It's Like An Orgasm For Your Eyes

***Quote Above: From Lindsay Page during our cycle rickshaw ride to the Ganges River in Varanasi, for the ceremony where they put the river to sleep***

I would have to say that Lindsay put into words perfectly what India is like, and I am sure Kate would agree with me once I explain what she meant. She meant, that there is so much going on, so much chaos and so many people, that you don’t want to blink because you are scared you are going to miss out on something, and I must say, that was my entire experience in India. In fact, when I had to take out my contacts on the bus with particles flying everywhere, I was sure I missed at least 20 awesome things that happened.
India was my first of all future long independent over night trips to come. We left the first day to catch a flight to Dehli, me and 29 other people whom I didn’t know until I saw them, then realized I was fortunate to have such a great group of people that were on this trip, some of my closest friends on the ship and others that I loved to hang out with. We headed for the 15 minute walk outside the port to meet our guide and bus to take us to the airport. It was about an hour drive and we got to the airport and checked in with enough time to beat the SAS Taj and Varanasi trip there, thankfully. We were on the same flight as them, the constant theme through out this trip was 588-1400. We paid 588 for the same exact experience they had and they paid 1400. The boys were kind of obnoxious about it but whatever. So we got on our flight with the other group of 70 SASers on the SAS trip and headed to Dehli, where we were greeted by our next guide and led to our bus where they gave us lei’s and took us for a little night time city tour and to dinner. Our dinner was delicious, the bread they gave us was flat like a tortilla but a little thicker so I put everything in it for a burrito, can you tell I miss Mexican food much? We then proceeded to our hotel and sat up on the roof talking and then headed to bed as we had an early rise to catch our train to Agra to see the Taj Mahal.
We got on the train the next morning, also with the SAS trip again, and had two hours till Agra. There we met our next guide who took us to a palace that was beautifully built and I can’t honestly remember the name nor do I know where my notebook is where I wrote it down but it was BEAUTIFUL, and huge. We took some really cute group pictures and then proceeded off to the Agra Fort which had weird looking monkeys hanging around and it was just another palace that was built and it had a beautiful view of the Taj from a very far distance. Before we went there we definitely had to eat some lunch that was good, everything in India was a little sketchy as you never knew what you were eating because you didn’t know what the words meant, so you put it in your mouth and hope for the best. Luckily I didn’t get sick and my stomach didn’t start speaking another language as Becca (my friend from Minnesota on the ship, her and her sister are doing SAS together) said. After we were done at the fort we headed to Taj, and the anticipation was definitely built. I was definitely scared it was going to be like the statue of liberty …a huge disappointment but all the pictures and movies of it, just doesn’t do the thing justice at all! It was bigger than I though and more beautiful than pictures I had seen. I honestly started getting teary eyed because it finally hit me that I was traveling the world and seeing one of the wonder’s of the world. WE spent about an hour and a half there taking pictures with all our crazy ideas and getting group pictures, jumping for joy pictures and anything else. Sometimes I just sat and stared and really thought about where I was and lived in the moment. After we were done there we headed back for dinner and then prepared our selves for the sleeper train we were about to experience. I was definitely really nervous because a train in India is definitely much different than Amtrak, let alone a sleeper train. Let me tell you, it was quite the experience. We were in first class which could not even be considered economy in States. It was sketchtastic and awesome, the pictures really do tell the whole story and unfortunately I don’t have internet to put them up. We had a “corpse” across from my section of the six of us, just this body with full sheet over it that never moved even though we clearly were extremely loud getting on that they had to have been awake, so pictures were taken and people were dancing next to it, totally inappropriate, but what do you when there’s a weird situation? Just laugh, that’s what I’ve been learning. So finally the “corpse” got old and we went and traveled along visiting with our friends until we passed out. I was lucky enough to actually get some sleep compared to most people who stayed up paranoid all night. The bathroom was just a hole, like in many of these countries and you left your mark on the tracks in India. What was hilarious was how many people I saw going to the bathrrom on the side of the train tracks. I don’t think I will be able to hand anyone who complains about public bathrooms in the states ever again. I mean, public bathrooms in the states are definitely like the Marriot compared to public bathrooms in India. So we woke up the next morning to find out we were not even close to getting to Varanasi and had another three hours so we all went back to sleep after everyone ate some of my food I brought. See mom, you taught me well. I am always prepared with snacks and water and toilet paper and I am always the one feeding or giving toilet paper out…don’t worry I’ve always had enough for me! Haha. I usually save at least one persons hungry stomach or bladder every day, especially on this morning in India.
Once we finally got to Varanasi we got on the bus with our tour guide and headed straight to the hotel because we all felt disgusting and really needed a shower. Our hotel was super nice and we took showers and felt so much better then headed to lunch as we were all starving. After lunch we headed to a Buddhist monestary where Buddha was enlighted and saw the tree of wisdom and it was really cool to see some of the ceremonies going on. After that we headed to Sarnath, which is actually where a replica of the tree was but not the actual tree as not everyone can make it out to the actual tree. After all that we headed to a silk market where we bought some really cool silk scarves and I bought a silk hanging picture of the Taj, before we headed out on our rickshaw rides through Varanasi to get to the Ganges River (where the quote of this blog comes from). It was interesting for sure, and we got off and headed down the steps to watch the Buddhist priests put the Ganges river to sleep at night. Lindsay and I walked away from the group for a little ebit and we got to perform part of the ceremony and got paint on our foreheads by this old man and he gave us lei’s and flowers to throw in to the river and pray with him. It was a really cool experience, because he chanted what we were supposed to say and then apparently we were praying for a good married life, haha. I thought it was really funny.  The entire ceremony was just really cool and I really enjoyed it. That night we went to the SAS trip hotel and partied with them as they were having this really awkard 7th grade type dance the tour company put on for them, and Ken had come over to get us to go over there, so we hung out there and then left later back to our hotel as we had to be up really early again for our sunrise boat ride on the ganges river which was awesome and very peaceful at the same time. We learned a lot about all the crematories that were near the river. As we started off there was a dead body floating in the water that I spotted before everyone else, and then I kind of freaked out because it was right next to me floating in the water. So what they do is let the bodies float down the river and then they take them and cremate them and they throw the ashes into the river. It’s a really intense way for someone to be buried. After we were done we went back to the hotel for breakfast and then some of us decided to go watch some traditional Indian dancing and we got to drink some really good cinnamon tea which tasted very much like Canela. After we were done watching we got to dance together which was awesome and we learned some of the dancing she had performed for us. After that we headed back for lunch and prepared our way back to the airport where we ended our tour and made it back to the ship the night before we left Chennai.
The last day in Chennai I just went shopping, and I realized that Chennai was a lot crazier than Northern India. I was scared for my life at times with these motorized rickshaw drivers, we were followed by all of them they all would pull up next to you and tell you to get in and it became very frustrating it took us about 40 minutes to finally get one with our price and where we needed to go. So we went to the market mall place we were supposed to go called Spencer’s Plaza where I got some awesome quilts and scarves, dvd’s and groceries. Left and headed back to the ship…yay that was India, one huge mess but a lot of fun. Kate, I totally get why you chose to study there, and I honestly think it would be a great idea for everyone to go there.

Love,
A-Ram