my blog is now over a month behind, i've actually left india, arrived in nepal, and have gone on to thailand now. but the internet connections here aren't painfully slow, so I hope to get a chance to catch up. sorry. The last part of my India trip was to check out the "golden triangle," which is a series of three tourist attractions in Delhi, Agra, and Jaipur. I actually cheated a little bit and did Delhi separately, but when I returned from southern India, I met up with two other RUCHI volunteers, Gail and Richard. Gail and Richard are a [View Full Entry]

---

---

Hello everyone, Sorry, it looks like I'm getting a little behind with this blog. And on a completely unrelated topic, hooray for the election results in the US! Maybe I will come back after all. Depends on if the democrats take the senate too. Back to India. After finishing up with my volunteer program at RUCHI, I took a trip to the state of Kerala in southern India, where I could finally see the ocean, and where the pace is slightly less chaotic and the men are slightly less leering. I first visited a friend for a few days in a [View Full Entry]

---

---

Hi everyone, I've finally had a chance to upload all my pictures, so look for several new entries soonish. India is a huge and really diverse country with about 10 million different languages and cultures. I did have a chance to visit a small part of both northern and southern india, but there is a lot more of India that i did not see, so I can't speak for the entire country. At any rate, here are some of the more entertaining cultural differences I have noticed: Hair washing. For religious reasons, women do not wash their hair on Tuesday, Thursday, [View Full Entry]

---

---

If you're curious about RUCHI or what I have actually been doing over the past few weeks, here's what I have been up to! RUCHI is an NGO (non-governmental organization) in the northern state of Himachal Pradesh, India. It was started by Dharamvir Singh in 1980. The name stands for Rural Center for Human Interests. RUCHI works to improve the lives of Indians living in rural villages in Himachal Pradesh with projects in environmental, social, and health work. RUCHI is partnered with organizations such as the Rotary Club and has recently established a collaboration with Oxfam. Because [View Full Entry]

---

---

The last stop on our trip was Chandigarh, said to be _the_ cool city in northern India. Also said to be the cleanest and greenest. The city was planned out by some French architect. Normally, the thought of planned cities sends shivers down my spine and brings to mind memories of Irvine, California, where I just could not stand to live despite their excellent graduate school program. However, it might be that India could use a little bit of planning. For example, I was not quite as afraid for my life in the car because there are a whole bunch regularly [View Full Entry]

---

---

After visting Dharamsala, the next day we drove to Kangra Valley so that Neelam could visit her family. While she was visiting, Dharamvir and I visited this really cool fort. It was fairly well preserved, but for some reason it hasn't been made into a prime tourist destination. Which was great for me, because we could wander around and take pictures without being annoyed by pesky foreigners. Inside the fort was a Hindu temple that has some famous, "original" statue of one of the Gods. I didn't quite understand the story, but it's supposed to have some great spiritual significance. I [View Full Entry]

---

---

Over the weekend, Dharamvir (the head of RUCHI), Neelam (another RUCHI employee) and I went on a trip. The first place we visited was Dharamsala. Just north of Dharamsala is Mcleod Ganj, which is where the Dalai Lama resides in exile as well as where the former Tibetan government in housed. There are tons of Tibetan refugees here. We went to a museum about the atrocities that have been committed there. If you're not quite sure about the history, basically what happened is that China decided that Tibet needed to be "liberated" which meant that they were going to annex Tibet. [View Full Entry]

---

---

Hi everyone, I have returned from the mountains and the land of dial up internet connections, so some of these entries may be a little out of order because I have to do them all at once. As RUCHI is an NGO, they kind of have to schmooze around to get funding for their projects. One of their biggest partners is the Rotary Club. They have a lot of connections with the rotary club in New Zealand, and then connections with several India clubs in the surrounding area in Himachal Pradesh. So we took a trip to Kasauli, a town about [View Full Entry]

---

---

Hey everyone, Got a chance to get on the internet. We have arrived at the RUCHI complex in Bandh, India. Bandh is a very small village in an amazingly beautiful (and remote) part of Northern India in the foothills of the himalayas. RUCHI is the ngo that I am volunteerinmg with, and they do work in several sectors in things like providing clean water supply, supporting womens groups, education on health issues, etc. They are a really great organization with a great philosophy. They have some troubles with funding because they don't want to get too mixed up with politicians because [View Full Entry]

---

---

A NOTE: if you want to receive automatic notifications everytime I update this blog, either send me your email address (either by directly emailing me or by sending me a message on this blog) or you can do it yourself by clicking the subscribe button when you enter the blogs main page. Kyoto is the city described in the Lonely Planet guidebook, and by everyone else I've met, as the ONE place you HAVE to go when you visit Japan. Therefore I really didn't want to go. However, after talking to several people, (Rich, Micah, random woman at Fireside lodge coffe [View Full Entry]

---

---