Bombay Dreams and Romantic Rajasthan

Before Mumbai, the only other big city I'd visited was Delhi, which is complete chaos and quite dirty and messy everywhere - so I wasn't expecting to be a big fan of Mumbai but I thought it was such a great place. It's got beautiful buildings, it has pavements, it's relatively organised. I really enjoyed just walking around the place! I also got to meet up with my uncle Vance who was visiting his sister's family so it was lovely to see a friendly face from home!

Me and Vance in front of the Gateway to India

Park with university buildings behind

Sunset from Chowpatti Beach

While I was there I decided to go on a slum tour. I know that could sound a little weird, and I did feel a bit uncomfortable about it, but because I've worked in the slum in Delhi, I wanted to see it in Mumbai. I went with an ethical organisation called Reality Tours, who want to stop the negative views people have of communities who live in the slum and use their profits to fund projects supporting the community, through education, healthcare, sport etc. I visited the Dharavi slum and it was so interesting to see how it's not just a home for people, but also their workplace. There were so many efficient businesses being run in there, and they actually bring in a lot of money. For example, they recycle old plastic which they sell on in pellets to big manufacturers, so it's not just little shops - it's big business! There was a real sense of community and it definitely was an eye-opener. The slum is not as dangerous and corrupt as Slumdog Millionaire makes it out to be - it's largely honest people, making an honest living. I do think it's a really positive thing that there are tours that go to the slum and I highly recommend it. Of course, there was still poor sanitation and people living in extremely close proximity and it is wrong that they have to live that way. But it's even worse that actually they've got quite a good deal, because there are so many people in India who live on the streets and don't have a regular source of income. Also, the Dharavi slum is known as a "5 star slum" so not all slums run so well.

While I was in Mumbai I met two guys called Woody and Daniel, and at the weekend we visited the Ellora Caves and the Ajanta Caves in Maharastra. These caves have been carved into temples and monasteries, as far back as 200BC. The temples were Hindu, Jain and Buddhist - it's a great example of religions living in harmony for such a long time. The carvings are extremely beautiful and the work is so impressive, as it was built by monks such a long time ago.

Inside the biggest Hindu cave

After the caves I headed north to Rajasthan. I had to go via Mumbai again, and as I left the city on a bus I passed Mumbai's vast slums and saw the most incredible site. Everyone was out on their roofs flying kites. The sky was just covered with them, as the sun was setting. It was so beautiful and I did get a little bit emotional. I didn't get any pictures but I will not forget what I saw and how amazing it was.

My first destination in Rajasthan was Udaipur. It's city built around a lake, with beautiful buildings everywhere! On my second day there I went to a cookery class. I was joined by five other girls. Our teacher was called Shashi and she began bu telling us a bit about herself. She comes from a very small village (of only 1000 people) that's very traditional. She had an arranged marriage but in 2001 her husband died. He was murdered by his best friend over money. Shashi spoke about India's poor government and corrupt police, as the murderer only went to prison for one year. After her husband's death she was not allowed to re-marry and was expected to stay inside. She spent 45 days just sitting in the the corner of her house, while women visited to mourn with her. She didn't speak and she barely ate. After a while her sons secretly bought her laundry to wash in order to earn some money. As a Brahmin, the highest Hindu caste, she was was not allowed to do that kind of work but she needed the money to support her family.

Years later her sons met some Irish tourists in Udaipur and became friends with them. They brought the Irish guys back to their village. The Irish guys told Shashi's sons, "Your mother's food is great. She should start a cookery class." They were reluctant at first saying their mother didn't speak or leave the house, but with more encouragement Shashi started her classes. She only spoke the local language of her village so she had to learn to speak Hindi. Then, with the help of tourists who came for classes she learnt to speak English. Two Australian girls helped her to write out all her recipes in English, which she now gives out at her classes.

It makes me happy to see that Shashi has found a rewarding job and that she has been freed from the isolation that was expected of her by her village. I'm also amazed by the positive impact that Western tourists have had on her life. I didn't think that was possible before. She's listed in the Lonely Planet, so now she's fully booked everyday, and I'm sure she must make quite a bit of money!

Shashi was a great teacher and we learnt to make sooo much food! Masala chai, mango chutney, coriander chutney, potato and onion pakora, spinach and paneer pakora, basic masala sauce, aubergine and tomato masala, vegetable pilau, cheese and tomato naan, roti, plain paratha, stuffed paratha and sweet paratha! It was interesting, fun and I got to eat loads of delicious food. Very difficult to walk for the rest of the day.

Making vegetable pilau

The next day me and Rosie (a girl I met in the class) took a boat trip out to Jag Mandir Island on Lake Pichola and explored more of the city. It really is truly gorgeous there and would make a perfect honeymoon destination! In fact the whole of Rajasthan is lovely. I visited Jaisalmer, Jodhpur and Pushkar too and they were all incredibly beautiful. I spent a week in Pushkar, basically just relaxing and enjoying the surroundings. Plus I bought some stupid Indian style clothes that I'm going to regret buying, because they're just not going to work outside of India - too caught up in the moment! (I also visited Jaipur but I hated it because I was so harrassed and ripped off by the people there, but I'm not going into that!)

City Palace, Udaipur

On Jag Mandir Island in Lake Pichola, Udaipur

Pushkar

Pushkar - spot the temple on the top of the mountain

A lot of Rajasthan is made up of the Thar desert, so I took a three day camel safari from Jaisalmer into the desert. Riding a camel is actually really painful because it's so bumpy! My inner thighs were in so much pain for those three days, and bouncing boobs didn't feel great either, but I was definitely glad not to be a man.

Me and Mr Magoo

In the evening we settled down on the sand dunes, and sat around a camp fire. Sleeping under the stars was freezing, but incredible to look at the night sky. I was joined by the lovely Jeff and Lorilee and we shared the great experience of killing a goat and eating it for dinner (on the second night, because Jeff was craving meat). As we prepared the goat we sang all the songs from The Sound of Music - I was in good company.

I've left India now, after a wonderful five and half months. It has been the best experience of my life so far, and I will definitely go back to India, even though it can be frustrating, dirty, loud, corrupt, unfair - it is an incredible country. Indian people can be so kind and generous, and I've had so many great conversations with friendly people; I talked to a retired Physics teacher for hours while I was in Mumbai, I was taken out for lunch with some people I met at the zoo in Trivandrum and a girl gave me her handbag on a bus from Jodhpur to Pushkar, just to mention a few of the encounters I've had with Indian people. There are so many beautiful places to discover and India is absolutely huge, so there's a lot more to see and I can't wait to be there again! (Though I must say I'm relieved to be living like a Westerner again for the moment in more civilised Hong Kong.)

Chandro and Paru

Well the last month has been a blast! Let's go back to mid December...

Abi, Cosmo, Gitte and I left Munnar for Wayanad in a Super Deluxe Air Bus. It was so Super Deluxe that a bolt fell off the ceiling and hit me, it broke the screen of my phone it was so bumpy and broke down twice. We finally arrived in Wayanad, had a few hours a sleep, then got up to go on safari. During breakfast at our hotel, two drunken Germans walked in and were very pleased to see white people. They joined us for the safari but slept through most of it. In the morning we stopped at a wildlife park and had a little walk and a swim in the cool, freshwater river. As girls, we couldn't really take off our clothes for the swim and Abi managed to forget she was wearing her money belt, so she took her passport and cash for a swim too! Fortunately they dried out in the hot weather while we ate a delicious thali for lunch.

Well done Abi!

In the afternoon we went to the Wayanad National Park. Tourists are only allowed in for an hour and a half at a time, so we didn't have too long to spend in there. We saw buffaloes, deer, butterflies, a wild boar and we were really lucky to spot a wild elephant's bum through the trees! Unfortunately my photography skills were rubbish, as we were in a moving jeep, which is too challenging for me, so I don't have much to show for this.

In the evening we had a party to celebrate Gitte's birthday which was the next day. This meant that again we didn't get much sleep but we got up early again to go on another trip. This time we went to visit a cave with ancient carvings and then swam in a waterfall! The water was freezing and the waterfall was so powerful, but it was a great experience. It was lovely to share Gitte's birthday as it was a pretty special day.

Cold! (Cosmo's pic!)

Our next destination was to be Hampi. It's about 650km away from Wayanad and we looked into the public transport, but it looked like a nightmare, so I made the crazy suggestion that we hire a car all the way to Hampi. Incredibly, everyone managed to justify it to themselves (it's Gitte's birthday, you only live once etc...) and we roped in the drunken Germans, who were too drunk to understand that the price I told them was per person, not for everyone and off we went! We played the music loud and got very drunk. We checked the driver was OK. "I happy!" he exclaimed. Probably happy with the price we were paying him. Amazingly, we saw a large group of wild elephants on the side of the road an hour or two in. The driver turned round so we could see them again. There was a baby elephant so we had to be quiet to make sure we didn't make its mother mad. That's probably the only time I'll ever see wild elephants when drunk.

Gitte on our ride

Roadtrippin'

Hampi is probably one of the most incredible places I've ever visited. The landscape is just out of this world. It's covered in massive rocks, which must be something to do with volcanoes, I don't really know! And there are ruins of temples and buildings everywhere that date back to the 1st Century AD. Me and Cosmo got out scooters for the day which was a great way to see the ruins and enjoy the landscape. It was a bit scary (I still don't have a driving license), but Cosmo's a pro on all forms of transport so he made me feel safe! One of the temples we went to has it's own elephant called Lakshmi. We saw Lakshmi being washed in the river in the morning and then later in the day we went to the temple and were blessed by her. Hampi had a great backpacker vibe and I really enjoyed my time there.

Beautiful Hampi

Being blessed by Lakshmi (Cosmo's pic!)

Afer Hampi we moved on to Goa, where I pretty much didn't move for 3 weeks. We stayed on Palolem Beach in a beach hut, so there was no need for shoes at all! On our first night we had to say goodbye to Abi and Cosmo as they were heading back to Scotland. We had a delicious meal on the beach, then we headed to an outdoor silent disco at the end of the beach on a hill that looked out over the sea. Silent discos are popular in Palolem, I think because it means they don't break any laws about making too much noise. I don't know how many I went to while I was there! They varied in quality between awesome and terrible.

Silent disco

I spent most days lying on the beach and going for a nice swim once I got too hot. It's a beautiful beach so it's very easy to do very little. Gitte and I became regulars at a restaurant called Neptune Point and the waiters there named us Chandro and Paru, meaning Moon and Queen. Apparently it comes from a Hindi song about Chandro and Paru and how when they get together it's a big party! On one of our rare walks I had a run in with a palm tree. We heard a rustling above us.. I thought it was a coconut and Gitte thought it was a monkey but then an entire branch of the palm tree fell on top of me. They're actually really heavy and I'm still sore now, I can't fully move my thumb and my arm's feeling a bit dodgy. But it kept us amused for the rest of the day so I suppose it was worth it!

Paradise

Chandro and Paru and our favourite waiters

My painting of Chandro and Paru on our beach hut

Christmas in Goa was brilliant, but it felt weird that it was so hot! Because most people I met were from Continental Europe, I celebrated Christmas on Christmas Eve. I had dinner with Gitte and two Danish friends we made called Jannis and Nikolaj. We ate delicious seafood on the beach (I have finally come round to the pleasures of prawns!) and unwrapped our presents from under our fake Christmas tree. After dinner we danced round the Christmas tree (Danish tradition) singing songs and then we went to a club so I ended up ridiculously hungover on Christmas Day.

We decorated the beach hut!

Waiting for Christmas Dinner!

Christmas lobster

I was very happy to be joined by Andy, Fini and Gi Gi (fellow volunteers from Project Why) for New Year's Eve. About 20 of us got together for another tasty dinner on the beach. The amateur fireworks were insane, it was non stop banging, only a few metres from our seats! We lit lanterns and sent them into the sky with our wishes for 2013, they looked so beautiful as they floated upwards. At midnight, I was dancing on the beach to slightly dubious music (I remember Sandstorm being played) and enjoying the fireworks. The partying carried on all night, all over the beach and it was the best new year I've ever had! It was also a time when I really missed my friends and family from home and I can't wait to see them when I get back in May and share this year with them too.

Gi Gi, Fini, Andy, Gitte and me - dolled up for NYE

Lantern

Dancing on the beach

Happy New Year!

On my last day in Palolem I was at last a bit more adventurous and went on a boat trip. We spotted dolphins really close to our boat and then relaxed on quiet Butterfly Beach. I had an amazing 3 weeks on Palolem Beach and met so many great people there! I hope I get to meet them again and I know I'm definitely meeting my friend Alex in Bangkok next month, which is exciting. I'm really missing Gitte, but Chandro and Paru will be reunited and there will be a party! I left Goa on January 6th and headed for Mumbai on my own.... that's enough for now. I'll update you on the rest soon!

Bye bye Palolem!

A lot happens in a month in India...

I actually wrote this post two days ago, but internet failed to let me post it... references to "today" therefore mean on Monday...

So I’m not doing so well at keeping my blog up to date! In order to bring my blog back to the present day, I’m going to blitz through what I’ve done over the last month… here goes!

Shortly after my last post I visited Amritsar with Gigi, Andy and Fini – good friends I’ve made volunteering. We visited the Golden Temple, which is absolutely beautiful and just has a really peaceful atmosphere, even though it’s quite busy during the day. It’s in the nature of Sikhism to be really generous, so when we arrived there at 11.30 at night we were able to sit down to a free meal of dal and roti.

We stayed at the home of Gigi’s sister’s in-laws – it was so kind of them to open up their home to us and, man, did they feed us well! I ate some of the best food I’ve had in India and I definitely ended up carrying food twins. I really enjoyed eating a traditional Indian breakfast of parotthas (a flat bread stuffed with spices and vegetables)… delicious! We also visited the Pakistan border, where there’s a crazy celebration every night as they lower the flags and close the gates. Everyone was dancing and the border agency staff do this mad drill to much applause. It was weird to look over to the other side and see that women and men were segregated in Pakistan, it did make me feel very lucky to have the freedom I’ve been born into. Overall, it was a really wonderful weekend!

On November 13^th we celebrated Diwali in Delhi. Diwali is the Festival of Light so Hindus celebrate by lighting candles, putting up street lights, setting off fireworks and deafening fire crackers. It sounded like a war zone outside a flat (it’s really nothing on fireworks night in the UK!), but we got in the spirit. We volunteers lit up our whole flat with candles, and then we joined our neighbours on the roof of our flat and lit mini fireworks and watched everyone else doing the same on their roofs too. It was a spectacular day!

A couple of days later I finished my volunteering. It was really sad to say goodbye to the teachers and students who are a kind, generous and inspirational group of people! I still miss them now, and I’m looking forward to seeing them again in February before I leave India. We enjoyed some nail painting (with the girls), dancing and games on my last day, and you can see that some of the boys pulled off some impressive moves!

I left Delhi and went to Varanasi, which is considered to be India’s holiest city. The holy River Ganges runs through it and it’s where Hindus come to wash and bring their dead. The dead are openly cremated on the ghats, and then their remains are put in the river. It’s incredible to witness such personal and meaningful events and I actually found it quite overwhelming – it’s a lot to take in and certainly gave me a lot to think about.

The ghats in Varanasi

Next, I headed to India’s most Southern state, Kerala, which is where I am now. I absolutely love it here! It’s a lot more chilled out than the North, which is noisy, congested and can feel a little oppressive. I spent my first week in a beach town called Varkala, probably the most relaxing place I could go! I spent the day on the beach sunbathing and swimming, and my evenings eating good food and staying up all night drinking and chatting with other travellers. I was also introduced to the fruit lady on the beach who sings as she sells her fruit, “Beautiful madam! Pineapple! Yum yum yum yum!” I’m pretty sure all Varkala visitors miss here when they leave.

I met some really cool people in Varkala, who I’ve been travelling with since then. After one last crazy night, at the Rock n Roll café (home to Varkala’s biggest dancefloor, ooooh) and an hour or two of sleep, we got the train to Allepey. From there, we explored the Keralan backwaters. We spent a day kayaking, which is a great way to explore, because you can fit down really narrow canals, and just feel totally lost in there (we had a guide of course, so there was no actual getting lost). The next day we stayed on a houseboat for 24 hours – it was great to float along playing music, chatting, drinking from coconuts and enjoying the beautiful nature surrounding us.

After that we spent a few days in arty Fort Cochin. We discovered a café called Teapot that does a decent cup of English style tea! I do enjoy the Indian chai but do sometimes crave a brew from home (sadly they didn’t offer Earl Grey at Teapot, my personal favourite).

Now we’re in a hill station called Munnar. Yesterday we went trekking through tea plantations and spice gardens. It was so beautiful and we didn’t see any other tourists, so it felt really special. This morning we visited the tea museum (despite all the aches and pains from yesterday) and learned how tea is made. I think these couple of days have been very important to me as a massive tea addict, it’s good to know my roots!

Being "Flo Ma'am"

I’ve been teaching in the slum in Okhla, South Delhi, for 10 weeks now, where all the children call me "Ma'am" or "Flo Ma'am". I teach the same children everyday, so I’ve really had the chance to get to know them and they’re a brilliant group of kids: smart, funny, cheeky, loveable, loving, kind, naughty, chatty….

Seema and Sapna made me this very sweet card

I’ve been teaching mainly maths and English. As you probably know, I’m a bit of a maths geek, and so accordingly, I’m really enjoying teaching maths (it’s also what I will be doing when I return to the UK, so I’m glad I like it so far!). The biggest challenges I’ve faced with this have been that some students are really far behind on some basic methods that they should know. At their state school, the children are taught in classes of around 70, so they don’t get individual attention. Most of their parents are uneducated too, so they can’t get help at home. I think this means that if a student doesn’t get their head round something quickly enough, or if they miss a lesson, they just slip behind. One of the girls, called Pooja, is clearly bright, but she can’t do division, which makes it difficult to progress in other topics. I’m working hard to get everyone up to scratch on the basics, so they can do really well on the harder topics (like fractions and decimals). Pooja’s division is much better now, and she likes maths more and more!

I find English harder to teach, because I just take it for granted that I can speak the language! Breaking down the grammar is quite new to me, but important to the students. One thing that does come naturally to me is chatting! I’m one of the few fluent English speakers in these children’s lives, so I really encourage them to speak to me in English more; whether it’s about our lives in either India or England or a book we’re reading. At the state schools, English is taught how I imagine Latin is badly taught in England. The students learn long, difficult passages by rote, and regurgitate them in exams. I’ve looked through their exercise books and the level of writing in there, is way beyond their actual ability. It’s such a shame that at school the teachers aren’t focusing on what the children really need help with, but it’s so good that Project Why exists to give these children a chance at being good English speakers.

English lesson with some of the boys

Lately, I’ve been trying to encourage the students to be more creative. It’s actually a concept that’s really alien to them, and it came as a real shock to me. I think that in England a group of students would be very happy to get out of maths and English, in order to spend an hour drawing instead, but my students here have been so reluctant. They’re so concerned about having the “right answer” that drawing for fun is confusing for them. Now, some students still produce hardly anything when I get them drawing or will only draw what they’re familiar with (flowers), but some are opening up more and I’ve seen some really imaginative creations. Our latest efforts have been to design book covers and my favourite was the “The Dancing Elephant”. A boy called Viney drew an amazing picture of an elephant pulling some moves, complete with a man on a DJ deck in the background and I didn’t have to help him at all. I’m not totally naïve, I don’t think the children I teach are in a position to grow up to be designers and artists (although their prospects are still much, much better than the previous generation) but I still think it’s important they get a chance to be creative. For a start, I think it can really help with English, because art and design can always spark discussion. You can also link it to something relevant, as we did with the book covers. The special thing about Project Why is that it’s one of the few places where the children can go and spend time being children. Their homes are so small, that they don’t “hang out” there and they have a lot of responsibilities. Their only other place is the street. So it’s important that their time at Project Why is special and fun too, which is why we don’t just cover the topics they learn at school, and I think it’s a great opportunity to have fun doing an activity they’ll never do anywhere else. I’ve only got two more weeks, so I think I might do some messy painting with them, which is certainly in the spirit of upcoming Diwali!

Mehtab reveals his creative side...

I’ve learnt a hell of a lot from teaching here, and I really hope the students have too! I won’t forget them and I expect there might be some tears in two weeks time…