Ye Ol Farter

Meditation, misery, and a monkey mind
Wednesday, July 15 - Sunday, July 26th

I just got finished serving time.

Granted, I volunteered for my imprisonment; I even applied for it.

The past 10 days (which were, really, technically 12) I spent completing a Vipassana Meditation Course at the base of the Global Pagoda in a northern suburb of Mumbai.

I had to surrender my valuables: phone, money, passport, even the beads I wear around my wrist. I handed over all my goods, and walked outside, surveying the garden of the place that would be my latest temporary home.

"Excuse me," a voice asked. I turned to face the Course Manager. "What do your rings mean?"
I was wearing two rings I bought in Peru last year. They're simple, and I wear them most days.
"Nothing, just my rings," I replied casually.
She met me with a blank stare.
"Do you want me to take them off?" I asked, a bit surprised.
"Yes," she stated frankly. I handed them over meekly to the volunteer holding my bag with my other valuables.
Alright--I could tell this meditation business was not to be messed with from the start.

Some of you may be wondering, what the heck am I talking about? A brief explanation: Vipassana is a form of Buddhist meditation where you take a course for 10 days and learn the process of Vipassana Meditation.

You cannot talk for those 10 days.You cannot drink or take drugs.You cannot kill.You cannot tell lies.You cannot steal.And, you cannot have your phone, read a newspaper, watch TV, or access the Internet. You cannot have pen and paper. You cannout have books. Nothing. You are cut off from the outside world, much like a monk or a nun. Just you, and your thoughts, and you trying to calm your own Monkey Mind.

Why, you may be thinking, did I desire to venture on such a journey? A few reasons lead me to this place.
1) I had read the book "Holy Cow" about an Australian women's expierince for two years living in India, and she did a course, and her account sparked my interest. No talking? Could I DO that?Oh, a challenge! I had thought at the time.In her book, she describes some of the other students (you especially cannot talk or communicate with the other students). One was Crying Lady and the other was Lady who Brushes her Teeth a Lot. I wondered which I would be.

2) I have met people since I have been in India who have done the course, some many times, and who really were rewarded by it. I was curious. What WAS this all about?

3) I saw the pagoda in March and honestly, I was hoping to be able to meditate inside it. It has some of Buddha's relics in it, even!

4) Since being in India, I have not always been reacting to things like I wanted too--I've been stressed, snapped at people, been angry. I wasn't liking these feelings, and I wanted to see if this course would help.

So here I was, amongst about 40 other women, ready to meditate.

Or so I thought.

A rundown of my typical day:

*Wake at 4:00 a.m. (I learned to get up about 3:57 a.m. though, to run the hot water in a bucket so I had a somewhat hot bucket bath versus a very cold one).

*Meditate in the large hall from 4:30-6:30 a.m.

*Eat breakfast at 6:30 a.m. Tons of bananas.

*Nap from 6:54 a.m. - 7:53 a.m. (this was my favorite part of most days)

*Meditate from 8:00 - 9:00 a.m.

*5 minute break

*Meditate from 9:15 a.m. - 11:00 a.m.

*Eat lunch at 11:01 a.m.

*Nap, walk in the garden in circles, stare at the caterpillars, stare at the stray dogs, stare at the flowers, stare at the monsoon rain, from about 11:20 a.m. - 12:54 p.m.

*Meditate again from 1:00 2:15 p.m., in my room or in the hall

*5 minute break

*Meditate from 2:30 - 5 p.m. in the hall

*Have tea and a snack of bananas and salty snack mix until 5:14 p.m.

*Repeat after lunch activity until 5:54 p.m.

*Meditate from 6-7 p.m.*Watch a video discourse from Goinkagi, the Vipassana Guru who brought this form of meditation back to India from Burma, from 7:05 p.m. - 8:37 p.m. It originated in India with Buddha some 25 centuries ago but had been gone for many, many years but stayed alive in Burma.

*Meditate again until 9 p.m.

*Sleep by 9:30 p.m.

*Repeat. For 9 more days. 10 hours of meditation per day.

Yes, 10 hours of meditation per day.

I was starting the countdown from day one. Could I REALLY do this??

From the first evening video discourse, Goinkagi explained that we all have monkey minds, and I laughed. His explanation was spot-on for me. An example of my thoughts (mind you, a very short list):

Boys. Past, present, future. Graduate school, should I go back? Going back to volunteer for three more weeks here. Monkeys. Race car driving. London. Bananas. Would my toenails grow back I lost in Nepal? Boys again. Visiting friends in the states. Who WAS burping so much?? Going back to Denver. Was I ready? What would happen? Hiking to the Grand Canyon. Pizza. Bacon. Playing the accordion. OK, you get the idea. And this continued, etc. etc. etc.

Besides my monkey mind, I had a very literal sore point: I have not tried to sit cross-legged for more than 10 minutes at a time since 1999, pre-knee injury and pre-knee surgeries.

By the end of the fourth day, I knew my title.

I had become crying girl.

My knee pain was maximizing by the minute, and at 6 p.m. on Day Four of Meditation Misery Madness, Goinkagi's voice came over the audio cassette (yes, I said cassette): "You now must sit without moving for the next hour. No moving legs, arms, no moving. At all."

I freaked out.

In my head, I wasn't strong enough for this. What, was I mad? Worse yet, I was going to get kicked out. If I didn't follow the rules, wasn't I going to get booted? And I was in an insane, insane amount of pain.

I tried to fight them back, I really did. But they came. Big, silent tears, for an hour. At one point, I could feel that one of the volunteers had come over. Obviously, my distress had them worried. They ask questiosn when you apply like: "Have you had a major life crisis?" "Are you mentally unstable" etc. etc.

I am pretty sure they thought I lied to them when I had said I was a normal, run of the mill, meditation-seeker.

So, at 9 p.m. I told the teacher my plight--instead of kicking my booty to the ferry back to the mainland, she was understanding, and said they would find me a new spot the next morning to sit.

Little did I know that spot would banish me to the back row, near others who, too, had problems sitting crosslegged (and who were mostly years and years older than me).

And it would lead me to sit next to Ye 'Ol Farter for the next six days.

The move to the back row shifted me away from Snoring Lady, who had been sitting behind me the first four days, and to the left of most of the Burpers. I had liked my old spot, but I already could tell my knees were thanking me, and my mental fears of my knee spontaneously combusting stopped.

But when the farting started, I wasn't quite sure what to do.

A main part of Vipassana says while you are meditating to make sure you are realizing that everything "Arises and Passes Away" and to fight two main feelings that make most beings miserable, Craving and Aversion.

As I sat next to this older lady whose flatulence was to be my meditation partner the next six days I pondered whether I could, indeed, avert my aversion. Some of the stinkers lingered--they did not just arise and pass away so easily.

The days marched on though, and there were other times where I wanted to run away; they make you state your deep intention to not flee at the start, but still, though Goinka-gi reminded us we were, indeed, in Meditation Prison, I knew at the back of my mind if despearte, I could leave.

But really, I didn't want to. I wanted to stick it out. I knew I needed to do this. I needed to figure some things out; I needed to see if I could alleviate myself from some of my own misery, as the teacher told us, as we inflict it on ourselves, even though so often in life we like to blame otehrs for our own negativity.

So I soldiered on. Waking at 3:57 a.m. and eating vegetarian food (which was quite good) and more bananas in the 10-day period than I have consumed in my existence to date. Then, eating the same snack mix and again, another banana, at 5 p.m. (we did not get dinner there). Not talking. Not reading. Not writing.

Just meditating, and when I got distracted, trying not to open my eyes and look around.
I found that soon the farts didn't bother me as much. Maybe this meditation DID work, after all. And I never felt any aversion to the woman; I am all for older people doing whatever they want, and though I found myself fighting back laughter when a few loud ones really ripped out, most of the time I could stay focused.

On the 10th day, we were able to be freed from our bondage and talk, and get our phones back at 10 a.m. Needless to say, no one napped that day. We got a short tour of the pagoda, part of which is being constructed for people to meditate for up to 90 days at a time in individual cells.
I will not be signing up for that.

We traded stories and made connections with each other, and I soon learned that I was not the only Crying Girl and that others, too, had really wanted to run away. Even though we had not talked to each other for those 10 days, it was like many of us were already fast friends. Going through something like this together was pretty major it seemed.

After doing the Vipassana course, I feel overall glad I did it. I'm not ready to say I would do it again, and I am not sure if I will keep up my practice, but I definitely feel more of a sense of peace than I did before going.

This morning (on the 11th day) we had one more meditation session in before leaving, and I was treated to a few more farts from my neighbor.

But I found that there was no annoyance, no anger; just amusement. Because much like misery and much like the monsoon rains, the farts did arise and pass away.

Arise and pass away.

Arise and pass away.

The Global Pagoda, view from the Gorai Creek.

How I felt on like Day 7 or 8.

How I felt when I was DONE!

Barefoot bowling and Voyage to Nepal

Saturday May 9th - Saturday May 16th

I had a few days to catch up with friends and with everyone at One! International after Randy left and before my older brother Bryan arrived in Mumbai. Once again returning to the Sea View Hotel, I first picked Bryan up at the International Airport, fighting my way into a small group of angry cab drivers until I elbowed up to the window and arranged for a pre-paid taxi. I'm pretty sure my brother wasn't prepared for me having to yell and throw elbows straight off the plane, but it's India, and it was necessary.
We did a whirlwind tour of Mumbai the next few days, following on the footsteps of what I had shown Jessie and Randy when they were here, though this time around we were able to witness an army of monkey balloons flying over the beach as the sunset.

The next day we made it downtown eventually, but I first gave Bryan a quick tour of the school where I volunteered at and the area surrounding it. As my latest guest, I again went to Leopold's, then walked to Gateway of India. The next morning brought my second journey to Elephant Island, where we met a fellow American named Thomas who was in India for work but also touring around a bit. This monkey was especially impressive with his corn eating skills.

After touring the caves at Elephanta, the three of us hit up lunch, then drinks, then bowling, then dinner—it was so hot, indoor activities were preferred. I was somehow under the false impression that Indian bowling would differ from back home, but really it was the same, except for that they played even more bad hip hop music (loudly) and we didn't need to wear shoes or socks.

The next day, again swelteringly hot, we made it back up to Juhu from downtown, ran some necessary errands, and I introduced Bryan to Shiv Sagar, my favorite veg fast food chain, where he for the first time had pani puri, sev puri, and masala dosa, proof below:

Finally early Thursday morning we began our journey to Nepal; I had forgotten when I booked our tickets that there was both an International Airport in Delhi and a Domestic one, thus we had to leave Mumbai at the domestic airport and transfer to the International Airport in Delhi. However, all went well and though we had not heard from Pema Sherpa (our scheduled guide in Nepal) he did not let us down as he met us at the airport in Kathmandu with a sign bearing my name (one of my most favorite things is to be greeted by someone holding a sign with my name; this was starting well!)

Pema navigated us over to my friend Amber's place in Boudha (bow-duh), just a short distance from the center of Kathmandu. I had met Amber in Mumbai; she's a film editor from Massachusetts. We settled in, and Amber had to go wrap up some work, but her mom was visiting from the U.S. so she took us to a rooftop cafe near the Stupa in Boudha.

I welcomed the calm.


I had not realized just how intense Mumbai could be, until I sat sipping tea at the rooftop cafe in Kathmandu watching all sorts of people, including monks, walk around the large stupa in a clockwise direction. Despite Kathmandu's pollution, it truly was a breath of fresh air to sit there. That night we also witnessed a peaceful protest in support of Free Tibet and the Dali Lama, and I captured the two images below, a few of my favorites from the day.


The next morning we left Amber and her mom and got a taxi for Thamel, the touristy area of Kathmandu. I was tired, and gave in when the cabbie said that he had a “great suggestion” for a hotel for us. It turned out to not be half bad (though it was a cold shower) but for US $10 a night, it worked just fine. After a tasty breakfast at the small cafe Gaia—bacon croissant—the best one I have ever had, I must admit—we spent the next day using our trusty Lonely Planet—Nepal book to do a walking tour of Kathmandu, including seeing a Toothache God, the main Durbar Square as well as the Swayambunath Temple, better known as the Monkey Temple, which was a good precursor to the amount of stairs we were going to climb once our trek started. Durbar Square had tons of temples, as well as a few babas who befriended me, and the Swayambunath Temple also had shrines to Saraswati (Goddess of wisdom and learning, many students come and pay homage to her before their major exams) as well as an expansive view of Kathmandu.


That night, we filled up on a substantial meal at Fire and Ice Pizza not far from our guest house. Note, we take our training seriously.

We left early for the city of Pokhara the next day and after a long bus ride, we settled into an extremely relaxing day in Pokhara, enjoying some steak, beer, and Bryan purchased some knock-off Northface gear. We had our first meal with our group that night, and my first Dahl Bhat, traditional Nepali food of dahl, rice, and veggies. The highlight was that we got to celebrate with Jean from Germany, who was part of our trek group the first three days, as it was his 50th birthday. Starting off with a party—this seemed exactly like my kind of gig.

Wrapping April in Mumbai

April 15-30th, 2009, Bombay, Maharashtra India

Following a month of travel, I spent most of the last two weeks of April volunteering again at the Khar Danda school at One! International. It was great to see the kids again and to meet some of the volunteers who had arrived while I was gone, including Amy from Canada, Shawn from North Carolina, and Norman from Australia, who were all lots of fun. Those two weeks I also found time to read several books and enjoy being back in Bombay—in one place--for some time, all the while I continued to plan upcoming travel for when my friend Randy came and my brother Bryan in May.

A few days after I returned, we took about a dozen of the younger kids at the school to do a program with some other young students at The American School in Bombay, which is the school that all the children of various diplomats from around the world who are working in Bombay attend. The facilities at the school were impressive, surpassing many schools I have seen in the U.S., and the kids had a lot of fun going there, even though some of them were cold because of the high levels of A.C. that were pumping out in the building. The kids danced to Jai Ho! A song from Slumdog Millionaire, and really did a great job.

Practicing for Jai Ho!

I spent a lot of my time at school tutoring Sunil, our oldest student and also the first from One! International to take the 10th grade exam, which in India you must pass to go onto college. We were studying computers—a book on Windows 95, to be exact (I kid you not) but he was a very diligent scholar, and despite the fact that he insisted that over and over again “Didi, sooooo many cards!” (I made him a lot of flash cards) his hard work was paying off. Plus when he did well, he was able to play some songs off of my computer, favorites being the “Na Na Na” song by Akon and various Bollywood numbers. Also around the same time, one of the older girls at the school who is around 16 named Dilshad had been watching my habit of buying a samosa from my favorite Samosa Men after school each day; concerned, she told me “Didi, very bad for the health to eat a samosa everyday. I did and I got sick. Very bad. Every few days, but not every day.” Turning red, I knew she was right—and I loved that she called me out on it. I cut back on the samosas after that (but not completely).

So you know that I wasn't just being studious and diligent during this time, I also joined in some dance parties with the other volunteers from One! We found that the Boat Club in Bandra, seemingly has theme nights, or at least sometimes they change the posters on the wall—my favorite being when we showed up and there were framed rap/hip hop stars everywhere—nothing like seeing Snoop and Fifty Cent adorning the walls in India. Regardless of the music played that night though, it seemed that a fog machine was often involved. We danced there right before Amy went back to Canada, and again before Shawn went back to the U.S.





Though being back in Bombay was nice for a sense of stability, my body wasn't used to riding in the Riks again with all the pollution, and I got what I think was my fourth or fifth bad cold. That, however, didn't stop me from traveling to the Hill Station of Matheran with some friends from the Hash running club the last Saturday in April. Matheran is about 3 hours south of Bombay, and up a very windy road—the catch is though, motorized vehicles are prohibited after a certain point, so the last 45 minutes you have to either walk, or ride a horse. We chose to walk, and met about 10 other Hashers and stayed in a bungalow for the night before the run. Being sick, I spent much of the afternoon resting, but did rally to meet a few American Hashers who were traveling through and joined our group. What I thought was going to be a quiet night quickly turned when my friend Elizabeth's friend Mary Lou revealed she had brought karaoke. The TV was wheeled out onto the patio and the monkeys all around us settled in for a concert, as the night air soon filled with raspy renditions of the familiar words of Bryan Adams (Summer of 69), Cher, Britney Spears, Journey, and the list went on and on (for about three hours, I think). It was good fun, and the run did not disappoint the next day either, as the route took us to one particularly breathtaking panoramic view of the surrounding landscape of hills and valleys.

Though the red clay dirt (a trademark of Matheran) stained my shoes beyond recovery, and the ice was late so our beer was a bit warm, I fought off my cold and busted out the wigs for the first time in India, where they were very well received. We also turned the blocks of ice into a literally very cool slip n slide.


The 30th of April was voting day in Bombay, and elections in India are run with a surprising efficiency that lacks in so many other areas of the country. I walked down with Sunitha and her family in the morning to the polling place a few minutes from their house, and their fingers were promptly stamped with ink as to prevent voter fraud. Results are not revealed for a few weeks after the elections, however, but voter turnout here is actually very high, with lots of the poor coming out in droves to cast their ballots. A few photos below showcasing a bit of the action.

Elephant waterfalls and the Holiday Inn

Thursday April 9th - Tuesday April 14th. Mysore, Karnataka India; Jungle Retreat, Tamil Nadu; Ooty, Tamil Nadu; Cochin, Kerala

The night train from Mamallapuram in Tamil Nadu brought our group to Mysore, Karnataka known as the “City of Palaces” and as the name suggests, we took a tour of the Maharajah’s Palace upon arrival. Built in 1912, it was very elaborate, and the Maharajah still lives in part of it. As you can see from the expanse, it is on quite the large lot.

From the palace we visited the Devaraja fruit and vegetable market, where one can find everything from jasmine, roses, incense, and the colors used in the Holi celebration mixed in with the logical finds of fruits, veggies, mini bananas, garlic, and peppers.

In the spirit of Bon Jovi, Senor asked me to lay him down on a Bed of Roses.

One of the most packed days on the tour with scheduled activities, we continued on to a Muslim family’s house for lunch which was absolutely delicious. Almost as soon as we finished, we again hopped in the tour van for a very bumpy ride to the Kesava or Somnathpur Temple an hour or so out of town. This temple is on a raised platform in the shape of a star and was completed in 1268 under the Hoysala Dynasty. The outside is adorned by intricate sculptures of gods and goddesses, one of my favorites being Saraswati, Goddess of Wisdom and I also like to think, Goddess I Turn to Before I Make Bad Choices.

After dashing from shadow to shadow at the temple (no shoes allowed, and did I mention April in India is summer? Very hot hot hot on the feet) we then drove to a small silkworm factory--Mysore is known for silk--and were able to visit with the men and women who go through the silkworms, near the start of the process of making silk. I initially thought we were going to see weaving at the factory, but found looking at the worms and seeing the process at this stage far more interesting.

Returning to the hotel, we knew we were too late to go swimming, a main goal of mine throughout the trip. However, Vinit, our tour leader, was able to pull some strings so we were indeed able to go for a swim--which was also when I was asked my favorite question of the entire trip:

“Excuse me, but would you like the waterfall on?”

Of course, the obvious answer to that question was yes, and immediately the elephant adorning the walls around the pool started spouting water from their trunks. A rooftop pool with waterfall elephants; it made up for the fact the water was only about 4 feet deep.
Tired but happy from a great touristy day, most of our group had dinner that night in a wrap around booth.


Before bidding Mysore farewell, Friday morning we headed up Chaumundi Hill, where the Shri Chamundeshwari Temple is for the Goddess Durga; a few of us got a puja from an old man and we saw lots of cows, but mainly, it was too crowded. On the way down, though, is a Nandi Bull (the bull is the God Shiva’s vehicle) which at over 13 feet tall is the largest Nandi in India.

This is also where Anne from Ireland and I were surrounded by many interested Indians (mostly men) snapping photos of us until we were whisked away from the impromptu Paparazzi in our tour van.

Paparazzi--Iona on the left was my roommate on the trip

Mysore was one of my favorite spots on our southern tour; perhaps because of the pool, perhaps because of the nicer hotel; perhaps the beautiful Mysore palace we toured. Regardless, I enjoyed this stop a lot, and enjoyed our next stop, Jungle Retreat, even more.

Jungle Retreat is as it’s name suggests--we had dorm style living here, but it was just one night and surprisingly, no loud snorers in the mix! There was a fabulous pool here, where we had a very enthusiastic cannonball contest reminiscent of my Rajasthan trip, but this time with more participants and a deep desire to make huge splashes. After a rousing few hours of this, we cleaned up and headed off for a safari, where we were lucky enough to see many cows, as well as a wild elephant and its baby!


Though the tigers again evaded us, we were able to see some leaping Langore monkeys (can you spy the one in the photo below?)

The food at the Jungle Retreat was top notch, but even better was the foosball competition Roland, Lia and I engaged in with some adolescent boys from France; it was international Foos at its finest.

The next morning, we roused early and Catherine, Iona and I joined with a large group of around 40 to do a morning hike. We saw some wild buffalo, and though we missed out on the threatened elephant charge the rest of our group experienced, we did take in some beautiful sites along the way.

Soon enough, we were headed off again to our final new city of the tour, Ooty. At 2,286 meters, Ooty is a prime vacation spot for many Indians as it is much cooler due to the high altitude. We found that for the first time in nearly two weeks we were, indeed, chilled. My friend Sunitha had also spent some of her childhood in Ooty, so I was intrigued to see it. Though it does boost more greenery and a cooler climate than many places in India, it left many in our group under whelmed overall. However, some of my friends from the Hash running club in Mumbai were in town for the Southeast Asia InterHash, so Ed, Anne, Catherine and I piled in to a Tuk Tuk that trudged mightily up a hill to the Holiday Inn (I don’t think that Tuk Tuk will ever be the same) and met my friend Harsh and some other Bombay Hashers at the Holiday Inn there, where we were able to crash a very fun dance party.

Rising early after bringing down the roof at the Holiday Inn, we tried to get on a toy train tour, but since it was Easter Weekend, we were denied on our first attempt and instead headed to the High Field Tea Plantation, where I bought some chocolate tea, and also snapped a photo with a die hard Britney Spears fan.

We eventually made it on the toy train, as well, which was a nice little trip, but more of a challenge to get off as lots of people rushed to get on as we were exiting. Still, a let the wind go through my hair while on it, and made a few new friends as well.

Rounding out the afternoon, we first headed to the Ooty Botanic Gardens and then headed to the Ooty Lake where Anne and I paddled Ed and Catherine all around and where we dutifully posed for photos for passerby boaters. We also took a harrowing ride on a Viking Ship, which was quite the highlight.

Ooty wrapped up with a dinner at the palace next to the servant’s quarters we were staying in, and our next day came early with a leaving time of 4 a.m. By noon we were bussed back to Cochin, and after trying to get into a Tamil language movie that was sold out, we whiled away the afternoon in the hotel bar and were met with the arrival of an early monsoon rain in the late afternoon; it made the dream I had of rain 14 days earlier in the same hotel seem that it had come full circle. After our last group dinner and some last goodbyes, some of us found ourselves back in the hotel bar for one last South Indian Hurrah before the next day would take us back on our separate paths.

Holla for Southern India!

Elephanta Monkey Fights & Chicken Tikka Street Rolls

Thursday March 26th, Friday March 27th, Saturday March 28h

The next day we had to head back to Mumbai, but unfortunately landed in the thick of rush hour traffic, so making our way to Colaba (downtown Mumbai) took much longer than planned. I got us an AC taxi that was run by an all-female cab service from the airport, but our driver said she knew where to go when she didn’t (a typical Indian thing to do, I have noticed) and also talked the ENTIRE TIME on her mobile. It was when I realized my increasing level of impatience that I had to laugh and think, maybe I did, indeed need two days lying on the beach instead of just one. After all, having the BA (bad attitude) wasn’t going to get us there any faster.

We didn’t make the movie we hoped for that night, but we did go to the famed Leopold’s Café for a great dinner and then walked around the area where India Gate is and the Taj Hotel. We also were approached to be extras in a Bollywood movie shooting the next day, but we already had full plans so passed that up (I still hope to do this while I am here though!)

The next day took us to Elephanta Island in the morning, which is about an hour boat ride from the Gateway of India and is an island full of ancient caves and sculptures of famed Indian Gods, as well as lots of monuments to Shiva (which all are very, very phallic). We chatted up some fellow Americans on the way there (including one from Minnesota), and ended up getting a local guide, Nitin, to show us around the caves which turned out to be worthwhile as he proved to be a skilled photographer as well. We also were able to see several monkeys and even a monkey fight (which yes, I did get on video). This little guy also really liked Sour Cream and Onion chips.

MONKEY FIGHT

He loves Salty Snacks just like me.

Shiva Shrine

OMMMMMMMMMMMMM

I snapped a lot of photos at Elephanta; there are a few below for your viewing pleasure. This includes photos of a hen and her chicks (yes, my fascination and love for animals has yet to wane) as well as a replica of the Eiffel Tower, my second in two weeks. Perhaps Paris is indeed calling me back?

Yes, we had lunch here.

After Elephanta, we hit up Jehangir Art Gallery, did a bit of shopping, than rested for an hour before we headed to see a movie. We had hoped to see a Bollywood flick, but near where we were staying was a new, renowned drama called Videsh (and no Bollywood flick) so we tried it; turns out it was an uplifting film on domestic violence. DOH! I felt terrible about the choice, but Jes, champ that she is, rolled with it. We then headed to Café Modegar where we met up with Harsh and Vinu. Café Modegar is a tourist and seemingly popular locals hot spot, with entertaining murals on the walls, see for yourself:


The night brought us to a place called Henry Thams, where an Indian guy who I think lives in the UK was spinning some crazy music; we had to wait to get in, pay a cover, and once in fight the crowd, but it was hip and urban at its finest. Not the type of place I would likely hit up back in Denver but it was a great time and we got to sit in huge, Alice in Wonderland type chairs!


Once closing time hit, we were pleasantly surprised to find we could stay later and exited through the kitchen around 3:30 a.m. But the fun didn’t end there--as the guys walked us back to the hotel, a restaurant had seemingly sprung up from the earth, and I was privy to what was the closet thing to a burrito I have eaten since my arrival in India. Alas, if only the man who makes those Chicken Tikka Rolls knew he holds the key to my heart with those tasty treats of his.

Saturday was Jes’ last day in India, and we headed to the ‘hood (AKA Sunitha’s) for some great lunch and a (rented) Bollywood flick. We had a whirlwind week and I was sad to see Jes go that night, but more so I was elated she had made the trip! There really is nothing like seeing someone close to you show up in a foreign land; it provides a sense of stability and normalcy that you might not even have realized had been missing, and I am really grateful to her for that. (Plus, we got to party it up!)