So far, so Totally Awesome

Okay, so my skin is still dyed pink, even after vigorous rubbing with soap and warm water....ah well, such is life.

We celebrated Holi today fairly low-key, with our driver and some other tour guides dousing each other with pink and green dyed water. Al and I each started the day wearing all white and ended as bright pink as you could be....very fun.

The saying today has been "Happy Holi." Which sounds to my ears like; "Happy, Holy" which just strikes me as a beautiful thing to say to somebody, especially as you smile and rub bright colored dye on them and then give them a hug...what a fantastic day!

After being dyed, our driver said we would stop by the market to pick up a chicken, then go to his friends restaurant, who would cook it for us. It was slightly surprising when the market turned out to be the house of some family on the backstreets of a nearby village and the chicken had been beheaded and drained of its blood within a few minutes of our arrival. We had never watched a chicken be skinned, plucked, gutted, ripped, cut, and generally prepared to be eaten before, but it turned out to be a very happy and somewhat solemn occasion for me as I tried to respect the life of the animal that I was about to eat. the next thing I knew I had a blue plastic bag with the remnants of a chicken it in and i carried it to the restaurant where it was turned into the best chicken curry I've had so far in India....such is life. Then we got painted some more, then drove to the White city, Udaipur.

Oh, yesterday we saw the Blue City's Fort, which was magnificent, and then went to the Jain Temple in Ranakpur, with it's 1444 pillars of white marble, all carved in fine detail with none of them identical; like something out of Lord of the Rings....except for the go#^&mned Tour bus full of French people that arrived...
Have I yet mentioned my distaste for Tour Groups and the way they manage to completely destroy any atmosphere you may have been fortunate enough to have stumbled across at any given location? No? ....probably for the best....

Udaipur was used in a scene in the Bond flick, 'Octopussy', or so I'm told a lot, but I don't remember the flick very well....if you happen to get a chance to see it, keep an eye out for a marvelous White Palace taking up an entire Island in the middle of a Lake in the middle of a glistening white city in the middle of the desert and....that's where we are....

Also...

I'd like to apologize to:
Australia, China, Cambodia, Thailand, and Malaysia....but India has dun' kicked all y'all's asses with it's super-duper-wicked-good-coolness....

Word.

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