Delhi, Agra & Chennai

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After my basketball tournament in Singapore over the weekend, I boarded a flight to India (Chennai) to meet Laura. I have to admit that for the first time, I was a little apprehensive about flying to India and being on my own for the first bit. There was a recent tip about possible highjackings to the Chennai airport and naturally I was a bit worried. But of course everything turned out ok. My first impression of India was that the people were extremely helpful (and didn’t expect payment just for their help) and many spoke English. Once in a tuk tuk to the hotel, I had a chance to see life along the streets – there were people peeing on the side of the road, cows walking through traffic, women paving the road with their bare hands, and basically just a ton of people, animals, cars and bicycles everywhere. This country really is packed tight! There wasn’t much for tourists to do in Chennai – we just headed to the waterfront for the afternoon, ate some amazing South Indian food and went to bed early. The most eventful (and infuriating) thing that happened in Chennai was that my phone & my ipod got stolen. I am going to keep a positive attitude and believe that some homeless savage really needed it to feed the 9 children he has and that it is just not some punk-ass kid rocking out to U2 now on his new ipod. Karma baby, karma.

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From Chennai we flew to the country’s capital – New Delhi. This city was a quick stop for us before heading to Agra to see the Taj Mahal. The best part of Delhi was meeting up with 2 other travelers – Adem from Canada (teaching in Bahrain with my friend Bill Kelly… very random!) and Deideir (sp?) from France who we ended up traveling with for the next few days. The next day we took a train through the countryside to Agra to see the Taj Mahal. Agra was FREEZING (my poor body is too used to the Malaysian climate) and the Taj Mahal was just a beautiful as it looks in the pictures. I enjoyed seeing it, but I continually recognize that going to visit monuments, temples, museums, etc doesn’t really do it for me. I’m always like – ‘Wow, there is the Taj Mahal - cool”, but I’m not blown away by it like others are. Agra was a lot smaller than Delhi but it had some very cool little back alleys with regular life going on all around you. The locals have all been very receptive and interested in us in a good way. The kids especially like talking to us and wanting us to take pictures of them. Once, when walking around the streets in Agra I saw these men playing badminton. Their net was strung up against a row of plants on the ground and the game was taking place right in the parking lot, dodging around parked cars and customers who were doing their shopping. They invited me to play and I think all those practices as a St. David junior doubles player really paid off (Dad, I used those smash you showed me!)

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After Agra the plan was to head into Rajathan via Jaipur. However, after a few dinners with Adem & Dedier we changed our plans to include the holiest Hindu city of Varanasi. For about 24 hrs we had even changed our trip to include Nepal (we are so close right now!), but after careful consideration, have decided to leave that for another trip. I have to admit that the idea of trekking in Nepal with a view of the Himalayas made me drool, but I knew that I had come to India to see Rajasthan. Besides – 5 days in Nepal would just not do it for me. It’s now officially on my list of places to go, but I will ensure that I devote the time that it deserves for that trip in the future.