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In the last episode, Wendy was departing Thailand for India. Now Thailand seems like a distant memory....
I arrived in Dehli, India late in the evening and at the hotel early in the morning on Saturday (7/30). The next morning I met Paula at breakfast, she is an architect from London. After our tour she will be living in Bali, Indonesia, for a year to study music. Ali, Marie & Owen soon joined us. Ali, from York, England, has been traveling around the world for the past 14 months. After India she'll travel to Nepal and then return to England. Marie and Owend are both teachers in Oxford, England. Marie teaches students in "year four" and Owen teaches history, religion and philosophy at the secondary level. We had a lively discussion about schools and school systems.
Next Penny arrived, and I soon learned she would be my roommate for the next leg of my journey. She is from the city I adore--New York. She works at both the UN (organizing volunteers who teach English) (Brenda, I asked her if she had seen the Peacemaker, but alas she had not.) and the Whitney. In my mind her job situation sounds
utopic. (Val, I shared with her my grandiose idea to name children (THE) Walker and (THE) Whitney and she laughed.) After some additional discussion we parted only to meet again shortly.
Our next encounter involved making the acquaintance of our trip leader, Vipull, who is Indian, and the other seventeen members of our group. Vipull gave us a comprehensive overview of what we will experience and what we might expect. While I do not yet know everyone's names I do know that 3 people are from Australia (Darran, Jo and David), 11 are from England, and three of us are from the U.S.
Later I learn, ironically, that Neil, the other American is from Milwaukee (Shorewood area, a graduate of Nicollette H.S.) and now he lives in Chicago (he just graduated from U of C and took the bar prior to embarking on his journey). Small world indeed. Yesterday morning he appeared wearing a Wisconsin t-shirt as he is an alum of Madison--it made me think of one of my many homes.
On Sunday, after everyone became oriented Penny and I decided to explore Dehli. Penny said to me, "I feel honored to be traveling with a
Wendy. Your parents must have been dreamers, what with your name originating from Peter Pan." Funny.
Our first stop was Humayun's Tomb, believed to be the predecessor to the Taj Mahal. While wandering about we encountered Ali, Owen and Marie, and Paula. At that point we decided to travel together in our explorations of Dehli. Our next stop was Jama Masjid, the largest Islamic mosque in India. Ali and I both thought the area around the mosque reminded us of St. Mark's Basilica in Venice, Italy. After the mosque we hired cyclos to take us through Old Dehli. Quite the experience! Past massive crowds, enduring the stares, through very narrow streets we saw it all. Swirls of color and frenzied activity.
After our cyclo tour we ventured around Connaught Place and then back to the hotel to explore the local market and eat dinner. A VERY full day!
Yesterday we traveled via train to Pushkar, the dust covering the train window only reinforced the fact that I am an outsider and what I see is only a glimpse of what life in India is like. Women in colorful saris dot the landscape. The countryside is quite the
contrast to the crowded and chaotic city of Dehli.
Pushkar has been quite the experience! Pushkar is a holy pilgramage site for Hindus. Yesterday afternoon almost all us participated in a ceremony to eliminate our sins. So you would think that good karma would now be in abundant supply, but apparently there was something else toxic within my body that needed to be purged.
This morning I awoke with a horrendous stomach ache (Despite my efforts to heed my doctor's (who is Indian) advice, "Don't drink the water! If you are in the shower don't breathe in the water. If it rains, don't open your mouth." I hope I have not offended her by not borrowing the shirts she wanted to lend me for my travels). I was unable to participate in the morning walk to a site high up on the hillside. The majority of my time was spent sleeping and visiting the porcelin god. Once I finally felt rested I ventured up one flight of stairs for some 7Up. The venture exhausted me so I returned back to my bed for yet another hour of rest. After my fifth sleeping experience of the day I decide
to travel into the city and meet up with some of the others. At a restaurant I ordered some fruit with what I believed would be a small amount of yogurt. Unfortunately that did not sit well...and out erupted what little I had ingested. Despite my extreme embarassment I felt remarkably better. Words cannot express my embarassment (sorry Sarah). Everyone has been quite empathetic...constantly checking to see how I feel.
I was well enough to get some henna applied this evening...I only hope the design will last until I return home. Until the next installment.... (and hopefully next time I will have an opportunity to respond to my delinquent emails--sorry!)
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Maureen
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Poor Wendy! I hope that you're feeling better. My Mom also got sick when she was visiting India in February. She sends her sympathies.