Bali

I think I'm going through a bit of culture shock.  Just a few weeks ago we were in India, and now we are in Bali.  It is not normal to be jet-setting as much do currently.  It is a strange feeling when going to the airport is a regular routine.  Packing is a now fine tuned skill.  And within a very short time period our apartment is full of souvenirs picked up from various destinations.  Waking up yesterday morning felt like a dream.  Where am I now?  What am I doing here?  

But I'll be honest.  That feeling soon disappears when I glance around our ENORMOUS room.  The mosquito nets block the view slightly, but they just add to the ambiance.  I ventured outside on to our veranda, which is also huge.  Equipped with lovely large chairs to sit and enjoy the view.  This is a hotel our friends regularly stay at.  Unfortunately someone else thought a view of the rice paddies would be a great place to build as well, and have built buildings right in front of the veranda.  There  is one little space where you can see what once was a beautiful, serene view of rice paddies.  Now however the hotel is surrounded by a construction site.  The hotel is a bit of a haven.  No construction noises breach the walls.  But as for the rest of the place, power drills are on for most of the day.  Things seem to move slowly here though and they don't tend to start up the power tools until 8am.  

We are here in Ubud with our friends Tina and Andrew.  They are frequent flyers to Bali, solo and with guests, so they seem to have set places to go visit in Ubud.  You know how it is when you have taken people visiting several times.  You slowly develop a system and plan.  We certainly did in Christchurch.  Anyway, it is great.  We don't have to think too much.  We just jump in the car with Madi, their regular driver, and go with the flow.  Yesterday we enjoyed views of rice terraces, attempted to see a volcano but due to fog there was limited visibility, and had our first sips of cat-poo coffee.  Ubud is beautiful.  It is everything that people say it is.  Tranquil, terrific food, stunning scenery, kind people and great shopping.  

Yesterday we ticked off one of Dave's "bucket list" items and we sipped our first cat-poo coffee.  We were taken to this beautiful plantation, full of fruit, vanilla beans, herbs and several other delicious treats.  Wanting us to sample some of the fruit our driver immediatly grabbed a large stick and began hitting a branch high up in the trees, trying to knock down tamarillos for us.  After a trying with a couple of different sticks the tomato-looking fruit fell to the ground.  I don't think I've ever eaten tamarillo before.  Looks like a roma tomato, tastes similar to a passion fruit.  So after this first taste test we wind our way through the path and arrive at some tables and chairs, ready with all the fixings to try all the various teas and coffees the plantation produces.  The plantation is set up so you sample all the drinks and then you make your way over to the shop and buy what you have just tried.  The atmosphere was very relaxed.  And after they found out Tina and Andrew had been there several times already, we were nearly left to our own devices.  They could probably tell they would get a sell out of us regardless of their speeches.  And of course we ended up buying some cat-poo coffee.  How could you not?  The civet cat chooses the best coffee beans to eat, and then passes them through.  I think the acid in their stomachs does something to the coffee beans, they are collected and then roasted.  Yum.

The rest of the day consisted of driving through the country side, laying our eyes on rice terrace after rice terrace.  The scenery is just beautiful.  Everyone is relaxed, people seem to live comfortable lives.  I can see why people speak so highly of the area.

Anyway, my coffee awaits.  Breakfast is coming.  This is photo was taken at from the restaurant of our hotel. 

 

 

Taking a breath before the next plunge

I can almost hardly believe we made it on the plane.  By Tuesday I wasn't sure if I was going to make it through the week!  Looking back it is hard to believe how much was crammed into the last two weeks.  Not to mention a visit from friends, a birthday, the ballet and handing out report cards to students.  

A cab came and picked us up from school today at 5 o'clock.  I had a lovely, meeting free two hours, to tidy up my desk and attempt to put my classroom back into some sort of order.  The paperwork on my desk was so bad my computer was hidden.  Though I was extremely tired from a late night yesterday, today was a lovely day of Chinese New Year celebrations at school.  Most of my students showed up in Chinese outfits, there were activities set up around the school and just an really nice buzz about the place (probably due to teachers who knew they were catching a flight out of there in just a few hours.)  We had plenty of time at the airport for a few drinks and food.  I have flipped through my In Style magazine and now start to feel like I am unwinding a bit.  I can't wait for a few days of sleep next to rice fields.  

 

Return from India.

We departed India at 10pm. I love watching the inflight entertainment no matter how bad. Gives me a distraction when there is turbulence. As a result I haven't slept yet. I was going to push through the day and go to sleep a normal time but I think Im too tired for that. Dave ANSI have already been fairly productive. A visit to our nearest Coffee Bean. Then a quick trip to the bank. Groceries and then a snack. All the while I can't believe we aren't in India anymore. I will have a nap and our trip will feel like a dream when I wake up 

Amritsar

It is with much sadness I drink a final pitcher of beer and munch on my final plate of peanute masala in Amritsar. This location has been an unsuspecting highlight of the trip. With bellies extremely full from a few days of eating food that has been out-of-this-world, we wait to board an overnight bus back to Delhi. There we get picked up by a driver who will take us to our final destination, the Taj Mahal in Agra. What is to not like of a city that has good food, friendly people, great sites, and a bed that has magical powers where you sleep like a log? Our visit started off a bit slow. Due to heavy fog our train was late getting in. We were pretty tired by the ride and I think we both felt a bit off kilter being in new surroundings. We had a great dinner and fell fast asleep, sleeping in until 10:30 the next day. We had just gotten accustomed to our surroundings in Rajasthan. While each city was very different, there was an undercurrent of Rajasthan that made all of the places a bit similar. A theme of old dynasties, exquisite service, poverty, cow poo, rural country sides, and of course a huge fort. Amritsar, a Punjab city has none of this. For all intense and purposes it is a fairly normal city. It even has a mall. Celebrations Mall. We went there today, curious what an Indian mall entailed. They do a lot of things well, malls might not be one of them. It was an incredible shift of worlds though. Before going to the mall we spent some time wandering through the old city trying to find a well known restaurant called Kesar Da Daba. We got lost along the way and needed to ask for some directions a few times. Fortunately it is a well known restaurant so everyone could point us in the right direction. This restaurant has been in the family for a few hundred years. The restaurant has two parts. There is a room where you eat. The tables and walls look like the restaurant has been around for a few hundred years. Next door is the kitchen. Men sit on benches, leaning against the wall looking out on the street. Huge pots sit in front of them. This is where they cooked up all our fabulous food. I've used this in a previous blog post but the food tasted like a few hundred years of perfection. It was so so so good. All washed down with a huge glass of lassi thick enough we needed spoons. I would have loved to stay to enjoy the atmosphere but it was getting busy and people started hovering over our table when it looked like we were near completion. Then we jumped in an auto-rickshaw and went to the mall. We had a few hours to kill so we bought tickets for the latest Mission Impossible movie. It was dusk when we got out of the movie theatre. I waited for Dave as he collected our camera batteries from security. We had 3 security checks before getting into the theatre. We had to leave our camera batteries with a "coat check-like" man. I suppose this is their attempt to prevent piroting movies. I was feeling skeptical about getting an auto-rickshaw back to the hotel because the mall was a bit out of town. There was one right outside the mall so we headed straight for him, only to find out he had been booked! I immediately thought of our life in Singapore and taxi bookings through our iphone apps and I wondered how one goes about booking an auto-rickshaw. Same same but different I guess. The driver was kind enough to wave down another auto-rickshaw for us. This benefited us in two ways. One, we got a ride. And two, I think we tend to get a better price when a local flags us a ride. This reminds of me of the situation last night. A well-known restaurant called Makhan had evaded us our first night. Try as we might we could not find it. We asked our hotel guy to give instructions to an auto-rickshaw driver to get us there. HAH! Within minutes we were surrounded by guys who were more than welcome to take us but had no idea where the restaurant was. So the hotel guy asked the hotel's taxi driver to drop us off on his way home. The taxi driver got us there no problem. We ushered us into the restaurant, barked some orders at people, bowed to us and left. I guess we had been officially handed over in the care of the restaurant. But that was fine because we knew we were in for a great feast. Again, huge pots of deliciousness cooked away at the front of the restaurant. We sat down and the head guy came over and helped us through our order. We got lots of attention just by being there. It was NOT place tourists would find by just wandering around. One guy from another table came wandering up, stuck his hand out and introduced himself as Paul. "Hello Paul, where do you come from?" "I'm fron near here, but live in Abbortsford." Crazy to hear that name from home all the way here in India. We chatted with Paul, and he finished his converation by telling us he would give us our mobile number and if we needed anything he would help us. So we get our food. Again, delicious. Again, the tandoori chicken I could have lived off of and died a happy person. It was that good. It was obviously a drinking place because there were many men with big bottles of whiskey drinking and eating. By the time a family left I was the only woman there. At one point a man got up, alcohol hitting him hard and he walked right into our table. The entire restaurant watched us. Wrong table to bump into I think. He was ushered out. The table to the other side of us told us we should eat at "safe" establishments. Anyway, we eat our food. We tell the owner that we have been in India for 2 weeks and their food was by far the BEST food we have eaten. We get business cards and walk out the entrance. Now we are on a dark road outside of town. We wonder how we are going to get home, and there is Paul! A bit more drunk than the last time we talked, but there he is nonetheless. He helps us get an auto-rickshaw. Helps with instructions about where our hotel is, and off we go. Before Amritsar we had been saying we felt like we had travelled quite "safe" in this trip. We were fortunate that most of the restaurants at our hotels were quite good and so we just chose to eat there. Also we knew we would have a better chance of not getting sick eating at our hotel. I'm happy that (for the most part) we avoided being sick but you do miss out by eating in the tourist run establishments. Amritsar enabled us to get off the tourist track. Every place we ate was either down some alley or in an obscure location, and the food was terrific. And along the way we had a chance to chat with the locals. (Most of the time we needed help finding our way). So what I'm saying is if you have an opportunity to go to Amritsar you SHOULD! Well, I should get going. I have my beer to finish and Dave has left me one more spoonful of peanute masala. We board a bus in a few hours and then we are nearly back to Singapore. Time has gone by so quickly. I am actually surpsied how much I have enjoyed India. Taj Maha here we come.

Food heaven in Amritsar

We may have just found food heaven in India. While we have been eating well the entire time we've been here (as my increasingly tight jeans would suggest) things just went up a notch in Amritsar. Two days ago we flew out of Udaipur, spent a night in Delhi and then boarded another early morning train for Amritsar. Amritsar is located in the Punjab province, which is markedly different from Rajasthan in many ways. First of all, the majority of people are Sikh. This means there are significantly less cows, the holy animals in Hindu, wandering the road. This in turn means less cow poo to be concerned about! In fact, all this considering, the roads are fairly well maintained! Yesterday we went wandering down a street that was supposed to have a market. This market however almost resembled a "normal" street of shops. There is certainly more money in this province. Anyway, back to the food. We arrived later than we expected. The train went slow due to heavy winter fog. We got settled into our hotel which was right across the street from the train station and then went for our wander. Amritsar is famous for its snack food so we wanted to find us some of those treats! We ended up in a little cafe down a side alley. We were greeted by the usual group of men who jump to attention when they know you are choosing their restaurant. An old man (obviously the one in charge) barks some orders at them, and before we know it we are seated with water and menues. Then everyone watches as we choose our food. We chose kebabs and a special Sikh paneer curry. It wasn't the snack food we were wanting but it did not disappoint. We wandered back to the hotel, where the restaurant serves draft beer (also a first in India). We did some internet while enjoying a pitcher of beer and my new favourite snack peanut masala. Peanut masala is made of roasted spiced peanuts, chopped tomatoes, chopped onion, sald and pepper and coriander. With beer it is delicious. And then it is dinner time! We had already researched a few places we wanted to go check out. On our last two trips we have used Trip Advisor quite a bit, an online social network for travellers. It is a great place to check out for most up to date reviews. With a restaurant in mind we got in a rickshaw and went our way. Unfortunately we were unable to find the place we wanted to go to. We walked up and down the street, asked several people, some of them gave us directions. None of the directions seemed to coorespond. So we eventually ended up at another restaurant that was on our list, and this did not disappoint either. We enjoyed a beautiful dish of tandoori chicken, a fried fish and a chicken curry. It was so delicious. I could happily eat there for the rest of our stay in India. The tandoori chicken was unlike anything we had eaten before. We found out on our Indian cooking course the orange colour of tandoori chicken is a colouring added to give the appearance of spice. We were pleased to see this tandoori chicken did not have the fake orange colour. It was cooked beautifully, with the crispy bits in all the right places. The seasoning was to die for. It tasted of honed in perfection, worked on through several generations. Feeling quite euphoric over our meal, we got ourselves another rickshaw back to the hotel and flopped into bed, sleeping almost 10 hours. What was in our food?? Today we go see the Indian/Pakistan border ceremony, and then the ceremony at the Golden Temple. Followed by more food adventures I'm sure.

R & R in Udaipur

You know you are on holiday mode when you slowly wander to the hotel's restaurant for breakfast at 10am. I remarked how much warmer it felt today, but I think this is more as a result of us catching the sun at a later time than a different temperature. Dave is chowing down on his chocoloate banana pancake. Washing it down with a strawberry lassi. I have just been served two pots of chai. Now, it won't be as delicious as the chai we learned to make in our cooking class yesterday. But then restaurant food is rarely as good as homecooked treats. Yesterday we were shown how to make ginger chai. Yum. You could feel a slight spice come through the chai. We have played it safe with eating in India, hoping to avoid stomach problems. I unfortunately picked up a bug and on our 3rd or 4rth night in spent hugging the toilet seat. The next day we travelled to Jeisalmer. We were meant to take a bus but I was in no condition to manage that. So we rented a car. Dave enjoyed the view from the front seat and I lay in the fetal position in the back, and slept most of the way. It has taken awhile for me to bounce back. Several banana lassis later I have a more regular appetite and I am beginning to enjoy the Indian cuisine again. Most of the hotels we have stayed at have had really good restaurants. The food is far more than what you would find on the street, however it is a small price to pay to avoid getting sick. We hope to do a walking tour through the markets in Delhi before we go. This isn't to say we haven't enjoyed 'local' cuisine. While in Jeisalmer, Dave was invited twice to a home for dinner. I bowed out of the invitations because of my stomach. And in Jaipur we came across a sweet shop where we ended up with 1kilo of Indian sweets. The sweet shop is called LMB Hotel. It was obviously a popular place because there were lots of people inside. Two long glass cases sat at 90 degree angles. There were some tables set up as well where people seemed to be enjoying their purchased sweets and chai. We must have stood there for a few minutes just trying to understand how the system worked. Customers were shouting orders to the uniformed staff behind the glass counters. There were short women in blue blazers who were taking orders as well. Behind the glass counter sat a very large man, on a bench, perched high enough so he could see the entire shop. All the money went through him. The uniformed boys brought each packaged box of sweets to him to check, and he was the one who issued change. Dave's first attempt at ordering sweets didn't go so well. The uniformed boys did not speak English, and they were quickly distracted by the Hindi orders being shouted at them. Eventually we were aided by one of the women in the blue blazers, who probably sold us enough sweets for a family of 10. They were packed in a brightly coloured box and shrink wrapped to go. We brought the sweets back to our hotel. And yes we were good. We had dinner first. And then....then we tasted our first sweets in India. If you haven't tried an Indian sweet I encourage you to do so, because my description cannot do it justice. And then I encourage you to hop on a plane and get yourself to Jaipur to try the sweets from LMB. As my teeth took a bite, liquid sugar or honey oozed from every nook and crevise. Though the piece was as small as ping pong ball, it felt as heavy croquette ball. As pistachio crumbs fell on to my lap I had to wonder how on earth so much sweetness can be packed into such a tiny piece of heaven. One small taste was more than enough, and yet in front of us sat a 1 kilo box. Probably 8 different varieties purchased from the store. And two of each of course. Sadly we never managed to finish the box. We tried. We passed our sweets to the driver and his friend while traveling to Jodhpur. (We were meant to take the train but it was 6 hours late. Not wanting to hang around to find out it would be delayed even longer we asked the driver we'd had for the last day and a half to drive us to Jodhpur. But that is a whole other blog post.) And then it was in Jodhpur where I got sick. I lost my stamina for eating due to my stomach and we had to leave the remainder of the sweets at the hotel. Oh how I wish we were heading back through Jaipur just to taste those sweets one more time. Today is our last night in Udaipur. Final night of 2011. This time last year we were walked down from our hike on Louis Tops, we bought ourselves some fish and chips for dinner and were in bed before 10. My legs were so sore, I don't think I could walk the next day. And then we were on our way to Stewart Island with Towny and Laura. What a crazy year it has been. Tomorrow afternoon we fly out of Udaipur and back to Delhi. We spend one night in Delhi and then we are on the train first thing in the morning to head to Amritsar. There we will watch the closing of the Indian/Pakistan border and watch people putting a book to sleep at the Golden Temple. Happy New Year to you all. Lots of love from Udaipur!

Udaipur

It never ceases to amaze me how fortunate Dave and I are. Here we sit, in Udaipur India. The sun basks on my face. Dave and I are both enjoying a capuccino, the first coffee of our trip. The coffee machine sits on a table inside the restaurant, displayed ceremoniously. Last night Dave asked if they served real coffee and he was immiediately invited to inspect the coffee beans and the inner workings of the prized machine. "Yes yes, I believe you" Dave insisted. I think we jumped out of bed a bit quicker than usual knowing what was waiting for us. We are sitting on the outside roof of the restaurant. It is filled with patrons, there is an open window to the kitchen. Dave and I both are engrossed on our ipads. Beside me lays a book I have just started reading, "The White Tiger" written by Aravind Adiga. The view from our rooftop over looks a very large lake. Directly in front of me are two large structures built on the lake. One is the former palace, now a posh hotel. Behind the hotel sits an even larger temple. Just to clarify, these buildings are sitting in the middle of the lake. There are some boats lazily gliding across the water. To my left another palace sits above all the other buildings. And to my right, way off in the distance I can see yet another fort perched on top of a mountain. I can't wait to get out and explore this city. It was a long day getting here. We left at 8am from Jodhpur, and arrived in Udaipur at 6pm. Much of the road was a tiny, one lane road through hills. Our driver was in no rush and so we were able to relax and enjoy the ride. As it turns out he works in Dubai, and is now in India on his break. He drives for his brother's business as part time work while back home. He seemed to enjoy the ride through the country side as much as we did. We drove through village after village where time has come to a complete stand still. The villages reminded us of Nepal, not necessarily because they looked the same but because village life all over the world seems similar. There is the smell of animal and smoke, dirty children either running around or walking with loads probably heavier than they are on their heads. Groups of old men in traditional dress sit huddled together in the town "centre" probably talking about the "goold old days". The women are always busy doing something, working the fields, pumping water at the well, and of course carrying loads I can't even fathom, on their heads. It wasn't something we expected to see on our drive and so Dave and I sat silently in the back of our hired card, mesmerized by all that we were passing. We had two stops along the way, a temple and a fort. One of the highlights of these two stops was the lunch at the temple. For Rs 25 (less than 50 cents) we were ushered into a clean cafeteria style eating area. In front of us was a silver platter, two bowls and a cup. Everyone sat on long benches. Men walked around with buckets of fresh cooked vegetarian food. One by one they laddled the food onto our plates. It was some of the most delicious food we'd had in India so far. When you had finished one dish, then a man came to laddle more on your plate. We sat near the kitchen door. Probably the most spartan kitchen I have ever seen. There was a man that walked from pot to pot, stirring and adding. What a great experience. Anyway, Udaipur beckons. We are here for a few days and we plan to take things slowly. Our last few days in India are spent jumping from one place to the next, with the Taj Mahal our final destination.

There is always time for chai

Oh, the effort of trying to write a blog post in India! I swear I have tried several times but have (obviously) had little sucess. The Indian Gods are against me, forcing me into a blog-free world. Some advantages of being blog-free? I have nearly finished my book that I have started 3 times and have dragged through 3 countries trying to finish. I think I savour the slow moments when drinking chai. I might otherwise be concerned with writing my next post. I can lead screen-free existence, which is nice because I sometimes think I spend too much time in front of a screen for school. Anyway, India. Today is the first day I feel like the cobwebs from my brain stomach have been cleared. We both arrived in India with the sniffles and a general sense of being overwhelmed at being in India. We must have spend the first 48 hours just 'floating' around, going with the flow, allowing drivers and hotel reception to direct us where they think we should go. I think only now, about a week into our holiday, are we feeling like our senses are sharpened. We somewhat confidentely stroll down the narrow alleyways feeling clever that we so narrowly miss being hit by any number of vehicles. Not that they are going that fast, because they too are narrowly missed. At the moment we are back in the city of Jodphur, home of the Mehrangarth Fort. Alas, I am able to type but can't post photos. Traditionally the city had a large Brahmin caste population. In the past the Brahmin painted their houses an eggshell blue. Now people paint their houses blue because they think it will repell insects. As a result, a significant portion of Jodphur is blue. The city clusters at the bottom of the aforementioned fort. Imagine the coolest sandcastle that you have built, times it by a million and that is sort of what the fort looks like. We are staying in an old boutique guest house, nearly 400 years old. Apparently the great granfather of the owner was the banker for the Maharaja. This family, Brahmin, was also the caretaker of a nearby temple. We are in the old city of Jodhpur, though really to me the whole city seems old. Slightly more removed from the central clock tower there are fewer hotels. People in the markets are just minding their own business, doing what they have done for hundreds of years. There is so much I can say about India, I could sit here for hours and write what we have done. But then I'd be missing out on my sunset. Impressions of India? It has been easier to travel through than we expected. Everyone is so helpful. Yes you are approached on all sides when you step off a bus or a train. But this is no different to any of the other countries we have visited. For the most part, people seem to appreciate a personal exchange, even if a business transactiopn has not transpired. The streets are filthy, to be on the highways at night is actually you putting your life at risk, and in some places people seem to be living a lifestyle that has endured for hundreds of years. No matter what, there is always time for chai. Anyway, I have a few days in Udaipur. Perhaps I will pick up my Indian reflections there. If not, then you know I have been swept up in my holiday. Happy holidays to you all!