mussoorie with the aussies

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I'm in Mussorie, it's the most beautiful place. It's right in the foothills of the hymalayas. My Australian friend Hugh Evans went on an exchange here in 99 and wanted to come back.

It took us forever to get here yesterday, that's actually kind of a funny story. We had train tickets that left Delhi at 7am. However two trains left from the same platform and we got on the wrong one. The aussies realized it before the train took off, i guess someone had the same seats assigned. I bought my ticket separetly so was sitting in a different car. Angela burst into my car yelling Andie! Andie! get off the train, of course this caused a huge specticle because we were the only white people in the car. We were then going to take a taxi, however that fell through, another funny story but I won't get into it right now. Ultimately however we ended up taking a five hour bus ride, which of course turned out to be 8, to dehra dun and then another hour by cab up the hill to mussorie. We were travelling, including missing our train and negotiating with everyone for over 16 hours, and went a whole 300kms, actually a little less. Tom had a fairly good expression for what india did to us yesterday, but i won't repeat it.

Hugh, one of the boys that I'm travelling with is an absolutely amazing guy, he's the austrailian youth of the year and the international youth of the year. I guess 3 years ago he started an organization called oaktree, it's a youth run charity that works with ngo's in developing countries helping with fundraising awareness and all that. the website is theoaktree.org if that doesn't work it might just be oaktree.org or with a www. He also wrote a book that aparently has taken off in australia called something like the stone of a mountain. Him Tom and Antoine are here looking for ngo's in india to partner with and then going to the millenium development goals conference in Agra in 2 days. Angela is a friend of Antoines from uni and is tagging along and then going to nepal with Antione.

I will be sad to leave mussorie, compared to Dehli it's calm and safe and of course located in a cut out of the himalayas. It's faily cold here, that jacket was a god send. I've got to say it's wierd travelling with 3 christains and a devout catholic, religion is brought up a lot, and I don't have much to contribute. It's not that i have anything against it, i just can't relate. Hugh was telling me that if it wasn't for religion he wouldn't have been able to deal with a lot of the troubles of his life. That "god" helped him through it all. It's not that i disbelieve him at all, it's more that i just don't see it the same way. Actually i can't tell if Antoine is religious, he's the type of person who will argue the side that no one's mentioning just to get it on the table. He told me that he hardly believes half the stuff he argues he just feels that it should be mentioned.

I've taken loads of pictures and will send them as soon as possible. Angela said that she's been having hers burnt to cd's and sending them home. That way not only can her family look at them but she's got a copy safe at home if her stuff gets stolen. I think that i might do that as well, it may be easier to email them, i'll have to look into it when i'm in a bigger city.

Tonight we're having dinner with the town tailor and his family, Hugh knows him from when he was here so we went to visit his shop today. He's a really interesting guy, been a tailor his whole life and his daughter is a lawyer and son is in his first year of engineering in one of the bigger cities. He's so incredibly proud of them, he just beams when he talks about them. Tomorrow we're having lunch with the math teacher from the school, he's an american fellow who was raised by missionaries and has lived in india for 26 years. His wife's parents were also missionaries and she was born in india. The school is absolutely gorgeous, it's all alone on a hilltop, it's white with a red clay tile roof. I guess it's a boarding school for foreigners and rich indians. It's called woodstock.

Well I should be off, i've got to draw up a skirt that i want the tailor to make for me. I should be leaving tomorrow afternoon, i think that we're taking the 5 pm train back to delhi. I may be joining the Aussies to Agra, but i'm not sure yet.

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Comments

[Sid]

Yoga teacher
Hi andy, I'm from Calgary and an engineer and wanted something more fulfilling as well. i just happened to land upon your blog by accident. I'm going to India as well although not for yoga training but for volunteering purposes. I'll be near Bangalore. As for this yoga thing, you also might want to check out Rishikesh and specifically the Himalayan Institute (Swami Rama Sadhaka Gram). i'm going to see my guru there and it's a great place. I've been associated with them for quite some timen now. You probably have everything planned out in Mysore but see if you can check this out. Cheers!