Blogs from Kangra Valley, Himachal Pradesh, India, Asia - page 2

Weekend on my own On the weekend between the old group leaving and the new volunteers’ arrival nobody was up to much really but I couldn’t bear the thought of staying in the house. I decided to take a bus and see where I ended up with a vague aim of heading towards a ruined temple which according to Lonely Planet resembles Angor Wat. The first bus took me to Dharamsala bus station where I then headed out to a tiny place called Gaggal where there was a wedding going on. Here the final bus didn’t seem to be making any move towards leaving, and I got slightly concerned about getting the bus back with enough time to make all the connections back to Palampur. Instead, I took the bus back towards Palampur but got off ... read more

A consistent theme of India seems to be contradictions and the idea that a different perception can entirely change the way something is viewed. Visiting the Jalianwala Bagh and then watching ‘Rang de Basanti’, a film which showed how media presentation can entirely alter perspectives and the struggle against government corruption, placing the concept in a modern perspective... The question - acts of terrorism or liberation? - is really brought to the forefront. I’d been listening to the song angles by Dans le Sac vs Scroobius Pip, a song exploring a similar idea about different perceptions, and there always being another side to things. There’s the obvious juxtaposition of modern ideas and age-old traditions that the Indian culture is built around. Ancient religion that’s still very much alive and also Western aspirations, modern technology and emmerging ... read more

I'm in Yol! o: o: o: Jo, Daisy, Tenzin and I just had a picnic on some rocks next to a river. Thought you all should know. Teaching so far has consisted of a test to determine classes, and nothing else. We start properly tomorrow. 7:30-8:30 for first lot 1-2 second 2-3 senior nuns 3:30-4:30 last lot 6:30-7:30ish Tibetan grammar teacher, if he ever shows up. The computer I'm at is under the table. I'm confused too. Temperature gets warmer (yay!) There's a woman in a green salwar kameez with a bundle of grassy stuff on her head keeps walking through the nunnery, followed by a black lamb with a patch of white on its head.... read more

to make sure that Ali is well and truly woken up in a spectacularly loud and rude fashion at 7.45 am. EVERY SINGLE MORNING THIS WEEK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Has no one told Indian guys that the Vengaboys are and always will be crap? And so 1990's teenybopper material??!!!!!! At least this morning they had a change of tunes... Backstreet Boys were a slight improvement but still made for a very grumpy Ali this morning!! Our weekend turned out to be very different than we had initialy planned. Although this time it was completely under our control for once. We had organised a taxi to take us to Rewalshar Lake closeby. Meant to be very beautiful and descirbed as a "slice of tibet". But when we found out that the taxi ride there was gonna cost us like 700 ... read more

So we had a great weekend last weekend... we decided to go to McLeod Ganj (again!!) rather than stay in Palampur. We left Saturday after lunch, after waiting for the new volunteers to arrive (they all seem nice and waaaay more mellow than the group I came with which is brill!) and had another interesting bus journey there. For most of the way I was sat on one side, beside old lady who chitter chattered Hindi in my ear for most of the way. She couldn't speak a word of English and she spoke so fast that my pitiful Hindi knowledge wasn't suffice for decent communication, though with the odd word we managed to have a "conversation". If you can call it that. On the other side was a young schoolboy who was very polite. He ... read more