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Open Wide – Before You Go
Learning about India and Pakistan
The best way that I feel I’ve prepared for my trip has been reading, hearing, listening to and about the Indian and Pakistani people and cultures. Following is a complete list in its utter incompleteness of starting places for information:
On Approach
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Open Wide – Before You Go #2
Travel Essentials
A Hindi-Urdu phrasebook – if you don’t know the language, I always believe it’s good to make an effort where you can.
Flip flops – for bathrooms & buckets.
Chain & Padlock – to chain your backpack to stuff. India and Pakistan are extrem
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Open Wide – Before You Go #3
Safety: Health
Mom says: “Make sure you go to your local travel clinic and get your shots. The last thing you want to do is get sick away from home.” Also, make sure you get good health insurance.
I had to get the following vaccines, travelling as I am from May to August, durin
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Open Wide – Before You Go #4
Scams, Taxis, Practical Tips
There are so many to list that I don’t have the energy to relate what I’ve read. Check out the Lonely Planet Thorntree for more. They store a complied list at the end of the postings around page 24.
1) At the airport, only use the Delhi Taxi Police
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A Round-the-World Journey to Find a New Home #3
13th May 2001, Mt Abu
So here we are in Mount Abu, holiday retreat for thousands of Indian Nationals in the months of June and July. It’s the 13th of May today, and the first few Indians are in town. When I say “few”, I mean it’s crowded like the streets of Delhi in
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A Round-the-World Journey to Find a New Home #4
27th May 2001Sand-Storm in the Thar Desert
We missed Jaisalmer because of the heat reported there. But if you come at a more agreeable time of year, do not miss this town, it is like nowhere else in the world, let alone India. We are regretting the decision now as we have met old friends wh
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A Round-the-World Journey to Find a New Home #6
13th July 2001Himachal Pradesh
Last time I wrote seemed an age ago, we had just arrived in Manali, and since then we have witnessed what I consider the most peaceful and beautiful place I had ever experienced, Chandra Tal, “Tal” meaning lake, also known appropriately as “The
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A Round-the-World Journey to Find a New Home #7
From Manikaran into Uttar Pradesh
Manikaran is a 4-hour bus ride from Manali, and we spent the most time with noses buried in books to kill some time. The trips by bus are interrupted by stops at local roadside eateries, sometimes that would be just a loose interpretation of some of the place
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Travels in India and Pakistan #12
Village Life
Everyone is in search nowadays for an ‘authentic’ experience while travelling. I think, in a small village in the eastern Punjab in Pakistan, one was handed to me. Staying with a family for two days in Gujranwala, north of Lahore, I was informed I would see village li
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A Round-the-World Journey to Find a New Home #8
Rishikesh to Nanital and now Varanasi
When we came down from the hills of Himachal Pradesh to Dehra Dun the first thing that we noticed was the heat again. Not only was it hot, but humid too. This is the way of the monsoon, coming up to it is the Indian summer; it becomes hot accentuated by h
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A Round-the-World Journey to Find a New Home #21
Back to India
The last remnants of amber golden tinge, the colour of a gold foil top on a bottle full cream milk; sunrise over the outskirts of Kolkata as seen from the 2703 express out of Howrah station. Unfortunately, the view is spoiled by the decaying buildings, makeshift homes and the dai
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A Round-the-World Journey to Find a New Home #22
Vijaywada, and Train travel to Hampi
Vijaywada, well what can I say? Not a lot really. It has a lot of cinemas, a very confusing road layout and to top it all, only very average restaurants. Why we planned to stay two nights here I can’t quite work out… The tiffin shops (kind of ta
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A Round-the-World Journey to Find a New Home #24
Mysore, Ooty and then into Kerala
Mysore has to win hands down for being the unfriendliest town in India we’ve been to, and comes close to the top for hassling rickshaw drivers. It has, though, a nice atmosphere once you get past all that but it does detract from the enjoyment factor of
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A Round-the-World Journey to Find a New Home #23
Hampi, Holy Town and Traveler Hang Out
On our trip to Hospet (the stopping off point for Hampi), the overnight sleeper train was full. Opposite was a woman with a sick child that wailed most of the night. I couldn’t help but feel sorry for the mum, it was obvious that it was her first ch
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A Round-the-World Journey to Find a New Home #26
Bangalore and Nandi Hills
We spent a night in Kottayam waiting to catch a train the next afternoon to Bangalore. We traveled 3 tier A/C instead of our usual sleeper class as it was fully booked, and although we always traveled A/C on our previous trip I was surprised at the difference between
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A Round-the-World Journey to Find a New Home #25
Kerala and the back waters of Alleppy
After an uneventful train journey south we arrived in Cochin, also known as Kochi. The air is noticeably warmer and humid here and sweat was starting to gather on our bodies, which is a bit of a novelty this time around. Kochi is just a stopping off point
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Chasing Horizons #1: Arrival in India – India
Arrival in India
For all those of you who don’t already know, I am a complete dickhead.
After months of planning and research, the anticipation was just about unbearable. I had spent two months back in South Africa over Christmas and New Year. It was great to catch up with family and fri
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A Round-the-World Journey to Find a New Home #9: Bodhgaya
Buddhist temples in Bodhgaya
Unfortunately we have had two things go missing from our packs, one a Maglite torch that was lifted from our room in Nahan, and a camera, which we suspect but cannot be sure, was removed from our hotel in Varanasi. Both these rooms had key locks; the safer rooms a
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A Round-the-World Journey to Find a New Home #10: Calcutta and the Andaman Islands
A hectic city and long white sandy beaches
Calcutta and the Andaman Islands
Calcutta has a reputation; at least it did in our minds. Guidebooks describe it as a place densely populated and polluted, with extreme poverty and a desperate feel to the city. Others have told us stories of the home
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Slow Train from Igatpuri (1 of 2) – India, Asia
“But Madam, don’t take the ‘ladies’ compartment. Travel safely with the men.” My eyebrows arched out of my face, like in a comic strip. The mobile tea vendor, with his huge stainless-steel can, had to be joking. The train was sliding in menacing, python-like, and
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