Sunning in Puri

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Hello All,

This is my first entry in awhile, so there is a lot to tell. We have spent time in Kolkata, Bihar and are now relaxing in Puri.

Kolkata...
It is such a rich city with tons to see and experience. We are lucky because we have family there that we can spend time with and eat with. I have decided that a large part of this trip is going to be about the food. I love to shop, but I don't have unlimited amounts of space to lug stuff back. Don't get me wrong, there has been some shopping, but not nearly as much as I would like. We did some of the touristy things here like the Victoria Memorial, the Ghats, New Market, Chowringhee- but the real pleasure has been from the food - for those of you who know Indians, we are all about the food! We found KC Das, an institute of sweets and went in ate the most delicious "rosogolas' ever. "Roshogolas" are curd balls boiled and immersed in a sweet syrup. I know it does not sound great, but these were light and fluffy and just the right amount of sweetness. I don't even really have a sweet tooth! We also indulged ourselves in some street food, these rolls - they are so good, yet so bad all at the same time. Yummy, but the paper they are wrapped in turns see through in about 0.5 seconds.

Bihar - Sundernagar
This where my aunt and uncle live. This was the first time I had been there since the passing of both my grandparents. There was definitely an emptiness there. My aunt and uncle are hacing a tough go of things. It is out in the county and at night the sky is so clear and dark that you feel like you are looking at the stars through a telescope. It was pretty amazing. We spent a week there and really just hung out. Daily chores take up a lot of the day as there is no running water and the elecricity goes out quite often due to load shedding. It is such a pirture of old and new. The house itself is pretty rudimentary, but there is a TV with a satelite dish and a phone with caller id. So bizarre! Some house even have air conditionning! The house up the street has installed motorised tube wells so that they may have sinks and running water. Some of the houses have refrigerators even! I benefitted from my time there by meditating and learning how to crochet - still need some practice! I thinkk our aunt really enjoyed having us there, it gave her something to do and people to talk to.

Puri
We then made our way to Puri. There is a beautiful beach here that goes for miles and miles. We have seen many temples, sat on the beach, eaten fresh seafood and just have had a good time. We had an unpleasant experience at the Jagganath Temple a couple of days ago. It is supposed to be a Mecca of Hindu worship, since we are Hindu we felt like we should go check it out. We walked about 30 minutes from out hotel to the Temple, checked our shoes at the stand - a bit out of comfort box as this entailed walking barefoot in the street for some time- and went to the front door. The security guy checked my bag and was granting me permission to enter when I see Parag being escorted to the information booth. So naturally, I follow, the security guard that dealt with Parag was questionning his faith. He asked all kinds of questions that Parag answered, but he still was not satisfied that we were Hinud. I was really angry at this point and so was Parag - they were not understanding us even though we were speaking in Bengalie. In reality, they were playing dumb because they wanted to cause trouble for some reason. There was a priest there, a panda, as they are known here, and he verified our Hinduism and then they finally consented to let us in. Parag was so angry by this point that he did not want to go in. We decided to walk away and lodge an official complaint with the Temple head office. That proved to be useless as well. They did not understand why we were complaining. We were complaining because of being discriminated against and not because we were not being allowed in.
Anyways... the story ends by us going in with a man who took us through the temple and then we went and ate a delicious meal of fresh fish and prawns,

There will be a section from now on dedicated only to food, so stay tuned for the next gastronomical update.
I have not had a bad meal yet!

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