Goodbye India

I went to meet my new friend at 8 am outside the train station cloakroom as we had agreed. I waited for 15 minutes and then checked the sleeper class waiting rooms. He was in neither place. I'll send him a friendly E-mail when I get home to see what happened.

Back at the hotel, Kate and I had a lazy morning. All we accomplished was breakfast and Internet time. Our long journeys back to Delhi had taken their toll on us.

The tour company we booked with on our first day owed us a Delhi day tour. We happened to run into the tour operator on the street and he called a car for us right away.

My main objective was to buy a nice scrapbook or photo album. We saw a number of sights including the President's house, the Parliament buildings and the India gate. The gate looked like the Arc de Triomphe and was dedicated to the Indian soldiers who died fighting for Britain in WWI.

Above all we enjoyed relaxing in an air-conditioned car all day. We went to a few shops where the drivers would undoubtedly receive commission. Looked at some stuff and drank free cokes. My highlight, however, was going to the Gandhi Museum which is housed on the same property where he was assassinated.

There were countless quotes (in Hindi and translated) accompanied my photos inside the museum. You could walk in the courtyard where he liked to meditate and see the last steps he took, indicated by raised concrete footprints, before he was shot.

I thought our driver had failed to find the one thing that I had wanted to buy. I was pleasantly surprised when walking back tot he hotel, he talked to a photo store which had a handmade scrapbook. It was exactly what I wanted, though Kate said it was close to being tacky. I like it anyhow.

Back at the hotel, I picked up my fresh laundry and had a shower. I felt the cleanest I had all trip.

After a mediocre supper, chosen to be easy on our stomachs for the flight, I said goodbye to Kate and left for the airport.

The Delhi airport is hilariously small. There is poor signage leaving all of the guesswork to the passengers. You had to get your baggage safety-checked, but you would not be told this until you had waited through the disorganized lines in front of the check in counters. Once though immigration, I had to clear security to get to my gate. The security guard informed me that I needed a baggage tag, which I could get from a desk halfway across the airport. I wondered how hard it would be to keep a box on hand at the security area.

At the gate, I watched some Hindi “Who wants to be a millionaire” and picked up the classifieds off a barren newspaper rack. On the TV, celebrity pairs were on competing for charities of their choices. The host and guests spoke Hindi, but would switch into English at times to insert a saying or antidote. All of the questions appeared on screen in English.

Buried at the end of the classified section, there were no personals; there were matrimonials. If I were a parent who wanted to get my son or daughter married, I would place an ad in for them. I might also spend my afternoons search the ads for appropriate spouses.

The listings were sorted by profession, language spoken, caste, and region. One matrimonial that caught my eye was for a “young professional woman working in the San Francisco Bay area.” I wondered how a young women living and working in the US would feel about an arranged marriage. I wondered if she knew about the ad.

I am going to depart in less than an hour. I'm sure that after I've had some time to reflect on my trip, I'll be able to say something meaningful. All I can say now is that I was glad that I went where I went, and I am ready to go home and get back to work

I'm Alive!

Hello Everyone,

I am a little behind on my blog entries; first because of being in the mountains and second because of the LONG trip back to Delhi. Don't worry, I've got all my entries hand-written in my journal, and I will type them up when I arrive in Korea tomorrow. I'll also put my photos online, so check back in a few days for all of that.

For those of you who read the news (Thank you for the e-mail Aunt Charalyn), I am alive. There was massive flooding in nearby regions of India. A train de-railed, killing around 100 people, somewhere in the country while I was on the train elsewhere (Kate was quite worried, as she waited for me in Delhi). Finally, there were a series of terrorist blasts that rocked Delhi killing nearly 100 people. A bomb was found and diffused in the afternoon, but 4 or so bombs still went off. The first blast was in the same market as my hotel, about 150 metres further down the road. Kate was reading a book in our room at the time, and I wouldn't arrive at the train station for five more hours.

Thanks for reading. I can't wait to see those of you in Greenfield and wherever else I go in Nova Scotia this Christmas.

Charles

Worried Kate

Catching my second train was another ordeal yesterday. The train I caught was 50 minutes late. As soon as I boarded, I argued with a man over my seat, which was in an open compartment he booked for his family. I was sure it had been double booked. 30 minutes later we realized that I had boarded the wrong train. A railway employee had told me to wait at the wrong platform.

A few people near me argued, passing my ticket around, about how to fix my situation. I watched the family man, a PhD student and an old man banter for a while. They told me that the train I was on was headed for Kolkata, not Delhi. Eventually they figured out that I should wait two stops, get off and catch my train there.

Distant fluorescent lights dimly lighted this second station. I wasted some time shopping for chai and snacks, making sure to shop around. The first vendor tried to inflate the price of his bottled water by 400%.

Strolling up and down the platform, I was interrupted by the call of a man with a shaved head. He wanted to chat, and our conversation progressed whimsically from obtaining basic biographical information.

“That’s my brother over there,” he said, pointing to a man crossing the tracks between platforms. “Why does he have hair and you don’t?” I enquired. (As a Bengali Muslim, I though there could be some religious significance to his shaved head).

“Dandruff”, he replied.
“What?!”
“Yes, I have too much Dandruff, so I shave my head”
“Why don’t you use special shampoo; it works for me”
“I Tried that, it didn’t work”
Our conversation stopped abruptly with the arrival of the train he had been waiting for. My train came a few minutes later.

Boarding the train was like climbing into an ant farm. The corridor at the end of the car was crowded with people sitting on the floor. My movements were nothing short of acrobatic getting around them. I forced my way through a similarly crowded aisle halfway up the neighbouring car. A ticket office stopped me and informed me that I was in the wrong car.

Heading back the way I came, I sifted through the jungle of passengers. Boxes and luggage in the aisles left very few footholds. Chai and snack vendors flew past me compromising my balance. If I looked up, feet hung over the edges of the top bunks creating a canopy of body parts.

When I arrived at my compartment, it was set for daytime mode. The middle bunks were folded up making the bottom bunks into seats. I was assigned to a top bunk, which had been filled to capacity with luggage. There were six assigned seats in the open compartment, though eight people sat on the converted benches, and one man lay in the top bunk opposite mine. There was no room for me.

The occupants tried to convince me that I should sit up with the luggage. Having a ticket in my hand, I wouldn’t stand for this. I deserved a seat on the bench (my seat number was written there). I demanded my seat for a few minutes, after which the seat’s occupant acquiesced.

I was uncomfortable; it was hot and stuffy in the carriage; but I was happy to be on a train to Delhi. I did not have to buy an expensive plane ticket to Delhi. I was not stranded in Northeast India.

Hours later, I cleared my bunk and went to sleep. The humidity and temperature were suffocating. I had to lie on my side to feel like I could breathe. I made a pillow by stuffing dirty laundry into my pillowcase and chained and locked my bag to the steel grate that separated the neighbouring compartments from mine.

I woke up at one point to find myself squished into the foetal position with my bag at the head of my bed and a man stealing space from the foot of my bed to sit on. I had to yell at him twice to kick him out. I felt the increased comfort instantly and went back to sleep.

When I woke up this morning and rolled around semi-conscious as long as I possibly could. I knew I would be on the train all day, so I sat and though about life, my trip, my job, about anything really, until I was bored of thinking. Sore from lying so long, I relocated to an open seat below (the train had emptied significantly).

The men who shared my compartment turned out to be members of the armed forces going on or returning from leave. We chatted for a while about the casual dating that was possible in western counties, and their eyes and ears were wideopen at the idea of being able to live with a girlfriend without being married. One of the soldiers, named Ujjal, had a MA in English literature. We had studied different genres and authors, but that didn’t stop us from having a long and interesting conversation.

The only other noteworthy event from my trip was running into the same man dressed in a green sari that I had seen on the train days before. She (he?) was looking for money and tapped me on the shoulder as I brushed my teeth in the sink at the end of the car. I shrugged in confusion and she walked away. No one else seemed to give her money this time.

After 28 hours on the train, we arrived at New Delhi station. I was covered in dirt and I felt as though filth had permeated my skin. My last shower was two days earlier in Gangtok.

My new friend Ujjal didn’t have to board his onward train until the afternoon of the next day. We resolved to meet at 8:30 am outside the cloakroom on platform number 1. We would then spend the morning sightseeing together, perhaps with Kate. Ujjal helped me get to my hotel, which had us drive us past an army of news vans and up an empty market street. In the hotel lobby, I shook hands with Ujjal, saying goodbye for the night, and was led up the stairs to meet Kate in our room.

Kate was so happy to see me; apparently she had been worried all day. She had decided to rest in the room all day, as a 48-hour bus trip from Kathmandu to Delhi had worn her out. At some point she turned on the TV to watch the news. The live broadcast was covering a major train derailing that killed 100 and injured many more. Fearing for my safety, she enquired with the front desk staff, who turned on the news in the lobby, and watched until they determined it could not have been my train as it was on another line altogether.

Mayhem reappeared later in the day when a series of terrorist bombs ripped through the city. The first bomb went off at around 5 pm just 100 metres past our hotel. That was why the marked had been closed. All of the bombs together killed about 60 people who had been shopping for an upcoming holiday. Because of my train delay, I was nowhere near the danger. Kate was lucky that she stayed inside all day. She was reading her book at the time and didn’t take the loud bang seriously, not finding out what had happened later in the evening.

Indian Time: A Lesson in Irony

After four days of waiting, the skies finally cleared revealing the beautiful Himalayan range. Micah and I got up at 5:30 and were our the door by 6 to go to the look off point. What we saw when we got there was a sight worthy of a postcard. Mt. Kanchenjunga and its mammoth neighbours appeared bright white across the horizon against a blue morning sky. There were a low tufts of cloud, but none of these managed to spoil the view for the time we were there.

Back at the hotel, a streak of bad luck began. I had misplaced my key earlier and delayed checking out to see the mountains. I had to find it before I could leave. I searched frantically with the bellboy who eventually found it wedged between the two single mattresses that made up the bed.

I knew I was cutting it close, so I ran down to the private bus and jeep stand to try and make it to the station on time. I had a choice between a bus or a share jeep which I was told would both leave at 8:10. I chose the share jeep for the extra comfort, but this may have been a miscalculation because it took the company longer than expected to sell all the seats. We ended up leaving 20 minutes late.

The ride was supposed to take exactly four hours, and that was exactly how long I had. We stopped for 20 minutes to eat, which seemed unnecessary for such a short trip. Once in Siliguri, I grabbed the nearest autorickshaw and promised the driver a higher fare if he could get me there fast. I had 15 minutes to get to a train station 20 minutes away.

Up to this point, all of my trains in India had been late; so, when I arrived 2 minutes after my train’s departure time to see it pulling out of the station, I felt like I had been more than unlucky.

Exhausted and in shock, I climbed the stairs to the pedestrian overpass and walked back to the station entrance. The ticket window ques were huge and it took over an hour to get to the front. The whole time I was worried about not getting a new ticket back to Delhi and missing my flight to Korea. I had read that these long distance trains book up months in advance.

Halfway through the line, I started a conversation with the man standing behind me. He was an Officer in the India Army whose job it was to load and unload military shipments to the region. He handed me some forms I had to fill out before I reached the window and assured me that I had nothing to worry. I turned out that he knew all of the station staff very well.

I was lucky that there was one space available on a train scheduled to leave in three hours. I had a ticket in first class in the train I missed; this ticket gave me a berth in the lowest class that still has reservations. Any lower and I would be fighting for a seat. I had been demoted from traveling like James Bond to travelling like Indiana Jones but I wasn’t complaining. I thanked my friend and went to an internet place to try to e-mail Kate about my delay and to reconfirm my flight.

Yumthang Valley

Our group finished the final 24 km of our journey in under and hour. We climbed a further 1000 m to the centre of the Yumthang Valley.

The short bit of road was quite a change from earlier where terraced crops and banana trees had been prevalent. As we drove, we entered a land of coniferous trees and countless rhododendrons. Many of these rhododendrons were like small trees, adding a low forest canopy no provided by the sparser large trees. Others were like the garden variety you would see at home with smaller leaves and overall sizes. It was hard to say if they were just younger versions of the same plant, but it’s probably that they were different species. I remember reading that the area has over 30 different ones.

As we neared the end of our assent, the clouds and foliage began to clear. The valley basin was an empty sea of pebbled riverbed and pasture. We stopped next to a bungalow built by the British, which was the only building save for a few shacks used by yak herders.

Micah, Michal and I got out of the car, and I immediately ran around getting as many photos as I could. Although we were at quite a high elevation, it was hard to tell under so many tall peaks. There was a mountain at the end of the valley that must have been 5000 metres in height, and the ones bordering the valley had to be at least 600 metres taller than the valley bottom.

A large row of prayer flags was erected along part of the riverbank. I wondered if they would be there if it were not for tourists. They were particularly photogenic, so I dismissed any apprehension of being unoriginal and shot a ton of pictures.

I had seen a herd of yaks near the bungalow. Wanting to get some yak photos, I was startled to look back and see a herder drive them up the mountainside. Rather than lose my chance at a good picture, I ran after them. I forget or didn’t realize how far I had ran down from the road to the river. After a good run up the hill, I snapped a few shots and then caught my breath overlooking while overlooking the valley bottom. The cool morning air caught my breath producing a steady stream of white fog.

Everyone was assembled at a yak herders hut near our parked jeep. A local man had toasted some bread and boiled tea, which he served along with apples and hardboiled eggs. I was the last to eat breakfast, due to my running around, so I exercised no restraint and ate nearly all the remaining food. The tea was salted instead of sugared, as preferred by Tibetans. Micah mentioned that it was less salty than he had had before. I felt that anymore salt would have ruined it. The tea had been prepared with yak milk and a brief survey revealed that that the driver and cook preferred yak milk, while the guide preferred cow milk.

On our way to the hotel, we stopped at a natural hot spring. Micah and I jumped right in to the sulphurous water. Michal sat out, as she had been sick from the coldness of the hotel and the high altitude.

After lunch and packing, we started our long journey back to Gangtok. The driver had to stop by his house to pack a change of clothes for an overnight stay. His matronly wife served us more salt tea, and we snaked on dry corn as we patiently waited.

We learned that our driver only taxis tourists on the side. He is a local Yak owner, owning 56 of the animals. This explained the size of his house, which although normal in Canada, was quite large compared to nearby residences.

On our way back to Gangtok, it seemed like our driver knew every other jeep and truck driver for the first 50 km. You could tell he had a contagious sense of humour. He would stop and have mini conversations every time we passed another vehicle. Most would laugh; some would roll their eyes. It almost seemed that he was having a running conversation that including every one he talked to He yelled out something funny to a young woman doing dishes in a roadside spring. She smiled, yelled something back and threw water a bowlful of water in his open window.

We arrived in Gangtok hours later, after being reminded by countless signs that “driving with care makes accidents rare.” In the confusion of arrival, I was whisked into a cab and sent to my hotel without saying anything. Micah and Michal happened to choose the same hotel out of their guidebook and checked in a little bit after I did. We decided to go for supper, and later exchanged e-mails with the promise I would contact them if I go to Israel.

BRO Works for You

My tour group departed Gangtok around 9 am. My travel partners were an Israeli couple, Micah and Michal. Michal worked in a group home for the mentally and physically disabled. Her parents were originally from Poland. Micah was a computer engineer who was born in Montreal but grew up in the US before moving to Israel with his family.

The drive was on mountain roads similar to those in the Darjeeling area. The roads were paved but were a bit narrower than earlier roads. Also, quite a few sections were washed out or sunken and under reconstruction. Our guide told us that a few sections wash out annually and need constant rebuilding. I could imagine a lot of locals made their living off road building for the government.

Both men and women worked on the countless construction sites we passed. Almost all job sites lacked heavy machinery or more frequently any machinery at all. Men seemed to do the heavy lifting while women concentrated on making crushed rock. It was like going back in time to see sledgehammers and chisels splitting boulders into sizes that could be carried. More amazing was the women sitting next to piles of potato-sized granite. One by one, the women placed these small oblong rocks on flat stone surfaces and smashed them into a few pieces with a regular hammer. The resulting pieces were thrown in piles of other freshly hammered crushed rock. I saw one mother doing this with her baby hanging around her neck. The amazement of seeing gravel-filled wicker backpacks and antiquated construction lasted the whole trip.

Whenever there wasn't labour intensive construction distracting me, there were more of those cautionary yellow signs. Alongside the usual safety messages (For safely arriving, no liquor while driving, etc) there were a great number of signs extolling "BRO".

BRO can build bridges that bring states together.
BRO works for you.
BRO - The organization that leads the way.

I wondered who or what this BRO could be. The mystery of the acronym puzzled me all day. I imagined some kind of omniscient "Big Brother," who holds the real power in Sikkim. After hours of wondering, I finally asked our guide. It turns out that BRO stands for Border Roads Organization, nothing quite as exciting as I imagined. We eventually passed a few signs that spelled BRO out completely. "Ever wonder who defied death to build these roads? Border Roads Organization - The organization that leads the way." The mystery was fun while it lasted, but I was certainly glad to turn more of my attention to the scenery.

Just so you don't think I spent all day looking at road signs and construction, I'll describe the rest of what I saw.

The road wound its way on hillsides up a long valley ascending into the mountains. If we continued to the end and hiked about an hour, we would be looking across the border and over the Tibetan Plateau in China.
The hills we passed were covered in greenery. There were no tea plantations to be seen, but countless small villages hugged the hillsides and were surrounded by terraced fields. The fields were all rice or millet, while small gardens complete with banana trees surrounded many houses. Banana Trees in the mountains didn't seem to make sense, but apparently we weren't yet high enough for the temperature to drop below freezing.

On the way were a number of spectacular waterfalls. One was wide and cascading; another was a narrow stream that dropped only a few metres; one was a spectacular jet of water shooting over the edge of a 20 metre high cliff face.

Just after sunset, we arrived at our hotel, 20km short of our final destination. There was no heat, but the wooden structure retained was well-insulated and equipped with thick blankets. Before bed we were served Chinese and Tibetan food.

Saved by Blue Sky

My two dollar Thailand alarm failed to sound this morning and I was lucky that I happened to wake up at 5 am on my own. The taxi driver beeping his horn may have woken me up, but I don't remember hearing anything.

The taxi drove me to a few scenic viewpoints in the hills above Gangtok. The first stop was the Tashi viewpoint which gives a view of Mt. Kanchenjunga. The third highest peak in the world, Mt. Kanchenjunga has never been successfully climbed. Its faces are steep, and all expeditions that leave to scale it never make it back. The clouds were thick around the viewpoint for the first 40 minutes, and then I got lucky. A thin horizontal sliver opened up revealing the famous mountain. I got lots of pictures and left for the next stop satisfied.

We drove further from town and climbed to the top of a ridge to a Hindu temple that was said to have nice mountain views. It was drizzling by this point, but having seen Kanchenjunga, I was content being enlisted by clouds and a cool mist. The sun entered from an opening in the clouds and created the most amazing rainbow. The rainbow persisted for the whole 20 minutes that I visited the temple. I haven't seen one so vivid in a long time.

The last stop was a Buddhist supta, or pilgrimage stop. We were supposed to overlook the town, but that wasn't possible through the thick clouds.

Back at the Hotel, I had my first really hot shower all month. I packed my bags, ate breakfast and went to the tour company's office to leave on the 3 day trip into the mountains that I had booked.

The two Slovenian girls who were also coming on the trip were running quite late. The girls were staying at a monastery a bit of distance from town and the phone network was making calling the monestary difficult. The tour operator sent a driver to go find out what happened to them, and sent me to the nearby zoo for the meantime.

The zoo was a lot of fun. It was set on the top of a large hill so that all of the enclosures were set in a circle that crowned the top. There was a lot of forested space between the enclosures making the place seem less artificial. The animals had a lot of room to move around, which allowed the Yaks and Tigers to remain invisible deep within their enclosures.

I was lucky to see Hymalayan Black Bears, Snow Leopards, Common leopards, and mountain Wolves. The taxi driver came into the zoo with me and led me to places that I don't think visitors are supposed to go. As a result, I was within one metre of a snow leopard (there was a fence between us). He also got me the perfect camera angle my favorite animals in the zoo, the Red Pandas.

Red Pandas are as cute as normal pandas but, as the name suggests, they are red. They only live in and around Sikkim and seeing them in the wild is almost impossible. There were two pandas sitting on the top of a tall tree stump, and because of where the taxi guy had led me, I was quite close. Unlike the other animals, the pandas were curious about my presence and stared at me the whole time. This made them really photogenic.

When I got back to the tour office, the man who I booked from was conveniently in the out-of-town main office. He left an associate who spoke no English to give me my money back and tell me that the Slovenian girls canceled. I haven't been angry all trip, but this sneaky cancellation got to me. While it wasn't the operator's fault, he went out of his way to describe his trustworthiness when I booked (always a bad sign) and did, in fact, trust him. He hadn't gotten a deposit from the girls, so it's no wonder they canceled so easily. I exercised at little restraint and upon getting the main guy on the phone, I told him how unprofessional it was to disappear and not give me ANY other options for salvaging my trip to Sikkim.

I went to the tourist bureau to find a solution or lodge a complaint. The woman at the desk was quite helpful and got the hiding operator to call all the other tour companies to find if they were offering the same trip and had space. Luckily, an other tour guide was standing around and rescued me by offering me a spot in a 2 day version of the same 3 day trip. My anger dissipated at once, and I rushed off to the office of Blue Sky Travel where I booked a tour with an Israeli couple.

I was just happy that I'll get to see some beautiful scenery and walk beneath mountains. I calmed down some more and salvaged the rest of my day.

I spent the rest of the daylight walking around town. I walked up to the the ridge at the top of town, visited and orchid exhibition hall, and then walked the the far side of town and back to my hotel. I ended up joining the procession of school children home from the many schools over the ridge, and noticed quite a few young monks returning from their studies from the monastery near the schools in the royal palace grounds.

Darjeeling: Queen of the Hills

I was up this morning at 4 am. I had paid the guy at the hotel for a share jeep to Tiger hill just 11 km from Darjeeling. It's the tallest hill in the area and the best place to view the mountians.

After washing my face and brushing my teeth, I shook myself awake and went to look for the guy. He was nowhere to be found. I knocked on a few doors and giving up, decided to find the jeep on my own. The doors were locked and so was the gate out front. I had to scale it, which was fine going up and over, but not so gentle on the landing. I didn't notice a concrete ledge the edge of the steps and banged up one of my shins on it.

Finding a jeep was as easy as finding my belly button. I walked down the stairs at the end of the alley to the main street and a Jeep pulled up. The driver yelled out "Tiger Hill?" and I said "OK!" I was the only passenger, so he passed me off to one of his buddies up the road and I was soon squished between the steering wheel and stick shift of a jeep full of Hindu college girls.

Once we got most of the way up the hill, it was backed up with so many parked jeeps that we had to walk from the entrance gate to the top.

At the top we were greeted by a circus of tourists walking this way and that. All of the Indian tourists were bundled up like it was -20 in the middle of a snowstorm, although it was nowhere close to zero. In their defence, you could see your breath in the air.

Even manly men wore shawls wrapped around their necks and up over their heads. This brought me back to the memory of a Varanasi silk shop, where the shopkeeper tried to convince me that men could wear sick shawls. Many of the shawls looked beautiful, but not on me.

The view was nowhere as interesting as the tourists. The horizon was obscured by thick clouds and the only indication that the sun had actually risen was the slight brightening of the sky and my watch showing 5:45, the time sunrise was supposed to occur.

I had considered shelling out money for the tourist pavilion behind us for a better view. It had 3 tiers. The general lounge was at the bottom (20 rupees), the nice lounge in the middle (30 rupees) and the deluxe lounge (40 rupees) at the top. It was only 5 rupees to stand where I was among the amusing crowd of tourists.

The rising of the sun was followed by a light drizzle, which put the crowd in motion toward their jeeps. I was lucky in that the girls and I were fast moving. Our jeep was one of the earlier ones to leave. I thought we were home free until the whole line of jeeps came to a standstill part way down the hill. After 20 minutes of waiting, I paid the driver (who was sleeping on his wheel) half the fare and decided to walk the 10 km back to my hotel.

It seemed that some kind of accident occurred somewhere as traffic police held up the jeeps and there was virtually no traffic. About 1/4 of the way there, a string of police cars sped past me. I had told the driver to pick me up on the way back if he saw me. I didn't get picked up, and I hope they took a side trip in order to make them so late. Waiting that long would have been horrible.

The walk to Darjeeling was pleasant. I passed a few colourful gompas (Tibetan Monasteries) and the roadside markets of the many small villages. I walked mostly along the road side railway, which had narrow tracks about 80 cm apart. This hill railway is one of the last still running in India, and is a World Heritage site. Unfortunately, its schedule doesn't fit mine.

My grandparents would have been proud of me. My hotel was just liek the olden days in that there was no running water. I ordered a hot bucket and was sponge bathing like my grandfather always described.

After buying some high grade Darjeeling Tea, for which the area is famous, I booked a seat in a share-jeep to Gangtok the capital of Sikkim. My quick breakfast/lunch was two Masala Dosas-- large round crispy bread rolled up like a crepe with a spicy potato inside. The cafe exclusively played Elton John for some reason.

The four hour drive started on winding roads in the clouds and eventually descended into the main river valley of the region. The river was a beautiful chalky blue and looked excellent for kayaking. I had read about kayak tours and got excited about the possibility.

Sikkim was a seperate kingdom like Bhutan up until 1975 when it allowed itself to be annexed by India. Because of its proximity to the disputed Chinese border, foreigners require permits to enter. I got mine a few days ago, so all the border guard did was write my details down in a logbook and stamp my passport.

Once in Gangtok, I checked into hotel-- this time with hot running water. It was around 4pm so I rushed around to tour agencies to see what I could find for the three full days I have in Sikkim.
I found a lot of 9 and 10 day treks that were leaving the next day. There were also some one day tours happening. Rafting was a possibility, but no outfitters in Sikkim have invested in kayaks. The tour operator I asked said that the "crazy kayakers" bring their kayaks from their own countries. They must have money to burn.

I ended up getting lucky and finding a three day tour to the Yumthang valley which is at the base of the Himalayan mountains and near the Chinese border. Now that I've got the rest of my trip set up and I've eaten, I'm going to sleep. I'm going to check out of my hotel at 5 am and try again for a panoramic Himalayan view (please, no clouds tomorrow!)

Bhutan in 40 Seconds

I woke up early to a cold shower and disappointment. There was a different guard at the border this morning and he said there was no way I could pass. He knew nothing about day permits, and I couldn't enquire at the immigration office because it is closed on Sundays.

The 40 seconds that I passed through the gate the night before was all I got to experience of Bhutan. Feeling somewhat defeated, I decided to take the bus to Darjeeling. I was 1.5 hours early for the 7:30 bus, so I sat and soaked up the atmosphere of Bhutan on the Indian side of the border.

It seems I had been wrong about the guards' housecoats last night. They were actually traditional Bhutanese clothing. Two Bhutanese couples brought freight to the bus and confirmed this. The men wore simple plaid coats that folded across their chests and came down to their knees. One man wore pants under his, and the other wore long socks so that it looked like he was wearing a kilt. The women wore horizontally striped skirts that looked like sarongs and knitted petticoats.

I scored some Bhutanese money when I got change to tip the porter for loading my luggage (he called it a handling fee, although no one else paid it). The unit of Bhutanese currency is called the ngultrum (don't ask me how to pronounce that) and is on par with the Indian rupee at about 45 ngultrum or rupees to the US dollar. Feeling somewhat less defeated, I boarded the bus. I had a similar experience to yesterday. There was a detour in our journey and the attendant, perhaps aware of the porter's 5 rupee forced tip, tried to scam another 15 rupees out of me for the extra hour of travel. I asked "why?" a few times and he gave up.

Hours later we finally reached the hills. "Hills" near the Himalayas would be huge mountains anywhere east of the Rockies. Being afraid of heights, found myself sitting on the wrong side of the bus.The road didn't follow the valley, but cut along the sides of the hills. I was next to the windows overlooked the edge. I could look straight down over a half metre high barricade that probably wouldn't stop a bicycle. I had to avoid thoughts of the bus plunging to my and the other passengers' death the whole time.

The mountains were covered with a blanket of fog that wasn't fog at all. At nearly 3000 m about sea level, we were in the clouds. The windows of the bus were tinted and made the vivid green of the hills even more vivid. We passed a number of tea plantations. The bushes were low and looked like a leafy shrub that would make a nice hedge.

Bright yellow signs along the road gave subtle and not so subtle messages to motorists to slow down. One read ""Enjoy the beauty of the hills at slow speeds." Another read "Time is money but life is precious." No slogan was repeated twice. I could imagine bureaucrats sitting in a tiny room thinking of what clever lines they could put on yellow signs.

We stopped for lunch part way there, but not knowing how long we were to stop or how to order, I chose to eat two chocolate bars and a bag of chips.

At 4:30, after about 9 hours in transit, we arrived in Darjeeling, "Queen of the Hill Stations." There were a few old British building scattered around town. The post office and government office looked like they could have been anywhere in the UK. Some of the old plantation mansions had been converted into heritage hotels. The rest and majority of the buildings were Indian in design and construction.

I quickly found a hotel, walked around town and now am going to sign off and go to bed.

Changing Faces

My train last night was late by about 40 minutes, so I didn't board until around 11:30. There was an annoying man who sat in Kate's empty berth (by bribing officials). I was a little irritated because this guy kept on telling me "you go to sleep." "go to sleep." His insistence really creeped me out because if he got his was he would be right next to me; and, although my bag was chained and locked, there is something unsettling about being told to go to sleep by someone you don't trust. I was placated by the promise of a refund from the official who probably accepted the bribe. In order to go to sleep, I had to reason that this guy was probably no more or less safe than anyone else on the train.

I woke up in the morning at around 7 am; the creepy guy was gone and I went back to sleep in peace. I woke up for good at around 11 and stared out the window until we arrived. At one point, a tall big woman (who looked like a man to me) in a green sari came to our compartment and said something. The guy in the next berth gave her/him some coins and she touched him on the head in a Jesus-like way. I have no Idea why.

At 1 pm our train pulled into New Jalipaiguri Station. In the station I noticed a few different faces from the India I had seen so far. Among the mostly Indian crowd were a few Indians that looked a bit North East Asian (Chinese/Korean/Japanese, etc).

In the nearby town of Siliguri, I got permits for visiting the far northern region of Sikkim that borders China. The book said it would take 2.5 hous. It took me under 20 minutes.

Feeling accomplised, I walked to a nearby restaurant. The restaurant I chose was like an Indian version of TGI Fridays or one of those other tacky places. All the waiters wore baseball hats and bright ugly aprons. The service was fast, especially for Indian food (on my table two minutes after ordering). After eating, I ran to the bus station.

In addition to seeing a few more Asian-Indians about, I saw an old man that looked exactly like an Indian Bill Cosby. Then I saw a guy who had cheeks like the Grinch. At 4:30 pm I boarded my first bus in India. I was headed to the town of Jaigon on the Bhutanese border.

The bus was cramped; my seat held about 3/4 of my body leaving the other quarter to fight with the passenger in the neigbouring seat. I thought the bus was reasonably full when we departed, but the attendants must not have agreed. They hung out the side door for most of the trip yelling out our destination to anyone and everyone. When someone signaled they wanted on, the bus slowed down and, without stopping, the attendants pulled them on board.

Sometimes people wanted freight carried. For a freight stop, one of the attendants crawled up the side of the bus and tied whatever needed delivering to the roof. Throughout the journey, he would climb up the same way, only the bus wouldn't stop or even slow down. As the attendant grappled the side of the bus, the driver paid no attention. He continued driving at full speed dodging pot holes or crashing through them arbitrarily.

I was assigned to the seat directly next to the door. The seat next to me seemed to be the seat for anyone popping on for a short time only. Over the course of the journey, I had no less than 5 people sit next to me. One of them was an insurance salesman, who I chatted with for quite a while. He was telling me about the kinds of insurance that he sold and about his large extended family that lived in one house. I told him about my day trip into Bhutan, and he enthusiastically told me that the border was open all the time and I might not need to wait until morning to pass.

When we arrived in Jaigon, the Indian border town, I talked to the Bhutanese Guards at the crossing, who were lounging in housecoats. One of them told me that the earliest I could enter was the next day at 6 am. I asked if going in for 1 day was fine and they assured me it was.

I sought out the nicest looking guesthouse, which was absolutely disgusting inside. My room smelled of mold and even though the sheets looked clean, I used sheets I had packed and put up a mosquito net.

A Different Side of India

It's election day!

The countryside was almost shut down this morning. There was hardly any traffic and no taxis or autorickshaws running. I had to take a cyclerickshaw the 15 km ride to the nearest train station in Gaya.

The road to Gaya passed through green fields and brick houses and factories. locals quietly shuffled to and from voting stations and military police stood around to prevent mischief. As we neared Gaya we ran into our first roadblock. The main road was closed for all traffic. We then had to do a 2km detour that passed through narrow streets and outlying villages. Every now and again we would run into the police and have to do small detours. TI amazed me that the police road blocks didn't actually block us from getting to the station.

As the end of the 2 hour journey drew near, I had my first encounter with a different side of India. A school-aged boy pulled up beside the moving rickshaw on his bike and started chatting. In Bodhgaya, he would have been looking for money, but money wasn't what he wanted, he just wanted to chat.

At one point he asked me what my name was. When I told him, he asked what Charles meant. I know that Charles has some kind of meaning ("leader among men", or something like that) but I wasn't exactly sure so I just said I didn't know. He was confused by the Idea of not knowing what you name means. He took a different approach to find some meaning in my name; "Like Prince Charles?," he asked. "Yes. exactly," I replied.

Upon affirming that my name is the same as the prince's, he went into a long explanation about how his uncle lives in London and how he had his picture taken with Prince Charles once. After a little more chatting, when I was sure he was going to ask for money, he just said it was wonderful to meet me and cycled away.

My second encounter with a friendly Indian was after eating lunch on the railway platform. An old man who I could only understand about 30% of the time started chatting away. He was 67 years old, retired from a job in a British chemical company. He loved to talk, and gave a long explanation about the good and bad people in India and how there are both types of people anywhere in the world.

I took his point and began to realize that I had only been exposed to Indians in the tourist industry or those trying to siphon off as much money from tourists as possible. Many of these Indians have been deceptive and not worthy of any tourist's trust. Starting with the boy on a bike and followed by this old man, I was starting to see a friendlier honest side of the country.

Our conversation (which mostly consisted of listening on my part), lasted over 45 minutes and spanned from his personal life to the details of my trip. At various points, our conversation attracted large crowds of other people who listed curiously. I doubt many of them spoke much English; nonetheless, they all listened intently.

My third encounter with a friendly Indian was on the train to Patna. I sat next to a Chemistry student who lives in Calcutta but is from Patna. Named Vivek, this guy talked more than the other two combined. Trains and Planes usually put me to sleep, but every time I closed my eyes, he would start a new conversation. I gave him my e-mail and he left me with an offer to stay in Calcutta anytime.

Sitting next to Vivek also introduced me to the corrupt side of government in India. His father is an Engineer in the public sector, so the mere mention of his father's name was his ticket. I turned out that the majority of passenger in our car only had ordinary tickets and had bribed the railway officials to let them on the AC chair class car, which is much more comfortable.

Monks and Tibetan Dumplings

The Mahabodi temple was a lot more alive today. Early morning was definitely the time to go as there were monks and pilgrims everywhere. Some sat in mediation; others walked around the temple in a clockwise direction; and many others prostrated themselves in front of the Bodhi tree or facing the temple. I saw and watching these prostrating monks. Standing with hands folded and then kneeling and sliding into a flat laying positron with their hands facing the temple/tree. Their movements were fluid and they seemed to continue with no sign of tiring.

I was chatting with the Internet guy last night, and apparently December and January are the peak months to visit. He said that the year before almost 20,000 monks were in town for pilgrimages/mediation retreats. The Dalai Llama comes during these months and speaks to large crowds in a few languages.

Other than relaxing in the temple grounds, I finished reading Midnight's Children and ate some good food. I had been eating Indian food for every meal, but I figured that today was the day to try Tibetan food. I had vegetable thukpa which was a pungent noodle soup with noodles that were like Korean ramyeon (ramen in Japanese). I also had steamed chicken dumplings called "momo" that were similar to Korean mandu or Japanese gyousa. It was a simple meal, but I enjoyed it.

The plan tomorrow morning is to get a rickshaw to the train station in Gaya (13 km). It wil be voting day in the national election, so everyone is telling me that I won't be able to get to the station. I got one rickshaw driver to agree to pick me up at 9:30 am at my guesthouse. If he doesn't show up, I could be walking (my train isn't until 1:45 pm)

The Bhodi Tree and Con Artists in Training

At 5:10 this morning I boarded a train to Gaya. This time I traveled air-conditioned first class which is the highest class possible and much much nicer than the non-airconditioned first class that shouldn't be called that because there are 4 classes above it. I had so much fun that I felt like a kid. I imagined being James Bond in "From Russia with Love", although I don't think my compartment was quite as nice as his.

After a very comfortable sleep, my alarm work me up at 8:30 in time for our 9 am arrival. It took only a minute to catch an auto rickshaw to Bodhgaya, just 13 km away. To get the fare I wanted, I ended up sharing a vehicle with a Nepalese traveler named Uhm or Gum, which was ironic because by that time Kate would be on her way to Nepal.

Once in Bodhgaya, I checked into a brand new guesthouse on the edge of town. It was only 150 rupees (about three dollars US) for a clean single room with shared washroom facilities.

Bodhgaya is centred around the most holy site in Buddhism, the Mahabodi temple. Inside its grounds stand the Bodhi tree-- the tree under which Buddha achieved enlightenment. Actually the present tree is a replanted sapling (genetically identical) planted when the old one dies. It's still big and impressive looking, so who's keeping track anyway.

Around Temple building and Bodhi tree, the temple grounds are dotted with suptas, or small domed stone monuments, that were placed there pilgrims. There were a few monks and lay followers meditating among these and eve I took a chance to sit in the grass and enjoy the near silence.

While the main temple was nice, the surrounding village had even more to look at. Every country with enough Buddhists has their own temple in town. This way, visiting monks from that country always have a place to call home. The neat thing is that these temples are (usually) built in the style of the home country. So the Japanese temples look Japanese and the Thai Wat is just like the ones in Thailand. The one notable exception was the Korean monastery and temple which looked like a 70s bungalow. It was quite peaceful and homey.

Now, one would expect this to be a peaceful place, and on the most part it is, but what surprised me were the annoyances that I though I left behind in the rest of the country. I was constantly bombarded by school aged boys who wanted money for schooling. Some backed down and then wanted books instead. Reading what I just wrote this sounds fine, but these kids were salesmen/con artist pros. One followed me for at least 30 minutes on his bike while I dipped in and out of temples. Another offered to introduce me to his "teacher".

I told them all that if they took me to their school I would make a donation of books or money there. None of them liked that idea. It's sad, because these kids should be playing or studying in school and not being exploited by their parents or other adults.

I know that any money I give will be turned over to their parents and any books I buy will just be returned to the same shop for a small commission on the obtained money. I've had to resort to ignoring these kids entirely. If I even say hello or look at them, they won't leave me alone.

There's one last thing I've been forgetting to mention. In both Varanasi and Bohdgaya, there are frequent power failures. Most places have back up generators, and right now I am typing from a computer hooked up to a car battery.

Keito-Chan Sayonara

Things have changed since earlier in the day. Kate got a good price on a 5 day trek in Nepal and will be heading that way instead of to the West Bengal Hills of India with me. A 5-day trek was what she wanted to be the highlight of her trip, and hiking beneath the tall Himalayas in Nepal will be better than hiking in the foothills of western India.

From now on, I will be traveling solo again. Our tickets were non-refundable, so I'll have two berths to myself wherever I go (not that two are needed).

This afternoon, Kate and I visited a government-regulated silk shop near the station. There was no bargaining, as the prices were fixed and we got to relax and enjoy looking at the various products without huge pressure to buy.
While Kate was tired and wanted to stay near the hotel, I wanted to go to the river one last time. I hired a cycle rickshaw for only 15 rupees (39 cents). The driver was an old man and he had to work so hard even to go slow that I ended up feeling bad and upped the fare I paid him.

At the main ghat on the Ganges River, I saw a ceremony similar to what Kate and I saw last night. Tonight, however, it was staged for pilgrims and tourists and performed by about 10 holy men simultaneously. Although staged, it was still great to see and I was able to snap a few photos due to thinner crowds.

On the way back, I hand-picked a younger rickshaw driver and we were back at the hotel in half the time. It's now bedtime and in the morning I will say goodbye to Kate. We had a great time together and I will see her in Delhi before our flights or when I return to Canada.

Varanasi in the Morning

We were up early again today. Kate's alarm failed to go off, so a call from downstairs woke us up and we frantically put on clothes and left.

Our driver brought us to the riverside where we were greeted by a boatman. The morning air was cool and refreshing and the sun was a floating red disk barely above the horizon.

Our trip was short, but we got to see pilgrims bath in the early morning sun. I read in our guidebook that the pilgrims bathe in a circuit of 4 or 5 ghats and end it all by carrying water to the Vishwanath temple. This temple (the one we didn't get to see the day before) is the holiest in the city and houses a phallus that represents the god Shiva. Pilgrims who have completed their journey collect a pail of holy river water and go to the temple where they douse the phallus with it.

Non-Hindus are not allowed to enter even the courtyard of the Temple, but our boat driver took us into a silk shop and up the stirs to the 5th floor where we could see the complex below. Photography of the temple yard was forbidden, so I'll have to rely on memory and description.

The temple was surrounded by a red outer wall and had an outer courtyard on one side. The roof of the inner sanctuary was was shaped like the roof of a steeple and covered in 50 kg of solid gold. There was also a golden trident attached to the roof's side. Although going in would be nice, it was interesting to see the pilgrims shuffle into the temple from a bird's eye view.

Right now, it's just about time to check out of our hotel. We're going to change hotels to get closer to the station for our early morning train to Gaya. There is a silk market that we might visit this afternoon, but other than that and another possible visit to the riverfront tonight, the rest of the day should be low key.

Cows and Old People

We finally got to sleep in... Getting up at 10:30 was nice for a change.

Today we started out by driving around to a few of the local temples. We saw one that was dedicated to the "terrible" form of Shiva. The whole thing was a was a beautiful deep red colour. Another temple we saw was only built in the 60s, but was spacious on the inside and all of its walls were covered in lines and lines of poetry.

The third temple we saw was overrun with monkeys. The pillars there were covered in fresh orange paint that looked like it was applied on a daily basis. Kate loved the monkeys and a group of three boys loved Kate. The came up to say an enthusiastic hello and she took their picture.

The last temple we saw was New Vishwanath Temple. I had asked repeatedly to go to Vishwanath temple, and out driver assured us we would go there. It wasn't until we got to the "new" temple that we realized we had been duped. The sunset there was beautiful, however.

After a lot of arguing and dismissing 100 excuses of why we should not go to Vishwanath temple, we finally convinced the driver to take us there. Once downtown, we could see why he wanted to avoid the place. Right now is heavy tourist season for Indians (not for foreigners) and that means a LOT of pilgrims come to the Ganges river to bathe and pray.

Our driver parked at a movie theatre and we navigated through the narrow crowded winding streets of Varanasi to get to this temple. Once we finally made it to the temple it was too dark to see anything so we had dinner and excellent and cheap dinner at a local restaurant and headed to the waterfront.

Varanisi is a holy city on the holy Gange river. The bank of the river in the city is covered in ghats, which are stairs and terraces that lead down to the river's edge. Most are used for bathing in the sacred water, but a few, including the one we visited, are used for cremation.

As soon as we neared the water a noisy procession cut us off from a side alley with a body wrapped and on a stretcher. A man with a bundle of kindling followed behind along with the family or teh deceased.

The ghat itself was covered with people sitting and waiting. There were groups of women and children in some areas, and we later learned that only the men go to watch their loved one cremated which takes about three hours.

Druing our visit about five people tried to con us into thinking we had come to a place where only family could go and demanded a donation for our transgression. We clearly were allowed to be where we were because of the clear signage in English and the fact that some of the waiting family members offered a place for us to sit down and shared some cookies. We had read in the guidebook not to take photos and we kept our cameras hidden in our bags.

Kate and I did not actually watch a cremation, but we were lucky to see a ritual to the river by a group of holy men. They waved a variety of brass lamps over the water to the ringing of bells that sounded like the clanging of pots. One of the lamps looked like a five layered cake and another looked like the lamp Aladdin rubs. Both lamps produced bright flames the stood out vividly in the darkness of the evening.

Once the ringing stopped, the chanting began. The men chanted in harmony varying between 3 or 4 parts. It was repetitive, but with the fire, the evening air and the smoke drifting from the cremations, it was tranquil. Neither Kate nor I knew what was really happening in front of us, but neither of us spoke nor diverted our attention from what we saw.

Every one hears of how in India the cows run freely in the street to do whatever they wish, and this is certainly true. On our way back to the car, we saw a few interesting interactions between the cows and the pilgrims. As we stood up from watching the ceremony, we saw a cow shift toward a man sleeping on the steps. The cow started slowly licking the man's face causing him to wake up. The man, who was much less startled than I would have been, gently shewed the holy animal way and went back to sleep.

Nearly back at the car, and a few cows later (I think I stepped in a cow patty on the way), another older person felt the free reign of a cow. She apparently wasn't looking beside her, and a slowly moving cow didn't bother to stop, instead bumping her in the rear end and onto the ground. It's amazing to see how much respect and lack of indignation both these people had toward the offending cows.

Experience the Postcard

We finally made it to the Taj Mahal!

When planning the trip, I had considered skipping the famous monument, but my friend Morgan convinced me otherwise. "It's so pretty at sunrise", she said. She was right.

Whenever I experience something given a lot of hype, I expect disappointment. I expected to like the Taj a bit, but I didn't expect to be so enchanted by its beauty.

That morning, the sunrise lit the Taj Mahal from the right hand side so that all of its features were accented with a golden glow. As the sun rose the glow disappeared leaving the dramatic white structure, with it's dome and towers, floating against a pale blue sky. Wow.

After our morning visit to the Taj, we went to a bank, saw bright-red Agra Fort, said goodbye to our driver and waited for our train.

Our train left 40 minutes after the scheduled departure time, and when it finally pulled into the station we had to rush around searching for the first class car, which ended up not being labeled.

The train ride was an experience. First class sounds luxurious, but it is really only the highest class that doesn't have air conditioning. It was the highest class on this particular train however.

Over the course of the train ride, we had visitors come and go from our compartment. The first guy who was only in for an hour wasparanoid about something. He made sure the compartment door was locked and closed the windows every time we stopped at a station. This had the unpleasant effect of making our compartment dark and as hot as an oven. After some time our paranoid friend left and was replaced by a grandfather or father and his beautiful (grand)daughter wearing a nice sari. The cabin was quite relaxed with these two passengers, and towards the end, the old man started singing out of boredom.

He had a nice voice. For the next 5 hours, we were invaded by the train attendants and then
(probably why the first guy kept the door locked. The benefit of ouropen door policy was that the air flowed freely from our window through the door and out the windows on the other side of the train. The pitfall was that the seats were crowded and we weren't getting the comfort that we paid for.

When we were finally left alone, the new train attendant (the old one had gotten off) told us to lock the door. We spent the remainder o fthe trip stretched out and comfortable. After 12 hours on the train and at 2 AM the next day, we arrived atVaranasi. We had arranged for pickup in advance and soon arrived atour hotel, where we barely had enough energy to undress for bed.

Camels

Bright and early, Kate and I stumbled out of bed to go camel riding.We met our guides and the camels at 5 am right in front of our hotel.What service!The camels were laying on the side of the road and were easy to mount.Standing up was a two step process. You had to lean back and hold onwhile the camels first snapped up into a kneeling position and second got up on their hind legs while straightening out their front legs.You felt like you were gonna fall of the whole time.

The ride wasn'tnearly as rough as I expected and before long we had left town andwere riding into the cool morning of the desert.The desert itself was surprisingly lush. The rainy season had justended a few weeks before and all of the foliage was still greenbecause of it. Our camel drivers/guides ended up being teenagers 17 and 18 years old (Indians seem much older than they are to me). We travelled in a circuit around a big hill on the edge of the city andwere back at our hotel in around 3 hours. Both drivers were really nice, but mine was the one who really spoke English. Kate and I bombarded him with questions and found out that Male camels are muchbetter than female camels for manual labour among other things. If we had been in Pushkar just 3 weeks later, we learned, we would have hit the annual Camel fair. With over 6000 camels, horses and cattle for sale, it would have been quite a sight.

Back at the hotel, Kate was keen on having Indian breakfast. So we asked what to order. We ended up having chai (spiced tea) with parathas (flaky bread) and dahi (yogurt-like curds). Having been scarred by Asian breakfasts elsewhere, where soup and rice seem to be major staples, Indian breakfast was a nice surprise. The dahi especially had a nice sour flavour which I found quite appetizing. Before leaving town, our driver took us too the sacred lake and the Brahma Temple.

The sacred lake was nice and tranquil with the the lake. Apparently if we actually took the flowers from them, theywould try to charge us something ridiculous like 200 USD dollars for the service. The Brahma temple was nothing spectacular, but was interesting to visit because it is the only temple in India where you can worship Brahma . Brahma is a Hindi god who plays a great role in the creation of the universe, but spend most of the rest of history deep in meditation. In order to enter the temple, we had to take off our shoes and then ascend a set of marble stairs up to the temple entrance.

Inside theTemple walls, everything was covered with white marble memorials todead loved ones. Most were in Hindi, but some were written in English, Arabic, or even Japanese. The English ones were the standard "In loving memory of..." that you find on tombstones at home. Many stones near the central structure in the temple were inlaid with big silver coins from the country of the person who paid for the stone. Inside the Central sanctuary, there was a statue of the god and people lined up to receive some kind of holy water from a priest.

Our driver camewith us and instructed us to receive water how to receive water fromthe priest. Today was yet another day of driving. We left at 9 am and didn't getto Agra until 10 pm. We stopped once in Jaipur to get lunch and seethe Hawa Mahal or 'palace of the winds,' which turned out to be reallynice. We got a guide for cheap and he showed us around in under 20minutes (one of our conditions). You could see the courtyard where theMaharajah's concubines and wives bathed naked and them many manywindows where they sat all day enjoying the breezes that naturally blew through.

After many hours of driving, we made it to Agra. Out driver washilarious on the way. We were chatting about Camels and cars and hisfavorite Hindu god-Shiva, which we joked might be due to her frequentdepiction with large breasts (but she's known as the destroyer, so I would watch out). We said goodnight to our driver, ate again andheaded off to bed.

India Day 1: Detour to Rajasthan

I arrived in Delhi airport after 4 hours of solid sleep on the plane. The first thing that I saw after getting my bags was Kate. It had been over a year since I had seen her and it was great to see her again.

A driver was there to pick us up and take us to our guesthouse located near the main train station. From thew moment we entered the highway, I knew that India was like no place I had been before. The drivers are crazy. They cut people off.. signal each other with long and short horn blasts and drive on the wrong side or curb of the road whenever it is convenient to pass. There were a few times I though we were on course for a head on collision. Why did anyone bother to paint lines, I wondered.

Kate and I weren't in the guesthouse long before the in-house travel agent was ready to plan out whole trip. There were so many places we "had to see" in order to see the real India (I thought his selling skills were the real India right in front of me). Kate was initially into the idea of getting part of the trip organized by him, but I was freaking out because I had already paid for our train tickets for the whole trip and had them delivered to the guesthouse.

I finally calmed down after 10 minutes of convincing the agent to stop talking and go get the tickets I ordered. He ended up refunded our first ticket to Agra so that we could take a car and driver for the first few days. We decided to leave Delhi for the last day of our trip and immediately ventured east into Rajasthan.

Our route took us on Highway 8, the main road from Delhi to Mumbai (Bombay)... this was a busy road with 6 lanes at one point, four at another, and 2 lanes at it's narrowest. The driving wouldn't have been so bad if 80 percent of the traffic hadn't been BIG trucks.
These trucks were huge and built for rough roads rather than for speed. At maximum they travelled 50 km an hour, but more often than not they averaged 35-40. This meant that we had to weave in and out of lanes narrowly missing head-on collisions. Perhaps it seemed more dangerous than it was in reality-- we rarely traveled faster than 70.

Our destination, Pushkar was over 300 km away, so this made for a full day of driving. We stopped only three times. Once for gas, once for lunch and once to get the tube replaced in the spare tire. I couldn't help but noticing that all we saw everywhere were men. Men in trucks. Men wearing turbans an smoking pipes. Men bathing and boys making chai and selling refreshment. This highway was clearly man territory, which led to an interesting phenomenon. Men and boys, any age anywhere, could not keep their eyes off of Kate. She was used to this treatment from travelling in Egypt, but it was a surprise for me. We both wondered what it would be like had she been travelling alone (her original plan before I decided to go too).

At 8 pm, we arrived in Pushkar. It was dark and hard to see anything, but you could tell from entering the main street that it is not a big place.

Out hotel was more than I expected. Although the pool water was green and nothing you would swim in, our room was spacious and comfortable. We ate some supper where there were locals Roma or Gypsies playing instruments and dancing for the few assembled tourists. We went to bed soon after with Kate's alarm set for 4:30 am the next morning.

Dear Dakanda

I ended up seeing a Thai movie last night. It was a love story called "Dear Dakanda." I think it was supposed to be funny in addition to being romantic, but a lot of the jokes didn't translate well into the subtitles. Of course I laughed along with the rest of the audience, and eventually I found even the jokes I didn't get funny.

I had completely forgotten the tradition of standing for the national anthem with an on-screen tribute to the king. I really enjoyed this show of patriotism. As an aside, the Thai king is the longest reigning monarch in the world.

Today was lazy, yet again. I spent all morning sleeping rolling in bed, and all afternoon reading "Midnight's Children" in the park. With so many hours of reading, I'm only half way through the thing.

Rigth now, there are only 7 hours until my plane lifts off the runway and flys toward Delhi. I'm not sure what the internet situation will be like in India.. and I'm not sure if my friend's and my packed itinerary will permit frequent updates. That being said, I will keep notes in my journal and post the entries whenever I have the chance.

For those of you who don't know, I won't be travelling solo anymore. I'm meeting my friend Kate Fletcher (taught with her in Japan) as soon as I get off the plane.

Boredom Achieved

I reconfirmed my flight a little while ago and only have 36 hours until I leave for India.

It's taken a while, but I have sort of achieved my goal of absolute boredom. I thought about going to Pattaya, a beach 2 hours from Bangkok, but I figured that relaxing in a dirty city would be more relaxing taking the bus to a dirty beach (been there before, not a fan). Instead of getting up and going, I've been reading more of "Midnight's Children" laying on my bed.

I moved across the city to another hotel yesterday and that was a good choice. I was starting to find the traveler world a bit suffocating. My new hotel is cheaper, cleaner, and includes breakfast! I think I'm gonna go see a movie tonight. I'm sure it will be action/adventure, as that seems to be all that ever plays here (saw Van Hellsing last time I was here a year ago). It should be fun.

I forgot to mention a Viennese businessman (last name was Gander, like the place in Newfoundland he said) who I was chatting with pool side the other day. We chatted a lot about India, where he also does business, and about what Thailand used to be like 15 years ago. A more interesting subject than eather of these was his business. He imports wood and other things from Asia in order to make oriental gardens in Europe. He was telling me about designing golf courses and about people who would just come to visit his house in Vienna, point around his gardens and say "I want 10 of those and 20 of those", as if money weren't a concern. Of all his products, however, the most popular one and the hardest to keep in stock are his palm trees.

Palm trees normally can only stand around 10 days of very cold weather before they die. This makes incorporating them into European gardens nearly impossible. Gander's business gets around this by growing palms in mountains in Austrailia for the Australian winter and then flying them to a northern climate like Newfoundland where they grow for the northern winter. After 7 years of going back and forth, these trees can then stand the two or three months of sustained winter in Europe. He told me I could get my own winterized palm for only 15,000 dollars US.

Poolside Reading

Today's been a pretty lazy day so far.

I had a Thai massage for about 30 minutes. There is no oil used and it involves a lot of pushing and manipulating joints. I was relaxed by the end and sat down to writing a few post cards and finishing a book that I had been reading, called "Year Zero." Year Zero is a detailed account of the first few years of the Khmer Rouge government and the last few of the republican government topples in the revolution. It gives similar accounts to "The Killing Fields" of the insanity of the Khmer Rouge regime. It described how the KR took simple socialist principles to "the fullest extent of their internal logic." For example, the idea that capitalism is bad led to the regime blowing up the national bank and abolishing money altogether. This stretching of logic also led to the emptying of all cities, as I mentioned before, to return the citizens to an agregarian way of life. While these ideas could sound good on paper... evicting 4 million people who don't know how to farm and rendering their money valueless is cruel at best.

Newly in need of reading material, I went to a book store and bough a murder mystery/detective book called "Andorra" and Rushdie's "Midnight's Children," the latter in preparation for my India trip. This is my second attempt at Midnight's Children, the first being in a class (which I should have finished it for). I've been reading it poolside all afternoon. I love the writing and this time the story is much more engaging (I'm not being forced to read it). That being said, the prose is dense with metaphor and digression and I find myself re-reading certain pages over and over again to make sure I know what really happened and who did what.

Other than reading, I bought some bed sheets and a waterproof backpack cover for India. At another point in the day, I had a great moment lost somewhere in the city in the back of a cab . My cabbie had no idea where we were going and had to ask others for directions a few times. Having no set schedule, I just sat in the back listening to the happy Thai music blasting form the radio.

Only two more days left to relax before the madness I expect in Delhi.

In the Navy.......

Now that I have everyone’s favorite Village People song in your head….

I got up bright and early this morning and quickly resolved that I was done with the beach. A day seemed quite enough. I packed up everything, including my not quite dry laundry, snapped a few photos of the beach and hopped on a motorcycle taxi.

Today, I resolved, would be a day of transit. I needed to get over the Thai border eventually, and was paranoid that the transport from Sihanoakville to Thailand would be unreliable.

I unsuccessfully tried to locate the LCDI, the students from which I met yesterday afternoon. The moto driver only heard “CD” when I asked if he knew where the school was, and that brought me to a CD shop.

I had the driver check with a few other moto drivers. We checked with a real English school. We checked with a backpacker’s café. Still no luck… no one had heard of the place. Fully defeated by this point, we continued on to the other side of town where the port and ferry terminal were.

After an hour wait it was 12 noon and departure time. The ferry took around 4 hours to get to the Cambodian town closest to the border. The ride was gentle compared to any bus anywhere. For the first part of the trip, I sat on the roof enjoying the sun and wind until the rain drove all the travelers below. Throughout the trip, I ran into an Austrian backpacker whom I had met on the crazy bus to Siem Reap from Bangkok. I also chatted with a teacher at an international school in Saigon. He was traveling overland through Cambodia to get to Thailand.

Getting off the boat was mayhem! I felt like I was in India already. There was a crowd of pick-up truck taxis and moto drivers shouting and pulling at my arms for the dollar or two they would get if I chose them. I got on the polite guy’s truck immediately. After a minute of sitting there, I realized that another truck (run by the pushiest of all the drivers) was almost full. I defected to that truck and soon we were on our way.

The border crossing was rather quick. At once point, I was calculating Cambodian Riel to US Dollars to Thai Baht in my head to change money without getting ripped off. I half thought of keeping the riel just to avoid hassle.

An hour-long minibus brought us to Trat, a small Thai city. One of the two Thai passengers turned to me and asked if I was going to Bangkok. In the spirit of idiot-proof travel, I said sure and followed along behind him.

It seems we had just missed the 6 pm bus… the next wasn’t until 11 pm, which would get us into Bangkok quite late. I was ready to buy my ticket when my new Thai friend rushed me down the street to another station.

On the way I learned a few things about this helpful guy. His name is Poang Wan and he comes from Bangkok. I his asked if he was Thai and he said. “Yes, Thai native”. The next question was what his job was which produced the same answer, “Thai native.” I thought he misunderstood my question so I went into an extended explanation about how I was a teacher and Canadian and a man, so that he might get that I was asking about his job and not his nationality. I turns out that he wasn’t misunderstood at all. He wasn’t saying “Thai Native,” but “Thai Navy.”

Everything made so much sense all of a sudden. I though he was a Thai traveler coming from Cambodia, but the Khmers hate the Thais, so that was unlikely. It turned out that he was on border patrol and now had 10 days leave to go and visit his parents and sisters.

We got to onto a 7 pm bus at the other terminal and stretched out our conversation as much as the language barrier would allow. I showed him some photos of my students in Korea and we talked about our families a bit. He then surprised me completely and pulled a Thai navy hat (looks like and army beret). “For you,” he said. I was really shocked by the kind gesture. Having packed lightly, I had nothing that special to give. It took me a bit of thinking to remember that I had two 1000 won notes from when I left Korea. Worth about 2 USD, I passed them to him as the only interesting gift I could think of (I gave a few Oreos too).

The bus trip was like a luxury cruise after travel in Cambodia. In less than 5 hours we were in Bangkok. I said good bye to my new friend, and caught a cab with some other travelers to Khao San Road, where I plan to buy a few things tomorrow before I head on to India.

A Productive Day on the Beach...

I was hardly bored at all today... I guess it'll take one more day of loafing for complete and absolute boredom. I haven't worn a watch all day so I have no idea what time it is (it's dark, I do know that).

First thing this morning I ate a full English breakfast and headed directly to the undeveloped end of the beach (a lot more garbage at that end).I looked at the water for a while and then floated in it for a while. I read some of my new book, which looks at the facts behind Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code.

I was just starting to wonder why I was the only one down that far on the beach when I got my first visitors. Two brothers, 18 and 10, came walking from the field behind the beach and plopped down right next to me.

I initially thought they wanted money. But either due to lack of English or lack of desire, they never asked. Right away the 10 year old boy wanted to impress me with his English number skills. He repeated them in order a few times over the course of their visit. I was impressed with his pronunciation, with the exception of "seven" which almost sounded like it had been reduced to one syllable.

Early in their visit, the three of us happily wrote letters in the sand. Both brothers seemed to know their CAPITAL letters, but had little knowledge of the lower case alphabet.Eventually, I decided to ask the 10 year old show-off if he knew his colours. This backfired a bit. For whatever reason we entered into a ten minute lesson on the Khmer word for EVERYTHING in visual range. I heard the word for every colour, every body part, and every thing else visible from “sand” to “book” to “hole (or dig)”. The only word that I remember is “book” or "eew you". I remembered this one because it is similar to the Korean word for milk. All I can say is that I'm glad there wasn't a test at the end of his lesson.


After our “conversation” died down, I returned to my book. A minute later, the older brother seemed really intent on something. I figured out that he took some kind of offence to me reading my book. It took me a while before I learned that he really wanted was for me to read aloud. So I did. Apparently I was readind too quickly, so I read word for word, pausing so he could repeat each word after me. It's too bad that what I was reading was filled with big words that were difficult to pronounce. It may have scared him of English forever.

Our Khmer/English lesson was ended abruptly when the older brother noticed rain clouds in the distance. They headed back from where they came, and I headed to the restaurant on the beach where I check my e-mail. It rained hard for well over an hour, at which time I e-mailed a lot of you and told you about this blog. When the rain stopped, I headed back to a new spot near the old one and did a lot of the same activities as before. This time, however, I started building a sand castle.

I was quite far along on my castle building when my activity was punctuated by another set of guests. Again it was two males, although older this time.One spoke English quite well and explained all about the group he was with. He was a teacher at a local organization called LCDI (Leadership something Development Institute). His school exists to teach young Khmers how to speak English so that they can make a living. The boy with him, he explained, had been a gangster but now was studying English.

We chatted for a while, and eventually the teacher called the whole group over who soon gathered around my sand castle. I had to explain what a castle was to the group because the concept was apparently as foreign as snow. At first the teacher thought that it was a temple so I had to explain where castles were located and that their function involved fighting and wars. I think (hope) they understood what a castle was by the end.

My conversation was mostly with the teacher, as the other students were too shy or too weak in English to communicate with a-- gasp-- foreigner. One boy was less shy than the others and actually asked one or two questions. Our conversaion progressed and I soon had a few helpers extending the outer walls as we continued to talk. When it was time for them to go, I was given enthusiastic directions (written in the sand) to their school with a promise to visit before I leave town. I spent some more time diddling around in my spot and swimming in the ocean. I ended up leaving the castle unfinished.

As the sun went down on my first full day at the beach, I sat in a reclining chair under an umbrella with a bowl of curry chicken and rice in front of me. I think I should sleep well tonight.

The Beach... FINALLY!!!!!!!

I can't believe it.... I made to the beach!

The bus this morning was excellent when compared to my last bus trip. It took under 5 hours on a decent road this time.

I am staying in Sihanoukville at Serendipity beach. I am a 45 second walk from the ocean. Now I can eat, read, sunbathe, and sleep for hours on end until the point of boredom. I haven't been bored for a while, I'm excited.... I think I'll be here a few days for sure.

A Day of Mixed Emotions

I got up, had breakfast and was on a motorbike taxi by 9 am. My first stop was a former school that the Khmer Rouge had converted into a concentration camp. Thousands upon thousands were tortured until they gave false confessions. They were then sent away to be murdered. About 20,000 passed through the prison and only 7 were found alive when the Vietnamese invaded.

I had been prepared for a strong emotional reaction by my friend Marion who, after having visited this same site, was overcome by emotions to the point of crying for 45 minutes. From her account I had some kind of idea what to expect. The school grounds were quite eerie, not because of how depressing the appearance of the yard, but because of how normal a place it looked. If cleaned up, it could be a school in any Asian country (reminded me of school designs in Japan and Korea).

The first wing I went to was used exclusively for torture. It was here that the Vietnamese found the prison's last victims, tied to bed frames and bludgeoned to death. The photos that they took were mounted in the same room that each of the bodies was found. The rest of the compound was similarly unsettling.

Another wing contained panels covered with pictures of nearly all of the prisoners. These people were ordinary peasants, teachers, engineers, students and those members of the regime suspected of treachery. Their faces looked stunned with a sort of disbelief in what was happening to them and those around them.

After walking through the former prison, I rode to the mostly infamous of the killing fields. It was here that the prisoners from the former school were sent to be executed. The fields were even more unsettlingly normal than the school yard. The atmosphere was as peaceful as the rice fields near Angkor Wat I visited a few days ago.

The focus of the site was a tall tower topped with a golden roof. This tower was erected to commemorate the victims of the Khmer Rouge regime. Inside it were over 8000 skulls disinterred in 1980. Only about half of the mass graves were dug up to produce these remains.

The mass graves themselves were located behind the monument tower in a grassy area. The dug up graves left square depressed areas that were easy to distinguish. It was here that executioners led prisoners from a nearby holding cell one at a time. Blindfolded, each prisoner was brought to their knees at which point they were stuck on the neck until unconscious. The executioner then cut their throat and threw them in the pit. The filling in of the graves was haphazard leaving some body parts uncovered.

While many thousands of people died in this camp, this was only the tip of the iceberg. In only a few years, almost 2 million people died due to starvation, sickness from malnutrition or murder by the Khmer Rouge. While it’s depressing and shocking to look into such a dark past, it serves to emphasize how positive the peace that now exists is. Yes, there is still corruption and countess other problems facing the country, but none of these problems compare to the numerous conflicts and revolutions that have devastated this country in recent history.

----------------------------

The end of the day was almost strange when compared to the morning. I met up with the Aunt of one of my students. She is a Korean woman married to a French journalist. After meeting her, she suggested going for French food. All I could hear in my head were voices screaming "expensive" (I managed to bite my lip). We had food, wine and great conversation for a couple hours. I asked her all about her life and we talked about differences between Cambodia, Korea, Japan, France and Canada. I had managed to ignore prices (reasonable for home, ridiculous for Cambodia); fortunately for me and my out-of-control budget, the meal was on her. Phew!

The Mekong en bateau

Today started off bright and early. I woke up at 4:30 am, ate the breakfast I ordered before bed and headed to Angkor Wat for sunrise. It was nice for a change to be up so early.

The sunrise was rather unremarkable-- not a hint of red, orange or yellow in the sky. The temple site was notheless impressive. With four main towers on the cetral dias, I had to pass though some outer walls before reaching central dias upon which therse towers rested. Like yesterday, I was confronted with some insanely steep stairs that, even though they posed no real danger, still got the adrenaline pumping.

The top was worth the climb (and desent) however. From up there I could see all of the courtyards below and watch all the early rising tourists wandering about and craning their necks like ants looking for food. Their ant size however muvh fiun at the top was a nice reminder of how high up I was as I climbed down to the bottom.

My motorcycle driver was ready and waiting at the entrance. He rushed me to the guest house at top speed where I was scolded by one of the staff for missing my pickup for the boat to Pnom Penh. IT was 6:30 and the boat left at 7. I was already packed, so after checking in my key, the motorcycle guy rushed me to the lake some 10 km away. It seemed that being late prevented me from having to wait around for almost an hour for those toursits who showed up at 7:20.

The boat ride was a relaxing change from the bus ride two daysd before. The guest house had pushed the bus as a cheaper alternative, bu I though I would screw the roads and give water transport a try. In the end, the lake/river route was sceneic and relaxing. I saw boat houses and local fishers. But the neatest thing for me was seeing patches of waterhyacinth everywhere. Too thing that people pay money for it back home. Here it grows like a weed.

I spent the majority of the boat trip on the roof of the boat reading "The Killing Fields." for those who haven't read it, "The Killing Fields" tells the true story (with ficticious elements) of an American journalist and his Cambodian colleague. The two of them choose not to evacuate Cambodia in 1975 when the Khmer Rouge topples the puppet government installed by the Americans.

Today started off bright and early. I woke up at 4:30 am, ate the breakfast I ordered before bed and headed to Angkor Wat for sunrise. It was nice for a change to be up so early.

The sunrise was rather unremarkable-- not a hint of red, orange or yellow in the sky. The temple site was nonetheless impressive. With four main towers on the central dais, I had to pass though some outer walls before reaching central dais upon which these towers rested. Like yesterday, I was confronted with some insanely steep stairs that, even though they posed no real danger, still got the adrenaline pumping.

The top was worth the climb (and descent) however. From up there I could see all of the courtyards below and watch all the early rising tourists wandering about and craning their necks like ants looking for food. Their ant size however much fun at the top was a nice reminder of how high up I was as I climbed down to the bottom.

My motorcycle driver was ready and waiting at the entrance. He rushed me to the guest house at top speed where I was scolded by one of the staff for missing my pickup for the boat to Phnom Penh. IT was 6:30 and the boat left at 7. I was already packed, so after checking in my key, the motorcycle guy rushed me to the lake some 10 km away. It seemed that being late prevented me from having to wait around for almost an hour for those tourists who showed up at 7:20.

The boat ride was a relaxing change from the bus ride two days before. The guest house had pushed the bus as a cheaper alternative, but I though I would screw the roads and give water transport a try. In the end, the lake/river route was scenic and relaxing. I saw boat houses and local fishers. But the neatest thing for me was seeing patches of water hyacinth everywhere. Too thing that people pay money for it back home. Here it grows like a weed.

I spent the majority of the boat trip on the roof of the boat reading "The Killing Fields." for those who haven't read it, "The Killing Fields" tells the true story (with fictitious elements) of an American journalist and his Cambodian colleague. The two of them choose not to evacuate Cambodia in 1975 when the Khmer Rouge topples the puppet government installed by the Americans.

The book goes into some detail of the insanity of the situation. It tells of how the Americans had bombed the country side on the chance that they might hit North Vietnamese forces based on the Cambodian side of the border. It tells of how the Khmer Rouge, upon taking the capital, forced its 2 million citizens (mostly refugees) into the countryside to face starvation and poverty. And it describes the Khmer Rouge's policy of to kill any educated or undesirable people (those with glasses, soft skin on their hands, or a serious illness) in order to create an entire country of peasant farmers. I'd definitely recommend reading it.

I had planned on going shopping this evening, but I was tired, badly sun burnt from the boat, and really into the book I was reading. I think it's time to eat again... mmmm....

Angkor Wat

I slept well last night. Had a quick breakfast and rented a motorcycle driver for the day.

The temples of Angkor are beautiful! I've left the main Angkor Wat (wat=temple) for tomorrow morning at sunrise, hoping to leave the best for last.

I saw four temple complexes so far. The first was Angkor Thom- actually an entire walled ancient city. Inside its walls are a number of ruins that you can walk around and explore. The first structure I saw had beautiful carved murals all round its exterior. The murals depicted warriors and political figures and the like. My favorite moment, however was standing on a pavilions along the main square. The leper kings and elephant's pavillions are large raised areas along the side of a huge grass courtyard (maybe 800 m long). The earth that make up their bulk is contained by carved retaining walls that provide an impressive sight from the courtyard. I could imagine being a Khmer king sitting on the pavilion watching troops monks and elephants parade by (or some other majestic vision giving a grandiose feeling).

The second complex I visited was actually never completed. My driver suggested that if I climbed to the top of the thing that I could see the jungle well. I'm glad I did it now, but I wasn't glad by the time I got to the top... The stairs were really steep, and even though they were quite sturdy and I was in no danger, my fear of heights kicked in. T felt like I was gone die and I sweated buckets.

The third temple that I visited was the only one "left to the jungle". Everything was covered in moss and enormous trees sprouted out of walls and rooftops. Being there was like being in Indiana Jones or tomb Raider or something like that. The atmosphere was amazing.

The last temple I saw was quite a ride to get to. 30 km on the back of a small motorbike can be a bit rough. The ride was worth it however, because the temple had the most detailed carving of any in Angkor. It is known as the Women's temple because apparently the carvings are too delicate to have been made by he hands of men.

Now that I am back in town, I'm gonna get some food and go to bed early to get an fresh start tomorrow.

OMG What a Crazy Bus!

Yeah, so it seams there was a bit of a physical price to add to that cheap bus ride. The bus arrived at Thai-Cambodian border from Bangkok in record time.. Around 4 hours. "we've covered well over half the distance, we must be over halfway there", I dumbly thought. Boy was I wrong.

Processing visas, eating lunch, passing through Thai immigration, passing through Cambodian immigration and diddling and waiting for the group on the other side took around 2 or 3 hours. After this point we boarded what was apparently a luxury bus for Cambodia. It had air-con, so I wasn't complaining.

Eventually we left town and headed toward the 'highway'. "Only 140 km to go", I thought, "we're practically there already." At around 3:45 pm we hit the highway and I saw what bumpy roads really are. Although it was sealed, the road had HUGE craters in it every 2 metres. Sometimes I though we we were on a ship instead of a bus. The passengers rocked and bounced with every contour of the road. Imagine the roughest part of a muddy mill yard stretching for 120 km. Now imagine driving on it!

I'm sure the jarring experience gave everyone thoughts of "are we there yet", although no one was dumb enough to say it. We stopped once to eat, once to change flat tires, and once for a drink/pee break. I noticed on our last stop that our luxury bus was actually a Japanese school bus-- Su-koo-lu bah-su was written on the side in Katakana (a Japanese script).

All together the bus took 9 hours. Assuming an hour of breaks, we were traveling at an incredible average speed of 15 km/h. From Bangkok, the whole trip took 16.5 hours, so much for the 13 I was told when I bought the ticket.

I think I'm gonna sleep well tonight. I'll be dreaming about the over 120 USD that I saved and the beautiful temples I'm gonna see tomorrow.