Advertisement
Published: August 26th 2010
Good afternoon people, time for another update!! I have actually come across a couple of minor problems since the last entry I submitted, so this update won't be anywhere near as busy as the last one, hence less reading for you which you are no doubt ecstatic about! This episode begins in a little town called Pushkar. Now I ended up here because, after complaining that I was moving along too slowly and taking action to tackle this problem, seemed to get carried away and sped along far too quickly during the last leg of the trip (really can't quite seem to get the balance right!), so came to this quiet little town in order to get some chill out time! And that's exactly what I did, as there really isn't an awful lot to do in Pushkar. It is a small town of significant religious importance and at it's centre contains a holy lake which is surrounded by temples. I managed to walk from one end of the town to the other in around 20 minutes which is a refreshing change in comparison to some of the other places I've been to, checked out a few of the temples and walked round the lake and that was pretty much everything covered, a more than refreshing change from the hectic cities I had been inhabiting up until this stage. Part of one of my days was spent in a tiny village just outside Pushkar that I stumbled upon, which basically consisted of fifteen or so tents with families living in them. Here I was accommodated well, given complimentary chai (tea) and played traditional Indian music, which was quite an experience, and then it was time to head off.
Once I had rejuvenated myself in Pushkar I headed towards Jaipur with an Irish couple I met called Michael and Tracey. This however was a bit of a 'dead leg' of my trip as I fell ill on the day we spent out in a rickshaw doing a whistle-stop tour of the sights in Jaipur, and had to head home after about an hour and a half and leave those two to get on with it as I was slowing them down, and felt I was in danger of throwing up all over one of India's integral tourist sites! After spending a day sleeping it off though I was O.K and it was time for the tree of us to move on to Agra, in order to get a close up viewing of one of the world's most beautiful buildings, the Taj Mahal.
We arrived in Agra late at night and hit the sack straight away in order to get what little shut-eye we could, as the theory is that by far the best time to see the Taj Mahal is sunrise. So in bed at 00:30, up at 05:15 to shower and the three of us headed down towards the Taj, undeniably bleary-eyed to a man, for sunrise at around 06:00. One undoubted bonus is that we managed to get into a hotel which was literally up the street from the Taj, so we didn't have far to travel to get there! Once arriving it was clear straight away just how amazing the Taj Mahal was but it was a slight anti-climax due to the fact that the sky was overcast for most of the morning, but the building still looked amazing, and no doubt would be absolutely astonishing in nicer weather where the sunlight would reflect of the pure white marble. We spent around 5 hours wondering around the grounds, went to the Taj museum which we all agreed was laughably woeful, the entry fee was 5 rupees (around 8p) and we still felt ripped off. You would think that such an incredible monument as the Taj Mahal deserves an awesome museum to accompany it, but someone somewhere obviously disagrees! After seeing that, the day later we checked out Agra fort, which was very attractive but nothing was really going to compare to what we had seen a day previously, even if it was with an overcast sky!
After that, my final destination on this trip was further north in Amritsar. I separated off from Michael and Tracey who headed towards Khajuraho, and was back on my lonesome on an overnight sleeper train.
The reason I headed up here was to see the Golden Temple, which is the holiest shrine in the Sikh religion, and this was an awesome experience. Part of what Sikhs believe in is that wealth, food etc. should be shared, and that they should generally help others. The Golden Temple sets the standard somewhat here and everyone who makes a pilgrimage to the temple can get free accommodation, free food (in a food hall that apparently serves up over 60,000 meals a day), and free water. I got the benefit of all three of these as I stayed there for one night and also benefited from a serving or two in the food hall! In addition to this all the Sikhs that I met and spoke to there were incredibly friendly, and the day that I spent there was thoroughly enjoyable. I went into the temple both in the day time and at night (again no entry fee, and its open 24 hours), and it was much more attractive when lit up at night, as the photographs will prove. In addition to this I also spent the late afternoon watching the India-Pakistan border closing ceremony at Wagah, which was absolutely mental. Some of the most outrageous, boisterous marching you are ever likely to see, along with an MC on the Indian side who was whipping the crown into a frenzy, they banged some Indian pop music on as well before the ceremony starts and all the youngsters were up dancing their arses off, it was insanity. The crowd goes for it like you see at a seriously heated football match, and we actually came at the worst time of year as the Pakistan stand was practically empty due to it being Ramadan. I would genuinely love to see what it is like when both stands are packed out!! Before we set off from Amritsar we also got a cheeky reminder of the somewhat harsher side of British colonialism, when we visited a memorial around the corner from the Golden Temple known as Jallianwala Bagh that is there to commemorate an occasion in 1919 where British forces killed more than 370 defenseless Indians, including women and children. It was a bit weird wandering around the memorial, being British I felt as though I was strangely responsible, despite the fact that I obviously had no hand whatsoever in the aforementioned massacre!
Well, that is the end of this little feedback session, I am now heading further north for the Himalayan foothills, and what will be some much needed, much appreciated cooler weather! I am having some problems getting any photographs on at the moment but will remedy that as soon as I possibly can! Hope you are all having a ball back in the U.K, I shall speak to you again soon!!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.111s; Tpl: 0.01s; cc: 7; qc: 44; dbt: 0.0583s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Katie Shirt
non-member comment
I am mega jealous Ryan, glad your having such a good time! I hope your putting lots of sun cream on xx