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new york city/new jersey/pennsylvania

2009-01-18T10:40:00.006-04:00

This time last year, Micah and I had just arrived in Dubai. It's really strange to think that it's been a year already. Sadly this year has not been nearly so interesting yet. As the title implies though, I have done a bit of traveling. I took a 5 day trip to the US to celebrate NYE, watch Bollywood, and visit Erica. Woooo!

On New Year's Eve I was supposed to fly direct from Halifax to Laguardia in NYC, but it turned into a huge ridiculous adventure and I almost didn't get there. It was due to a series of flukes that it all worked out - the whole day was insane. I got to the airport at 8am for an 11:30am flight, because that was the only time my sister had to drop me off at the airport before work. So when I got there, I looked at the departures screen and saw that the Continental flight to Newark had just canceled. That was originally the flight I was going to take, but I decided to go to Laguardia instead via United/Air Canada. Lucky. So I went to the bathroom for a few minutes to put my makeup on. When I came out, maybe 10-15 minutes later, I looked at the departures screen again and saw that MY flight had just canceled too. I almost cried right there, but then I figured I might as well attempt to be productive first and cry later.

So I went up to the Air Canada counter and asked what I should do about my canceled flight. Well, the Air Canada people didn't know what I was talking about - apparently I noticed the flight had canceled even before they did and was the first person to the counter to ask about it. So the very nice Air Canada woman told me to hold on, while she looked into it - turned out "weather" in the NYC area was to blame. Since I was the only one at the counter, she tried to find me a new route to NYC. Because it was New Year's Eve, everything was totally full. But she found me the last seat on a plane to Ottawa, and from there to Montreal, and then from there to Laguardia, which would in theory get me to NYC about 7 hours later than originally planned. But I had no other options, so I took it. Before she finished booking me, other people started to come up to the counter to ask about their flights, but everyone was turned away and given a number to call because they don't do re-bookings at the airport. So it is a MIRACLE that I got re-booked when I did.

So at this point, I phone Erica. She tells me it's clear and sunny in NYC. What?! Apparently the problem was actually strong winds, and the tiny planes that go back and forth from Halifax to NYC are too small to handle that wind. I found one more flight to NYC from Halifax that hadn't canceled, on American Airlines. Apparently there were a few seats left and they were letting canceled Air Canada passengers onto their plane. I went back to the Air Canada woman to look into it. She called and there was one seat left on the AA plane. I was debating whether or not to take it (what if it canceled too?) when the seat went to someone else and I lost my chance at it. So, no decision to make. I was going to Montreal to hope for the best. Everyone was telling me just to get out of Halifax and hope for the best in Montreal - Halifax was due for a huge blizzard in a few hours time and if I didn't get out of Halifax that afternoon, I wouldn't be going anywhere for days.

So, I got the plane to Ottawa, then transferred and went on to Montreal. When I got there, my plane to NYC hadn't been canceled! So it was extremely lucky. On the flight to Laguardia, I ended up sitting next to a woman who had come from Ottawa, because her direct flight from Ottawa had canceled too and she'd been rerouted the same way I was. We started talking, and it turned out that she was supposed to be meeting a friend at Laguardia, but that friend had been on my exact plane out of Halifax that had canceled, and she had gotten stuck there! She had actually gotten a seat on the AA plane that was supposed to go... but then at the last second, the people in charge at AA said that Air Canada had no right to transfer their passengers onto the AA flight, and they booted everyone off! So she didn't make it to NYC. I am SO unbelievably lucky that I went via Montreal and didn't try to take the AA flight! When we finally landed at Laguardia, the turbulence was insane. The plane was just being thrown all over the place. Although I am normally freaked out by such things, I was just so happy to be getting there that I didn't care at all. When we landed, everyone applauded.

So FINALLY I arrived. Erica picked me up, we met some of her friends at the Millennium Hilton (right next to the WTC site) and got ready to go out. I got to have a shower after my long day of being at airports, so I was pretty happy. We went to a rooftop NYE party at a different hotel. When midnight struck, Erica and I were lost somewhere in the crowd between the bar and the table where our friends were, because we took too long to order drinks and didn't make it back to the table until about 10 seconds too late. Oops, haha. (Group photo, and view from the roof.)

We ended up crashing at the Hilton afterwards. Pictures from the window, because the view from the room was crazy, but somewhat depressing.

Anyway, on New Year's Day, Erica and I drove to a movie theatre in New Jersey and watched two new Bollywood films back to back. Ghajini and Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi, which are both huge hits in India and we've been just dying to see them. They were both fantastic so it turned out to be the best double feature ever, haha. Ghajini has actually broken all records to become the highest grossing Hindi film of all time. I wish I could be in India while all the hype was going on about it. I feel like I'm missing out being here where nobody knows what it is. Arghhh.

After the movies, we drove back to Erica's house in Pennsylvania, and I hung out there for a few days before flying back to Halifax (totally hassle-free) on the Monday. And now, here I am, back home and back at work. Adventures are over. (In a way, that's good, I don't need another adventure like the flight cancellation saga... I will NEVER fly somewhere the same day I need to be there again.) Actually this blog entry was largely pointless and consisted mostly of my airplane issues, but it's been awhile. Will update again next time I travel. It won't be too long - I'm always going somewhere. :)

two months later

2008-12-24T08:38:00.006-04:00

I haven't gone anywhere so I haven't written. The last two months have been busy, but nothing worth writing about here. No updates yet on what I am doing next. I'll get back to that later.

Halifax is gross and cold. I still miss India. Things have been crazy over there recently. The Mumbai attacks were horrible, and I was pretty upset watching all of it on TV. (If you are somehow oblivious to international news and missed it completely, google it and read about the terrorist attacks and hotel sieges on Nov 26.) I think I sat in front of the TV and cried for 8 hours the first night it was happening. Those terrorists attacked so many places I've been and know really well. In the past year I've spent at least a month in Mumbai, and I'm pretty familiar with it, especially the areas that happened to be under attack, since they were common tourist areas. It was totally surreal to see these places that are so vivid in my memory on TV, with all of that going on. It's all so horribly sick and depressing. The images of the train station, the Taj on fire, and the cafe were the most unbelievable for me.

Especially Leopold's Cafe. When I went to Mumbai in March that place was right next to my hotel and I went there every day at least once. I was there so often I made friends with one of the staff there, Thomson, and he was trying to help me get into a Bollywood film. I've even mentioned him in my blog once or twice. We used to talk every day, and in September when I went back to the cafe he remembered me from March. I went there for dinner a few times, and Erica and I had drinks there one night. Thomson and I had a running joke that I was supposed to be finding him a woman. Anyway, seeing this cafe on TV with blood everywhere and bullet holes was more than a bit disturbing. I can't imagine that it's the same place. Apparently the attacks were originally scheduled for Sept. 27 and then got pushed back. It's conceivable that Erica and I could actually have been there when it happened, which is scary, but I don't really think about it too much. I am just so sad for everyone who was there. And I have no idea if Thomson was there when it happened, or whether or not he's okay. I suppose I could call and ask, but I don't think I'd want to know if the answer was bad. I'll go and see next time I am in Mumbai.

Alright, enough horror, it's Christmas Eve. I am feeling extremely indifferent to Christmas this year. I am not sure how it even got to be December. It feels like it should still be August. On the positive side of things, I've now maintained a blog (well, sort of) for an entire year.

All I want for Christmas is for this movie to release in Halifax:

Otherwise, the travel blog will get interesting as I'll have to travel some place to go and see it.

Happy Christmas, New Year's, whatever else, etc. etc. :)

canada is cold. i miss india.

2008-10-22T18:15:00.013-03:00

Worst travel blog EVER. I know. I KNOW. It started out well, then fell off terribly in the last couple of weeks. Erica and I got so busy, there was just never any time to sit around in the internet cafe and talk about all the things we were doing. But to be truthful, there wasn't much to write about. We were out enjoying Mumbai, but most of our time was spent riding in taxis or in coffee shops. Tourism was minimal. I think two weeks passed where I didn't take any photos at all. To make up for that, Erica and I are posting our travel videos here:

http://www.youtube.com/user/glitterspoonprod

Erica also has a blog, and is slowly but surely posting some backlogged updates from the trip here: http://ericareddywrites.blogspot.com/

Our last few days in Mumbai were quite low-key. Erica came back from Hyderabad on Sunday morning, and that basically just left us with one day to do some last minute shopping before flying home. Which we did, but not until after we spent 2 hours stuck at the airport with all our luggage and nowhere to go, because the airport was renovating and didn't have anywhere to leave luggage for the day, and the Continental desk was closed until evening. In the end, we hired a taxi for 6 hours, so that we could drive around wherever, and leave all our bags in the car when we wanted to go somewhere. By some wonderful miracle, I found the loveliest taxi driver ever, who drove us around all afternoon (and by some miracle even charged us a fair price) and guarded our stuff while we shopped.

We took the opportunity to drive past Shah Rukh Khan's house, which was dorky but fun. We did some shopping, then I tried to go to McDonald's to get one last Paneer Salsa Wrap, which is the best item on a McDonald's menu to ever exist in the history of McDonald's, but they were sold out! It was devastating. I have withdrawal. I need to go back to India just for the McDonald's. How sad is that?

Anyway, here are a couple of photos from our last day in Mumbai.

1. The taxi driver wonders why the hell we have so much luggage. (Note: He isn't the aforementioned nice driver.)
2. Good times in the taxi.
3. Shah Rukh Khan's house. Ooooooh.
4. Random steamroller.
5. Crazy sky in Mumbai.
6. Forgot to post this one awhile back. A cafe had poutine on the menu! A nice idea, but wasn't so great in practice. I ordered it for the novelty but trust me - it wasn't anywhere near poutine! Also... foo tayn?! What the hell?!

The flight home was decent, but sad. It was really depressing getting off the plane and having it be cold out. I miss India. But, I have a funny feeling I'll be back there at some point again. I said that last time I left, and it happened. So, I'm staying optimistic.

The future now is... strange. And uncertain. I have decided not to go to Korea. Basically, the longer I spent in India, the more I realized that I really didn't want to be in Korea. I think ideally I'd like to just live in India, but obviously that's not an immediate possibility. Even so, I don't even want to be in Korea for a year. I just don't think it's where I am supposed to be right now. So I am back in Halifax, indefinitely. Which won't be for too long - I have a few ideas in my head, and I am going to figure out the right direction soon. Wow, what a vague and pointless paragraph.

I shall keep updating my blog with random stories of India as they come to me, and photos when Erica sends them to me. I leave you now with the theme song of our trip, which we probably heard about a million times in 4 weeks. With a suitably Bolly-esque video to match!

thane

2008-10-04T09:57:00.002-03:00

I am officially sucking at the travel-blogging thing. I have just been too busy and had too infrequent access to the internet to maintain this properly. Also, I haven't been doing anything new or touristy that would be good to write about. Erica and I have been very very busy, but this trip has turned into more of a business trip than a pleasure trip, so we've been working. I don't think either of us has taken a picture in 2 weeks.

At the moment I'm in an internet cafe in Thane, which is just outside of Mumbai, where we're staying. Erica is in Hyderabad for the day, I am just waiting for her to get back tonight, then we'll probably go out one last time in Mumbai - we fly back home tomorrow night. Originally we were supposed to come back last Monday, but we pushed our flight back. A bunch of funny things have happened which I will write about, but it'll have to be once I get home, because this keyboard is kind of stiff and hard to type on for extended periods of time.

I don't know what the hell is going on with the weather right now, but the sky outside is a weird hazy yellow-orange-peach color. Not like a sunset, it's all over. So kind of ominous and scary looking. I am going to get some dinner and go hide inside.

hyderabad

2008-09-27T05:43:00.002-03:00

Presently we're in Hyderabad with Erica's sister-in-law. It's a quick trip, I haven't had much time to see any of the city. Back to Bombay possibly tonight, but most likely tomorrow morning. Everything has been a bit crazy. Many stories but no time to tell them. More later.

tales from the land of bollywood

2008-09-22T08:22:00.007-03:00

I haven't been online in so long, I can't remember everything that has happened since my last post. We're still in Mumbai, enjoying the shopping and night life and the Bollywood stuff. I haven't been an extra in any films or anything - we are avoiding the creepy scouts this time around. We have had a few funny Bollywood encounters though. Erica saw Ram Gopal Varma (famous director) in the Hyderabad airport last week when she was en route to Delhi. We also saw Amitabh Bachchan's house, because it was down the street from the movie theatre where we went to see The Last Lear. Funny story... we were walking down the street at night looking for a taxi, and this creepy man wandered over to us. He was old and stumbling like he was drunk, and groaning a lot... it was like he was a zombie. Anyway, he walked right up to Erica, then just fell onto her. I was ahead of her and turned around because she had screamed, and saw her running away from this guy. He tried to follow us, or rather kind of lurch after us, and so we decided to run across the street. Then we look up, and we're actually right in front of Amitabh's house, and all his security guards (he had 5!) were watching us screaming and running. They didn't help us or anything. Thank you, Amitabh's security guards.

Then, that same night, we were driving in an auto-rickshaw to a bar, and we stopped at an intersection. Suddenly Erica grabs me, pulls me across her to look out her side of the rickshaw and points forward. At first I had no clue what I was looking at, then she says "It's Salman Khan!" He was on a motorcycle, two rickshaws ahead of us. I was like "No way, it's not him" but then he turned his head and I saw him in profile, and if it wasn't him then he has a twin. Not sure why he'd be on a bike and not in a private car, but hey. It wasn't just us who noticed him, too. All the rickshaws pulled up alongside him and the driver closest was nodding back to the other ones to confirm it. We tried to get our rickshaw driver to follow him, but he drove off so fast, and we didn't know how to say "Follow Salman Khan" in Hindi or Marathi. I made Erica's brother in law teach me to say it though, so if we ever wind up behind Salman in traffic again (or anyone else I want to follow, for that matter) we're all set. Haha.

We had a filmi day yesterday too. We met our friend Shikha's cousin Rajat, who is a director, and he brought us to a place called Filmistan, which is probably the busiest bunch of studios in Bombay, even busier than Film City. Also much more concentrated than Film City. He had a friend working on one of the sets there, so we got to sneak in and watch them shoot some scenes. Interestingly, the film was a collaboration between Bollywood and Hollywood, with a Hollywood director - Jennifer Lynch, daughter of David Lynch. The film's title isn't 100% confirmed as far as I could tell, but it's something like "Nagin: The Snake Woman" or Snake Goddess, or something to that effect. It appears to be about a very pretty Indian woman (Mallika Sherawat) who transforms into a giant snake and eats people. Seriously. We got to watch them shoot one scene where a guy freaks out because he is about to be eaten by the giant snake. He falls to the floor and screams in terror. Then we had to leave the set, because they were bringing in the giant snake and we weren't allowed to watch. (In case we leaked film secrets or something?) We saw the snake's head though, and it was hilarious. It's not a real snake, it's a ginormous fake snake that they built, like something from a horror B-movie. Jennifer Lynch herself wasn't particularly nice. We came on set quietly and stood out of the way, but she made a point to stand near Erica, and say loudly enough for her to hear "They can't come on this set just because they're Americans. It's bad enough I have to deal with the Indians." (Quote has been altered slightly to remove foul language.) How sweet, eh? Charming lady.

Anyway, after leaving her set, we decided to wander around and see what else we could find. We saw a sign that said Red Chillies on it, which is Shah Rukh Khan's production company, so we tried to go in onto the set, but the door guy wouldn't let us. Undeterred, we found an unguarded back entrance and snuck in that way. It was a freaking massively huge futuristic set that looked like a space station or something and glowed bright green. In the middle there was a small spaceship. Inside the spaceship, there was a man wearing a shiny costume. The spaceship was on cables so it hovered straight up and down, and there was lots of fake smoke underneath. We have NO idea what they were filming. Actually, they didn't shoot anything while we were in there, so we figure they were just getting the shot set up for later on. After about 10 minutes, we were noticed and questioned about what we were doing there. We convinced them to let us stay a bit longer, but then eventually we got kicked out before any actual shooting started. Still, it was a pretty crazy set.

After that, we sat down next to a building to figure out how to sneak in to a different set. We were just waiting around there when this American guy with full sleeve tattoos and a beard came up to us. We thought we were going to be in trouble for something, or told to move, but he just asked where we were from and said his name was Brian. He's one of the special effects guys on the giant snake film. We chatted with him for a minute, and we were asking him about the snake, and suddenly he was like, "Hey, come with me!" So we followed him, and he took us into this back room where they were keeping all the special effects stuff for the film! It was insane. There were giant snake heads and different parts of the snake. It's all really complicated stuff, it's built to move like a real snake. We saw one of the actress's costumes, which is a half-woman, half-snake suit with a 6 foot tail. And another costume that looked like some kind of alien creature. It was all wired up to move on it's own - Brian squeezed some handles and the face moved like it was real! I am sure Jennifer Lynch would have been livid if she knew we were behind the scenes with the snake, but that made it better somehow, haha. It was seriously really cool - Hollywood sci-fi special effects. Brian said the Red Chillies spaceship set looked like children made it. I still don't have particularly high hopes for Nagin, but it was fun to see behind the scenes anyway.

After all this, we wandered some more. There were a million dancers running around, and we could hear a song sequence being filmed, but the door guy wouldn't let us in, and we couldn't locate a back entrance. Aww. After that, we were starving, so we gave up on the film sets and left. We did see Mallika Sherawat for a few minutes, but we didn't talk to her or anything, because we didn't particularly care.

So that was our film experience thus far. Otherwise, we've been having fun going out in Bombay. Last time I was here I was alone, so I didn't go to any bars or anything. We went out Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights to different bars, which is definitely a bizarre experience to have in India. They have these extremely posh bars, and once you step inside you've completely left behind anything third-worldly and might as well be in London or NYC or wherever. Saturday night we went to a nightclub called Enigma, which is inside the Marriott hotel, and was definitely the fanciest club I've ever been to in my entire life. It's hotel guests and couples-only to get in, but single ladies are also accepted, of course. The cover charge to get in was 12$ for each of us, but that was cheap. Couples paid about 60$ to get in. Being a single lady has advantages, apparently. Inside was packed - you could barely move anywhere! And the drink prices... oh my god... it was 20$ for a rum and coke!!! Fortunately, our entrance cover doubled as drink tickets so we could afford one, haha. It was insane. The music was really good though, a mix of Western stuff and Bollywood stuff. Erica and I had fun dancing, even though we had to fight off the occasional creep. One guy asked me, not kidding, if I was "single and ready to mingle". I was literally speechless that anyone would use that line. That guy wins hands-down for worst attempt at a pick-up EVER.

Anyway, I think we're done with the nightclub scene for now. It was fun once, but way too expensive to do a second time. I am not sure what we're doing for the next few days, but I think we're leaving for Hyderabad on Thursday morning. Will post photos once we remember to start taking them again. Oooops.

photo update from mumbai

2008-09-17T07:51:00.007-03:00

Neither of us knows what it means to be prosected, but we're sure it can't be good. Ha. This sign was by a sidewalk in Delhi.

We have safely arrived in Mumbai and are staying with Erica's brother-in-law. Our flight was turbulent, due to heavy monsoon rains. And we had a hell of a time in the Delhi airport, mainly because we're both ridiculous. I tried to take 3 bottles of water through security because I forgot they were in my bag. Erica did the same thing. The security lady was like, "Ma'am, this is NOT allowed... now you have to drink it." So we had to stand there drinking to prove it wasn't poison or lighter fluid or something.

But we got here, and all is good. Have I mentioned that Bombay is weird? I always end up talking to the most random people here about the most ridiculous things. Today we were in McDonald's (I like the novelty of Indian McDonald's because they have a dozen different veg options) and some man started talking to us. He was a Christian preacher, and we got subjected to a half hour impromptu sermon on trusting and obeying God. He also wanted us to gather up 20 of our friends and move to India to open a school. Yeah right.

Anyway - photo update! Random Delhi adventures:

1. Me with Shah Rukh.
2. Erica with Aamir.
3. Us both with the India Gate.
4. We join the police force.
5. Random dog sleeping at India Gate (it's not dead, I swear).
6. News vans crowding around one of the bomb areas.
7. A gentleman selling "real leather" cowboy hats. Actually they were foam.
8. A handy bathroom sign.

delhi (wherein erica is scared by a bloody chicken)

2008-09-16T04:22:00.001-03:00

This is an overdue update from Delhi. A million things have happened and I’ve been nowhere near the internet. I got to Delhi on Friday afternoon. A few random stories from Mumbai before I get into the Delhi stuff, though. At a restaurant, this random creeper who tried to chat me up last March found me again! He stopped at my table and was like, “Hey, do you remember me?” I made myself look as confused as possible, and then said “Uh… no.” And then he stared at me for a second longer, apologized, and moved on. Whewww. It’s so weird that 6 months have gone by, and there are still a handful of people in Mumbai that know me. Also random and unrelated – my efforts at blending in were working a bit too well. An older lady stopped me on the street to ask me for directions – in Marathi! Or at least I assume it was Marathi, since I know enough Hindi to know when someone is speaking it. Unfortunately I couldn’t help her, since I don’t know a single word of Marathi. Weird. I only knew she was asking for directions because we were next to an entrance to a tunnel that went under the street, and she was pointing at a sign.

The last thing I did in Mumbai was see another Bollywood film. A really stupid one called Hijack, about a plane that gets hijacked, if you couldn’t figure that out from the title. It was kind of stupid timing – I saw it on 9/11 without even realizing the significance, and also it was the night before I had to take a domestic flight in India. And I’m not a big fan of flying already. But whatever, it was entertaining enough, and again the plot was suitably contrived so I could follow without subtitles. My comprehension is getting better though, honestly. I can understand about 25% of what’s being said, I’d guess. But it’s not overly helpful. For example, I might hear a sentence, but I’d understand it like this: “Oh my god! Raj and Rohit are ---- to ---- and ----!” So I get that something is happening but I don’t know what. My vocabulary is limited to food, objects around the house, and overused words from songs. I must work on that.

But anyway – Delhi! I landed Friday afternoon, then proceeded to hang out in the domestic airport for about 5 hours. I made a friend named Amit who helped me out and let me use his phone. (What’s with random Amits helping us out in airports?) I was stuck waiting for a few hours because I wasn’t sure when Erica was supposed to be flying in from Hyderabad so I was waiting to hear from her. She missed the last flight out though, and had to come in Saturday morning. So her mother-in-law picked me up from the airport, which was extremely nice, and brought me back to their apartment, and the next morning we went back to pick up Erica.

So, Erica and I are reunited, and the fun begins, right? We’ve been staying with her in-laws for the last few days. They’ve been feeding us home-cooked Indian food every day, and letting us ride around with a private car and driver, which seems really fancy to me but is actually a pretty common thing for people to have here. On Saturday night, our plan was to meet up with Erica’s friend Sahira, then go out for dinner and to some bars/clubs. Obviously, this didn’t work out. We found out about the bombings right when we were pulling up to Sahira’s. So we stayed the night there, but didn’t go anywhere. It was still a good night though, and Erica and I have some funny videos to post. On Sunday, we went to Connaught Place to do some shopping with Erica’s father-in-law. A couple of the bombs went off in that area, and one bomb was found and defused in the park at the center of the shopping area. So there were police everywhere, and a few million news vans.

We went back there again today to meet our friend Sid for lunch. Originally we planned to have a few other meetings while in Delhi, but everything has gotten a bit messed up and disorganized after the bomb stuff happened, so we’ve been taking it easy here. We met with Erica’s father-in-law again later on and we all went for coffee. The guys at the coffee shop screwed up at first and gave our order to the wrong table. Then my drink had a fly in it. So Erica’s father-in-law got irritated and yelled at the coffee shop guy... and you have to imagine this, he’s a really big man, like 6 feet and several inches, and he calls the poor waiter guy over and is like “Do the flies come free with the chocolate?” It was simultaneously embarrassing and hilarious. He totally chewed out the coffee shop staff, but by the end of it everyone was laughing, even the waiter was fighting not to laugh. I had sympathy for the coffee guys, of course.

We also did a bit of street shopping. Erica is pretty hardcore when she bargains. It’s a big change from shopping with Micah last time. I made a video of that too, will post whenever I get a chance.

OH. Ugh. One more story. Last night on the way home, we stopped at this outdoor fruit and vegetable market. They also had a meat market. Erica was making a video, and we wandered into the meat market. This was a very, very fresh meat market. As in, you point to which live chicken you want, and they cut off the head and de-feather it, cut it up right in front of you. We were a bit slow to realize what was happening. Erica was focused on making her video, when suddenly the guy she was recording chopped the head off a chicken right in front of her. She swore loudly and ran away. The meat guys found this all very funny.

Anyway, tonight we fly back to Mumbai. I’m hoping I’ll get a chance to catch up on posting photos and videos when we get there.

delhi bomb blasts

2008-09-13T12:00:00.002-03:00

Erica and I are currently in Delhi. If you've seen the news on TV or online, you've maybe seen that there have just been 5 bomb blasts in Delhi. In the downtown, market areas, etc. Erica and I are currently at her friend Sahira's house - we were all about to go out for dinner, but obviously we are going nowhere at the moment. We are just sitting here watching the TV. Right now it says 18 people have been killed and 90 injured. One of the blasts happened at a market about 10 minutes away from us right now. This is all really scary. But anyway, I am posting because Erica and I are safe. I don't know what we'll be doing for the next few days. Probably just staying inside, since we can't go anywhere at the moment. We had plans to go back to Bombay on the 17th but not sure what the situation will be, or when we can actually travel. I'll post again if I get internet access in the next few days and can find out more about what's happening or what we'll be doing.

Apparently there was a 12 year old boy carrying one of the bombs. This is just really scary. :(

*hugs* to everyone at home.

MONSOON!

2008-09-09T11:41:00.002-03:00

Holy crap. When it rains here, it seriously rains. I just got caught for 20 minutes in a downpour, and when I got back to my hotel, I had to wring out all my clothes in the bathroom. I was soaked through to my underwear. Crazy. To be honest, it's not any worse than some of the rainstorms we've been having in Nova Scotia recently. It just lasts a bit longer. And it's hot out so it's kind of fun. Everyone here is prepared for it to rain at any second, so they all carry umbrellas. But I am not so prepared, and so I get wet.

Anyway, in contrast to yesterday's post, which was largely negative, I have decided to post some things I like about India. I'll try to keep it short, since talking about nice things is boring. I love the food - I am stuffing myself silly on the best food in the whole world. I love that they have like 50 different TV channels that play nothing but Bollywood movies and songs all the time. I love that I can go see all the movies in the theatres with lots of people who are also excited about them. I like that I can buy any DVD I want here for cheap... haha, enough with the Bollywood related stuff. I like the smell here - well, not the third world smell that you sometimes get (even though that's part of the experience), but the other one that's kind of a mix of incense and yummy food cooking. I like that there are a million colors everywhere, and everyone's clothes are so pretty. Nothing is boring or bland in that regard, ever. I like that no matter where I go, there are always nice people who are willing to help me if I have any trouble. I even like the heat and humidity here - heat suits me anyway, and even the humidity is much more tolerable than it is at home, though I don't know why. The climate makes my skin much nicer. Weird.

I like most things here, to be honest. Really the only thing I find frustrating is that I am incapable of blending in, and therefore am often subject to odd racial stereotypes. (I.e. white people are all rich and promiscuous). Anyway, I am trying to find a way around that. Today as an experiment I made it a point to dress particularly Indian (tunic type shirt down to my knees) and look like I knew where I was going. This seemed surprisingly effective. I didn't get a single pervy comment all day, street vendors didn't harass me, and the beggar children didn't chase me down the street. It was a really hassle-free day. Yay. :)

It was monsooning all afternoon which spoiled my plans to walk a gajillion miles to some gardens and a mosque, so I went to see a movie instead, which was called Rock On!! Fortunately for me, the plot was so contrived and unoriginal that I had no trouble at all following along. It was about a rock band that fell apart and then reformed 10 years later. They weren't a particularly badass rock band... the costume department dressed them all in classic rock and metal band t-shirts so they sort of looked the part, but there wasn't a tattoo or illegal drug in sight the whole movie. It was pretty tame stuff. Which is good, I suppose, since people brought small children with them. It was a suitably entertaining few hours though, and gave me a chance to work on my Hindi comprehension. And at one point during the show, some guy's phone rang and he answered it and started having a really loud conversation in the middle of the theatre. And then everyone started shouting at him, haha.

Sorry I keep posting so randomly. I am just killing a few days in Bombay before I meet Erica again in Delhi, so not much going on just yet. I am typing to amuse myself while it downpours outside! Now I will brave the water in search of dinner. Mmmmm.

mini-update from mumbai

2008-09-08T07:25:00.002-03:00

I think I might have just broken my toe. I am not sure. How can you tell? Maybe it's not broken, because I am not in any pain at the moment, and it doesn't look broken. But this internet cafe is dark so I can't really tell. It's not even a good story - I was walking on the sidewalk and I tripped on a loose brick or something and hit it really hard. And then when I tried to put pressure on that toe to walk, it was excruciating pain. Maybe it is just fractured. I suppose it doesn't matter - there is nothing to be done for a broken toe anyway, right? Ugh.

I also just managed to get groped on the sidewalk. It's not a good day for me and the sidewalk! I'm normally pretty good at avoiding random gropings, because I keep as much distance as possible from sketchy men who are staring at me or following me, but this one I didn't see coming. This kid who looked no more than 12 totally grabbed my ass while I was walking by him! I would never have expected it - he was just a kid in a school uniform! And it was definitely intentional, no mistake about it. What a pervy kid. The lesson is, be on guard all the time, even around seemingly innocent looking school children.

Last night after I left the internet cafe and went for dinner, I walked around the Colaba area. I managed to get scouted for Bollywood within about 15 seconds. They were recruiting for a TV commercial, and a London nightclub scene for a movie. Neither of these were of particular interest. I am not familiar with the actress in the movie, and I don't feel like being made to wear a mini-skirt this time around. You see, now that I've worked with Amitabh Bachchan, I'm quite choosy about what roles I'll accept. Hahaha...ha...ha...

I also ran into my two favorite sketchbag Bollywood scouts from last time I was here! They both recognized me, which was weird. The creepy greasy one with the ponytail has actually cut his ponytail off, much to my dismay, because I was hoping to take a photo of him this time to show everyone what a Bollywood scout looks like. He did leave himself a glorious rat tail in the back though, so all is not lost. I have to find a way to ask for a photo without him interpreting that as a come-on. A guy at Leopold's (Mumbai's most famous restaurant/bar) also remembered me. Weird.

I am mostly avoiding that area of town for the rest of this trip though - too irritating. I got followed by 3 different guys wanting to take me for drinks. One of them got pissed off when I rejected his spontaneous marriage proposal and called me a slut in Hindi. It took me a minute or two to remember what the word meant though, so I missed the opportunity for a comeback. I'm ready next time though. (I should point out that my sexual harassment stories do not reflect all of Mumbai. It mostly just happens in Colaba because that's the tourist area so the perverts hang out there. Most of Mumbai I could walk around hassle-free.)

I am now going to try and figure out transport to Delhi. And then go to my hotel and decide if my toe really is broken. Ahh, my hotel has the scariest elevator ever. The stairs are closed so I have to take it, and it freaks me out a bit every time. It just seems... rickety. In the event of a fire I'd probably have to jump out the 4th floor window in the hallway. Eeeek.

Better stories and photos to come, I promise.

mumbai/bombay - take 2!

2008-09-07T07:45:00.005-03:00

AHHHHH. For anyone who didn't happen to read my last blog, or perhaps just skimmed it and missed this info - I am currently in Bombay. INDIA! Again! It feels SO strange to be back here. Things are familiar, I know my way around, I am even using the same internet cafe I used last March. Which makes me feel like I am not really here, but actually just wandering around in a dream or something. It's a bit surreal, I don't believe I am actually here again so soon. I am very very jet lagged and haven't had a proper meal in a day and a half though, so everything seems a bit foggy.

I left Halifax on Friday afternoon. Some planes there were practicing tricks (for an air show coming up, I assume) and we got to watch a fighter jet doing fancy spins while we were waiting on the plane to leave. In Newark I met up with Erica (who is my travel buddy this time) and we managed to kill the 6 hours of layover by eating and walking excessively around the terminal.

The 15 hour flight over here was fine, except it just felt like night the whole time. We left at night, then it turned into daylight as we were going over the ocean, but all the windows were shut so it seemed dark and everyone went to sleep. Then when everyone woke up, it was getting dark again outside, and we landed at night in Bombay. So I just feel like I had a really long Friday night and missed Saturday completely.

But the plane ride itself was fun - Erica and I were sitting next to a guy named Amit, who became our friend right away. We all shared similar tastes in Bollywood stars. He was on his way to India for his wedding, and invited us to come, but it's in Chennai which is quite far South so we couldn't make it. But there is a reception in Bombay on the 21st, which we're definitely planning to attend. He met his wife-to-be on an internet dating website! The other highlight of the plane ride was the view. Mostly it was dark the whole time or too cloudy to see, but in a few places it was clear and we had an incredible view. I got a good look at the deserts and mountains of Turkmenistan, of all places. Here are some in flight photos - Turkmenistan, fancy clouds, sunset, and the in-flight map that shows us coming in to India!

When we landed, we had the challenge of collecting all of Erica's luggage and hoping we didn't get hassled at customs. Amit stayed with us and helped us out, and also let us use his phone to call Erica's friends and relatives to try and figure out what to do with all the luggage. She realized, a bit too late, that the domestic airlines in India might not let her check in 4 suitcases.

In fairness, half the stuff she brought was for other people, but still! We bypassed customs, because the customs guys were lazy and just waved us by without checking. So Erica didn't have to explain why she was carrying multiple laptops and cell phones. (Gifts for family, actually.) Erica's friend Punit picked us up from the airport then, and because nothing was open that late (it was after midnight by this point) he just drove us around the city. Everything looks different here at the moment because they are in the middle of a big festival for Ganesh, the Hindu elephant god, so there are decorations and lights EVERYWHERE. Very pretty. It also started raining really hard while we were driving, with lightning. It didn't rain once the entire time I was in India in March, so this is kind of a novelty. Also - Bollywood moment! We saw John Abraham's car. John is a very attractive male model turned Bollywood star. Celebrity cars - how exciting! Don't worry, I'm (half) joking.

Finally Punit dropped us off at the Domestic airport so Erica could catch her flight to Hyderabad. We stopped in a parking lot so Erica could rearrange some of her luggage and transfer some of it into a suitcase she didn't need right away and could leave behind with Punit in Bombay. You have to imagine, it's 3am and she has got half her suitcase dumped out on the ground in the parking lot. Actually, it was mostly shoes. Hilarious.

We waited for many hours for Erica's flight, then I waited a few more hours and phoned some hotels. I finally found a decent one, and so I am staying here for a few days on my own until I meet up with Erica again in Delhi, probably around the 10th.

All is well here, India is pretty much like I remember it. A cockroach tried to attack me in the airport bathroom by falling on my head but it missed my face by an inch. I also got cheated pretty bad by a taxi driver who charged me double the fare (his "meter" was definitely broken), but I was soooo tired and dying to find my hotel so I didn't bother to argue with him like I normally would have. And everywhere I go, young men stare at me and yell out "Hello Madam!" so it's all the same as before, really. It's fun, but will be a bit better once I've slept, for sure.

Now I will go locate a restaurant and eat some Indian food. I'll write again once I've done something more interesting than just land here and find a hotel, haha.

maiden voyage of the milky dream

2008-09-01T17:50:00.010-03:00

The travel blog becomes a travel blog once again! It's about time. Many things are happening in the near future. But before I talk about those things, I'll first show you some pictures. My brother recently purchased a sailboat, which was a dream of his for some time. Someday he will circumnavigate the globe. But for now, he just sails around the Halifax Harbour. Last week, I had the privilege of being on the boat when it had its maiden voyage. I didn't actually know it was the maiden voyage, and that he and my sister had never attempted to sail it before, or I probably wouldn't have gone. I was tricked. But it was pretty awesome, except that I thought we were going to tip over several times and I screamed. I'm lame. My sister used to be a sailing instructor though, so she probably knew what she was doing.

Random funny story about the boat. When my sister first saw it, it was from a distance. She was struggling to read the name of the boat on the side, which actually is Misty Dawn. But because she's a bit special, she thought it said Milky Dream. Ever since, we've called it the Milky Dream, which is a much better name than Misty Dawn anyway. So, here be photos.

1. I wear the hat. I steer the boat.
2. Brother Adrian hides in the cabin.
3. View from the top with the crew down below.
4. Pretty view from the boat.
5. Cheers to the Milky Dream.
6. Totally unrelated photo of my dog putting his face out the car window.

Okay, so, in travel-related news... I am working seriously on the whole teaching-in-Korea thing. I've applied and have interviewed for a few jobs. The interview process is exhausting because I have to operate on Korean business time, which is 12 hours ahead of my time, meaning I end up having phone interviews at midnight. And since I get up at 4:30am for work most days, this doesn't really put me at my best. But whatever. I've had 2 actual job offers so far. The first one I didn't accept because the pay wasn't great and they deducted a lot more from the pay for stupid reasons. The second job I'm still debating, but I think will likely turn it down. It seems like a decent school and it's in a great area of Seoul, but the contract is pretty sketchy. I tried to discuss the contract with the boss but he wasn't very helpful. I asked him to change a few things (basically I asked him to write in the rates of things deducted from my pay, like taxes, pension, etc.) and he did not. He "revised" the contract and sent it back to me with minimal changes. He also lowered the pay offer without mentioning it. Not cool. And also he wants me to teach kindergarten for a million hours a day, which is a bit too intense for me. Older children would suit me better. So the point of this massive paragraph is that I am still looking for a job in Korea and I am aiming to get there and start work around early November. We'll see what happens.

Now, if you've read this far, it's about to get a bit more interesting. In a sudden burst of last-minuteness, I am going back to India. Very soon. On Friday, actually. As in, about 3 days from now. This doesn't seem quite real to me yet. It all came about sort of suddenly. My friend Erica decided she was going to India, for a number of exciting reasons which I won't babble on about here yet, and she invited me to come with her. Many factors were involved in making this decision, but basically I couldn't pass it up and so I bought a plane ticket. We are meeting up in Newark on Friday and departing for Bombay on Friday night. We'll be there for 3 weeks, and I'll be back home again on Sept. 30th. I'll mostly be in Bombay, Delhi, and Hyderabad. We have tentative plans, but only tentative because the best thing to do in India, really, is just go with the flow once you're there. We'll really be going with the flow because it's still monsoon season over there. Eek. Anyway, I'll maintain the blog as much as possible, and Erica and I have plans to video blog too! So, watch this space. ;)

And, one last exciting thing - I have cut all my hair off! I have been keeping it long for ages, in hopes that it might look like this:

But then I accepted that this would never happen. So I cut it all off and it's a million times better and I love it. Here is a before and after picture.

This blog has been all over the place. More to come very very soon.

unbreakable... sans underwear

2008-08-09T21:29:00.021-03:00

Under normal circumstances, the Backstreet Boys show would not warrant an entire blog entry, but it's kind of a funny story. (Travel-related blogging shall resume next entry, I swear.)

Last Saturday afternoon, 3 hours before we needed to leave for the Backstreet Boys concert, Tiffany and I got it into our heads that, because we had 10th row tickets, it would be absolutely hilarious if we made a really ridiculous sign for the concert. (Since we'd definitely be close enough for the Boys to read the message.) Now, dorky as I am, I have never made a sign for a concert before. After running through a number of options that were probably only hilarious to the two of us, we finally settled on the following message:

We spent 2 hours designing, drawing, and coloring the poster. Then we recruited Alex (a co-worker of mine, who was going to the show with us) to help us hold it up once we got there. We were hoping one of the Boys might see it and wave to us or something, but beyond our wildest preteen dreams, all 4 of the Backstreet Boys saw it during the course of the show and had funny reactions.

Only a few songs into the show, Brian sees it. He makes an X with his fingers at us, then motions forcefully for us to put the sign down. We comply.

Later, ignoring Brian and putting the sign back up, we catch Howie's attention, who pauses, reads the sign, then makes an exaggerated surprised face.

In between the next songs, Nick sees it. He points to us, grins, and gives us a thumbs up. We all freak out and thumbs up him back. Then Howie looks at us again, points and laughs, and gives us a peace sign. Until Brian, out of nowhere, hits him to tell him to stop! Brian really didn't enjoy our sign. Is he extremely conservative? He's been doing this job for 15 years, surely he has heard and seen much more explicit things from girls. Was he annoyed that we were being attention hogs with the sign? Was he pissed that we blocked the rows behind us? (We left it down for all the songs, and only threw it up a handful of times during talky bits of the show.) I suppose we shall never know.

Someone posted this video on Youtube from the show... if you watch between 1:45 and 1:55, you can see Brian's initial response to our sign and angry gesturing at us. Eek.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eu7jVRmQOwU

But the best moment was at the end, right after the finale (Backstreet's Back, alright) when AJ, last to notice us, finally reads the sign. He points to us, walks up a few steps to the front of his stage, then points at his jeans, and pretends to lift his shirt and check if he is wearing underwear. Then he looks at us and gives an exaggerated shrug. It was pretty thrilling. If a Backstreet Boy had acknowledged me like that 10 years ago, I'd probably have wet myself. But I'm obviously too mature for that now.

Everyone in the rows ahead of us were turning around to see what the Boys were looking at, and they'd all start laughing at our sign. Even some of the security people were laughing at it.

In summary, of all the Backstreet Boys shows I've been to over the years, this one was the best. For the combined reason of the joy the sign brought, and also the fact that it was actually a really entertaining show. Much more upbeat than their last tour.

On a terrible horrible negative note, opening act Girlicious was the grossest thing in the history of gross. I don't want to talk about it at length, but they made me ashamed for my gender. They also made me feel like I needed a shower.

If anyone is ever in row 10 for anything and wants to borrow a sweet sign, just let me know.

*note - all of us were actually wearing underwear. the sign was a lie. though i can't speak for the rest of the strangers in the 10th row... so who knows?*

unforgettable... in toronto!

2008-07-28T00:45:00.013-03:00

So Toronto was... amazing. The whole trip was fantastic, and the Bollywood show was the best thing I've ever seen in my life. We had a great week - Alex and Kim were awesome enough to let us stay with them again, and I spent most of the week just shopping (I love you H&M) and eating good food. Friday night was the show, we met up with Shikha and her friend Diljeet for dinner beforehand. Then we all went to the show... where I basically just screamed my face off for 3 hours because I couldn't contain myself.

Here are some before photos, in which we are all very excited.

We had a bit of a panic when we first got there, because our original seats in Row 2 ended up disappearing. They actually cut out our whole seating section, because it was too far to the side of the stage. But they moved us into 11th row in a section closer to the stage, so we ended up with a much better view. They did ALL the songs I ever wanted to hear, and the energy was incredible. It was a total nightmare for the Rogers Centre staff, as they couldn't control the crowds. People were rushing the stage, stealing other people's seats, physically moving their seats to different rows, etc. Shikha got into a fight with a little old man behind her, who was mad because everyone was standing up and he couldn't see. It was hilarious. The man was INSANE. He was hitting Shikha with his program booklet. And he tried to pull a chair out from under someone else who was pissing him off. Indian film fans are psychotic. (Myself included, haha.)

I posted photos from the concert here, for those who care:

http://s302.photobucket.com/albums/nn102/choohi/UNFORGETTABLE%20TOUR/

I also took a bunch of videos, which you can see here: (Edit: Apparently the nice people at Wizcraft International Entertainment Pvt Ltd are mad at me for posting concert footage and infringing on their copyright. They have deleted all the videos and are threatening to close down my account. So there's nothing to see right now! But I'll see if I can get them back up again later.)

http://www.youtube.com/user/maliceandmannie

Other highlights of the week include dinner with Shikha and Gaurav (we meant to go see a Hindi film but ran out of time so opted for dinner/drinks instead), "special" milkshakes with Alex, and Canada's Wonderland! A bunch of us went there Sunday. It rained a bit which was good because that meant smaller lineups. We rode the Behemoth, which is Wonderland's new roller coaster, and apparently the highest and fastest one in Canada. It was sooooo much fun - best roller coaster I've ever been on! Photos below: Everyone looking like dorks before the Spongebob Squarepants 3D Adventure, and the 4 ladies who conquered the Behemoth, next to a photo of the beast itself. We're awesome.

It kind of sucks being back home again and going back to work. I've been doing all the opening shifts, which is cool because I finish around 2pm every day, but also horrible because I don't go to bed any earlier to compensate for the early start, and end up exhausted beyond all reason after a few days. Oh well. Money is needed for future travels. This used to be a travel blog. I need to get back to that.

island photos

2008-07-15T22:42:00.019-03:00

I meant to post these a few weeks ago - just a few random photos from the trip to Prince Edward Island in June for the family reunion.

And here are a few pics from the night that Tiffany and I thought it would be a good idea to take the dog to the beach. He misbehaved and ate a lot of sand.

2 days till Toronto vacation!! And UNFORGETTABLE TOUR!! I am dying of excitement.

india vs. canada

2008-07-01T13:47:00.003-03:00

I just found this gem on Youtube - the scene for the TV show I worked on when I was in Mumbai! You can't see me anywhere in it, so don't try. I was very tiny in a crowd scene, so tiny in fact that I can't even see myself. But you can see the soccer game, all of which was filmed when I was there. And you can see the cheerleaders dancing. You may remember I was fired from being a cheerleader, for the combined reason of me being too fat, and also being mouthy with the crew.

The scene is HILARIOUS though. India VS Canada in a soccer game. Don't ask me why the Canadians are wearing green and yellow, and have British accents. And why they are apparently assholes who try to injure other players on purpose. I have tears in my eyes from laughing at this. Indian TV is... special.

Random update: Toronto on July 17th! Yay. Went to Prince Edward Island last weekend and it was great, will post some photos once everyone e-mails them to me.

punjabi wedding crashers

2008-06-11T18:39:00.011-03:00

So, today I was looking through some of Micah's photos from the trip - he has thrilling photos from the wedding we crashed in Amritsar, which was one of the coolest random things that happened to us in India. (To recap: Micah and I met two girls in the Golden Temple, became friends over the course of the afternoon, then they brought us to a wedding where we dressed all fancy and ate a load of food, despite not knowing anyone.) Pictures abound!

1) Here we have myself and new friend Ruby arriving at the wedding in style. 2) Followed by the groom arriving in even more style, atop a decorated white horse. 3) And here we have a dance party gathering around the horse and groom. That's how they roll there. 4) Inside there was a giant mountain of fruit. It was awesome.

5) I wasted no time in stuffing my face. 6) The marriage happened and everyone was joyous.

7) Micah and I pose for what I am pretty sure is the only photo from the whole 2 months that has both of us in it, actually looking nice. 8) Ruby and I leave the wedding, still stylish in an auto-rickshaw. We were singing a Hindi song and I was laughing because I wasn't very good at it.

9) We stay overnight with our friends, then leave the next morning by motorcycle. 10) Vroom vroom. 11) Holy crap I'm on a motorcycle!

And finally, just for fun, random shots of Micah and I being dorks at the Taj Mahal, and Micah sporting a very fetching faux beard in front of the Red Fort in Delhi. Haha.

That is all I have for now! In other news, I have no other real news. I am still trying to figure what to do next in life, which is a slow process. I've been stressing out a lot. On the plus side of life, I now have the dorkiest summer of concerts ever lined up - along with the Bollywood Unforgettable tour, I will also be attending the Backstreet Boys Unbreakable tour when they're in Halifax. Unforgettable and Unbreakable... it's like we have some kind of theme going on. Gloriously, we managed to get 10th row BSB tickets online! My inner 13-year-old self is squealing with excitement.

Also, I have yet to book plane tickets, but have booked off a week from work in July from the 17th-23rd, which is approximately when I will be in the Toronto area for the Bollywood show, among other things. Kim wants to go to Canada's Wonderland - oooooh. I am glad I will get at least one week of summer in Toronto. I forgot Nova Scotia doesn't actually have summer. It's cold here. Very very cold. Brrrrr. I miss India.

update and unforgettable tour!!!

2008-05-17T23:49:00.005-03:00

Oops, it's been nearly a month again. I fail as a blogger. Actually, I am just sparing others the boring details at the moment. I am still working at Second Cup, and am contemplating what I will do next in life. Korea is definitely the plan right now. I'll get that sorted out at some point in the very near future. I also found a wonderful Master's program at the University of London that would let me combine South Asian Studies with Film Studies - I could do a Master's degree in Bollywood! Amazing. It also lets you include a language course in your program, so I could take proper Hindi classes. It's pretty much my dream program. Unfortunately international tuition is going to cost me about 25,000$ per year, so it'll be a few years of saving in Korea before this is possible.

Unrelated, in random scary news this week - a bunch of bombs went off in Jaipur, supposedly in touristy areas, too.

Bomb attacks in Indian city kill at least 50, injure 150

This is very sad, but also really weird to imagine because Micah and I spent a few days in Jaipur in February. Only 3 months ago. All the memories are still very vivid. It is hard to think of it as a place where something like that can happen.

However, in better news... I am going to see the Unforgettable Tour in Toronto in July! This is basically a grand coming-together of Bollywood stars on stage, where they all dance and lip-synch to songs from their films. Shikha managed to get us 2nd row seats, and I am practically peeing my pants with excitement. Amitabh Bachchan (my co-star) will even be there! Maybe he'll remember me and wave, since I'll be so close to the stage. (Let me live with my delusions, please.) The following video gives you an idea of what this thing is:

Could it be ANY better? No it could not.

And finally, on a completely different note, my Dad got married two weekends ago! It was a nice little ceremony with a sweet after-party, at which I took full advantage of the "open bar" thing. I'm such a binge drinker. And what's a binge drinker without a social life? Just a big loser, that's what. I need to get out more, is what I am saying. I have become a hermit (albeit a productive one) since I've been back.

Oh well, I'll attempt a social life in Korea.

photos, and a mini-soundtrack

2008-04-20T14:09:00.011-03:00

That photo is the movie poster for the Amitabh Bachchan film I'm in! They seem to have forgotten my name in the cast list though... no idea why. I'm the next big thing. Watch for me in theatres everywhere. (Or at least in India... I can't imagine it getting a wide release in North America. Arghhhh.)

Anyway, I didn't really mean to go a month without posting. It just sort of happened that way. I didn't want to blog again until I got my photos uploaded, and that took a long time. Also, I'm lazy. Oops. I've been semi-busy for the last few weeks. I had a good time visiting everyone in Toronto and Ottawa, then came back home and got a job working at another Second Cup. So I am back in the coffee business. Which I like, but it's not nearly as exciting as traveling so it doesn't give me loads to write about. I've spent most of my free time in the last month just reading, watching Bollywood films, and working on my Hindi. I'm productive, but temporarily very boring.

But, as I said, I did upload the majority of my travel photos. So people can look at them if they feel like it. I've got them all organized by city or place that we visited. They can all be found here:

http://s302.photobucket.com/albums/nn102/choohi/

Going through them all was fun, I got to relive large chunks of my trip as I went along. The pictures don't do justice to anything... you really need to be there to get the whole idea of it, because you're missing the sounds and smells and everything which is a big part. But hey. Sort of on that topic, I decided I am going to relive, for the blog, the Top 3 Musical Moments of the trip, with Youtube video accompaniment! So basically I am just going to link to 3 Bollywood videos! Yeahhhh!!

But seriously, music is everywhere in India and Bangladesh. Mainly Hindi film music is everywhere, on buses and trains and in the streets. People walk around singing songs constantly. It's just part of the culture. Which obviously works for me since I listen to tons of Bollywood music anyway. But there are certain songs that almost made up a mini-soundtrack for the trip. Enjoy. :) (Or not, if you are like my brother who thinks Hindi music sounds like hamster singing.)

So, the first one... there was one day in Bangladesh where we were visiting some villages, and we went to one village in the evening to interview a woman there. We rode out to her house on a rickshaw type thingy... it was basically like a flat board on wheels, pulled by a bicycle in front. Four of us could fit on it comfortably. It was almost dark when we rode back, and we were just slowly rolling down this small, foggy dirt road through the village, past rice paddy fields where the only light you could see came from tiny lanterns in houses faraway on the fields. And Yunus, our translator, had his cell phone with a bunch of songs on it, and he was playing them as we went along. He played this song, and it was just so pretty and the tone fit the setting so nicely... it was just a really cool, peaceful moment. I can't describe it properly, but here's the song:

Secondly, here is the song that could easily stand alone as the soundtrack for the trip - this is basically the biggest song of the year from the biggest Hindi film of the year (maybe the highest grossing Bollywood film ever, not too sure of the numbers) and it played EVERYWHERE. It was the first song we heard when we landed in Bangladesh, in our car ride to the hotel, and we heard it constantly blaring all over Bangladesh and India for the next two months. (Jenn, I dedicate this one to you, of course.)

And lastly (for now), this song brings back memories of Amritsar, when we met some girls at the Golden Temple and ended up crashing a wedding with them. The girls were singing this song in the afternoon, then sang it again on the auto-rickshaw ride to the wedding. There were 8 of us crammed in the back, all singing along to this song. (Well, not Micah and I, obviously - but everyone else was!) Also, since I love the movie it's from, I made it my mission while we were in Delhi to visit every single location in this video, so it's extra special. I'm a nerd.

There are dozens more but that's probably enough. More photos to come though, if and when Micah ever gives me copies of his - he has good photos of us at the wedding and us on a motorcycle that I'm dying to see. Ooooh.

happy birthday to me... from toronto?!

2008-03-24T04:19:00.003-03:00

Uhhh, yes. Because I apparently can't manage to stay still for more than a week, I am now in Toronto. On a whim I booked a plane ticket and flew here... somewhat irresponsible, but definitely fun. I did manage to line up a job interview for when I get back (at a Second Cup! Yay!) so that makes me feel a bit better about hurling myself even further into debt by randomly purchasing plane tickets. I swear, after this trip is over I will stop having fun and concern myself only with finances.

Anyway... today is my birthday! 24 on the 24th, so that makes it like, special or something. I probably won't do anything overly special, because you know, I'm poor, but I am going for dinner with Alex and Kim (who are also letting me stay at their place again, they are awesome) in the evening. They are taking me for poutine, mmm. Unfortunately before all that, I need to go locate and then visit a doctor. Something is wrong with my left ankle... it got a bit sore my last week in India but I kind of disregarded it. It doesn't hurt to walk on or anything, just when you push on it or stretch the muscle behind it. But it's been getting more and more swollen. Which still doesn't hurt, but I realized last night that you almost can't even see my left ankle anymore because the swelling is so much. I showed Alex and Kim and they both insisted I see a doctor. I don't think it's a huge deal, but they were pretty vehement about it, being that I've just come from a foreign country and maybe some kind of giant poisonous creature bit me. That would be... unfortunate, so I am hoping I just sprained something without noticing.

On a different note, whenever it's my birthday, I get all lame and feel like reflecting on the past year, and then get depressed because I feel like I've accomplished nothing. Which is never really the case. So, for my own reassurance, I have accomplished the following things while being 23: graduated University, had the best summer of my life thus far, successfully ran a 10km race, discovered Bollywood, learned a new alphabet and make decent progress learning Hindi, wrote a 40 page screenplay treatment (even though it won't be used, still an accomplishment for me to have finished), got another tattoo, travelled to Montreal and Toronto (multiple times), New York City, London, Dubai, backpacked Bangladesh and India, met a Nobel Peace Prize winner, met the biggest movie star in India, got to be in 2 major films (I know being an extra is not seriously an accomplishment, but let's pretend), met a million new people, and made a bunch of genuine, really good friends that I will keep for a long time and can't even imagine not knowing. So I would say that 23 was a massive success. Actually, having just written it out, I think this has probably been the best year of my life thus far. Which is good, since the next 3 years at least are going to be devoted to paying off the horrific debts I've built up while having such a good time.

Enough of that.

Yesterday I went to see Race (the latest Hindi blockbuster, of course) with my friend Shikha. It was complete crap but in the best way possible. Ridiculous plot, pointless action scenes, overly attractive and scantily-clad characters who burst into song and dance every 25-30 minutes, and a ludicrous climax in which the two lead characters decide to settle their differences with a car race. Basically everything you could hope for from Bollywood. (It was, however, a bit short on romance, and a lot short on the usual Indian family values/morals, but hey.) It was also super fun to see Shikha again! :)

On Tuesday, it's my plan to take the overnight bus to Ottawa to visit, so I should be there all Wednesday and Thursday. I want to visit everyone! In only 2 days... ahhhh!! No idea how I'll manage that. Please melt your 15 feet of snow before I get there though, I can't handle that. Euhhh.

reverse culture shock

2008-03-19T12:29:00.002-03:00

Aaaaand... I'm back in Canada. Halifax. It's... weird. But it's okay. I thought I'd be really upset when I had to leave India, but I was surprisingly okay with it. I am 100% sure that I am going back to India at some point in the not-too-too-distant future, so it didn't break my heart like I thought it might. I have so much left to see there. It will warrant multiple trips.

It is incredibly weird coming back to the winter though. And I've been experiencing culture shock in reverse, which I didn't anticipate. My flight home included a connection in New Jersey... when I got off the plane and people were wearing winter coats, it felt weird. When I got off the plane in Halifax and it was cold, it freaked me out. Since then I've just been wandering around thinking "Oh my god... Canada is so... empty. Where are all the people? Where is all the garbage?" Clean air feels weird. Drinking tap water feels wrong. I am so aware walking down the street that NOBODY is staring at me. I feel weird not being sexually harassed every 5 minutes.

My friend Lyndsay, who just came back from Brazil, was experiencing the same thing. She said, "Canada is like a big bubble of cleanliness and safety." And it's true. It's like being cut off from the real world. Everything is nice and happy over here. I appreciate Canada like I never have before. Except the cold. Oh my god. I am such a wimp.

My last day in India I took a boat out to Elephanta Island, which is like an hour's ride from Mumbai. There are some caves with big Hindu statue/carving things, and you can climb up a massive hill for a really pretty view of the island and the water, which I did. It was hot. It was gorgeous. It was full of monkeys. While I was up there, I was sitting down under a tree writing some postcards, and a couple of guys started to talk to me. I kind of blew them off, like I usually do. They sat a short distance away from me. After maybe 15 minutes, one of them came up to me, and said they had a gift - and then he gave me a picture of myself that the other guy had sketched while I was sitting there. I thought they were going to ask me for money, but they didn't. The guy was just an artist (he gave me his card with his website and everything) and had sketched me and gave me the pic. It was really cool. Nice to have a positive experience with strangers before I left. Although I followed that up with a bad but typical experience involving me yelling at a jerky taxi driver on the way to the airport, haha. I swear, next time I am in India I will be fluent in Hindi so my yelling will be more effective.

Anyway, now I am home and all is well. I celebrated my first day back in Canada by eating two massive bags of Doritos and watching 4 consecutive episodes of America's Next Top Model. I have spent the last few days driving my Mom and brother insane playing Hindi film soundtracks at high volumes. (Anyone who knew me at Second Cup can sympathize.) I don't really know what I am going to do with my life now... though it is looking extremely likely that I'll be moving to Korea within the next few months to start teaching English, since my debts are caving in on me and I don't have any other option.

I'll keep the blog alive, of course, but it'll likely be a bit less frequent and not as exciting until I actually get going somewhere again. Ohh, but I will post some more travel photos soon! I have yet to upload anything yet, I am being pretty lazy about that, but I will. I am sorry to everyone I have failed to keep in e-mail contact with over the last few months. I will try to get caught up on that too.

Oh and in other news, my former travel buddy Micah is still alive, or at least he was three days ago when I phoned him. He was in Goa, at a beach party. I am very jealous that I did not make it to Goa. Next time, for sure. Micah and I have resolved to go back and do South India sometime in the near-ish future... whenever that might be... who knows. Korea is not THAT far from India... hmmmm...

last night in india...

2008-03-11T13:22:00.005-03:00

So this is it, really... tomorrow night I fly home. I have really mixed feelings about the whole thing. I am ready to leave in some ways and really not ready in other ways. I love India. Even though sometimes I want to strangle people here. So yeah, mixed feelings. It is going to suck going back into winter though - it's 30 degrees or higher every day here! I can't believe how much snow there is in Ottawa right now. I am pretty happy to be missing that. Nova Scotia doesn't have snow at the moment (knock on wood) so I'm hoping it stays that way.

I have been feeling annoyed at Bombay the last couple of days. Normally when you are travelling and you get this feeling, it means you've overstayed the area by about a day and ought to move on. But, I am stuck with my flight going out tomorrow - not enough time to go anywhere else - so just a bit tired of this place. I think I'm done here! It's weird. In a week here I've managed to meet like, a million people, to the point where I almost have a social life. Everywhere I go, I run into people I know!! In the street, in restaurants, on film sets... it's so weird. Although it's nice to have people to go for dinner or drinks with. The other day I met a girl in the Music/DVD shop who was from Germany (we bonded over being the only two white people attacking the Hindi DVD section), and we went for dinner. Turns out she's a University lecturer/PhD student/journalist who writes for a major German newspaper, and a month or two ago she interviewed Shah Rukh Khan! Soooo cool. It's fun having all these random friends. However, it's a pain in the ass in other ways... like the creepy scouts who still materialize out of thin air everywhere and want to go for drinks. I've started taking odd routes home to try and avoid them. But my hotel is so central it's impossible. THEY FIND ME.

A few things here have been making me mental though. One big one is HOVERING. My god... the hovering. If you go into a store... like a clothing store or pharmacy or whatever, the sales people will come and stand right next to you and just watch you shop. It's so unbelievably annoying! Like, I turn to walk down an aisle and I'm blocked by the salesperson who is watching me intently. And the second I pick something up, they take it out of my hands and say "You want to buy this?" And I just want to scream at them to back up like 3 feet so I can just browse! Most of the time I end up just leaving, because I can't shop with someone on my elbow constantly. I know they do it to be helpful, it's their job... restaurant staff are often the same way, hovering while you eat (that's even worse) but aughhh!! Back off!! The culture here is geared towards service... but it's over the top. Every single store has a doorman. McDonald's has a doorman. It's too much.

Also, Bombay for some weird reason is crawling with men selling giant balloons. I don't know who would want a giant balloon, but someone must because they are all over the place so they must be doing business. These men just stand in the streets and when you walk by they wave their balloon in your face (it's maybe 4 feet long, 1.5 feet wide at the top) and yell "Yes madam, you like big balloon?!" What the hell am I going to do with a giant balloon??? When I ask them that, they give me a blank stare and move on to the next tourist. They have no good answer.

The other question I want answered: at what point did a bunch of Western tourists come to India and hand out pens and chocolate to street kids and school kids? I mean, I understand when the poor kids are asking for money... but lately I've been bombarded with kids begging me for "one chocolate, one chocolate!" or "school pen, one school pen!" Obviously, I am not carrying a stash of chocolate and pens with me, and I don't imagine anyone else is either, so where did this start? A group of six barefooted children attached themselves to me at the train station yesterday demanding chocolate. I had to physically remove them as they were clinging to my clothes and arms. It was 30 degrees out, WHY would I have chocolate? The kids are crazy here. I don't give any money to these kids cuz it's not the solution. Occasionally during this trip I've given money to women, mostly in Bangladesh. But I don't give it to kids cuz I know they don't get much use from it, they have to pass it on to someone else. And you don't want to encourage the begging system. But it's unnerving when they attach themselves to you, or grab you and won't let go, or try to open your purse. And when you don't give them anything, sometimes they'll be really rude, or hit you and then run away. Which is irritating, but I can't be too irritated really, because mostly it's just sad. It's hard to know how to feel about it.

Anyway. Since I last updated, plenty has happened. After the 3 consecutive Bollywood days, I hid from the scouts and took 2 days off. I wandered around Bombay, saw the waterfront, went to the cinema a few times, etc. I saw Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge (longest running Indian film ever) in the theatre where it's been playing every day for 13 years since it first opened. (Julia - that's the one we watched on the train!) It was pretty awesome, since I'd seen it 3 times before and knew all the songs and what was going on without subtitles. Everyone in the theatre was cheering and clapping and whistling at all the good parts.

After two days of tourism and being film set free, I got jumped on by a new scout, a woman this time, who asked me to do another film. At first I said no, but then she said Hrithik Roshan (the sexy villain from Dhoom 2!!!) was in it, so I relented. But this was a bad idea because I ended up being double booked. My friend Shikha's cousin lives in town and works in Bollywood, and she had gotten me in touch with him and I was supposed to meet him the same afternoon as the shoot to go visit Film City again. So Monday morning I went to the film set anyway, which turned out not to be a film but actually a vodka ad. You know how retarded ads for alcohol are when you see them on TV... imagine shooting one. Everyone in retarded clubbing outfits pretending to be dancing at a posh bar with overdone models. 5 of the 7 foreign extras ran away from the shoot before noon, because it was so lame. Also the woman coordinating the extras was a psycho and kept yelling at all of us. (In my case, probably warranted, because I kept running away from shooting and wandering the set where I wasn't meant to be, taking photographs.) So anyway, I needed to leave at about 1:30 to make my meeting in the afternoon. Hrithik Roshan arrived on set at about 1:30. Aughhhh.

I managed to see him. I managed to speak to him, most briefly. I said a quick hello, I'm a fan, can I take a photo - the usual. He was being rushed onto set to see the rehearsal, but he stopped and said "Yes of course, right now I have to go get something, then get ready for the shoot, but we can take the photo after when I am looking as good. Okay? You'll be around for awhile?" To which I nodded, even though I would not be around for awhile, and he was whisked away. (What he wanted to look "as good" as, I haven't got a clue. He looked pretty good already in my opinion.) And then I was heartbroken because I had to leave and it'd be hours before I could manage a photo, and even then it would have been tricky with crazy extras lady herding us around set and screaming. So, I consoled myself briefly by sneaking up to the set where he was practicing moves with the dancers and filmed a video on my camera of him sort of dancing. I am kinda bummed though, I didn't get a photo with him, and also I didn't get to watch his proper dancing for the commercial! It would have been pretty awesome. But the shoot itself was pretty crappy, and the other extras didn't get back till like, 11 at night. 16 hour day, at 500 rupees? That's something like 70 cents an hour? Ouch. Oh well.

I ended up having to rush to make my meeting, and in the end did not get to meet Shikha's cousin, but instead met a guy who worked for her cousin, who took me to Film City. Originally he was supposed to give me a tour but he kind of ditched me there, which is a long story I don't want to get into (but no fault of Shikha's cousin's, I must add), so I ended up left alone in the middle of Film City. Which I guess is sort of cool since visitors aren't allowed in there and I was roaming around alone where I wasn't supposed to be. This might have been fun except there was nobody around of interest to me, no shooting going on. (Well, one shoot with Govinda, but ugh... who cares?) I was kind of bummed I was missing Hrithik Roshan's dance moves at this point, but whatever. He talked to me, at least, even though I don't have photographic evidence of it. I have photos OF Hrithik, just not WITH him. Will post when I get home in a few days. Side note: He's extremely polite, and not snobby in the slightest. Actually, none of the Bollywood stars I encountered were snobby - everyone has been extremely polite and friendly. Well, Amitabh was a bit scary, but that's acceptable considering his level of awesomeness.

Anyway, on my way home from Film City I decided to locate Aamir Khan's office. He wasn't there, obviously, but I left a note for him with his receptionist. I'm such a dorky fan, I know. I'm not normally the type to be chasing down celebrities, but it's been fun for a week. In any case, I'm finished with it now. I've been offered to do like, 3 more films, one of them even with a song and dance number, and another in which I'd allegedly be playing an air hostess on a plane with Abhishek Bachchan, but I have turned everything down. (Actually, the Abhishek one was on the 13th, the day after I leave - would be hard to say no otherwise!) It's been really fun seeing all the sets, and taking photos and seeing stars. The behind-the-scenes look at Bollywood has been amazing. But, it's exhausting and I feel like I'm done with it. I am ready to go home, lie on my couch, and just watch the movies, instead of being part of them, haha. Who knew I'd get sick of it so fast?

One of the scouts was getting pissed at me today cuz I didn't show up for a shoot he wanted me to go to. He was accusing me of going to a different shoot instead. I was so annoyed, it's none of his business what I do. Dirty skeezebag. OH!! On that topic, tonight I happened to run into Nicole, the girl from Carleton that I met the other day and went for a drink with. She went to a shoot the other night with skeezebag (slimy ponytail dude I have mentioned many times) and while he was "watching" her bag during the filming, her camera and gold necklaces got stolen. SO SKETCHY. I am glad I missed that one. And yet, that experience hasn't deterred Nicole from the scouts... when I saw her tonight she was with this scout named Imran, who is the least sketchy of the group but still asks me to go for drinks constantly. Nicole had taken him up on the drink offer, and they were on their way somewhere. I chatted with them a bit, me and Nicole standing and Imran sitting in a chair, and the whole time, Nicole kept smiling and flirting with him, and playing with his hair! What the hell! I just wanted to slap her and scream "NO!! Don't do it!! He's a dirty scout!!!" He was just sitting there, loving the attention, his bushy chest hair popping out of his partially unbuttoned shirt. Good lord, it was gross. I was secretly angry with her because she's propogating the stereotype that western women respond to sleazy advances. Euhhh.

Anyway, in summary, I am done with Bombay/Mumbai for now. Someday I will come back. I could stay forever and have film work every day (there are multiple shoots every single day that need extras, you actually could come here and easily find work 7 days a week) but somehow it doesn't seem worth it. I'll go home, I suppose. Though I am not sure how I am going to get home with all the gifts I've bought here... nothing fits in my bag anymore, oops.

Oh, one more random story... I have developed my own method of haggling which has been working really well. There is so much competition between street vendors because they are all selling the same things, so I basically just decide before I start how much I am gonna spend on an item, then go to it. I will go to a street vendor, look at the stuff, and inquire as to the price. Generally they double or triple it on first offer, and you bargain them down a bit. But the thing is, they know that we don't know the real price or how to bargain, and they know we'll automatically suggest to pay half the original price, then meet somewhere in the middle. That's the standard transaction. But like I said, cuz they know this, they'll raise the original price higher knowing that the bargained price will be where they want it to be. However, I don't play that way. I just ask the price, and then when they quote me something ridiculous, I just say "Oh no, that's too much" and walk away. And then they get upset because that's not how the game works, I am supposed to offer a price and we're supposed to argue. So they chase me and ask me how much I am willing to pay for it. And then I give them my pre-decided price. And they look horrified and claim that they're making no profit and I'm killing them, or something. So I shrug and walk on, and they keep chasing me and trying to negotiate, and I stay firm with my original price. And then eventually they just want to make the sale so badly that they give me my demanded price, all the while moaning about losing profit. Obviously they're not, or they wouldn't sell it. Occasionally I have to walk away without the stuff, and buy it elsewhere. (They all sell the same stuff.) But it's worked for me most of the time. I can't believe what other tourists must pay for some of this stuff, considering the prices they ask for at times. They're very clever.

Anyway, I am going to get a drink and write some postcards which I have been neglecting so I can mail them before I leave for Canada. Oooops.

AMITABH BACHCHAN!!!!!

2008-03-07T13:56:00.008-04:00

As the above photo indicates, I MET AMITABH BACHCHAN!!!!! For the Bollywood-unfamiliar, he is the biggest film star in the entire history of Indian cinema. He was a massive stud in the 70s, and now more often than not he just plays a grumpy but sexy old man (he's somewhere in his 60s) but still fills movie theatres because he's the biggest star ever. Seriously, check his IMDB page. So to get anywhere near him is pretty amazing. I have spent the last 3 days working in Bollywood and I have so many stories to tell. I will split this up into 3 parts (Mr. Bachchan is Day 2!)

Day 1 - I ended up filming for a TV show called "Kis Desh Mein Hai Mera Dil". This came about because the scout who claimed I was shooting for a film the night before had no idea what he was talking about, and the bus that picked up myself and a pile of other extras the next morning took us to the TV shoot. There was no film. It was lame. Apparently it's a big TV show because it's produced by a lady named Ekta Kapoor who is like, the big name in TV here, but whatever. We spent the majority of the day laying around in the heat, occasionally pretending to be a cheering crowd at a soccer game. All in all, it wasn't much of an experience. They weren't very nice, the food was minimal and crappy, and the whole thing was beyond boring - it was like a 14 hour day, too! However, I met cool people - a Canadian girl who used to go to Carleton, actually, and a funny Spanish girl. And a handful of other backpackers.

Perhaps the most interesting bit of the day was when myself and 3 of the other girls got selected to play cheerleaders. This involved all of us putting on skimpy cheerleading outfits and supposedly performing some choreographed routine. It didn't quite work out. Myself, the Spanish girl, and an Australian spent all day running around the set in tiny skirts and getting stared at by gross men. This Belgian girl flat-out refused to wear the outfit, so we were down to three cheerleaders. It was all ok though, actually, because it was really hot out and being in a tiny skirt was better than my jeans. Eventually, late in the day, they called us cheerleaders over to do a scene. Unfortunately, by this time (it was around 5pm, we'd been there 10 hours already) the Australian girl had quit and we were down to 2. They managed to find 3 other girls that were willing to put the outfits on, but 2 of them, Russian girls, refused to show their stomachs and wore tank tops underneath. This pissed off the director, who got one of his people to try and talk the girls into it so we could all look the same.

Here's where trouble started... the Russian girls were refusing to do it. The sun was starting to go down and they were losing light on the outdoor set, causing stress. This guy kept arguing with the girls that the rest of us were wearing the outfits and we all had to look the same so they had to take off their tank tops. They still refused. They argued that the Indian cheerleaders had their stomachs covered, so why couldn't they do it? The guy said it was to show the difference between how Indian girls dress vs. western girls. HA HA HA. They think we're all hoochies. We all started laughing because NOBODY would really wear an outfit this hideous ever. (Incidentally, the opposing soccer team was "Canada" which was highly amusing since all the extras had Canada flags painted on their faces, but lame since they thought Canadian girls were hoochie.) At this point, the guy was pissing me off with his attempts to pressure them, and I spoke up and said something along the lines of, "Listen, they aren't comfortable with that. You can't pressure them to do it. So you either have to find someone else who will wear the outfits, or work around it." I don't think they appreciated that.

Not 5 minutes later, a woman (who I think may actually have been Ekta Kapoor, but I would have to see a recent photo of her to confirm that) walks up to me and tells me I can't be a cheerleader anymore, because, and I quote, "we want girls who are thin." Ouuuuuch. How many times since I've been in India have people called me fat now?! I am losing count. It's lame because Indian movie heroines are generally not thin either! You'd think a country that's generally curvy would be a bit nicer about this stuff. But no. Anyway, I didn't take it too personally, since fair enough, I don't look like a stereotypical skinny cheerleader, which is what they want. I wandered off and told the story to the Belgians and the Australians who were nearby - the Australian guy went apeshit, which was hilarious, and said they were all racist with their stereotypes, and he started swearing.

At this point I wandered off to the trailer to change back to my normal clothes. After I change, there is a knock on the door and in comes the guy from the field who was pressuring those girls. He wants to know why I left, and tells me to change back. (He knows I was told to leave and why, he is just playing dumb.) I got a bit snarky.

Guy: Please come back on set, we need you.
Me: Oh, you realized there was nobody thinner to do it?
Guy: That was just a misunderstanding! We need girls like you.
Me: Nope, I'm not wanted.
Guy: I know what we want, and we want you. You have a beautiful face, great expressions. You're very spirited.
Me: (with sarcasm) Oh you're good. Have you been in this business a long time? Because you know exactly what to say!

At which point the dude continues to beg, and I enjoy the fact that I'm being a total diva having a fit in the trailer, until the other girls come back and announce the cheerleader bit has been cancelled for the day since the other ones still wouldn't take their tank tops off. It was all pretty hilarious. I am not going to make it far in the entertainment business though with my attitude though, haha. But seriously, you can't call someone fat and then tell them to put the outfit back on and prance around in front of a camera. Bad call. (I do have photos of the outfit which are pretty funny, but I didn't want to take away from the glory of Mr. Bachchan by including them in this post.)

We didn't get back from the shoot until late, at which point I went for dinner and drinks with the Canadian girl. Originally, I was supposed to do another shoot that night, for a song and dance number, but the stupid TV show ran late and I missed it, which pissed me off tremendously. However, not being on the dance shoot worked in my favor - outside the cafe we went to for dinner, we ran into a scout - the slightly less sketchy one, and right while I was standing there he got a call from someone who needed 2 extras for a film shooting at Film City (big Bollywood studios!!)... A FILM WITH AMITABH BACHCHAN. I was like "I'LL DO IT!!!!!" It was entirely a case of being in the exact right place at the right time.

Day 2 - Early in the morning, I get on the bus again with a new crowd of extras, which takes us to the stupid TV show set again. On a gross side note, the really sketchy scout was there on the bus (the slimy guy from my first day here) and he kept touching my arm alot and trying to get close to me, saying stuff like "Hey... I like you..." I nearly puked. From the TV set though, they sent me to the Amitabh Bachchan shoot. This involved me getting on the back of a motorcycle alone with a strange man. Which, under normal circumstances I would not do, but the magic words "Film City" and "Amitabh Bachchan" caused common sense to fly out the window. As we were flying down the road at ludicrous speeds, me helmetless again and clinging to this random dude for dear life, I kept thinking "Dear god why didn't I buy travel insurance?" But we got there safely.

It was SO cool being at Film City. It's like a bunch of studios inside this massively huge and pretty wilderness area, with trees and almost mountains and stuff. I spent most of the day hanging out inside a sweet air-conditioned trailer getting my hair done and eating good food. No sign of Mr. Bachchan at all. At the very end of the day, me and this one other English guy named Tom got taken on set for our scene. We were bookstore patrons, and we had to walk into this bookstore run by Amitabh Bachchan. I just walk in and browse, and Tom says a line!!! (I was so freaking jealous that he has dialogue with Amitabh Bachchan - he didn't know who he was so couldn't grasp how cool it all was, haha.) Actually we filmed our part after Amitabh was done, so I never filmed with him directly, but it'll be cut together into the same scene. I watched him film his part though and he's amazing. He is such a megastar though that the whole shoot seems like it's controlled by him. He told the crew to hurry up so he could go home, haha... he seemed pretty grumpy. When he was done, he was walking out and walked right past me. I was scared since he was grumpy, but I stopped him and said "Excuse me sir" and then told him I was a fan and asked if I could take a photo with him. He asked where I was from and how I knew him, haha. And then he posed for a photo with me. It was all over in less than 2 minutes, but it was awesome. AWESOME.

The whole experience was SO cool. This was a big budget Bollywood film, way better than that dumb TV show. The only downside to the day was that it was about 40 degrees out but the film took place in the mountains so they made me wear a parka. Which was ok in the AC trailer but a bit toasty outside, haha. On the way out, we passed a set where Abhishek Bachchan (son of Amitabh, star of Dhoom 2, among other things) was filming. Abhishek was in a trailer and I was outside, begging to be able to say hello to him, but they wouldn't let me in. Apparently he was in a meeting with the director and producers. Bah. Then we had to leave Film City and go home. :(

Photos: Set construction for Amitabh Bachchan film, and Abhishek's set (allegedly that's his car!)

Day 3 - It was my intention to not do any Bollywood stuff today, and sightsee instead. I slept in till nearly 11am, then wandered out, not even showered yet, to get breakfast, and got jumped on by yet another scout wanting me to go to a shoot RIGHT then. At first I turned it down but then he begged me, and since the day was half over already and I'd only have to be on set a half-day, I relented. It turned out to be another actual Bollywood film, a comedy with Kunal Khemu (a hot guy who is a fairly big deal here, but not an actor I am familiar with) and Soha Ali Khan! Soha Ali Khan was in Rang De Basanti, one of my favorite Hindi films ever, so I got pretty excited. (Also - JULIA!! Soha Ali Khan is the younger sister of Saif Ali Khan!!!) This was smaller budget than the Film City shoot, not as big a deal, so the set was pretty relaxed... I kind of wandered around somewhat at my leisure taking pictures of stuff on set. (I actually snuck in beside the cameraman at one point and filmed one of the takes on my camera!) In between takes, Soha Ali Khan sat down next to me, and so I got to talk to her! We chatted about Rang De Basanti, and she was pretty interested in the fact that I'd taken a Bollywood film course. Then I got a photo, yay. And later on I was in a scene with her. It's in a restaurant, I'm sitting at a bar in the background while her and Kunal are at a table. It turned out to be a really cool day. I also ended up chatting with the executive producer of the film about random stuff, including Aamir Khan, and he gave me the address of Aamir Khan's office. So I can hunt him down and try to meet him, haha. We'll see how I do with that.

Photos: Me with Soha Ali Khan, and Soha and Kunal filming a scene!

Okay, internet cafe is closing - tomorrow I actually intend to sight-see, but this could change if the offer to meet anymore Bollywood stars comes up... oh, incidentally, the Amitabh Bachchan film was called "Shoebite" and the one today was called "Dhoondte Rahe Jaoge". I hope they release to theatres in Canada, haha.

mumbai - networking bollywood?

2008-03-04T12:14:00.005-04:00

I am finally in Mumbai! Glamorous home to Bollywood. I am peeing my pants with excitement. I haven't met any celebrities yet, but I'm keeping my hopes up. I got here yesterday afternoon, looking pretty nasty after 2 consecutive nights on trains with no shower in between. I arrived at Bandra station in north Mumbai, which is like, 10km from where I am staying in the south so I had to attempt to navigate the local trains to get to my hotel. This was somewhat terrifying, since the train station was in the middle of a huge ghetto. Bandra is a ritzy neighbourhood too, stars live there! But not around the train station, I'm guessing. I could have taken a taxi but I'm cheap. I made it in the end and didn't even get groped (Mumbai's local trains are known for being cramped and groping of ladies occurs) because I stayed in the ladies-only compartment. Haha.

Anyway, I've been wasting no time in my attempts at getting famous. The first thing I did (after showering) was have dinner at this cafe where I heard they often scout for Bollywood extras. I was not scouted during dinner, so I asked one of the guys working there if he knew anything about it. He gave me a phone contact, and I ended up talking to some dude who said there was a shoot on the day after tomorrow and to call him back about it. Promising... except I asked what the film was, and I thought he said "Race" which doesn't make any sense because that film releases in 2 weeks so they couldn't possibly still be filming anything. So maybe I misheard. Or maybe he's a sketchbag. Who knows. I'll have to call back and see. The restaurant dude was nice though - I asked him if his Bollywood contact was a good guy and he said "Well, I don't trust him, but you can judge for yourself." Greeeeeat. Restaurant guy asks for my autograph every time I go in there now though, since I'm going to be a star, obviously. He's funny.

Regardless, I didn't even need to put that much effort into trying to get into a film - I've been scouted about 4 times now just walking down the street!! I am amassing business cards! Firstly, last night this guy stopped me about working as an extra in a TV serial (i.e. Indian soap opera type thing, probably). I said sure, I'd do it, since I figured it'd put me in contact with the right people. So I agreed to meet the next morning (today) for the shoot. I wish I could properly describe this scout guy - he is everything you would imagine a Bollywood scout to be. He is a slimy little weasel of a guy, with greasy hair slicked back in a ponytail, a shady smile, a shirt with stars on it (like the shape, not celebrities). After scouting me, he then asked me out for a drink. I declined politely, and then I wandered off to a coffee shop. I ended up getting into a chat with a semi-creepy dude at the coffee shop, but the discussion was harmless and relatively interesting so I wasn't concerned. But then all of a sudden, mid-conversation, sketchy Bollywood scout appears in the coffee shop and tells me his boss is outside and wants to meet me. HOW he found me in the coffee shop I don't know. He claims he just walked by and saw me... unlikely, but whatever. So anyway, I go outside, and his boss isn't there, he says he just wanted to get me away from the guy I was talking to in the coffee shop, because he says he knows him and he's a big sketchbag and I shouldn't be talking to him. At which point I just started laughing because I'd only been in Mumbai a few hours and it was all so ridiculous I didn't know how else to respond. But then his boss phoned, so I talk to the boss on the phone (the boss is the one who arranges all the extra work, after the scout finds people I guess) and the boss says that they're all going out to this bar for drinks and I should come. Which I decline, obviously. And then he tries to be all charming on the phone and talk me into it, saying that two other western girls were coming. And then I said straight out I wasn't interested, so that ended that.

So this morning I show up at the meeting place for the alleged shoot today. The other people haven't shown up though so me and sketchy scout walk to their hotel to pick them up. (He wanted to take a taxi but I refused to get into a taxi alone with him so we had to walk, haha.) Anyway, at the hotel I met his boss. What his boss was doing at the hotel where the western girls were staying is beyond me. He was creepy too, I should mention. After a bit of disorientation, it turns out the supposed TV serial shoot has been postponed to the afternoon. So I go about my business, shopping and snacking and seeing Mumbai. Later in the morning, I run into sketchy scout dude again, who says his boss wants me to do a TV commercial for a mobile phone company, which is a character role and pays big money (like 3$ an hour versus 1$ an hour, woohoo! I'm not doing this for the money, clearly). So I spoke to the boss again on the phone, we'll see what happens with all that. After that I phoned them in the afternoon, only to hear that the TV shoot's been moved to tomorrow. Lame. A few hours later, I run into sketchy scout in the street again (HE IS EVERYWHERE. HE MATERIALIZES OUT OF THIN AIR CONSTANTLY. It's so disturbing. We're like good buddies now, we've unfortunately met about 40 times since yesterday), who informs me of a film happening tomorrow which he's scouting people for, but he can't scout me because it's a different boss and I'm already doing the TV serial. I said no way, forget the serial, I want to do the film. So he writes my name down for the film thing. And then he follows me down the street asking me if I want to go for a drink. And then he says he wants to take me to a disco. I politely decline, as usual.

A bit later, I am scouted by ANOTHER guy on the street. (Actually I was scouted by a second dude before this but he works for the same guy as the first one so not important.) This guy tells me about the same film in the morning, except he is like a million times more legit sounding. I asked a bunch of questions and he answered them. They have 2 films and a TV serial in the works tomorrow. Allegedly one of the films has John Abraham (big Bollywood hottie) in it, although he is not expected to be on set tomorrow. I expressed a preference to work in the John Abraham film anyway. Soooooo exciting if that works out. I told him I wanted to see Film City and meet some celebrities and whatnot, and he said he'd see what was happening. He said he was going to Film City on the 10th and I could go with him if I wanted to. Haha, we'll see. So, SUPPOSEDLY I am going to working in a film tomorrow. Oooooh I hope it works out.

Bad news though, I have asked both the legit-seeming scout and "the boss" about the possibility of working on Ghajini, Aamir Khan's current film, but both told me that there aren't any western people required for that film. Awwwww. My dreams of starring opposite Aamir Khan have been temporarily shattered. I'm still gonna try to meet him though.

In other news, I took a nice boat tour of Mumbai's harbour. Also, I finished A Brief History of Time, and while I still don't understand quantum mechanics I have a better general idea of it than I did before. I have now moved on to reading The English Patient. I phoned Micah last night to see what he's gotten himself up to and if he's coming to Mumbai at some point. It turns out he's made a bunch of Israeli friends in Pushkar and they've gone on a camel safari. He was in the middle of the desert last night when we spoke. Now they're on their way to Rishikesh, which is a big spiritual hotspot for India - basically where hippie backpackers go to get stoned and do yoga. It's kind of funny that we're having such different experiences. He's gone with the hippies and I'm navigating Bollywood sleaze. India is a crazy place. You meet so many random people. Tonight in a cafe I met this 60-something year old woman, who is a flight attendant for Delta on a stopover between flights. She's been a flight attendant for 41 years, and has been all over the world, and gave me good tips to get over my fear of flying. We ended up chatting for almost 2 hours.

Now I need to sleep. I will report to this blog immediately if I manage to obtain photos of myself with Bollywood celebrities.

jaisalmer cont'd...

2008-03-02T01:43:00.007-04:00

The above photo was taken in the middle of the desert about 45km outside Jaisalmer. I don't know what to say about it... good advice, I guess? India is weird, haha.

I am currently in Jodhpur again, stopping over for a few hours on my way through to Mumbai. I just left Jaisalmer! What a strange place... the hotel owner was telling me that Jaisalmer (along with Varanasi, and two other places I forget) is one of the places in India that foreigners apparently come to with the specific intention of hooking up with locals. That might explain why men there were sleazier than usual. Everywhere I went, guys were saying hello, grinning at me, trying to chat, saying things like "Hi sexy", etc. I mean, you get that everywhere but Jaisalmer was excessive. Hotel guy says this is for 2 reasons: firstly, they all watch alot of western porn and think that's what western women are like, and secondly, because there are a ridiculous number of women (mostly older, middle aged) who come to Jaisalmer and stay with "friends" in the town... I didn't believe him at first, but it made sense after a few days. Men kept asking me "Do you have a friend in India?" It took me like 2 days to clue in to what that implied. I kept saying "Sure, I have lots of friends" which was the wrong answer since it made me sound like a whore. Oops. When I was going for a camel ride, the camel owner approached me, leaned in really close, asked the "Do you have a friend in India?" question, and when I said no, he smiled this creepy smile and said "You like Indian men?" What a creep. The guy that takes the cake though is the one who rode past me on a motorcycle and called out "You want a ride?! I fuck you!" Which marks the first time I've been unable to stop myself from giving someone the finger in India. I have no idea if that gesture even means the same thing here, haha. Oh well. It's not just women who go there though. The man in the hotel next to me was an extremely flamboyant gay man from the Netherlands who has (according to hotel guy) six boyfriends in Jaisalmer, so he visits several times a year. He was... a character, to say the least. Anyway, to deter these potential "friends" I've concocted a story for men who do talk to me - I've been married for 3 years, my husband is travelling with me but he's back at the hotel lying down with some stomach troubles. It usually gets them to back off.

There is one big plus to being a girl on my own - queue-jumping! They have separate line-ups everywhere for men and women, and the women's line is always empty, which means I go right to the front and get served ahead of the men's lineup. This comes in handy at movie theatres, train stations, etc. In Jaisalmer, there was only one reservation counter and the lineup to get a train ticket was over two hours long. But, being a solo woman, I waltzed in to the front of the line, and was in and out in 10 minutes. One man in the lineup, another tourist, was very vocal about how unfair this was. I felt kind of bad for him, because it does sort of suck to be a guy in line, but women get so much crap in other ways. Let us have this small compensation. I mean, sure he might have to wait in line awhile longer, but he doesn't have to worry about stuff like this:

So funny... I know it's a religious thing, but still. Amusing from my western viewpoint. Also amusing - I rode a camel! Not very far, only about 5km. I wanted to go out to the sand dunes to watch the sunset, and the trip involves a brief camel ride so I went with it. It was pretty fun, even though my butt hurt the next day. My camel's name was Rocket. He was very handsome. I dropped my sunglasses somewhere in the dunes though. I realized I dropped them within 2 minutes but they were gone when I went back (I was walking around at this point, not on the camel) so I am thinking someone swiped them. There were about a million people on the dunes, actually. This certain part of the desert is so touristy that there is nothing remotely remote about it. There were still children running around trying to sell me things. Fun experience regardless.

Last day in Jaisalmer I just wandered around. I bumped into the Australians again, that makes it 4 times now. It's getting eerie. We were even on the same train last night. I also think I saw the people we took the boat ride with in Varanasi. So random. Last night was both good and bad... bad because I got into a fight with a shopkeeper. He was showing me some scarves but was refusing to bargain on the price, saying it was fixed. Which is untrue, none of these things are fixed price. One time in Jaipur a man told me something was "fixed price" and I walked out of the shop, asked someone on the street what they thought I should pay, and it turned out the alleged "fixed price" was about 4 times the real price. So, I always leave if they won't bargain, in the interest of shopping around to figure out what it should cost. But this guy got SO mad that I didn't buy anything, he said I didn't know what I wanted, and I shouldn't be wasting people's time going into shops and not buying things. It was such a load of crap. Shopkeepers are crazy here... sometimes they chase you yelling things like "Madam! Please buy something!" This guy was a huge jerk though. I told him I'm not obligated to buy anything, I'll look at whatever I want to, and in this case I'll take my business elsewhere and then I left. Then I was disgruntled, so I went to get some cake, and I was sitting in the cafe reading my book, when a nice man sat down with me and saw my book. He had read it already and we had a great chat about Stephen Hawking, and other books, and Bollywood. So I left Jaisalmer undisgruntled, in the end. :) It was nice to have a conversation with someone who didn't try to proposition me. (Even the jerky shopkeeper asked if I had a special friend in India, ugh.)

Other random encounters in Jaisalmer: A funny old man befriended me on the train, telling me stories about how camels are dangerous in December because that's mating season and they are looking for female camels and get angry and bite people's heads out of frustration. I also met a bunch of cool people near Jaisalmer's lake. An old man named Babu Singh who had a cool arm tattoo, crazy hair, and used to be a beggar until he worked his way up to selling souvenirs and putting on puppet shows for tourists near the lake. He also takes care of this blind lady who he pushes around in a little cart everywhere. And I met this guy named Ravi who is the town history teacher, who was actually really nice and remarkably attractive. He invited me to his house for tea, which I declined because common sense says going to men's houses is a terrible idea, even though he was cute and non-threatening. This was probably a good idea, because after he left, two different guys in the street asked me if I was Ravi's "friend" and if I was going to his house. And we all know what "friend" means here.

In any case, I survived Jaisalmer without making any friends (except for Rocket the camel). Mumbai tomorrow, to seek my fame and fortune in Bollywood. This time next week I should be starring in several films, and engaged to Shah Rukh Khan.

jodhpur/jaisalmer

2008-02-28T11:28:00.006-04:00

Okay, so wandering India solo is actually pretty cool. It's only been like 2 days but they've been a really neat 2 days. I was happy to leave Jaipur - too touristy, which means it's too scammy and you get hassled alot. The guys hassling you are really smart there, too. One guy trapped me into a conversation by asking me why all westerners were so rude and why we ignored people trying to talk to us. So naturally I got all defensive and argued with him. He started to piss me off severely and finally I pulled a "I'm going to meet my husband now, bye" type of thing. Then not even 10 minutes later, I got stopped by a different guy who tried to have the exact same conversation with me... both guys were like "I'm a student, I don't want to sell you anything, I just want to practice my English. Do you want to go for tea?" but in a much more roundabout and clever way. As soon as I realized I was in an identical conversation, I figured out some kind of scam was happening. What the scam was, I don't know, cuz I left, but still... very slick. I met another girl today actually who told me of a similar conversation she got pulled into in Jaipur too. I don't know what their operation is, but it's shady... hmmm. The lesson is, don't talk to men in the street, ever. They're all huge creeps. Tiffany (my sister) suggested I make a t-shirt that says "If I haven't seen you in Bollywood, I'm not interested" and wear it around everywhere. I think I'm gonna have to do it.

Anyway, yesterday I went to Jodhpur. I was worried taking the overnight train alone but actually, it was really good, because apparently there is some massive supercomputer in Delhi that deals with train reservations, and when you make a train reservation here they enter all these details about you in the computer, like age/sex, etc. and when the computer sees a girl travelling alone, it automatically puts you into a spot on the train with other girls. So I've been travelling with other female tourists actually, and no creepy men staring at me while I sleep - what a clever train system. Jodhpur was excellent - being on my own lets me take it easy a lot more. Micah's preferred method of attack is to hit as many temples and monuments in a day as possible, while I like to wander around the markets, try out different ice cream shops, spend excessive amounts of time in used bookstores, and maybe hit up some forts or temples if I get around to it. Yesterday this is what I did. I also visited a big fort overlooking the city (all the buildings are bright blue in Jodhpur, so it's a neat view), had dinner at a Bollywood themed restaurant, and read a book under the stars on the roof of the hotel with a sweet view of the fort. It was a really nice day, and Jodhpur ranks comparatively low on the tourist-hassling scale so it wasn't stressful.

Jaisalmer, on the other hand... ohhhh my god. I took the train this morning, and ended up meeting a girl from Montreal. We got off the train together, and as we walked into the train station... we got SWARMED by men, hotel touts and rickshaw drivers all freaking out for our business. There were like 20 of them surrounding us, all talking at once, shoving brochures in our faces, fighting with each other, refusing to leave us alone. We couldn't even get breathing room. It was unreal. You always get hassled to an extent when you arrive somewhere but this was INSANE. Normally people will back off if you firmly say no, but not here. I didn't know how we'd ever escape, then suddenly 3 police officers barged in waving sticks and everyone scattered. It was hilarious. Later we got swarmed again and the police came back with their sticks and rescued us. They gave us space to figure out where we were going. Audrey (Montreal girl) had a hotel already so I opted to go with her to her hotel until I figured out where I was staying. (Hers was too expensive for me, but it gave me time to put my bags down and call some cheaper places without the station hassle.)

We went for lunch on a rooftop, it was really nice. Except when we were walking back, a shopkeeper said to me that I looked like I'd had too many chapattis. I.e. I look fat. I might blow this off except a guy in Jaipur the other day also told me I looked pregnant. Great. India is making me gain weight. It's not my fault they freaking deep fry everything here and load it up with cheese. Ahhhhhh!!! Oh well, I'll eat healthy when I get home.

I found a hotel this afternoon, did a bit of gift shopping, and am now debating whether or not I should go on a camel safari while out here in the desert. It's the thing to do here, I guess. We'll see... I probably should... I mean, when am I gonna ride a camel again, right? Haha. I also had a really interesting conversation with the guy that runs the hotel tonight - we spent an hour talking about Bollywood and various other things, and he traumatized me slightly by telling me about the goings-on of the industry, the underworld, and other such shady things. Apparently the only way to be a Bollywood actress is to sleep your way to the top. He seems to think I'll have to sleep with someone even to get on set as an extra! What madness. Well, if it gets me in... ;) I jest, of course. That can't possibly be the case, they always need foreign extras, and they can't sleep with all of them.

Random: I bought 'A Brief History of Time' by Stephen Hawking at the used bookstore and I've read half of it since yesterday. (True to India, I think it's a pirate copy too, it looks photocopied and the pages keep falling out so who knows what I'm actually reading, haha.) Dad, I am marking all the pages where I don't understand things so you can explain them to me when I get home. Quantum mechanics goes right over my head.

Even more random: Just found this news story: Newborn survives fall through train toilet

Apparently a baby fell through an Indian train toilet onto the tracks. Weird. I was having this conversation with Micah a few days ago, about how weird the train toilets are. You can actually watch the ground go by under you while you pee. I wouldn't have expected a baby to fit through though... insane.

jaipur

2008-02-26T03:04:00.002-04:00

We are presently in Jaipur, gateway to Rajasthan (or so says the guidebook). That means we're almost in the desert. This seems right, there are lots of camels in the streets here, which makes me laugh like an idiot all the time because I think camels are so funny looking. There are also alot of monkeys. We climbed up a massive hill last night to visit a temple for nice views overlooking the city, and there were about 50 million monkeys. Creepy little things... one of them walked up and hit me. What a jerk. I think he wanted my water bottle. I try to avoid them, when at all possible. If the movie '28 Days Later' taught me anything, it's to keep away from monkeys.

Jaipur is a fun place, not much to do but shop, but this is pretty entertaining for me, despite the fact that I have no money to shop with. Lots of pretty bazaars and stuff though, it's enjoyable. In other news, Micah and I parted ways today. We have different plans for the last 2 weeks of our trip, so we've split up and I am going it alone for the next 2 weeks in India. I expect most of this time will be spent in Mumbai trying to get onto a Bollywood film set, but hey. It may or may not be the last I see of Micah in India... oddly, travelling in India you bump into the same people over and over again, because all backpackers hit most of the same destinations. For example, Micah and I met an Australian couple on the train out of Calcutta. I bumped into them again a few days later in an internet cafe in Varanasi. Then just yesterday, we met them again in the train station in Jaipur. It's so weird. It happens to everyone here. So who knows, maybe I will see Micah again. Or maybe not. In any case, I'll be extra careful on my own and try not to get on the wrong train or get bit by a monkey or whatever else. Train to Jodhpur tonight!

amritsar, pakistan, and how we crashed a punjabi wedding...

2008-02-24T02:15:00.005-04:00

We've had such a crazy past 24 hours. But first back to Delhi... we spent our last days there doing fun things like bangle shopping, and visiting sites from Bollywood movies I enjoy. Here is a photo of me under the EXACT same tree that Aamir Khan recites poetry to Kajol under right before the Chand Sifarish song in Fanaa. I am such a nerd.

After Delhi, we took a night train up to Amritsar. (Which was good, except there was a mouse on the train that kept running past my feet and making me jump.) Amritsar is kind of an out-of-the-way place, pretty far north and it seems that not as many foreign tourists venture up this way. Understandably, because there is not much to see here, with the exception being the Golden Temple, which is a very huge Sikh temple and part of my "list of places I must see because it featured in a Bollywood film I liked". We weren't expecting too much from our brief stop here, but it's been so much fun! We went to the temple yesterday (see photo - I am not making a fashion statement, you have to cover your head when you're inside) and while we were wandering around, Micah disappeared. Usually when this happens, it means he has made friends with someone (most likely women) so I wasn't too surprised when I found him 20 minutes later with two girls. We ended up wandering around the temple with the girls, then around Amritsar. They took us to a park/memorial thingy, where one of them tought Micah and I (but mostly Micah) how to bhangra dance, much to the entertainment of the crowd that gathered to point and laugh while Micah made an ass of himself. Hilarious.

After that we were parting ways because Micah and I decided to go visit the Pakistan border, but before we left they told us they were going to a wedding that night and we should come with them, and to call them later... haha, I'll get to that. So anyway, we took a van out to the India/Pakistan border, where they do this really cool closing ceremony every night which involves the guards from both sides yelling and stomping around a lot while enormous crowds cheer them on. There were SO many people there, it was actually really exciting. Here is a photo of the electric barbed wire fence at the border, and a photo of Pakistan behind the gate during the closing ceremony. There were huge crowds on both sides, interestingly the Indian side was so colorful and the Pakistan side everyone was wearing all black and white.

After we got back, we called our new friends (their names were something like Shubnam and Ruby, not sure exactly) and they told us to come over to Shubnam's house. So Micah put on a fancy new suit that he had custom-made in Delhi, and we went over. I had nothing to wear (I have a sari, but I don't own the garment that goes under a sari so I'd have been indecent) so they lent me a salwar kameez type outfit to wear. Then they took us to the wedding... I suppose the fact that we didn't even know who was getting married was irrelevant, nobody seems to care. Anyway, IT WAS SO COOL!!! It was like a proper Punjabi wedding. The bride and groom were sooooo done up, it was incredible. The groom rode in on a white horse behind a marching band and a bunch of people dancing! And it all happened inside this huge banquet hall type place, where there was so much food it was unbelievable. I ate a ton, and it was hands down the best Indian food I have ever had. There was this crazy ice cream too, it was like vanilla but much better, almost like the flavour that's in cookie dough ice cream, but full of actual pieces of fruit and stuff. Amazing. As for the actual wedding part... well, I have no idea when that happened, there was no ceremony as such, you just kind of watch the bride and groom come in and sit on these throne-like things at the front of the hall, and then everyone runs around eating and not paying much attention. Apparently there was an all-night party afterwards, but we left shortly after stuffing our faces.

Afterwards, we went back to Shubnam's house again, and ended up staying the night because it was too late to get a rickshaw back to our hotel. In the morning, Shubnam's mom made us tea and a yummy breakfast that was a potato-onion-pancake type of thing. And then her mom let me keep the outfit I had borrowed as a gift! So nice of her! After all this, Shubnam's brother drove us back to our hotel on his motorcycle. I've never been on a motorcycle in my life... picture Micah and I flying down bumpy roads in a small Indian town on the back of a motorcycle (no helmets either, ahhhh) with Micah in a fancy suit and me in a traditional Indian outfit. It was probably the most random thing ever. Anyway, here is a photo from last night after we got back from the wedding. (Micah has some really amazing wedding photos on his camera but I can't get at them to post.) It's me with Ruby, Shubnam, and Shubnam's mom.

We are now leaving to get on a 20 hour train to Jaipur. I am hoping for no mice.

delhi (picture update!)

2008-02-20T12:28:00.008-04:00

Finally we're in Delhi! It feels fantastic to be in a city again. Micah and I have been making the best of it. In the past two days, we went to McDonald's, Subway, Costa Coffee, and Scotiabank, of all places. We've also seen some of Delhi's tourist sites, but who cares about that, eh? ;)

All in all, Delhi is a gorgeous city. I HATE auto-rickshaw drivers with a seething passion, but aside from that all is good, haha. Seriously, they're such douchebags here. They try to charge you at least triple the real price for anywhere you want to go, and then they don't even take you to your destination! You think you're going where you've asked, when instead you end up at a "very nice shop" owned by the driver's brother or friend or someone who is going to give him a fat commission for luring in tourists, where you're told you "no buy, just look, just look!" and if you refuse, get dumped out of the rickshaw in the wrong place. We're getting wise to it now, and demanding from the beginning that we go straight to our destination with no side stops (some drivers won't even take us because of it) and refusing to pay if we don't reach our requested destination. Such a hassle.

Also, continuing on with last post's topic of "Indian men are often sketchy", there are no shortage of creepy pervs in Delhi, oh man... the next guy who says "Hello Madam, please give me a kiss!" is getting a punch to the groin. What is WRONG with people? Holy crap.

Okay, it seems like all I do is complain, haha. I'm not actually that miserable, it's just the stories about things that make me angry are more entertaining than the happy ones where I visit tourist attractions. Now I'll post some pictures instead of bitching. But first, a quick Bollywood discussion, please feel free to skip to pics if Bollywood is not your thing: Last night we saw Jodhaa Akbar, unfortunately 3.5 hours long and without subtitles so I had no sweet clue what was going on. I have to say, it didn't seem very good and I don't think it will live up to all the hype it's been getting. The highlights for me were Hrithik Roshan fighting an elephant, and Hrithik Roshan waving a sword around with his shirt off. Obviously. There was even a sad lack of song and dance numbers in a film of this length. I don't think I'd recommend.

Pictuuuuures!

Sorry, my Calcutta pics were on a different memory card and it takes so long to get my pics in order that I didn't have the patience to do it with 2 different cards, so here are a couple from Varanasi! Us with some Israeli backpackers on the morning boat ride (ignore how greasy I am) and me looking pale and gross, but wearing a pretty sari! I have a nice tikka from the temple earlier too, haha.

And here are a few from Agra... Me with the Taj, me on the Taj with some random girl I don't know who wanted to take a photo with me so I took one with her too, the Taj being all pretty reflected in the water, and me learning Hindi on the roof of the hotel.

And in Delhi! Brief explanations in order, if you care. Random elephant in the street. Inside the Red Fort. Me inside the Red Fort. Bunch of crazy schoolgirls in the Red Fort who attacked me to shake hands (despite there being a million other tourists around to choose from). Jama Masjid (big mosque!) View from the left spire of the Jama Masjid. India Gate! Me in front of the India Gate! Micah eating a whole goat leg... eww.

agra

2008-02-17T13:17:00.003-04:00

I SURVIVED VARANASI. Just barely. After I finished that blog post yesterday, I went back to the hotel and we went to the train station. As soon as we got to the train station, I was seized with the overwhelming urge to puke. I didn't even make it to the bathroom - I puked in a garbage can outside the tourist bureau in front of a lot of other backpackers. I then ran for the bathroom, and - this is about to get sort of graphic, skip to next paragraph if you don't want to hear - before I could make if to the toilet, puked all over the sink, bathroom mirror, and everything around it. Then I had to spend 10 minutes cleaning the bathroom, with people knocking on the door outside wondering why I was taking so long. Ughhhh it was gross. Immediately after this I had to board the 15 hour night train to Agra... perhaps not the best place to be with a stomach bug. Once the train started going, I had to run to puke again, this time in the dingy train bathroom with no light, so I was aiming for a hole in the pitch dark. Oh my godddd. But then miraculously, that was it. I thought I was going to be up all night puking but that finished it and I actually got a great sleep on the train and felt a million times better when we got to Agra.

Everyone said the night trains were freezing cold... which is sort of true. I was sleeping on the bottom bunk (there are 3 levels) and I was next to the window which didn't shut properly so a cold breeze blew in all night. But fortunately I had a shawl, a sleeping bag, and a high fever so I was pretty warm. I felt almost back to normal in Agra... seriously, something about Varanasi was just killing me. Micah and I had dinner with a girl tonight in Agra who said the same thing happened to her... she was really sick within 2 hours of getting to Varanasi, described all the same symptoms as me, and she was better as soon as she left. And some people in Varanasi were talking about "the Varanasi sickness" that seems to afflict some travelers, just in Varanasi. WEIRD.

But anyway, Agra! Taj Mahal! Oddly enough we started out seeing the Taj Mahal from the back, not the front. Technically you can't even go around back, there are guards. And a barbed wire fenced, and a shoddy path that if you fell off, you'd fall into the gross river behind it. But Micah and I went back there, and Micah begged the guard to let us go through, which he finally did after protesting that it was "too dangerous". So we walked all the way around the back, behind the barbed wire fence. There were NO tourists. We were the only people back there, seeing the Taj from the rear. Sort of funny. We walked all the way around to the other side. We decided it was too early to go in yet (we wanted to get there later in the day for sunset) so we wandered down a side street, where we were attacked by crazy rickshaw drivers wanting our business.

One of the rickshaw guys was SO CREEPY. He kept hitting on me. In Hindi! Fortunately my 4 months of teaching myself Hindi came in sort of handy here... he said I was a very pretty girl and that he wanted to marry me. AHHHHH. Then he said in English that I have good legs and we should have 10 children. I was so grossed out. Micah was no help either, he was like "Yeah! She's single!" He then asked me if I wanted beer. Or hashish. Then he told Micah he could take him to a special massage parlour with lots of women. What a skeeze.

We escaped them finally and went into the Taj, which honestly is really awesome. It's worth seeing, for sure. My one disappointment though - here in India they have this great TV commercial on all the time with Abhishek Bachchan (hot Indian film star), where he is playing a tour guide at the Taj Mahal. So all I wanted at the Taj was for Abhishek to show up and be my tour guide, but no such luck. Sad. Regardless, it was great, and we spent a good 4 hours in there. We stayed till it closed and they kicked us out... we were the last people to leave! Us and this one Chinese girl, who kept insisting "One more picture! One more picture!" (She was cool - same aforementioned girl we had dinner with tonight.) Micah and the girl were taking a million pictures so I just laid down on a bench for like an hour with a sweet view of the stars, the moon, and the Taj Mahal. Coooool. One weird thing about the day - even though we're not in Bangladesh anymore, and India is overrun with tourists, especially at the Taj Mahal, the random celebrity treatment still happens to us. I got stopped 3 times while wandering around this afternoon by people who wanted to take photos with me. That's so freaking weird, every time. I just want to yell "I'm NOBODY!" Haha. It's sort of fun though. Sometimes it makes me feel cool, other times it makes me feel like a zoo animal. I can't decide.

Tonight we had a nice dinner in a cute restaurant that was playing Casino Royale on a big TV. Or at least it was, until the power went out (which it does fairly often in India, it seems) and we had some impromptu candlelight ambiance. Haha.

Other random observations about India - the women are SO nice here. Every time a woman talks to you, she is either genuinely curious or friendly, or being exceptionally helpful or kind. The men, on the other hand, 9 times out of 10 if a man talks to you, he is trying to sell you something. Or he'll talk to you for 30 seconds and then demand a tip for no reason. The men can be soooo shady! I am figuring out fast that if I need directions or helpful, honest information, I am way better off asking a woman. Which isn't to say that all men here are sketchy, cuz that certainly isn't the case, but seriously it's like 9/10, especially in the touristy places. The women are so cool though... the lady sitting with us on the train shared her homemade dinner with Micah last night, because she said the train food wasn't very good and he shouldn't get it. Sadly I couldn't have any because I was puking. But still, soooo nice of her.

Other random observation - India is jam packed with other backpackers, but they're all hippies! Holy crap! Everyone has dreadlocks and wears baggy striped Aladdin-style pants and looks stoned all the time. I am wearing jeans and makeup every day just to avoid being mistaken for a hippie.

Okay, this internet cafe has just been painted and I am being knocked unconscious by fumes. I'm going to bed. Delhi tomorrow! I can't wait to be in a city! (Note: I know I need to post some photos but these internet cafes I've been in lately haven't been letting me do it. I'll do a big photo post when I get a chance.)

varanasi

2008-02-16T06:05:00.002-04:00

Happy Belated Valentine's day from Varanasi, the city of cows and monkeys. Seriously, this place is overrun by cows and monkeys - they're everywhere. I can't walk down the street without stepping in cow poop.

This would be a super interesting place, except I've been nothing short of totally miserable since we got here. I was fine in Calcutta, and I was fine the whole train ride here, but as soon as we got here, I don't know what happened - I am sooo sick. Not throwing up or anything, just a combination of fever/aches/insomnia and major food aversion. My stomach just feels like it's churning, I can't even look at food. As a consequence of no sleep and no food, I have no energy. Micah's pretty much done Varanasi on his own.

Yesterday morning we got up at 5:30am to do the sunrise boat ride on the Ganges... it was a pretty cool experience. Later in the morning, we visited a bunch of Hindu temples, most interesting being the Hanuman (monkey) Temple, which had about a zillion monkeys running around, eating bugs and poo and being creepy, standard monkey behavior. After that I couldn't handle anymore and went to lie down for the rest of the day in my crappy 5$ hotel room which was everything you can imagine a 5$ hotel would be like. This morning I went out again, but only lasted an hour before going back to lie down. I feel like death. On a positive note, according to the Hindus, if I die in Varanasi supposedly that means I am released from the cycle of reincarnation. Or maybe that only works if you're Hindu. On the death topic (sorry to be morbid) there are two places by the river here where they cremate bodies before putting the ashes in the river. Which means you can actually walk down and watch these cremations in progress, which we did. Again, interesting experience, but I couldn't watch for very long because my stomach was still churning and watching a cremation was not making that any better. It's kind of hard to watch, really.

On a better note, I did get a very pretty silk sari, the cheaper variety but it's not like I can tell the difference. The guy at the silk shop showed me how to wear one though, so finally I know how to tie them. At some point I will post a photo of me in a sari looking like Aishwarya Rai (or rather, what Aishwarya Rai would look like if she were ghostly pale and deathly ill).

Overnight train to Agra tonight, Taj Mahal tomorrow. I may or may not survive. I am going to be happy when we get off the tourist loop and get into the city... Varanasi is a cool place but it's very much like Niagara Falls, or Venice... so touristy it's like they're not real cities. I expect Agra will be the same. Looking forward to Delhi. And not being sick. Unghhhh.

calcutta/kolkata

2008-02-12T12:40:00.000-04:00

We are in INDIA!!! Finally! Whoever said in the Lonely Planet that India was overwhelming and required a few days of adjustment upon arrival did not spend 3 weeks in Bangladesh first. India is such a cake walk by comparison. We have been here 2 days and I LOVE it. I'm never leaving. But let me backtrack a bit...

We spent our last day in Dhaka hanging out with Zabir. We went to his University first and had a meeting with the Head of the Economics department there, to talk about Grameen Bank. A VERY different perspective from what we were fed at Grameen, that's for sure. He had alot of criticism about the bank. There are so many sides to that whole story, it's crazy. Again, too much to get into in blog form, but I learned alot. After that, we saw the parliament building in Dhaka, visited Zabir's house and had a very lovely dinner, and then did a bit of shopping. A nice, relaxing end to Bangladesh.

We took a bus to Calcutta on Sunday, which was about a 13 hour journey start to finish. Long day. Especially for me, as I came down with a horrible chest cold the night before and spent the whole day on the bus with fever/chills, a runny/stuffy nose, and nasty cough. It was pretty miserable. I am slowly getting better now. I suppose the good thing is that if I had to get sick, it was just a cold and not a stomach flu (knock on wood) because it means I am uncomfortable, but not incapacitated.

Yesterday we spent all day wandering the streets and the market here. Calcutta and Dhaka are like two different worlds. Bangladesh is a tough place to be because there are no tourists so you are a novelty to everyone and get hassled everywhere you go. Tourism in India is massive so we are hardly bothered at all here by comparison. Nobody stares at me anymore! There are other foreigners everywhere! In Bangladesh, even white people stare at other white people because we all think "Whoa... I wonder what they're doing here!" Really, it is kind of a big relief to be in India. Which isn't to say I didn't have a great time in Bangladesh, because I did. It is a very interesting country with amazing potential and some fantastic people. But it is challenging as a traveler. Very, very challenging. I'd definitely go back, I just need a break first! I owe a big thanks to my friend Zabir though, because he helped me soooo much in Dhaka, and having a good friend there made the experience a million times better. So, thank you Zabir! :)

In other news, I am learning how to haggle but I suck at it. I keep paying too much because I look too interested. I need to make quicker decisions, and also pretend to walk away. They will chase after you to make you buy the stuff, I just don't let it get that far... I'll practice! Micah, on the other hand, is hopeless. Yesterday he got lured into a shop, and left with 6000 rupees (150$) worth of stuff, including an entire silk bed set with duvet and cushion covers. He needs to get a new suitcase now to carry all this stuff. Hilarious.

Food here is INCREDIBLE. Sadly, when I had my first Indian meal in India, I couldn't actually taste any of it because my nose was so plugged up, but I'm past that now. This is hands down the best place on earth to be a vegetarian. I will spend the next month eating like I have never eaten in my life. I'll have to buy two seats on the plane home because I will be enormous by then. And it's so cheap. A big plate of yummy Indian food costs like 1.50$. And the movie theatres are SOOOO cheap. Tonight I dragged Micah to see Taare Zameen Par (he's a good sport, watching a 2.5 hour Hindi movie without subtitles, haha) and it cost us 1.25$ each. Those were the expensive seats too, cheap seats are 50 cents. The theatre was huuuuuge. (Note to my Aamir Khan buddies: TZP was better without the subtitles! I liked it even more the second time around! I'l probably go a third time yet, since it's soooo cheap.) I am going to see every single film that is released while I'm in India, haha. On that topic, it's really fun being in a whole country of people who like all the same movies as me... I have had like 50 conversations with random locals about Shah Rukh Khan since I got here. I was talking to a guy in the market about Aamir Khan, and he said, "You know what we call him? We call him 'Lollipop' because he's short and sweet." And then I died laughing. Sorry, that's not funny to 90% of people reading this blog. That was aimed at a few specific people!

Tomorrow is our last day in Calcutta, and then we take a train to Varanasi on the 14th. I am pretty excited, though I kind of wish we had more time in Calcutta. But, only a month to see the entire country, so we can't linger too long anywhere. I changed my flight home, I am coming back to Canada on the 12th now, instead of the 5th. I will definitely need the extra week. I don't think I am going to want to leave though... anyone know how I can get a job and just stay here???

success?

2008-02-08T03:54:00.000-04:00

Okay, so... as the above photo indicates, we managed to meet Prof. Yunus. "Meet" is kind of a strong word for it. It happened the way most celebrity encounters go, where you smile, shake hands, take a photo, and that's it. Actually pretty disappointing, since we have been pushing for 5 minutes to sit down and ask him about the film possibilities. Apparently, he couldn't spare 5 minutes, so we got ushered in to a group meet-and-greet session with some of the Grameen interns instead. Micah managed to ask him what the deal was with the film thing, and he basically said that he couldn't give us permission to write a script because he has signed a contract with the Hollywood crew already and doesn't want to get in trouble. This is a fair response... however, it could have been given to us via e-mail, anytime in the past 4 months, or by anyone in the office who we've been in contact with. Grameen has NOT been very forthcoming with certain information. So, long story short, we're pretty much screwed. He did tell us we could get in contact with the other film crew and discuss the possibilities of working with them, so I suppose that's an option. Micah is pretty disappointed by the whole thing (which isn't to say we're beaten, just not decided how to proceed yet) but I feel pretty good. I am just really happy to be finished working with Grameen.

Now that we are done there, I feel a bit more at liberty to say that I am not particularly happy with Grameen. The picture they paint of the organization in Prof. Yunus's book, and the TV documentaries and what-not, is not a 100% accurate picture of the business. While the international opinion of Grameen Bank is very positive, once you get into Bangladesh and start talking to different people, particularly people who are not affiliated with the bank, you hear all kinds of different opinions and criticisms and issues. Unfortunately, Grameen is not particularly open to criticism, and the two weeks we spent there, while still being a fantastic and new experience, largely consisted of Grameen Bank officials leading us around by the hand and showing us what they wanted us to see. Very difficult to get an accurate picture of the situation in Bangladesh if you're working with Grameen. Proper understanding would require alot of independent research. Anyway, I don't want to get too in depth in this blog because it isn't the place, but the past 2 weeks have taught Micah and I alot about how business works in the real world. It's disappointing.

As far as Prof. Yunus himself goes... for the 30 seconds we managed to speak with him, he seemed like a nice enough guy. He's a professional celebrity, he has the meet-and-greet thing perfected, that's for sure. He was warm and charming with everyone, in an impersonal celebrity sort of way. However, the whole thing was frustrating for a number of reasons - I am not upset he couldn't meet with us, but I am upset that nobody could give us a yes/no answer, and made us wait 4 days for a supposed meeting which never materialized. Additionally, I am frustrated because Grameen Bank was charging us alot of money for this adventure - 20$US each per day we were working with them. On days we were meeting with people at the offices, or visiting the villages, this 20$ is a perfectly acceptable administration fee for arranging everything for us. However, yesterday... we were told we'd be charged for the day only if we managed to get a meeting with Prof. Yunus. This did not happen. However, because we attended the meet-and-greet for 30 seconds, they insisted on charging us anyway. So, Micah and I actually paid 20$ each to shake hands and take a photo with Prof. Yunus. THAT'S INSANE. I argued this point with the man who was coordinating us, and he had no response. Which pretty much sums up alot of our experience.

I can't explain all of this properly here. Micah has decided he wants to write an extensive article for Vanity Fair based on our experience. (Don't ask me why he chose Vanity Fair.) It's been a very eye-opening few weeks. And now I am ready to leave it all behind and go to India. No more banking. I want some naan bread and some Bollywood.

prof. yunus? almost...

2008-02-06T13:40:00.000-04:00

Okay, so we haven't met the man yet, but we SAW him. Tonight we went to some sort of function at Grameen Bank which was basically a variety show put on by families of Grameen members, or something like that. Lots of singing and dancing. At the end. Prof. Yunus went onstage and did something or other - we don't know what was going on, as it was all in Bengali. After everything was over, we were standing within 10 feet of Prof. Yunus, but we didn't approach him. We COULD have, but the thing is, we have requested a formal meeting with him already so it would have been pre-emptive and somewhat unprofessional for us to pounce on him tonight. Still keeping our fingers crossed for a proper meeting. Tomorrow might be our last chance for that. Prof. Yunus definitely saw us tonight though, and the letter we wrote detailing our intentions reached him directly, so he knows who we are, he knows we're here, and he knows why. We're SO close.

Anyway, I had no intention of posting again so soon, but I HAD to get out of my hotel room, so here I am. It is nearly midnight, but my room is SO NOISY right now. Apparently there is some kind of religious festival or holiday or who knows what going on, and someone has been screaming over a loudspeaker outside for hours now. I am getting used to the loudspeaker business - the morning prayer wakes me up every morning at 5am because it's so loud, but it's not that long. This shouting just won't stop. I don't have an issue with the loudspeaker thing really, I get that it's the culture, but I have an issue with the fact that the hotel walls are paper thin... and actually there is a bathroom vent that leads pretty much outside, so you hear EVERYTHING. Crappy hotel design.

While I am on a rant about the hotel, haha... I can't remember if I mentioned this before, but the hotel staff here are overhelpful to the point of extreme irritation. Like the staff will fall all over themselves to do things for you... which is nice to a point, I guess. But tonight, for example - we went to the hotel restaurant at 10:30pm to see if they had ice cream. They did not. The waiter said he would go out and try to buy us some. We said no, please do not do that, completely unnecessary, we will go out ourselves and have a look. This waiter INSISTS he must get ice cream. We insist that he does not. And then we leave. And go buy ice cream. And he also goes out and buys ice cream. And then we get back to the hotel to discover he's bought us ice cream and now we have to pay for 2 ice creams even though we specifically told him not to do it. (I mean, in theory we don't have to pay, but if we don't pay it then it probably comes out of his pocket and it's only like a dollar to us so who cares, right?) So we're stuck with all this extra ice cream... could he not have just listened when we said no? Arghhhhh.

Also annoying: I don't understand the tipping culture here. Basically I think because we're foreign and therefore assumed to be rich, we're expected to tip everyone for everything all the time. Probably why people are so overhelpful. But like, I ran out of toilet paper tonight and asked at the front desk, and they sent some to my room. And I didn't tip the guy who brought the toilet paper, but he was staring at me expectantly. It just seemed stupid to tip for something that should be essential, like toilet paper. I mean, I tip the rickshaw/taxi drivers, I tip the restaurant staff, I tip housekeeping for bringing my laundry... but toilet paper? Ummmm. Okay, hotel ranting over. It is dumb stuff to complain about, but this stuff happens several times a day here, and it's making me a bit mental. I'd much rather stay in a crowded hostel than a nice hotel, I've decided.

Other fun facts for today about Bangladesh: I don't think they have postcards here. I have yet to see one. I'll have to send all my postcards from India. However, while Bangladesh is lacking in the postcard department, it is doing extremely well in the avian flu department. Bird flu is apparently all over the place now. The travel warnings on Canada's government site warn against visiting any poultry farms, or playing with chicken feces. Good to know.

Despite all the above negativity, I am actually having a great time over here. Bangladesh isn't the best place for a vacation - it is far too challenging to ever be anything close to relaxing - but it's definitely an adventure. I feel so much more comfortable here than I did two weeks ago. I go out by myself now, take the rickshaws alone, pretend people aren't staring at me everywhere... I've adjusted. Though I will say that the past two weeks have given me an amazing appreciation for Canada which I never had before, haha.

Speaking of Canada, today at the grocery store I found some cheese which has a remarkably similar texture and taste to cheese curds. I will attempt to construct some sort of poutine. Photos to come if I am successful.

chittagong/cox's bazar

2008-02-05T13:25:00.000-04:00

This past week we took a train down to the city of Chittagong, which is the hometown of Prof. Muhammad Yunus, to see the origins of Grameen Bank. We visited the very first village where Grameen Bank actually began in the 70s. Even more exciting, we actually went to Prof. Yunus's house and had tea with two of his brothers! We got to interview them for an hour and a half, then his youngest brother took us to their father's jewelry shop and gave us a tour, as well as showed us the building upstairs where Prof. Yunus and his family used to live when he was a kid! We have yet to meet Prof. Yunus himself (though allegedly we might, we are waiting to confirm a meeting, everyone please cross your fingers for us) but his brothers were very friendly! Side story: At the jewelry shop, Micah was being super curious and taking photos of everything, and he made Prof. Yunus's brother open up one of the big safes for us to see inside. Afterwards, Micah wanted to lock up the safe himself, so they let him do it... then they said afterwards that actually nobody outside the family has ever done that before. So Micah is the first person outside of the Yunus family to lock up their jewel safe. Random but cool.

We also visited Prof. Yunus's University and primary school. At the primary school, the kids all went nuts over us and like 40 kids jumped all over each other to be able to shake my hand. I got to feel like a celebrity again. One bad thing about the Chittagong trip: sometimes on the roads here they have a ditch in between the road and the sidewalk. I was running in the dark towards the sidewalk at one point and didn't see this ditch and I fell in it (it was about 5 inches deep) and tripped, and bruised my leg up pretty badly, and tore a bunch of skin off my hand hitting the sidewalk. Owwwww. On the plus side, most of the ditches here are disgusting and wet because men pee in them all the time, but this miraculously was a dry ditch so at least I didn't fall in pee water! (Men pee EVERYWHERE here. Outside is like one big urinal, apparently. Our baby-taxi driver last night got out during a stall in traffic and went to pee in the ditch by the sidewalk. Everyone does it here. Except if you're a girl, you're not allowed. Lame.)

After we finished up in Chittagong, we took a break and went to Cox's Bazar for a day, which is in the south of Bangladesh and is actually the longest sea beach in the world. 136km or something? Maybe more? It was like no beach experience I've ever had before. Firstly, nobody wears a bathing suit here, because I guess that would be indecent. Everyone is fully clothed. (Except Micah, who wanted to get as much sun as possible, decency be damned, haha.) Personally, I preferred to be covered up in the interest of attracting less attention, but it didn't make a difference. We stayed away from the crowds, but people found us anyway. At least 10 people wanted photos with us. Several times the crowds of people got so annoying I had to get up from where I was sitting and run 15 feet away for some space. Nobody seemed to get the idea that we wanted to relax privately. Sometimes in this country I feel like a zoo animal under constant observation. Arghhh.

Perhaps the weirdest part of the beach trip was the elephant. We were just sitting in the sand reading, when along came this elephant. This old man rode the elephant right up to us. The elephant continued to approach after I took the photo, until it was standing a foot away from me. It nearly whacked me with its trunk, at which point I got up and ran away because I had no desire to be that close to an elephant on the beach. But then the old man got irritated because he wanted us to give him money, and I had no money to give him. He wouldn't leave until I got someone to explain to him that we didn't have any money. Which was for the best, because I wouldn't want to give money to some old man for forcibly obstructing my sea view with a sad, mistreated beach elephant.

After all that excitement, we came back to Dhaka. We've spent the last few days trying to arrange a meeting with Prof. Yunus. I would really like to spend my last few days here exploring Dhaka, which we haven't had a chance to do properly because we've been so busy, but it's been difficult because we've been waiting for a response from Grameen and have been stuck hanging around the office. We will be heading out to Calcutta on Thursday or Friday, I think. INDIA!!! I am beyond excited. (Here's hoping I have internet in India... I guess some undersea cables got cut and some places there don't have it? They'll have to fix that before I get there.)

Two random stories about Bangladesh: First - in the middle of Dhaka they have this big military cantonment thingy. Which is basically a long road that passes through a military area, and is a shortcut through the middle of the city. Which is great for everyone, except foreigners are not allowed to pass through it! The reason for this is because we could possibly stumble across national secrets and pass the information on to our governments. Ummmm... right. So, many times our taxis have been turned around and forced to go the long way (adding 20-30 minutes to our trip across town, which takes a good 45-60 mins anyway with traffic) because of this silly rule. It's soooooo irritating. Fortunately, at night we can usually get through, because the hawk-eyed guards can't see so well and we can sneak by. It makes me feel like a badass.

Secondly - Lyndsay wrote a post in her Brazil blog about how everyone in Brazil asks her the same questions, and it reminded me of here... everyone we meet, everyone on the street, says EXACTLY the same things to us. It goes like this: "Hello brother/sister! How are you! What is your country!" And then after that, if we've been trapped into conversation, it proceeds with "Are you married? Do you have children? What is your education?" And anytime I pass a shop, regardless of what it is selling (be it baby clothes, bathroom tiles, dried fish, you name it) someone yells at me "Hello sister! How are you! Please come in!" What I would do with bathroom tiles or dried fish, I have no idea. Mostly I don't mind, but if I am walking down the street, all the rickshaw wallahs yell "Hello sister! Rickshaw!" and chase me down the road, which is frustrating because I just want to walk sometimes. But apparently that's crazy here, because nobody actually walks anywhere. Walking to your destinations makes you weird.

Okay, this post is massive. I am hungry and tired and should sleep. Wait, one more story. Tonight we went to A&W for a cola float (they have A&W but no McDonald's over here!) and it was so posh that there were attendants that actually opened the doors for us as we entered. They have doormen at A&W... whoaaa.

A couple other photos - sunset over the beach at Cox's Bazar, and some workers breaking bricks - they sit on these huge piles all day and just hammer bricks for hours on end. Note the child labour in action... surreal but happens everywhere here.

more dhaka

2008-01-28T12:24:00.000-04:00

Tomorrow we leave for Chittagong and Cox's Bazar (which has the world's longest sea beach!) We will be back to Dhaka again on Sunday. We've spent the past few days taking it easy, venturing out into Dhaka a bit. It's an overwhelming place but I don't dislike it. I am not entirely sure that I like it yet - it takes some time to get to know. Two observations about Dhaka:

1. Air pollution - it's horrible. You can hardly breathe when you're outside. Micah and I read a newspaper article today about how the air has actually become toxic and unsafe for people to breathe, and recommends staying inside as much as possible. It's soooo bad. People are constantly spitting all over the place - I mean like, snorting back all the snot with a big "Unnnkkkkkshskhshshhkkk" sound, and then shooting a huge glob out the bus window, on the sidewalk, wherever - and that's why. Air pollution. Yuck.

2. Thai/Chinese restaurants. They are EVERYWHERE. Every single restaurant in Dhaka is Thai/Chinese food! (With the exception of the local hole-in-the-wall Bengali food places, which are kind of off limits to us foreigners if we don't want food poisoning.) Okay, I exaggerate a little bit, but about 95% of restaurants are Thai/Chinese. We spent ages last night trying to find ANYTHING else. We finally settled on a place that was Thai/Chinese/Indian so we could at least order from the Indian menu. We even went by one place that was called "Shwarma Palace", and even that was entirely Thai/Chinese food. Today I cracked and went to the grocery store and bought bread and peanut butter because I couldn't handle eating Thai/Chinese again, haha. Peanutbutter here tastes like plasticine. Maybe I'll go back to Thai/Chinese.

For the most part, this trip has been so hectic I've had no time to process anything. Today was the first day I felt particularly stressed out. Micah had a bad day last Friday when he was sick and everything hit him - it gets overwhelming here sometimes - and I had a bit of a bad day today. Everything kind of got to me at once - all the staring, the language barrier, the Thai/Chinese restaurant monopoly, the bare-footed 7 year old kids begging for money in the streets or digging in garbage, the over-friendly hotel staff, the insane amount of information thrown at us in the past week, worries about money, the film, everything... I just had to shut myself in my hotel room with a bag of potato chips and a chocolate bar and cry for 10 minutes. And then I felt better. I still don't feel overly culture-shocked... just really bombarded.

Tonight we went out with Zabir and saw some of the Dhaka University campus. Zabir and Micah like to have intense arguments/discussions about a variety of things, and since they're both so opinionated and stubborn and get really fired up, I can't get two words in anywhere. When they get going I suddenly feel like a little kid entertaining herself in the corner while the grown-ups are talking, haha. It's good though, it gives me some time to reflect and think because I can ignore them and focus on my own thoughts for awhile.

I thought I should post a few more pics, since my last picture post was looking too much like a World Vision advert. Here are some from Dhaka - city view from the Grameen office building, overlooking a field with kids playing cricket/flying kites, and a shot of some very light (seriously) traffic near the University campus.

tangail/dhaka

2008-01-26T13:17:00.000-04:00

I have so much to say I don't even know where to start. I can't do justice to everything. Must attempt to summarize. Scroll down to last post for new photos. :)

We've had a hectic week. Tuesday morning we left Dhaka on a 5 hour bus journey into Bangladesh's Tangail district, to visit some of the poor villagers and interview Grameen Bank borrowers. It was an experience and a half. The first thing we did when we got off the bus in Tangail was go to a tea stall, which is not much more than a tiny shack where they serve you a little cup of tea in a sketchy looking cup. (Though I will say that despite concerns of hygeine, the tea from the stalls is fantastic - very sweet.) But when we stopped, all of a sudden a massive crowd formed. More than 50 people just crowded around, gawking at us. Extremely weird experience for me. I am shy and do not particularly enjoy lots of people looking at me. It was very very strange and awkward. For the whole 3 days, anywhere we went, a crowd of a similar size gathered. And when we walked someplace a whole parade would follow. (I posted a tea stall crowd pic below - sooooo crazy.)

We spent 3 days staying at one of Grameen's branch offices. Among many other things I learned how to eat with my hand (that's the custom here, they don't use utensils) and use a squat toilet. Micah had even more fun with the squat toilet, because he came down with some sort of stomach bug while we were there and spent a whole night puking. I didn't envy him... the squat toilet pretty much consisted of a hole in the ground in a small concrete room full of massive hairy spiders, haha.

Visiting the villages was really interesting. The people were really curious about us, and hordes of children chased us around everywhere, but people were so nice and friendly and accommodating, and they all wanted to show us around their villages, and take us inside their houses, and speak to us. We had a translator the whole time, named Younus (who kind of looked like a Bengali Billy Crystal) and he helped us talk to the borrowers and ask questions. The whole thing was just incredible - I really didn't expect to be doing things like this! Though admittedly after 3 days I was ready to come back to Dhaka - the novelty of getting swarmed every time we went outside was wearing off. :( Seriously, I don't know how celebrities handle this kind of attention all the time - I felt sooooo self-conscious! One kid even asked for my autograph, and another guy kept taking pics of me on his camera phone!! And at one point I was in a car by myself waiting for Micah and Younus to come back and a group of people almost surrounded the car and were just leaning over staring at me in the window. At one point Micah asked an old man (via Younus) what they all found so interesting, and the man said they have never seen people like us before. So, so surreal.

Oh, one cool thing though - in one of the villages we visited a sari making factory where they actually weave the fabric. It was such an interesting process - aaaaand I bought a sari! NO idea when I'll ever wear such a thing. It's not even a super fancy one, it's pretty much a basic everyday wear type of sari, so I can't even hold out hope of being invited to a wedding. Maybe I'll make some curtains with it when I get home.

I feel like I am really glossing over the past few days in this post but so much happened that I can't do justice to it all. The pics help a bit. On the way home, we saw some crazy accidents - the Lonely Planet Bangladesh said that if you were not involved in a bus accident in Bangladesh, you would witness a bus accident or at least the aftermath - SO TRUE. We saw a demolished bus that had gone over a steep ledge into a pond. And then two trucks that had had a head on collision and one of them flipped over. And then another bus with the top smashed in, probably also from flipping. So scary. Even tonight while we were driving back to the hotel via baby-taxi, a bus rear-ended us. It's mental, I can't even articulate it.

Today was a very different day - we saw a bit of Dhaka, I got to do a little bit of shopping. We met up with my friend Zabir, and he took us to a massive shopping mall (the biggest in South Asia I think?) which was a HUGE change from the rural villages. Once you get to the wealthier parts of Bangladesh, everything is modern and almost nobody stares. It's hard to believe it's all the same country - a few hours away is like a different world.

On a different note, today I did my laundry for the first time in three weeks. That's a long time when you only have 3 outfits to interchange. I'm so gross.

photos from tangail

2008-01-26T11:59:00.000-04:00

Photos from our visit to the Tangail district of Bangladesh:

1. Sun over a rice field.
2. Me and Micah at a tea stall, surrounded by 50+ people staring at us. Ahhhhh!!!
3. The main road - the building on the left with the posters is a movie theatre.
4. A house in one of the villages.
5. Outside a woman's house - I just think it's an interesting photo.
6. Me and Micah at another tea stall. Tea is sooooo good here.
7. Me and Micah surrounded by overexcited children.
8. The most adorable kid ever.
9. One last gratuitous shot of cute local village children. It's cliché, I know. I'll stop!

dhaka

2008-01-21T12:49:00.000-04:00

(Note: I posted some pics from Dubai in the post below this one - too complicated to combine with this post.)

We're in Dhaka! Arrived last night, got picked up at the airport by a man from our hotel who was waiting for us with Micah's name on a sign. He drove us to our hotel, via a sketchy back road to avoid city traffic because it was a holiday of some sort here. That drive was a good introduction to Dhaka - there are NO road rules here. Everyone is all over the place, honking and swerving. About 20 times we narrowly missed sideswiping and crashing into other cars by millimeters. Rickshaws and pedestrians drive/run in front of cars constantly. And the sketchy back road was so bumpy we were flying all over the place in the backseat. Near death experience. And yet, somehow really fun! (Actually every time you cross the street here it's a near death experience. You run for it and hope the cars slow down.)

One more thing about the drive: Jenn, are you listening to this? As soon as we got in the car, the hotel guy puts a CD in... and the first song that comes on... Deewangi Deewangi from Om Shanti Om! I was dancing in the backseat. The guy was like "You know Hindi?!" and I was like "Noooo, I just watch all the movies." Nothing to make me feel more at home in a foreign country than some Om Shanti Om soundtrack, haha.

When we got out of the car at the hotel, two little boys ran up to me and one started tugging on my shirt asking for money. It was kind of surreal. I mean I knew to expect stuff like that, but it's different when you see it. Hard to imagine.

Our hotel is actually pretty nice. I have a big comfortable room (far nicer than my place in Ottawa was, haha) with a TV. There is a sweet Bollywood music video channel which pretty much completes my life.

Today we went to meet with the people at Grameen Bank. (I.e. the people we're attempting to write the film about.) It was so interesting, we spent all day in meetings with some of the people who have been with Grameen since it started in 1976. We met so many people from the book! (Banker to the Poor, the basis of our script.) So we spent all day learning about microfinance and getting an introduction to the whole thing. They've set us up with a crazy schedule for the next 2 weeks. Early tomorrow morning we are setting out on a 5 hour bus journey and spending 3 nights in a rural village with a translator, interviewing the people who are actually borrowers of the bank and seeing the whole process first hand. We come back to Dhaka for the weekend (Friday/Saturday) then next week we are going to Chittagong, and then Jobra, which is the village where Grameen first started. Amazing. I had no idea we'd get to do so much hands on stuff and meet so many people, but it's really exciting. (No idea what is going on with the film though - turns out there are some other people working on a film too, and they've recruited some dude who wrote a bunch of Star Trek films to write this one. I mean, this guy wrote The Wrath of Khan... how do we compete with THAT? Haha.)

Anyway, we spent all day there so I still have yet to see any of Dhaka, with the exception of the rickshaw ride there and the walk back. There are tiny culture shocks but they haven't hit me yet because I've spent most of my time inside Grameen offices and a cushy hotel. One big thing - people stare alot. Obviously, it was expected, but it makes me feel exceptionally awkward. I am dealing with this by not looking at anyone so I don't notice them looking at me, haha. The other thing - we were walking back and this animal comes bounding down the sidewalk and I said, "Awww Micah look, a dog!" And he was like "Um... that's a goat." Which it was. I just wasn't expecting a goat on the sidewalk.

That is all for now. I haven't even taken any photos yet - no time! More when I return from the village (can't remember the name) in a few days!

photos from dubai!

2008-01-21T12:18:00.000-04:00

1. Me and Tiffany in London
2. Dubai Creek
3. Fancy hotel area of Dubai (not where we stayed!)
4. Dubai Creek by night
5. Me and Micah crossing the creek on an abra (see boats in pic #2)
6. Arabic Doritos and Aquafina.
7. What Second Cup looks like at the Mall of the Emirates!

dubai

2008-01-19T15:39:00.000-04:00

Aaaand we are currently in Dubai. It is a miracle. We almost didn't make it. On Thursday afternoon we arrived at the airport to discover our flight to Munich had been cancelled, due to an "incident on the runway." Actually, pretty much every flight out of Heathrow that afternoon was cancelled. We eventually found out that this was the cause: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/london/7194086.stm

Basically there was a plane crash and so 200 some-odd flights were cancelled. Really scary. Amazingly everyone on the crashed plane was okay. But this left us stuck in the airport in a massive lineup of people waiting to rebook on new flights. We waited for awhile, then suddenly a woman appeared asking if anyone was going to Munich. So we went with her, and it turned out that an earlier flight to Munich hadn't been cancelled, only very delayed, so they bumped us onto that plane. We were extremely lucky - most people stuck at Heathrow didn't get anywhere. Tiffany's Friday flight to Copenhagen got cancelled too - I have no idea if she's gotten there yet.

From the window of our plane, as it drove out to the runway, we could actually see the crashed plane. It was just lying flat on its stomach, with all the emergency slides in place and a million flashing emergency vehicles surrounding it. Very surreal.

Anyway, the rest of the journey after that was smooth. Connected in Munich, and arrived in Dubai Friday morning as planned. Dubai is... wow. A crazy place. Lots of old stuff, Arab culture, etc. mixed with insanely modern stuff, fancy hotels, huge buildings, etc. Today we saw, among other things: the world's soon-to-be tallest building in progress, the Burj-al-Arab (world's only "7 star hotel"), and Ski Dubai, the famous indoor ski hill in a mall. Micah and I did a crazy blitz tour of Dubai because we pretty much had only one day to see everything. It's all just... strange. Things are so lavish and it's like nothing is real. And then the culture is so different - there are no women! Well, there are, but very few. When we walk around outside it is all men. The majority of women that you do see are all tourists. Also new to me - in Muslim culture they pray 5 times a day - they have these very loud public prayers that they broadcast over loudspeakers. The first one is around 5:30am. So this morning I was woken up by this super loud chanting over a loudspeaker outside. Very different. But interesting. One great thing about Dubai: food is soooo cheap. I can get a falafel sandwich for like 75 cents Canadian. Mmmmm.

I am a bit anxious because tomorrow we fly to Bangladesh. I don't feel overly culture-shocked in Dubai because it is so modern, but Bangladesh... here we go. :)

london

2008-01-16T17:33:00.000-04:00

We've been in London since Thursday. When our plane landed and was driving over to the docking area (what do you actually call that?) we drove past Iron Maiden's tour plane. Ooooh.

We're actually leaving for Dubai tomorrow, I've been a bit slow to update this week. We've done alot of sightseeing and shopping, the usual London stuff. We saw Phantom of the Opera. I've been gorging myself on cheese and onion sandwiches, and all the crisps and chocolate that I can't get back home. It's been a fun week, but I've been sort of bummed out because there were two people I really wanted to see while I was here, and neither worked out. So that depressed me more than it should have. I was also supposed to meet up with Jess, my old Ottawa roomie, and that didn't work out either. Urghhhh to all that.

We've been staying in a sort of sketchy hostel... well, sketchy is the wrong word, but I usually choose hostels of a slightly higher quality. Our room has 14 people in it, which might be okay except that I think 10 our of 14 at least are massive snorers and it's like a symphony of bullfrogs being crushed by airplanes landing. Tiffany has a cold and she's all congested and sleeping on the bunk underneath me so hers is loudest, haha. Another big negative to the hostel is the showers - not that I'm overly picky, cuz you know, it's a hostel, but there's very little in the way of space or privacy. Still, for all it's crappiness, I've gotten used to it and almost kind of like it. Almost.

Very much at random we bumped into Micah's cousin the other day (neither he nor his cousin knew the other was there) and so yesterday we went for lunch with her at a very fancy Chinese restaurant with a view of the London Bridge. I had a fortune cookie that said something about reality being a big hallucination. Tiffany's said "Keep your enemies close and your wallet closer." Good advice from a fortune cookie? Haha.

Anyway, Dubai tomorrow night, via Munich, so we arrive early Friday morning. It's going to be crazy. Will update more from there.

toronto

2008-01-10T04:54:00.000-04:00

Very early Monday morning in the airport, I leaned over the check-in counter to put my backpack onto the conveyer belt thingy to be checked in. Unfortunately, I had not gone to sleep the night before and so my distance perception and motor skills were not where they should have been and I smashed my nose on the edge of the counter. My nose was red for half the day. I'm a moron.

Tonight was fun - I went for dinner and to see Taare Zameen Par with Shikha and Ghora. I have been waiting forever to see it, and it did not disappoint. I had a few issues with it, but ultimately it was a well-made film and exceptionally unique - not standard Bollywood fare at all. (Not that the standard is ever a bad thing, haha.) Also, the songs were excellent in the context of the movie. For those who have seen it - my favorites were Mera Jahan (because it's gorgeously shot) and Bum Bum Bole (reasons should be obvious). Okay enough Hindi film talk, nobody wants to hear my blathering.

The last three days have been mostly relaxing - just picking up lots of last minute things, and hanging out with Alex and Kim. We (myself, Tiffany, and Micah - travel buddy) fly out to England late tomorrow night (or tonight, I guess? It's almost 4:30am). I should sleep. I just dozed off in the chair while staring at the computer screen.

P.S. The freakishly warm weather in Toronto has been incredible.

ottawa/montreal/halifax

2008-01-06T11:39:00.000-04:00

I am commencing with this blog thing - finally! It tooks ages, I know. Last few weeks have been crazy. I spent my last few days in Ottawa frantically trying to get visas and book plane tickets, finish work, and see everyone I could. Somewhere in there was a house party which I barely survived.

On the 22nd, Julia and I left for Nova Scotia by train. Total travel time: 31 hours. Not so bad though - we had a sweet Montreal tour and poutine stopover (thanks Tas!) and I could plug my laptop in on the train. Which meant I could watch Bollywood. That made me ludicrously happy. I'm a dork.

I've been at home 2 weeks now, Christmas was low-key but good, New Year's was the same. Today is my last day in Nova Scotia - at the present time I am sitting in my bed, surrounded by mountains of stuff on the floor, and I haven't even attempted to think about packing yet. I might want to get on that.

Itinerary for next 2 months looks like this: Toronto (Jan. 7-10), London (Jan. 11-17), Dubai (Jan 18-19), Bangladesh (Jan. 20 - ?), India (Feb. ? - ?), back to Canada (early March-ish). We don't have a fixed route in Bangladesh/India... we're just going to wing it when we get there. That's probably poor planning, but hey. On the topic of India, here's something really random - Blogspot just introduced this feature that lets you type everything into the Hindi script - how convenient! Not that I am going to start blogging in Hindi, but I COULD, in theory. Good practice. Look! मैं तुम लोग से प्यार करती हूँ! Hilarious.

Anyway, here are some pictures from the last two weeks. Christmas Eve it was gorgeous out so we went to the beach. We also went to Peggy's Cove last week, in the interest of being tourist-y with Julia. It looks like we're in the Arctic or something. The other pics are just random Christmas Eve and New Year's shots. (Apologies if the layout of the pics comes up wonky on your screen - I can't figure out the HTML to make this look decent for all screen resolutions.)

I will try to post pics from my travels as I go if I am able to upload them from wherever I happen to be. If I can't post pics, I promise to tell good stories. Nothing boring like "Today we saw the Taj Mahal. It was pretty. I got indigestion from some bad fruit." Well, maybe I'd still talk about indigestion. We'll see.

I fly to Toronto very very early tomorrow morning. I am sort of freaking out. That is all.