Then I let it sit for another 15 minutes. The bottom layer of lava rocks started glowing red, and I could already tell that the heat inside that tandoor was much more stable than before. Ok! It was time to try cooking something!I only had one skewer at this point, a piece of metal stock that is probably 3/8in diameter by 6 feet long. I sharpened the tip with my bench grinder and stuck a bunch of chicken on it. I dropped that in and set the timer for 10 minutes. Not quite enough, but after a 2nd 10 minutes, it was a little overcooked (but still delicious I'm told). So after getting the chicken off (which was quite a hassle, remember to oil the skewers before you use them) I dropped the skewer in a plastic garbage can filled with water to cool it off, then I prepped a 2nd skewer and dropped that in 17 minutes. That one came out just about right. At this point I thought the temp inside the tandoor had equalized, so I dropped in a 3rd skewer and set the timer for 15 minutes and walked away....When the timer went off I walked out and noticed that the lid I was using had cracked, so I pulled it off and saw that the chicken on the skewer was burning. Not burning like the edges were black, but burning like a log in a roaring bonfire! I quickly pulled the skewer out and the whole thing kept burning quite easily. So I shut off the propane, dropped the whole skewer in the water tank to put it out. I put my hand over the top of the tandoor for a second, and realized I couldn't even hold it 10 inches over the top of the mouth for longer than a tenth of a second without feeling like my hand was burning. All the lava rocks inside were glowing bright red from what I could see, and by my estimation, I think the inside of the tandoor was probably about 1000 degrees! I left everything off and left it to cool down overnight.The next morning I went out to check on it, and the clay liner was perfectly in tact, although the curing glaze I'd painted on the inside had been completely incinerated. I also noticed that the mortar I'd put on the bottom of the garbage can had all cracked and fallen off. At first this really worried me, but then I realized that it looked like it was nothing more than a different heat expansion properties between the steel and the mortar. The mortar was designed to stick to stoneware (which is does very well) and it it probably designed to expand at the same rate that fireplace bricks do. The steel of the garbage can obviously expands differently at different heats, so the mortar wasn't able to hold on, so it just cracked and sluffed off. A little more concerning, however, is that the wire basket I placed the lava rocks in. I poked at that a couple of times, and it seems like the metal had crystalized (or whatever happens when it reaches super high temperatures and then cools down)... because as soon as you poke it, the individual strands would just shatter. It actually reminded me a lot of the silk mantles that you use in coleman lanterns for some reason. And I hypothesize that as long as I don't move anything, it'll probably be fine, but as soon as I lift the can off the burner, that basket with probably break and all the lava rocks will fall out. I'll deal with that later if it happens, but for now, it looks like it'll be ready for cooking again as long as I re-glaze the inside.So I put a couple more coats of the curing glaze on the inside, then went out to find a thermometer to put inside this thing so I know how hot I'm working with. The solution ended up being quite simple... Jerry's has a magnetic thermometer that is for wood-stoves. It's designed to stick to the base of the chimney I think (to tell you if you're getting close to a chimney fire), and it goes up to about 800F. It's all metal, including the readout, so the whole thing can sit inside a very hot environment and not be any worse for wear. So I took a strip of steel I had sitting around my shop area and make a quick couple of bends with a vise and my big 3lb sledgehammer (I love that hammer!) and made a bracket that hangs over the top of the tandoor and hooks on the edge of the garbage can lid, and drops down into the opening about 5 or 6 inches. I fired up the tandoor after installing the thermometer and it doesn't really read anything below about 200F, but between 200F and 600F it did a good job of telling me approximately how hot it was inside.I had a big party coming up where I wanted to show off what the new toy could do. So I got about 15lbs of chicken breast tenderloins and started them marinating. I also bought 4 more pieces of steel stock from Jerry's. This time I got the 1/4 inch by 6ft plated rods. I cut each one in half, which yielded 8 skewers of 3ft per. 3ft means that I've only got about 8-10inches sticking out the top which isn't really enough to work with. So I found a small pile of wooden dowels in my shop, and cut a bunch of 1ft sections, drilled holes in the end, and jammed the skewers into the end of the dowels. I also sharpened the ends of the skewers, and then I measured out the optimal cooking placement for each skewer and realized that you only want to have stuff on it from the 7 inch mark to the 21 inch mark. That gives you 14 inches per skewer for cooking. I used the bench grinder to grind little divets in each skewer at the appropriate marks, then took then all to the kitchen for a thourough washing and oiling.In addition to the 15lbs of chicken, I sliced up about 5 lbs of potatoes into 1/2in rounds, and and equal amount of onions cut into eights. When it came time to make up the skewers, I would alternate potatoe-chicken-onion-chicken-potatoe-chicken-onion and so on until I'd filled up the whole 14inches of cooking space. The purpose of this is that I noticed when it's just a big bundle of chicken on a skewer it tends to fuse into a solid mass which makes it harder to both get off the skewer and cook all the way through. It also added a bunch of edible stuff to each skewer, as the big party might have as many as 17 people attend. I might also mention that after chopping the onions and potatoes, I threw them in a big bowl with peanut oil, and a mix of indian spices (ground cumin, corriander and turmeric) and tossed it all together to get the spices mixed around.On the day of the party, I started the tandoor about 90 minutes before I wanted to start cooking to get it heated up. I think the temp equalized within 40 minutes, and it never really got above 275F. So I turned up the propane and found that the temp would equalize within about 15 minutes after it was pre-heated. So I kept adjusting it until I got the temp to about 500F consistently, and started cooking. At 500F, each skewer would go in for at least 20 minutes. And each skewer came out slightly black around the edges (just right) seared on the outside, and the juiciest, most succulent texture on the inside that you could imagine. I'm really not sure it's possible to reproduce this in a normal oven... or even a back-yard BBQ for that matter. I started pulling the chicken out and serving it to people and they guests were actually doing little happy dances because the food tasted so good! It was awesome! All this hard work has paid off for a perfect way of cooking meats and vegetables.The next thing to try was naan, which is a traditional indian flatbread that is cooked by flattening out the dough into a little pancake-like patty and slapping it to the inside wall of a tandoor oven. It starts bubbling and cooking immediately, and they use a little hook and scraper to retrieve them off the walls when they are done cooking. So I'd actually fashioned a hook out of another piece of metal like my skewers, and I make a scraper by attaching a cheap wood-handled frosting spreader I got from the local kitchen supply store to the end of another piece of metal rod. I flattened out the dough, slapped it to the inside, and it started cooking immediatly just like it should. I was estatic and I was doing my own happy dance around the tandoor at that point. You see, we've been throwing these parties every month for the past year, and each time I try to make naan we can only cook them one at a time on a cast-iron griddle, and they just don't cook the same. It also takes the better part of 45-minutes to get them all cooked. Once I master the process inside the tandoor, it should cut that time to less than half, and they end up tasting better as well. So it's win-win all around!I realized this post is a little long-winded, but I know there are several people out there on the internet are wishing they had their own tandoor oven just like I was. And I hope this detail play-by-play of my process will help those people in building their own.In the photos I included a cost breakdown to give you an idea of how much this project cost. I'm pretty sure I could have gotten a propane tank cheaper somewhere, and a lot of people already have one sitting around. That was defenitely a large part of the cost, but overall I'm ok with the price. I could probably get a decent backyard BBQ grill for $230, but the way I see it, the tandoor can do almost everything a normal grill can do, and lots of things it can't do. And I also get an awesome burner for boiling water while camping as well. So I think this is defenitely a better deal.
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Delhi, India

Today is monday. And last monday, when we were on our way across town for the wedding reception, we drove down the street that was completely lined with stalls for probably about a mile or more. We saw all of these amazing wares for super cheap prices. Rebecca is pretty sure she saw multiple stalls filles with sarees hanging with a posted price of 150 rupees. Unfortunately last week we weren't able to stop to see anything, so I asked the driver "What is this place?" and he said "Shekat" So I assumed that meant it was the Shekat market. Then I asked him "Is it like this all the time?" and he said "Only mondays, sir." So Rebecca and I made a note to return to that place the following monday, which would be today.So today's goals consisted of going back to that market, buying a ton of cheap stuff for gifts, wall hangings or whatever when we return home. After that, we figured we'd go see one of the main sites in Delhi, being Humayan's tomb. Humayan is the grandfather or great grandfather of the guy that built the Taj Mahal, it's a similar style and I've heard a couple of people say that they actually liked it better than the Taj, so we figured we should probably see it before we leave.But first on the agenda, after breakfast is to head out and get some of our traveler's checks converted. So that consumes the first hour plus of our time out. Then we tell the driver we want to go to the place where the market is. And that becomes a bit of a problem. Last week we mentioned this market to Dekiva and she'd never heard of it. Then we described it and Binda says that there are all sorts of markets around Delhi that just spring up in the morning, fill the street with stalls, and then disappear at night. So this market we drove through is just one of many, and neither of them know specifically about it, where it is, or what it's called. But that's ok, we figured we could just call the driver from last week and ask him where we were when it happened.We had the name of a road, so we told this week's driver to go to this road... thinking it would be packed with stalls. But after about 45 minutes of travel across Delhi, we stop and the driver tells us we are at the location requested. Hmmm.... we look around and there is no market, just another street. Ok, time to call the driver from last week. It turns out this week's driver is actually the boss at the company, and he's out driving today because last week's driver had to take leave from work this week because his grandmother passed away, and he returned to his village in Uttar Pradesh to attend ceremonies and stuff. Once we found that out, I thought maybe he would be unreachable. But this is India, and their use of mobile phones is so totally integrated into the collective concious that nobody should ever be unreachable. So our driver picks up the phone and calls him. They have this long conversation and we hear things like "Fabindia" and "GK one". Which was actually our listed destination last week when we left Gurgaon. But we told the guy that yes, we were heading to the FabIndia at GK one... but on the way, we drove through this market lining the streets. And asked about that... a bunch more talking... like a lot of talking... probably a full minute's worth, and then they hang up and our driver tells us that we probably mean this other market that Devika had mentioned when we were talking about it. But that market is way out on the outer ring of Delhi, it's nowhere near where we are or where we were going last week. But I'm a little exasperated at this point, I'm thinking in my head we're having another one of those strange communication moments that seem to have happened alot since we've been here. (One of just needs to become fluent in Hindi!) So tell the driver just to go to this market that last week's driver suggested. Then I call Devika to get her opinion and she tells me that we're actually pretty close to Humayan's tomb right now, so we should do that first, then go see this other market. So I get off the phone and tell the driver that we should go to Humayan's tomb instead. I'm pretty sure I hear one of those "Yes sir, no problem sir" and Rebecca and I just wait until we get there.About 30-40 minutes pass and he stops in the car in front of this open-air shopping mall and says that we're here. Uhm.... what? Did I not say it right? I guess I didn't say whatever I was supposed to say to cancel the instructions to go to the market and go the tomb instead. Oh well, we're both hungry, so we decide that since we're here we should go get some food and see what we can find. The food options are a little limited... being a McDonalds, a Subway, a Pizza Hut and a handful of street-type stalls. I really don't want McDonalds or Subway, and we can't be sure about the street food, so Pizza Hut it is. I mean, it's plenty yummy and we're pretty confident about the hygene, so the only downside is people making fun of us for eating pizza hut twice while in India... specially when I generally avoid Pizza Hut when I'm in the states. But whatever. We have a nice lunch then go across the way to a music/video store to look for some movies. We find a couple that we're looking for, they're selection isn't so great. Then we step outside to see what kind of clothing stores we can find, but it's all designer western clothes... and I figure if I've going to buy western clothes made in Malaysia or Thailand, I can do that in Wal-Mart back home. So what else is there around here? And we find another music store that's got some videos... we're browsing through those and find a couple more on our list. Then the guy says there are more hindi movies downstairs. So we go down there and there is a whole wall full of stuff. And this other guy comes over to help us, his english is pretty good, and Rebecca starts just listing off movies on our list and this guy just reaches into the shelf and pulls out the one we name off. After the fifth or sixth time it actually gets kinda funny. He is pretty young, seemed pretty easy-going and his english was pretty good too. So we're actually able to start asking him his opinions about some of the movies. He really strongly recommends a movie called "Rock On", but it's a new release and like 4 times the price of some of the older ones we're getting. So we pass on it. But we walk out with a big stack of movies.... we're going to have to have some marathon watching sessions when we get back home to get through all of these new titles.We look around some more and don't really find anything, so we call the driver and arrange for a pickup. This time we try to say "Humayan's Tomb" really clearly... he gets it just fine, so I'm not sure what happenned last time. Another 30-40 mintues to head back to near where we were when we started and he dropped us off at the tomb. We paid our entrance fee and headed inside. It's a pretty neat complex. Once of the best parts of is is that they haven't locked off all the stairways that allow you to get to the upper levels. So there is alot more exploring than you get at a lot of monuments. In the first tomb we entered we were on our way out when Rebecca hear a noise (it was really dark inside) and I listened and it sounded like a couple of asian girls talking. We investigated a little and realized they were coming down a stairway that was completely invisible in the darkness, and if they hadn't been coming down we would never have seen it. So we wouldn't have been able to climb up and see the upper deck of this building. We spent a bit of time there, it was really neat, and then Rebecca told me that this wasn't even the real tomb, it was just a side building that was a tomb for somebody else. I'm sure I took a picture of the explaination plaque. But I didn't read of of them because it was getting late in the day and the sun was going down and we wanted to see what we could see before it all closed.So we made it through the gate building and say the main tomb and I could totally see how this is kinda related to the Taj. I even tried to get a photo that was kinda like the classic Taj photo with the reflection in the water. The actual tomb building has like 2 generations of people in it or something, there are a LOT of tombs inside that building. We didn't get to see it all, just the main tomb for Humayun, his wife and children. The grounds were pretty nice, lots of wonderful birds again. I could totally see coming to this place with a bunch of people and just picnicing all day long... having a bunch of munchie food and some games and books and stuff, and you could run off and explore a building or corner of the grounds, then come back, eat and talk and chill, then head back out and explore some other part of the grounds. Defenitely on the list for our next trip.After the tomb, we went back and picked up Devika and she instructed the driver to head out to this place called Dilli Hat or something like that. I guess it is a craft bazaar that is trying to get representation from all the various states of India. You actually have to pay admission to get inside. But the place is kept up really well, with lights in the trees and clean walkways and even a little grass in places. There is a food court inside and dozens of vendors booths. We took our time in the first quarter of booths that we saw, then stopped for a bite to eat and Devika introduced us to some kashmiri foods, then we got back out shopping again. And then suddenly we realized the place was closing up. The scheduled close time was 10pm, but everybody started packing up at 9. So we kinda rushed through about a third, but the whole back section was closed by the time we got there. We found a couple of things for Rebecca, but I was mostly looking for some nice outfits for gifts. And every time I found something that I though looked nice, I'd ask the price and it would be super high and Devika would come along and ask some questions and she's explain that the one I picked out was aways like the best possible quality of silk, or the hand-woven loom stuff, or it used actual gold thread or whatever. Essentially my eyes kept picking out the highest quality stuff in the whole place. And that's one of the only problems with this little bazaar place. Is that you can have totally cheap lower-quality stuff right next to the rich-blood stuff and you don't really know what you're looking at. Well, I guess I never knew what I was looking at. I just felt like I kept wandering into the wrong stall. I had to tell more than one vendor "Your stuff is beautiful, but it's out of my price range" and if I'd known what kind of stall this was, I wouldn't have even wandered inside.We kinda ran out of things to look at as everybody was closed, so we made our way back to the driver and caught a ride home. We squared the bill with the company, making sure today's driver got a generous tip (partly for not feeding us to any lions) and a nice big tip for last week's driver as well.We didn't actually get that much done today, but it felt like a big day anyway. We had a pretty quick dinner then sat down with Devika and Bindu to plan out our last day in India. We really wanted to head up to north Delhi and see the Red Fort and Chandi Chowk (the oldest market in Delhi apparently). But we realized that our priorities consisted of getting the last bits of gifts that had eluded us for the whole trip so far. And it didn't look like we could do both. So we've got a couple more things that are going to need to wait for our next trip to Delhi. And we've got a plan for tomorrow. And with that, we both went downstairs to crash.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1230084000/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1230084000/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1230084000/tpod.html Sun, 28 Dec 2008 01:25:34 -0500 India!

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Delhi, India

Last Day in Delhi
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1229913000/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1229913000/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1229913000/tpod.html Sat, 27 Dec 2008 20:00:50 -0500 India!

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Delhi, India

Today was Devika's 21st birthday. Her parents organized a pretty big party for her up on the roof. I actually didn't even know there was a roof to this house. I mean, I knew there was a roof and all, but I didn't know there was a nice seating area up there with a view of the city all around it.Rebecca and I actually woke up pretty late. Probably the latest that we've slept in the whole trip. Too many days of 5am train rides or 3am trips to the airport. We got in kinda late last night, and we didn't have anything planned for today other than attending Devika's party. So we woke up late, went upstairs for a quick breakfast that turned into something quite a bit larger than we really needed. And just kinda killed time before the party.I went up a little early and kinda watched the caterer's setting everything up. I took a couple of pictures then I spotted one of those large raptor birds that I mentioned on one of our first days here. Then I looked around the 360 degree view I had of the city and I realized that these birds were everywhere! Not hundreds of them, but defenitely dozens within sight. There were also large flocks of pidgeons flying around, a handful of crows and then a couple of smaller sparrow-sized birds. I don't really know my birds, and I don't really consider myself a bird watcher. But there is something about the birds in India that I really like. I don't recall going to any parks in the Eugene... even in the summer time, when there is such a cachophony of birds flying around and making noise and crawling all over everything. And in the cities... it's really wierd now that I think about it. Why are there so many birds here within Delhi city limits? I've never seen that many birds flying over Eugene... or Portland... or Seattle... or any american city I've been in. In the movies you always see big flocks of pidgeons in central park in New York... or London. But the flocks of pidgeons I've seen here in Delhi, or in Jaipur, make even that largest New York flock look small. And raptors? forget about it... if you see a raptor in an american city, it's a big deal. But Delhi probably has hundred and hundreds of these large raptorous birds that are as of yet unidentified.And what's so cool about it is how alive it makes everything feel. If you can get up on top of the roof of some tall building in Portland or Seattle and look out, there is this kinda quiet serene feeling because you're up above the chaos of the traffic and pedestrians and hub-bub of city life. That feeling has it's own value, but if you really look out, I don't recall really seeing an airspace over the city that is teeming with life. You might see a bird here or there, and maybe a flock flying through. But here in Delhi you'd be hard pressed to look any direction without seeing half a dozen birds flying around. It's really pretty cool.Anyway, I watched the birds for awhile and tried to offer to assist, but the caterers are pros, and I'm no match for that. So I pretty much just stood around and watched. Eventually people started to congregate up there and lots of guests started appearing. Rebecca and I really didn't know anybody there except for Karan and Sonika who we stayed with last week. But we met lots of new people and got asked our story of how we came to be there lots of times, and kept telling and retelling it. But that's ok, it's how parties work when you're a bit of a stranger to everybody there.Eventually it was announced that the food was being served, it was a pretty nice buffet line that actually used live coals in the bottom of the buffet racks. That was the first time I've seen it done that way, and it definitely feels like everything is being kept very hot. They also had a live tandoor oven there, and I got to watch the guy run it for for awhile. Slapping dough between his hands a bunch of times and then slapping it to the inside wall of the tandoor. After he'd get dough stuck to the inside walls all the way around, he'd use this poker-hook thing and a long scaper to peel them off and toss them on a plate. He was pumping them out fast, and I though to how slowly it takes us to produce the naan bread at our Bollywood parties and I decided I should really look into getting a tandoor.At some point I asked somebody about it, I think it was Bindu, and she told me that tandoor ovens were dirt cheap here. Like 500 rupees. What??!! That's like $10 USD! So I expressed a lot of excitement at the idea and said "where can I get one?" She told me she would talk to the head caterer guy, who is Devika's uncle and ask him about it.The food was pretty good, and we ate a good fill. I spent a lot of time chatting with one of Devika's friends (or cousins?) who was going to school somewhere in southern england. So she had an accent unlike anybody else there, and she was also quite a wit. She kept making these funny observations and comments like some kind of britishh stand-up comedian. Actually, now that I think about it, she was kinda like a less intense version of Eddy Izzard. But she'd just gotten there after god know how many hours of flying, and they'd lost her luggage, so she was hammered by jet lag and wearing her mother's clothing to get by, so you could imagine just how cranky a person could be in such a situation, but she had quite a good humor about it. So I was pretty impressed by that.Eventually people started filing out and the wind picked up a little and started getting a bit of a chill on the roof. So we all filed back downstairs and kinda chilled for the rest of the day.Happy Birthday Devika!
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1230170400/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1230170400/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1230170400/tpod.html Thu, 25 Dec 2008 08:58:43 -0500 India!

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Seattle, Washington, United States

Hello everybody! I just wanted to make a quick post to let everybody know that we've made it through all of our flights back to the US safely. Only to land in one of the worst winter storms in the pacific northwest in quite awhile.We've been traveling for more than 24 hours straight. We got to the Delhi airport at 11:30 PM on the 23rd (local time) and waited around until 3:30AM for our flight. I gotta say that the international terminal in Delhi is strikingly different than the domestic terminal. The international terminal looks a lot like most of the other international airports we've been in, with gigantic duty-free shops selling overpriced crap (seriously, who is going to spend $2400 USD on a bottle of whiskey at an airport in Delhi?) and they have obviously worked hard at making the food stalls appear to be something that would appeal to a westerner on both taste and hygenic levels.We partially passed out time by watching the last half of a bollywood movie called "Jhoom Barabar Jhoom" which we've been told a dozen different times in a horrible movie, but it's got great music and I kinda wanted to see what it was about. We watched the first half at Devika's house before coming to the airport, and at that point, I was seriously thinking that this movie was just a big train wreck. But now I'm not so sure. I kinda want to write more about it, but I'm already kinda digressing, and it's just another reason why Rebecca and I should start a bollywood review blog.So after the four hours of waiting for the first flight, we had an eight hour flight to london. On this flight was the most significant security concern I've ever seen on a flight since 9/11 and the British Airways staff just blew it off like it was nothing. It really pissed me off actually, and I kinda want to write a letter to the London Times or whatever to let them know what a joke all this security bullshit is.Here is what happened. First off, I've gotta say that I've never seen such volumous amount of carry-on luggage as the two flights to and from India. I don't know what it is, but it's like every single Indian person was traveling with one of those gigantic carry-on bags, and they would have a second bag almost as large to count as their "purse or laptop" it was so absurd it was downright stupid. I really wish they would enforce the carry-on restrictions. And it's not like they were doing the whole "lets put everything on carry-on in case our luggage gets lost", because I watched these same people pull off the largest check-luggage I've ever seen as well. So anyway, the result of this absurd volume of carry-on baggage is that there is no room on the airplane for it. And every single one of them gets on and starts stressing about where they are going to put all their crap. And after all the overhead bins are starting to get full, people start getting snappy. They don't really bark at each other, but they definitely start tossing stuff around and reorganizing bins trying to make sure every square inch of space is absolutely crammed. This also stresses out the flight crew, so it would be better for everybody if they would just enforce the rules at the time of check-in.Ok, so that's the background situation. The security scare is that this one gentleman right in front of me had the flight crew come up and ask him if it was his carry-on in some room in the back of the plane. The stewardess came and told him he couldn't put it there, and this guy just played dumb. So a man came up to him and started asking him "How did you get in that room? Who let you into that room? Did you know it's a violation of federal law for a passenger to enter that room?" And that should have been the end of it in my opinion. As soon as he admitted putting in his stuff in this special room, they should have stopped the plane, escorted him and his luggage off the plane and done a thourough security check on both of them. But they didn't... this guy just say there playing dumb, like "Oh, I'm sorry" or "but it's too full up here". So this male flight-crew man actually personally took this guy's luggage and hauled it up to the first-class section and found some overhead bin up there and stashed it up there. And this dude just got to sit in his chair and watch the whole thing. At that point I was pretty upset because I wanted to ask the crew "who is this guy?" "Do you know his background" and specially "Did you even look inside the bag??" But they were freaking out trying to get everything else ready, so I let it slide.But then it gets even worse. Ok, this dude sitting in front of me, he was obviously trying to look like a Sikh, because he was wearing a turban. We've seen dozens and dozens of Sikhs on our plane and train flights in India these past couple of weeks. So that's nothing special. But after seeing all the Sikhs I've seen, I have noticed that most of them (if not all of them) are very meticulous about their turban. It is usually immaculated wrapped and folded and tucked. But sitting right behind this guy and I noticed that his turban was really quite sloppy. He had hair sticking out and the fabric kind of haphazardly wrapped, so it was wringled and blunging in places and not very even. So that was kinda suspicious by itself, but I let that slide too. But then, right as the captain announces "we've got 20 minutes until we land in London" I look forward and notice that this guy sitting in front of me as disappeared.... AND the fabric of his turban is lying crumpled up in his seat. Yeah, you could say that I was freaking out inside a little. Rebecca noticed me stressing out and I told her the whole story. So started scanning all the people that were still standing waiting for the restroom, and I realized the brilliance a person with ill intent starting the flight with a turban on. Because as soon as they take it off they are really hard to identify. I didn't see anybody I thought might have been this guy, so I made a mental note of where the emengency exits were, and I scanned around real quick to see if I could spot any large imposing men that might be recruited if there was going to be an issue on the plane, and I was about the hop up and alert the flight crew to this whole suspiciousness, and then the dude came out of the bathroom and sat back in his seat. He had short hair (Siks are supposed to keep their hair long) and looked very average. Nothing really looked out of sort and we were just about to land, so I sat to see what would happen, and it was a normal landing like any other....Except... we were a little ahead of schedule, so the plane before us in our stall wasn't done yet, so we had to wait on the tarmac, not moving, for about half an hour. These old ladies were trying to get up and go use the bathroom, but as soon as they stood up and flight crew would rush over and force them to sit back down again. It was absolutely stupid!! They frreak out about the security concerns of a little old lady wanting to use the lieu, but this other guy that had all the signs of something really serious and they ignored it. Just infuriating. So anyway, we landed and what was noon for our internal clocks was just approaching breakfast time for Londonites. So we found this cafe at Heathrow and I tried my hand at a big english breakfast. Wooo... that was interesting. I definitely like their bacon better... but red beans with breakfast? It'll take me a while to get used to that one.We wandered around the infamous teminal 5, trying not to get completely nauseated every time we walked past the overpowering perfume counters. And we actually found this odd play structure thing for kids at one end (see the pictures). It was like a big 12ftx12ft squishy pad with different shapes on top of it. There weren't any kids around, so Rebecca says "I want to sit on it" so she did. There were these wavy sections on the other side that looked perfect for laying on, so we went over to that side and promptly fell asleep. It was actually quite comfortable (more comfortable that some of the beds we've slept on this trip) and we think more airports should have these play structures at every gate.After we got situated, the two scandinavian guys that were sitting on this thing kinda stretched out like they were going to nap as well, along with an asian woman at the other end, so all together there were about 5 people napping on this thing. About an hour later, I woke up and there were people sitting in most of the seats surrounding this thing, because it looked like a plane was getting ready to fly out of this gate. And there were also about 7 or 8 little tikes running around jumping up and down on the side we weren't napping on. So without a word, we all kinda hopped up, gathered our things and went out seperate directions.We went back to the giraffe cafe for lunch and I was really hungry to get a hamburger (You can't get beef in India). So we both tried their burger and it was probably the dryest, most boring tasting burger I've ever had in my life. They tried really hard, it had a fancy poppy seed bun and onions and all the trimmings, but for one, I forgot they don't have tillamook cheese in England, so their cheddar was pretty boring, and the whole combination of flavors was just kinda meh. I totally would recommend against trying the burgers at Heathrow.After our 7 hour layover in Terminal 5, we finally got on our plane for Seattle. That flight was about 9.5 hours, and when we flew over Greenland, the ground was actually visible, and Rebecca spotted giant cracks in the ice at one point. They must have been like 60 or 80 miles long. That was kinda cool. The flight continued over northern Canada and as we approached Seattle, the turbulence started up and continued pretty consistently until we hit the ground. It was interesting approaching Seattle in the middle of the day when everything was under a sheet of snow. That was kinda cool also, but as we shot down the runway, seeing all the icy and slushy tracks through the snow kinda hammered home just how harrowing it must be to land a plane in frozen conditions.Off the plane, collected baggage in one of the stupidest baggage handling systems I've seen yet. And then we got a ride from out hotel. Now the big mystery was whether my car was going to work after being in a deep freeze for the past week. I took the ice bucket from our hotel room, put on tons of layers (remember I packed for warm weather, not this sub-zero stuff) and headed out to the car. It took about 45 mintues to scoop off the 8 inches of snow accumulated on my car. And when I checked the radiator water, it was still liquid, so much celebration there. The car actually started right up and was fully functional, so it looks like Rebecca and I will be braving I-5 tomorrow to get her to the Portland airport so she can fly back out to visit her family in Florida.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1229826600/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1229826600/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1229826600/tpod.html Tue, 23 Dec 2008 07:34:49 -0500 India!

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Amritsar, Punjab, India

I knew we didn't have that much time today before our flight leaves back to Delhi. So I kinda wanted to get an early start, but Rebecca is still dealing with all sorts of uncomfortableness. She was downright miserable last night when we were walking around the Golden Temple, but she stuck it out because she knew I wanted to be there.I originally set the alarm for pretty early, thinking I could run over to Jallianwala Bagh when it first opened, before it became overloaded with tourists. But around 4am, the city started to wake and there were all the horns and people yelling, and pidgeons making a racket outside our window, so I decided to just let Rebecca get her rest (I knew I'd wake her up if I got up). So we woke up around 9am instead... took a little while to get moving, then called room service and asked them to deliver some toast, corn flakes, and an extra serving of milk so Rebecca could eat the muesli she's fallen in love with here.Room service eventually shows up, and there is a huge pile of toast, like 4 slices per person. And a gigantic bowl that looks like it's got half a box of corn flakes in it. Then Rebecca notices that the milk is warm. Not just warm, but so hot you can barely pick up the glass it's in. Oh great, hot milk and corn flakes... not my idea of a tasty breakfast. I ask Rebecca to mix in some of her muesli and that makes it all a little more palatable, but I'm already looking forward to a real lunch later. I'm not exactly sure why the milk is so frequently warmed here for breakfast. It's like the default... if you are having any kind of cereal, the milk has got to be hot. Oh well, it works out for people like Rebecca who find warm cereals yummy.After breakfast, we walk the 3 blocks to Jallianwala Bagh. For those that don't know, Jallianwala Bagh is a place where a british general by the name of Dyer, marched in on a peachful, non-violent gathering and ordered his troups to open fire without warning. There were more than a thousand people gathered in the courtyard, but one of the most brutal parts of the story is that the courtyard only had one entrance and exit. And the british troops had taken up position blocking the exit. There is a pretty large well in the area, so lots of people jumped into the well in order to avoid the bullets. They pulled out about 250 dead bodies out of the well after it was all over. There are also several walls around the area that are riddled with bullet holes, and aside from putting little whtie boxes around each hole, they have left the walls as they were when it happened. For the rest of the grounds, they have created a garden with green grass and flowers, and they have build a large eliptical monument in the center of the courtyard. They've done a very good job with the place.On our way out, Rebecca and I got approached by a group of young Indian men that wanted to take a picture with us. We consented and they started snapping pictures. One then another then another. It kept going on and on and a crowd actually started growing, including what looked like a large group of girls from a school, as they were all in a uniform of some sort. Rebecca finally started getting uncomfortable with the whole thing because it looked like it wasn't gonig to stop, and she didn't want to become a spectacle is this place that should have a certain amount of reverence to it. In this whole trip to Amritsar we haven't actually seen that many westerners. A handful in and around the golden temple (which is only like 2 blocks away), but aside from that and our hotel, hardly any. So I'm not sure if we were a sudden interest because we were white-skinned, or because we were white-skinned inside Jalianwala Bagh. Because we were defenitely the only westerners we saw inside. In fact, as soon as we walked inside, we got approached by three Sikh men that seemed very stern and serious and they started asking us questions. Unfortunately non of them spoke english, and we didn't hear any of the limited Hindi that we understand, so there was a total communication failure. They did mange to get out the world "country" and we said "US... America" and they also got out "engrishh?" and we said "Yes". But I don't know if they were asking about our language or our nationality. It was slightly unfomfortable because we didn't want to offend anybody, but I also really wanted to walk around this place and see it with my own eyes.After that, we headed back to the golden temple, because we realized we didn't get any pictures with us in them when we were there last night. So I at least wanted to get a picture with me in front of the golden temple before we left. So we went back, and turned in our shoes and washed our hands and feet and I bought a little black kerchief to cover my head. And we went inside and took some photos. This whole morning has been drizzling and rainy... so seeing Jalianwala Bagh in the rain with an overcast depressing sky kind of added to it a little. And seeing the golden temple with rain falling on the pool was also somewhat neat. I'd like to see it in bright sunlight someday, but that wasn't today. We got our photos and walked around the outside. I'd read that there was a museum of Sikh history in there somewhere, but I didn't write down where it was, and we couldn't find it, so we just finshed up, got our shoes and left.We were starting to get hungry, and Rebecca suggested that we do something inside so we can stay dry and warm. So the lonely planet said the fanciest restaurant in Amritsar is this place called the Crystal, and we found out there was a theater just down the street from it, so we decided we'd see a Bollywood movie while in India!We take a tuk tuk to the Crystal, and hop out to be faced with 2 restraunts right next to each other, both of them are named the crystal. The tuk tuk driver motioned to the right one, and it had a sign in front that said something like "there is only one crystal and it's on the ground floor" so we went in there. So somebody obvioiusly read the lonely planet and decided there was an oppourtunity there to catch guillable tourists and they built a different restaurant named The Crystal right next to the first one. It's kinda sad, really. Anyway, we go inside the right one (literally) and order some pasta for lunch. Like a fettucini alfredo from Rebecca and something kinda similar but loaded with all sorts of green and red peppers. And with the pasta, we got a couple orders of garlic naan. It was all very yummy. The food took quite a while to get to us, so we thought we might actually miss the start of the movie. But when we finished up, it was only 1:30, so we decided to try to make it anyway. We took the tuk tuk (ha!) over to the theater and had a bit of confustion getting tickets.... I said "one ticket please" and he says "one hundred" so then I say "I mean two tickets" and he says "three hundred"... and I say "No, I only want 2 tickets" and he nods his head and says "three hundred". WTF?? I decide not to make and scene and just give him the money and he hands me three tickets. Ah... just as I suspected. But whatever... gotta roll with the flow when you haven't taken the time to get fluent in the local language. So after that we go inside, and it looks like only balcolny seats are left. So we walk into absolute pitch blackness, along with dozens of other people... and we figure out we're just supposed to find a seat, any seat. Ok, that's not so hard, just like a US theater. Accept there is no lighting whatsoever. People are using their cell phones to cast enough light to find a seat for themselves and their girlfriend or whatever. The movie has already started, and it is absolutely the worst picture quality I've seen in a theater probably in my entire life. Flickering light that seems barely enough to make it to the screen... all the whites are actually a kind of dirty beige color. All the bright colors are noticibly dimmer, and there are several points in the movie when the light of the projector flicks off entirely for a fraction of a second and then pops back on a little brighter than before. I'm really curious what kind of technology they are using for projection, because it seems like it's antique.We finally pick a seat, and the seats are as comfortable of church pews circa 1940. That is to say straight-backed wood with worn off padding on the seat. And not enough leg room in front for my legs to exist in any position other than painfully rammed against the seat in front of me. I actually shove my fleece down between my knees and the sharp back of the seat in front to get a slight bit of comfort. People continually pile in through the doors, even though the movie started 10 mintues ago. And they are all talking in their outside voices and shouting at people on their cell phones and making a general ruckus. There were a couple of doormen trying to help peopple find seats, but it was mostly making sure that every possible seat had an ass sitting in it. At one point it gets hard to tell where the empty seats are, so this one doorman guy hits a switch and a old single light bulb crudely wired up to something in the wall. It looked totally sketch! Like a couple of stray somethngs could hit the wires, cause a spark and the whole place would burn to the ground. That's when I realized if there was anything of the sort in this place, we were totally screwed. I don't think there is any getting out of an Indian cinema once the movie has started. Rebecca noted the irony that they only turn on the light to make things easier 10 minutes into the movie.Anyway, there were lots of shifting and stepping over seats and people chattering back and forth. About 15 minutes into the movie, people finally started calming down, and then the ticket collector showed up!! And he walks up and down every row getting a ticket from each person in a seat. There is a lot of chatting and yelling as he gets tickets from every seat. We actually got very lucky that he walked down the row right in front of us and would just lean over people to get tickets from our row, because there was no way a person could walk by me with my legs so forcefully wedged into place. After he was done, there was a dull murmor throughout our sectionas people were texting their friends, chirping ringtones all over, and oh my god... the krinkling of plastic wrappers! Imagine 5,000 crisp plastic wrappers all krinkling simultaneously and you'll get an idea of what the first half hour of this movie sounded like. It was pretty humorous in it's absurdity.The movie we went to go see is called Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi. No idea what that means except it's somthing about dancing. And I wont give away any of the plot, but it's pretty cute, and we'll most likely share it with everybody on one of the upcoming Bollywood nights. Remember there are no subtitles here, so we kinda had to figure out everything from context. It wasn't actually that hard. Every once and awhile Rebecca and I would turn to each other and suggest our intepretation... like "This is the part where the parent makes a dying wish" or something like that. We've seen enough of them to know some of the formula elements, which are defenitely there in this one, But there is also enough new stuff to make it fun.After the movie, we went back to the hotel and asked about local shopping. We were going to go to botique shop of the hotel guy's sister... but she was at the cinema watching a movie. So we just walked around old town, didn't really find anything interesting, so we just hung out the last hour or so until it was time for our flight. We had a very nice ride to the airport and chatted a bunch with the hotel guy (I'm pretty sure his name was Bunty, just like Devika's dad). And we were told that Amritsar is actually one of the cheapest places to live in all of India. We'd have to think about it pretty hard before choosing to live here, but I could see it being a potential on the list if we were to move to India. There is something about it that is nice and homey.Our flight back to Delhi was very smooth, we were even 30 min ahead of schedule. But once we got to the airport, we had to wait more than an hour for our taxi to find us. The driver didn't speak any english, so we asked a local security guy to talk to him and explain where we were. So that resulted in lots and LOTS of talking and shouting and whatever else, but no progress. Rebecca and kept laughing at the absurdity of it because it didn't seem like there was that much to say to get it right, but there were probably 20 calls over the course of an hour and I don't even know how much time was spent talking and the guy was still lost. In the end, we actually got the taxi driver talking to a security underling that was very different in the way he talked to the guy. And when they started the conversation, Rebecca and I both said "Domestic Terminal!" which the guy repeated. Then it was like 10 more seconds on the phone and we were told the taxi guy had been at the international terminal this whole time. And Rebecca and I was like WTF??? why wasn't that the first question that everybody asked when talking to this guy??I've kinda got this theory that communication is just different here in India. There have been a couple of occasions when we ask a local to help us communicate something, and there are lots and LOTS of words being said, and the conversation goes on for a long time, and then they will turn to us and say 3 words, maybe 4, to communicate what was just said. I don't know what they are talking about. But from the outside, it seems pretty funny sometimes.We eventually got our taxi and made it home, paid too much... but we decided that was ok, because both the taxi driver and us both got screwed because of this misunderstanding. We came inside, had a little bit to eat and went downstairs to bed.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1229740200/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1229740200/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1229740200/tpod.html Tue, 23 Dec 2008 06:40:29 -0500 India!

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Amritsar, Punjab, India

Ok, so we got up this morning hoping for a better day than yesterday. The travel agent worked very hard to help us reschedule our flight to Amritsar and we were going to try again this afternoon.The morning is fairly uneventful. A nice breakfast with tea and lots of amazing toast. Devika appears to be a little under the weather. Nothing horrible yet, just general fatigue and congestion. We chat for a bit and then go downstairs and repack out traveling bags for only a single overnight trip.I spend a little time blogging, processing photos and I check in with work while Rebecca does some reading or something.The time to leave has come, we've got to leave like 3 or 4 hours before our flight in order to make it the 20-odd miles across town to the airport. So we make it there with a little time to spare. And we walk in the first door and there is this giant gorgeous waiting room.... lots of semi-comfortable seats that are actually movable. And they don't have integrated arrms!! So you could concievably lay across them if you needed to. And not only that, but there is a giant jumbotron screen at the end of the room that is showing the animal planet channel. And every couple of mintues it shows this nice overlay of which flights are pending, and their status (like security checking now, or boarding, etc). And we look at each other and say "Where was this room yesterday?!?!"Anyway, we wait for about half an hour before our flight moves to the "Security Check" status, and we go through all of that quite smoothly, wait a little while and get on our flight.The trip to Amritsar is quite quick, maybe an hour, maybe 90 minutes. I love short flights!We get off and get in touch with the guy from the hotel. We meet up with him and walk out of the airport that looks like it's in all forms of construction. Then I see a sign that says "Amritsar International Airport" and I think "This is an international airport??" I mention that to the hotel guy and he's leading us to the car and he says that they were only granted the license or whatever to open an international airport like a year ago. And they bought up all the land around the place and they were building and building and expanding into a giant new terminal with a giant welded metal overhang high above the parking area. I think it's really gonig to be quite impressive and nice once it's done. But right now there is a lot of plywood and mud.We're driven across town and it becomes apparent right away why some people think of Amritsar as a dirtly little city. It just seems lots more compact that any place we've been too thus far. I know that Delhi has a population of a zillion, and I know it's really cramped in places, but there is an actual feeling of openess to it much moreso than Amritsar. Every street in Amritsar feels dark, of course maybe part of that is that the weather was overcast, but I don't think that's it. It has that feeling like you see in movies sometimes, or maybe more in comics or aniime... almost like they buildings are wider at the top than they are at the bottom, and they squeeze together 3 or 4 stories up and don't let the sunlight in. I really don't know how it works, but the place just feels compressed. Not that that's a terrible thing, I got the feeling that it's got it's own eb and flow to the way things work, it would just take some getting used to in order to stay there for a prolonged period of time.We get to the hotel, and we're being shown to our room by the sme guy that met us at the airport, who is the owner's son. And we find out the hotel is actually his old residence... he even said "like... I was born right here" So that made it kinda neat. The rooms are really quite spacious, the vews out the window aren't so great, but that's not their fault. It's a very nice little place with amazingly helpful people. And it's withing walking distance of both the Golden Temple (about 1 block away) and Jalianwalla Bagh (about 3 blocks away).So we get all settled, then go downstairs to ask for help pin finding this restaurant that the Lonely Planet recommended. Some place called Sukrit, which is supposed to have amazing tandoori chicken. So we get a car over to where that restaurant is... which is in Nehru shopping mall in the newer portion of town. And have a pretty nice dinner. The tandoori chicken is very tasty, but even on medium spicy, it can kick your ass. Rebecca ordered a raita after the first couple of bites to help cool it down (worked very well), and we got ice cream for dessert, which also cooled us off just fine.After diner we just decided to walk along the streets and look at all the shops and see what we coule find. The couple of shops that looked good to me, which had formal sarees and stuff in the windows, Rebecca nixed because she said they looked too expensive. She was probably right. But we found a little grocery store that had some of our favorite indian cookies and Rebecca actualy found some colorful hand towels that she loved.But the real striking thing that caught us both off guard... is that there were no beggars. Nobody was looking for handouts, nobody was getting in our face trying to hock their wares, and if we did go into a shop, we were treated just like everybody else. And we both suddenly realized that while Amritsar seems a little rough around the edges to look at, we were both quite enjoying it because it allowed us to explore an Indian city and the Indian way of life without being stalked like walking money bags. So that part of the trip was quite nice.We actually had a difficult time finding a cab or a tuk tuk to get back to the hotel. So we went back to the restaurant and asked them for help. They were happy to help and walked us out and found a tuk tuk for us and explained where we needed to go and we hopped in for the ride.Once back at the hotel, we decided to walk over and visit the golden temple. It was already dark by this point, so we didn't know how it was going to work. It was easy to find, and we came up to one walkway and our first glimpse of it was pretty impressive. But it's a holy place, and you need to check in your shoes like you do at a bowling alley. Then you need to wash you hands and feet. They even make the foot washing easy by having these little troughs build into the walkway before you get to the holy place. And they run lukewarm water through the troughs 24/7 365 days per year. So you check in your shoes and socks, and get a head covering in these little buckets filled with kerchiefs that you take when you need one and put it back when you leave. And then you walk up to one of these little troughs and wade through it (they are only like 2 inches deep) and that's enough to be considered clean and respectful. Then you can go inside.Inside is like a giant marbel courtyard with inlay work everywhere. And a giant square pool in the middle that is considered to contain holy water. Then at one side of the pool there is a walkway to a little island in the middle and that is where the golden temple is. And inside the temple (during the day) is the original Sikh holy book. The Guru Granth Sahib. So we went through all the lines, and walked to the island and passed through the room with the book, and the people singing holy songs over it (they do that 24/7 as well) It was pretty neat, and seeing it all at night was kinda special too.We were just about to leave when a very nice Sikh gentleman walked up to us and asked where we were from and all that. And then informed us that there was gonig to be a closing ceremony in about 15-20 minutes. Where they would fetch a golden chariot, and dress it all up and then carry it out to the temple and get the holy book, then take it back to the place where it sleeps for the night. So we stuck around for that, which was quite a spectacle (I got some videos I'll try to post soon) And after all that, we went back to our room to turn in for the night.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1229565600/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1229565600/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/kirby/2/1229565600/tpod.html Sun, 21 Dec 2008 12:22:50 -0500 India!

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Jaipur, Rajasthan, India

We woke up this morning and got all our stuff packed because we've moving over to the other hotel today. The owner of Hotel Pearl Palace put our names at the top of the wait list, and somebody checked out early this morning and we got the call that a room was open. And it was one of the larger family rooms too, which means that there are 4 beds that can either stay seperate, or be pushed together to form 2 king size beds in the room.So we go down for breakfast at the little cafe attached to Arya Niwas... it was a pretty good meal. You get a voucher worth something like 250 rupees when you check in, and we packed out table with food, and didn't even come close to spending our full 250 per person. After that, we packed all our stuff into Dev's car and pay the bill at Arya Niwas, drive across town a little ways and checkin to the Hotel Pearl Palace.After getting all situated, we head back out and Dev takes us up to the old fort in Jaipur. I think it's called the Amber fort. And if I understood our guide right, it's not because of it's color, but because of the the old name of the city kinda sounds like Amber. I'm sure you could google it and find out. Anyway, Dev hands us off to another tour guide. Both of the guides he's handed us off two have been quite good, knowing alot about what they were showing, able to answer questions and interact with us on a good level. We hooked up at the bottom of the hill, took a couple of pictures you can see in the pictures section on this page. And then they asked us if we wanted to go up the fort by rented car, shared jeep, walking or elephant. Rebecca perked up at elephant and said that was what she wanted to do. But then we were told it was hot, smelly, and slow moving, so you get acosted by peopleing trying to sell stuff constantly. So we asked Dev to drive us up in his car, which was nice because we got the AC for a little while longer and we made it right to the door pretty quick... within 5 min I think. They told us the elephant ride is closer to 20min, and going by foot could be 40 minutes. Anyway, the amber fort overlooks a little city that is actualy outside of Jaipur, and it was the original capital of Rajasthan. So it's called the old city. It was the original city that the mughal emporer sat in and ruled from. Jaipur, the pink city, was build later and it was build mostly for the British.So we got a nice tour of this old fort which was one again a mix of muslim and hindu architectures. We actually saw a bunch of people from the wedding there. They had taken an early bus from Delhi to Jaipur that morning and were going through a bunch of tourist spots. We chatted with them a bit then moved on. We later found out this was the same emporer as we saw represented at Fetehpur Sikri, which we saw last week outside of Agra, so that was really pretty cool seeing all these ancient structured being connected by a common story that we'd also seen a little of in the movie "Jodha Akbar." Granted, the movie isn't know for being very historically accurate, but I'd saw it's a pretty good little introduction to the subject matter. So seeing this dramatized version of this ancient story, and then seeing the ancient buildings where some of the story takes place is pretty darn cool. At the tail end of the tour we actually saw a courtyard where part of the movie was filmed (or at least that's what the guide told us).Towards the tail end of the tour, the guide starts telling us about how all the artisans in this old city essentialy don't get any respect and all their wares just get bought up, hauled into jaipur proper, and sold at huge markups. This guy was outstanding otherwise, but towards the end he started feeling us these lines that seemed canned and kinda outside the normal level of his dialouge thus far. As we were walking out of the fort, we passed all these vendor stalls trying to sell stuff, but he didn't pressure us into any of these places, so I thought it was all fine. Then we got back in the car and we both thought the tour was done, so we were going to pay the guy, but then he says his tour isn't done and to wait a bit. And then they take us right into the den of the wolves. This big multi-level building full of like 10 different departments with every time of wares you can imagine, block-printed textiles, hand-woven carpets, marble figurines, metal sculptures, silk paintings, jewelry, leather shoes, and on and on and on. All this crap and a million high-pressure sales men scouring every square inch of the place. This one guy kept suggesting other departments to go to and Rebecca kept saying "sure" for some reason. I managed to get into the wall hanging section, because I've kind got this vision for a little piece of bare wall in our living room, and it could have been done pretty cheaply. But as soon as I told Rebecca what I was thinking she immediately starting expressing her distain for the idea saying it was tacky and ugly. So I had to change my plan at the last minute and find something she would also find appealing, which ended up putting me in the realm of getting something far FAR more expensive than what I wanted. I got it anyway, and then I immediately started kicking myself... and then I was surrounded by and endless stream of these high pressure assholes trying to get the rich american to empty his pockets in any way they could. And in my head it started going around and around on how dehumanizing the whole sitation is.... I mean I was suddenly looking at this situation like there are so SO many of these people that just have an endless sequence of scam-phrases that they've learned over the years which ones work of the guillable tourists. I mean, they don't give a damn about us as human beings... like what kind of impact buying a $500 rug is going to have on my life. They just want you to walk on it and touch it, and have their men unroll dozens of them so you feel guilty for having them go through so much effort to show whatever it is... and if you start turning them down they've got all these little verbal and non-verbal acts they go through trying to push buttons... and all they want is for you to make an impulse buy... and uninformed purchase for something that you may or may not need... they don't care. They just want you to open your money belt and poor it all out. Oh!! And the lies!!! The gigantic pack of lies!! The neverending stream of bullshit pouring out of their mouths in everything they would say. Like "buying here will benefit the local artist when buying in town will not" when the price, selection and quality is almost exactly the same as what we saw yesterday. Or this other one "look at that stamp on the wall, that means the goverment of rajisthan has given us a seal of authenticity" or some BS like that. or "this is the finest quality in all the world" it just went on and on. And I broke. I so completely snapped inside it was ugly. Rebecca just kept wanting to go on and on, and I eventually just walked out in a huff. Then some guy comes out to get me saying that the miss wants to talk to me and I go inside and Rebecca wants my opinion on a pair of leather jhutis that I'm 100% sure are probably 20 times they price they should be. And I'm pissed and all hell.... I wanted to grab them out of her hands and throw them right in the face of the salesman standing next to her. I even imagined doing it in my head. But I don't believe in violence, so I tried to calmly tell her that I'm not in any position to offer an opinion right now. And then.... and then some idiot from the store gets in my face trying to sell me overpriced mens shoes... and it's not like it was a first, I'd already said "No" to this guy 5 times already. And it hit me even harder.... the lack of respect is so severe that they won't accept a single "No"... they won't even listen to you when you tell them "No" to their face 4 or 5 or 6 times... they will keep doing whatever they can until you empty your pockets for them. So I was already on edge and I blew up at this guy, I shouted "NO!" into his face and I think everybody in the room stopped and looked at me. I walked back outside, and there was no way I was going back inside, I didn't care how much Rebecca wanted a stupid pair of shoes.I guess Rebecca got the hint, and came out shortly, and we got in the car. The guide for the fort told us his job was done now (I guess he's not don't until he pawns you off onto the professional con-artists) and he said "Are you happy with my services" and I said "Up until this last part, yes" and I gave him a tip that was half or a third as much as we had planned on giving him. He was great, and if he'd just let us go, we would have been very generous with out tipping for providing such an excellent tour. But holding on until we got dumped into the den of wolves and I was pissed, and not feeling very generous. I'd just been scammed and I knew it... AND the situation broke me and caused me to get angry, which I don't like to do. Understand, I realize that getting agry is still my choice and you can't really blame other people for that choice, so I know that. Which of course made it all the worse, because I'd read about all this before and I should have known better, but I just made a bad decision by agreeing to walk into this place. But I did, and I gotta face the consequences for that one.Anyway, we got in the car and I was in a mood. My quiet, mood which means I'm really chewing on stuff up in my head. And Rebecca and Dev made plans for lunch of some little food place in Jaipur. I'm honestly not hungry at this point, so I told them do whatever they want. So he takes us to this little place on some road in Jaipur. I got a picture of it somewhere, it's pretty sketch looking, but we saw little signs all over that they were trying to be sanitary, and there acttually lots of westerners eating there, which is always a good sign. I just sit there waiting for Rebecca's thali to come, and she's sweet and ordered a couple of Naan for me. When it finally comes I break off a little and nibble on it. It's actualy some of the best naan I've had on the trip, crispy on the bottom, chewy on top. I didn't think I was ready to talk yet, but I try to explain to Rebecca why the last hour has gotten to me so much. I'm not sure she understood, but she was loving and attentive anyway, so it doesn't really matteer. She's really something special and I'm so incredibly lucky to have her at my side.Rebecca wasn't done shopping for the day, and she wanted to find a bag in this style that she's seen last night. So Dev took her to some textile place and I refused to go inside. I was a little better, but I know much more of being looked at like nothing more than a walking money belt would probably set me off again. So I just sat in the car while Dev took her inside, and there were actually ruins right across the alleyway with a bunch of birds flying around. Just sitting and watching the birds nice. But then Dev came back out and tried to ask me about what was up, which I dodged. And we actually got to talking about the tourism business, and meeting people from all over the world, and all the jobs we've had. I can't compare to him at all.. he talked about being a bicycle rickshaw driver (which he said was a very wierd world... like the wierdest thing he'd done) and a job cleaning dishes in the restaurant, and all sorts of other jobs. He said he'd had "so many jobs! but I've never done the begging or the thieving" and that pretty much summed up Dev right there. He honestly cares that his clients have a good time and end the tour with a smile on their face, and you pay him whatever you think the tour was worth. I'd honestly recommend this guy to anybody going to Jaipur or anywhere in Rajasthan actually... and just know that because you stop someplace, that doesn't mean you need to go inside... and if you do go inside, that doesn't mean you need to actually buy anything. Give your money to the people who have earned it. As soon as you feel pressure for a sale, just walk away. Otherwise you'll have buyers remorse immediately and that could have a negative impact on the memory of your trip. And nobody wants that.Dev and I sat talking for awhile why Rebecca shopped, and while I was sitting there, it dawned on me that this is what I really want in my trips... a human connected, a sharring of stories and experiences. That's is what is important to me, and it's one of the reasons this trip to India has been so AMAZING. Because Rebecca and I haven't hardly been isolated (like we were in China) at all. We've been in and around people the whole time, and there are conversations going on all the time about people and places and politics and economy and movies and personal histories and preferences and just whatever. And it's all been simply fantastic. Sure we're picking up some touristy things to take back home and either add to our wardrobe or hang on the wall. But that's not why we're here... we're here to meet people and experience the Indian way of life, and we've seen SO many facets of indian life while we've been here. It's really something else.After Rebecca's shopping, we went back to the hotel to relax. Rebecca crashed and I wandered around and took pictures for awhile. I just sat on the scenic viewpoint on the roof for awhile breathing the lightly poluted air, listening to the birds and watching the kites. It wasn't a kite festival, but the evening wind was up and in Rajasthan there is something about flying these cheap little paper kites. So it was all very wonderful and good for my soul. Then I went back to the room to do some computer stuff and rest before we went out to see Chokhi Dhani.Chokhi Dhani (google it for more info, they've got a web site) is a like a little theme park. The theme is old rajasthani villiage. So there is a place to eat food like they did in the olden days... on plates and bowls made of pressed leaves (see the pictures), and there are stages all over the place with Rajasthani girls dancing, and a marionette show and there are elephant rides and camel rides and ox carts rides. And a little cave/tunnel thing to walk through, and an imitation villiage with mud huts and people dancing around fires and stuff. Then there is this wierd waterfall thing with a loudspeaker playing dinosaur sounds from the Jurassic park movie, and a big Tyranosaur sculpture made of carved wood I think. I'm not sure what all that is about, but all the performances are pretty good, and the whole setup and style of everything is really pretty spectacular. I highly recommend this for anybody going to Jaipur. The web site makes it look like they have lodging there too, but I'd have to look into that more to see if it's a good deal or whatever. We spend about 3 hours there, I didn't take many photos, mostly videos, which take a little longer to process and post. But I'll get something up eventually.After Chokhi Dhanhi, it was pretty late, so we rode back to the hotel to get out 3 hours of sleep before needing to get up and be at the airport to fly to Amritsar tomorrow.
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Gurgaon, Haryana, India

Videos from the Mehendi ceremony
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Jaipur, Rajasthan, India

Early rise, stomach still fine, cab a little earlySavita makes a nice breakfast5 min into cab ride to train station we realize we forgot the lonely planet, no time to go back. Hope for the best.Get to the train station looks totally sketch... dark, forboding, and not that populated. Like scary looking. We get cell phones ready to make emergency calls and go inside. We pass through a dark room with shadowy figures along the walls and pass out the other side onto the actual train platform. On the platform, most of the people were in business suits with briefcases, no beggars, and a smaller number of kids in school uniform... (do they take the train?)Stand in dark for about 10 min before power comes on. Once the lights are on, everything looks quite nice actually. We wander around while the sun rises. Train 10 min late, we hop on the carriage we think is ours... but two guys in the seats on our tickets. Are we on the right car or not? Just take two empty seats. Me in the middle of a big indian family, father and 8yr daughter on right side of isle, mother with 3yr daughter on left side. The father tells the wife to move over so I end up with an empty seat next to me. Rebecca takes isle seat one row back. Both of us on isle, so consequently the train ride was cheap, but not very scenic.Smaller girl gets a little restless a short while into trip. I fold up a corner of hindi newspaper and make an origami lotus blossom for her. She is shy at first, but her mother encourages her to take it. I think it might have lasted a full minute before being torn apart. Youngest girl moves around between seats (more family up a couple of rows) and eventually ends up with 8yr sister, both kinda restless now. So I pull out the archos, and put on some bollywood music clips and hand it to the father. They get all excited and start singing along to a Jab We Met song. It was really cute. For some reason after about 10 mintues, the father packs it all up and hands it back to me. I don't want to argue. He obviously had a good time with it because he was smiling big and giggled a couple of times while it was happening, but whatever. I think about how respect and graciousness are pretty universal, even across language barriers (the parents didn't speak any english, I think two of the kids knew a little bit)Get to station, called by Dev, our cab driver referred to us by the driver we had in Agra. He had a sheet of paper with Rebecca's name and "from Delhi" on it he was holding up in the window of the station as we left. We walked outside and he took us to his car. His car was very clean and new looking, it was a very comfortable ride, and it was a very secure and friendly experience.Dev (pronounced "Dave") suggested another hotel, pearl palace, it was booked, yet another that was a heritage hotel... we stopped by to take a look. The grounds were ok, the room was pretty nice, the bathroom was actually pretty exquisite. But not wanting to be conned, we wanted to actually see the place where we reserved a room. So we went there, saw the room, not so impressive, but it had wifi, which is kinda important for work, so we stuck with this place. Dropped our stuff off, realize that we don't have any of our traveller's checks because I left them at Bindu's for security (doh!) minor freak out, then realize we can use an ATM... But Rebecca is missing her debit card (double-doh!) but I've got mine (yay). We've still got a small pile of rupees, and a small pile of USD, so we figure we can manage. We got out and ask Dev to take us to an ATM, and he actually pulls out a big wad of bills and says "You have no money? I give you money, we go to ATM later and you pay me back then" WTF? Our cab driver is giving US money in the back of his cab... this is totally backwards! took us to pizza hut (which is a sit-down place with waiters in India), Rebecca not feeling so hot. We ate chicken tandoori pizza, which was quite yummy. Rebecca's half was essentially chicken and pineapple, which agreed with her. Overall it was very nice.Took us to gates of pink city, explained what that was all about. Then to a ancient astronomy/museum site and handed us off to a official tour guide. The tour guide was VERY helpful, explained much of the astronomy that we wouldn't have understood otherwise. The large sundial in this place is accurate to within 2 seconds. We checked the various instruments a couple of times during our tour and they were all right on... within seconds every time.then maharaja museum - kinda neat, but kinda mehDev takes us to textile place. Their prices are a little high. There is one shawl there I fall in love with, but it's $40, and Rebecca keeps asking me what am I going to do with it? I can't find a good answer, so I let it go.back to hotel for nap, Rebecca still not doing to well. She crashes hard, we both nap for about 2 hours, then go back out for dinner.Get in car for dinner and there is another guy there, I'm thinking "this is it, we're gonna get mugged" but no, he's just a cousin getting a ride to pickup a car from the mechanic. I kept expecting this guy (Dev) to throw us some kind of curveball, but he keeps being totally legit. We are totally recommending him to all of our friends, we'll post contact info at some point. So Dev takes us to the rooftop restaurant of hotel pearl palace and it's amazing. Highest recommendations. You can't get any better than this place! It's super cheap, it has a great view, the service is pretty good for what it is. The food is delicious... well, at least their Indian food is. And did I mention CHEAP! So super cheap. Like amazing they can stay in business at those prices. Oh yeah, and the place has tons of character... hand-designed art all over the place... each chair is actually a rod-iron sculpture designed and built by Mr. Singh, the owner of the hotel. And for warmth they bring out these little metal turreen-type things filled with red-hot coals and the put one next to each table. They reminded me of some Indiana Jones movie for some reason... I guess that would be the second one, which by the way, we learned has been banned for life in India. That's right, it's impossible to get Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom in any format in India. I heard somebody mention that the food scene with the monkey brains and snakes and stuff was the actual reason. I'm guessing it might also has something to do with a very blatant stereotype towards the Indian royalty, by who knows?Anyway, we're hoping we can get a room at this place tomorrow.After dinner, we go straight back to our room (at the other hotel) because Rebecca is still very very tired, and we're up at 9am tomorrow to so out and see more of the monuments.
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