Varanasi - Feb 22 & Jaipur - Feb 25

Visiting the Ganges

Varanasi is described as the holiest and oldest Indian city. This description barely does the city justice. We wandered through the small 2m wide winding lanes of the old city. The lanes were filled with small silk, flower and music shops, colorful Hindu shrines and temples. Goats, cows, dogs and monkeys also wandered freely through the lanes. Many of the lanes lead to the different ghats, large steps leading to the Ganges. The ghats were full of color, music and spirituality. People from many different faiths and regions have come here to practice their faith in the holy river. Many people bathe, pray, meditate, chant and give offerings. Some families gaily celebrate marriages and others solemnly attend cremations. It is fascinating to see the diversity of traditions. We went for a walk across town to the university. Along the way we met someone who explained the rituals of cremation at the burning ghat. We didn't completely trust the intentions of our new friend's persistent further invitations so we continued on. We ran into a great parade and met a bright young girl with a huge smile and perfect British English. We bought a lotus flower candle from her and that evening I released it in the river in memory of grandpa. It was beautiful to see all the candles floating in the dark. At nightfall we also saw an amazing performance of Hindu dancers. There was the sound of music, bells and special horns, the smell of burning incense and the beautiful sight of the choreographed dancers. Our last moments of Varanasi began at 5:30 am when we woke up at dawn to watch the sunrise from a boat ride along the Ganges. 

Never pick your nose in India
After being in India for over a week we have been in hundreds of photos and hours of short video clips. Indians are fascinated with western tourists. The bold school kids and husbands will often ask to have   their picture taken with us at monuments. Usually we pose and then ask some questions. However sometimes we can't walk a few seconds without getting mobbed by the paparazzi. In those situations we've decided to make the kids sing a song before they get their picture. Then there are all the less than subtle people that film us or take pictures with their mobiles. Sometimes it's the restaurant staff watching us eat, other passengers on buses, or people biking or walking past us. It just makes us wonder how many people have successfully taken our picture without us noticing! 

Pretty in pink!

After 17 hours of train and 6 hours of bus we arrived in the pink city, Jaipur. Hungry we went out searching for good, cheap, local Indian food. To our delight we found, pure-veg, a hole in the wall family run restaurant that exceeded our expectations. Their English was restricted to "hello mam", " yes", and "no problem". We tried to ask for  their favorite item since we had no idea what anything was. The waiter just ran off to get his uncle who still had no idea what our question meant. Luckily our two random choices turned out to be amazing and we kept ordering more nan bread until we could eat no more.

Since nightlife in India is non existent we bought cinema tickets. We splurged $4 to get box seats to see the Pataila House. The theatre was beautiful and had the comfiest seats I've ever had in a movie theatre. The movie great, it was about an Indian family in England so there was just enough English for us to follow the plot. The story was filled with many funny family scenes but it was also about some of the problems immigrant families face. The whole theatre applauded the cute love scenes and the hero's cricket victories. 

Jaipur is not just famous for being pink but it is famous for shopping. We explored the pink market in the old town. As you walk different streets sell different items such as textiles, tea, spices, marble, jewelry, pots and pans, books (including a whole section dedicated to university textbooks). Essentially anything you could ever need is probably somewhere in that market. 

When we went bangle shopping I felt we encounter the whole spectrum of types of Indian people. There are so many kind and generous people who go out of their way to help you and insist it is no problem. However there are a few who just want your money and have no problem cheating you. So we came across a beautiful bangle shop with hundreds of shelves of shining bangles. We tried lots on and got caught up in how much fun it was to properly convert the prices from rupees to dollars. Over some chai we got recommendations to see the amber fort. We left and shortly after we realized we paid too much and should have shopped around first. We sighed and took it as a lesson learned and contined on. The Amber fort turn out to be an amazing hike to the top of a small mountain. From the top you could see 4 forts on the top of each mountain connected by a wall and the small town nestled below. As we were walking out a man stopped us and we recognized him from the bangle shop. He explained that he was horrified with his brother's business attitude and told us to go back and get either money back or more bangles. He had waited over 40 minutes at the exit hoping we ended up visiting the fort. We returned, got the fair price and were in awe that someone would go so far out of their way for us.