If there is one thing I have learned from being in India for a month, that is to never underestimate the diversity of its cultures and people. I went from living in a town where we got daily power outages to Banglore, the IT capital of India. This city is like no other I have seen in Asia, let alone India. The IT parks are designed in the American fashion giving you an outer body feel while you drive through the Microsoft and Yahoo buildings. The streets are filled with boutiques, coffee bars, cafes and trendy restaurants. I want to stop [View Full Entry]

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Mumbai is the new face of India. It's a cosmopolitian city in which 55% of the population live in slums. Contrast survives side by side with the most expensive properties in the world next door to aluminum boarded shacks. It's crowded, multi-ethnic, humid and crazy! I stayed with a friend here who has been living here for a few years, in a suburb of Mumbai. As with all big cities Mumbai is also made up of several areas which make up the city, but the real Mumbai is really only the Colaba area which is the southern tip of the peninsula. [View Full Entry]

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I took a train in sleeper class from Virdhunagar to Mumbai. The journey took 36 hours and is the quintessential Indian experience! At first 36 hours seems like a lot of time... a day and a half, but it didn't not feel that long at all. I had a seat right by the window which was very lucky. Because I booked the ticket only a few days before I had been on the waiting list until the day before I was due to leave. The train ticketing system in India is something I will never understand! You can get everything you [View Full Entry]

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I've spent 10 days in Virdhunagar and have mixed feelings about the whole ordeal. The teachers I've met at the school are very sweet and kind. They have really left an impact on me. But being a foreigner sometimes just means money and I've been put in some awkward situations regarding the subject that has added a sour note. Being immersed in a real town atmosphere made me feel more strange at times than comfortable due to the stares and simple minded thinking of the people here. Then again, this was a real learning experience into the livelihoods of everyday Tamilians [View Full Entry]

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Kanyakumari is the southern tip of Tamil Nadu, very close to the Kerala border. It's most known as the spot where three seas meet: Arabic, Bengal and Indian. It's best to see it during sunset or sunrise. Unfortunately I missed both! I did a day trip to Kanyakumari taking the train early in the morning at 3am with a local girl I met while in Virdhunagar. We could only get unreserved tickets since we were purchasing the day of travel, which meant I was riding with the locals in overcrowded compartments hoping for a seat.... on the ground! It was actually [View Full Entry]

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My adventures with David in India have come to an end as David returned to Germany a few days ago, and I have moved on to Virdhunagar, a town about 40 minutes south of Madurai. I am volunteer teaching at a local private school for the next 2 weeks. Although the school is private it caters to the underprivileged offering free education to those that can't afford and also charges very low class fees. After coming here I have learned a lot about the Indian education system. I'm teaching spoken English to children from the age of 4 - 9 years [View Full Entry]

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Rameshwaram is the eastern most tip of India, the closest to Sri Lanka I can ever get. A lot of Tamil refugees come to Rameshwaram on small boats sailing through the gulf of Mannar. It is actually an island which is now connected to the mainland by a bridge that was completed only 20 years ago. The people who live here are mainly fisherman who reside in straw houses in sandy little villages. We were lucky enough to take a day trip there from Madurai because of our driver. It took 3.5 hours each way and highways are non-existent in this [View Full Entry]

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We couch surfed in Madurai for 2 days with a guy who let us stay at his guesthouse even though he wasn't there to meet us. I've come across surfers like this before in my travels but this was a little bit different because not only did we have a place to stay without the host, we also got full use of his personal driver! It was the real royal Indian experience. At first David and I felt quite uncomfortable with people addressing us as sirs and madams but sightseeing Madurai in an A/C car was definitely something we got used [View Full Entry]

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Spending a night on a houseboat is one the list of 10 things to do before you die. Of course it all seems a little over rated, right? WRONG!! For 4500 rupees David and I got a one bedroom houseboat equipped with 3 men for 24 hours. These men drove the boat, cooked us food (lunch, tea, dinner and breakfast) and took care of us as if we were royalty. They also took us to the toddy shop on the banks of the waterways to pick up some local liquor made from coconuts (I'm still not too clear on how exactly [View Full Entry]

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The state of Kerela is known as God's own country due to its lush greenery and beautiful backwaters. The first change I noticed was the language; I was lost yet again amidst the signs in Malaylam which are just as curvy as Tamil yet so different. The plan was to only spend a night in Cochin but somehow it turned into two, mainly due to laziness and the fact that we somehow managed to gain an extra day on our itinerary. David and I stayed at a homestay which felt more like an overpriced motel room. There was nothing homely about [View Full Entry]

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