Geo: 25.27, 55.33Since the apartment was only available for one night due to another booking I had to check out this morning. Luckily my friend Eddie has a friend in Dubai who I contacted and Tewfic was so kind to offer me to stay with his family while I am in Dubai. So I grabbed my stuff took the Metro to his office where I dropped it off because there wasn't enough time to take it to his home. Then I raced back to the Metro and just made it in time for my reservation to go up the tallest building in the world, the 828m (2732ft) Burj Khalifa. Truly a magnificent building and engineering marvel! And the main reason i came here. In 2011 it was the movie location for "Mission Impossible - Ghost Protocol". ... read more

Geo: 28.6137, 77.1834On my last day in Delhi I went to the National Museum of India. Although some of the exhibitions are quite interesting it is shocking how little remains of this 5000 year old civilization. Frankly there is more to see at the Museum of Natural History in my hometown Leipzig... But then again as I was told during my stay here Indians just steal and/or sell anything they can get a buck for. And this is made even worse by widespread corruption, including museum staff. So there are probably more Indian artifacts in private collections in Europe and America then left in India.An meinem letzten Tag in Delhi ging ich ins Nationalmuseum von Indien. Obwohl einige Ausstellungen ganz interessant sind ist es schockierend wie wenig von 5000 Jahren Zivilisation uebrig geblieben ist. Ehrlich gesagt ... read more

Geo: 26.2816, 73.0232Last day in Jodhpur. We went to a tea tasting and although I am not a big tea lover there were some delicious ones among them. Ended up buying some, space in my backpack permitting ;) Then our time exploring Jodhpur together was over and we said goodbye, with Rika taking a train down south and me taking another one up north to Delhi. On the overnight train, while trying to sleep in the noisy overcrowded berth I watched several mice in vain checking out our bags for edible stuff :)Letzter Tag in Jodhpur. Wir gingen zu einer Teeverkostung. Und obwohl ich nicht gerade ein Teeliebhaber bin, waren dort eine Menge koestlicher Teesorten. Natuerlich kaufte ich ein paar Packungen am Ende, zumindest soviel wie ich in meinen Rucksack hineinzwaengen konnte ;) Dann war unsere ... read more

Geo: 26.2816, 73.0232Despite the fact that the hotel is advertising WiFi service of course they do not actually have it. After all we're still in India. But I found a nice little cafe around the corner with complimentary WiFi. After breakfast we walked through the narrow roads of old town up to the mighty citadel. The views from up there are quite spectacular. And unlike the castles of Jaipur Mehrangarh houses at least some ancient artworks and furniture as well as old weaponry and wall paintings. So it was actually quite interesting. At the end of the tour we stumbled upon local palm reader legend Mr. S.L. Sharma and I got my past and future told, for a donation to the Mehrangarh preservation fund. My initial scepticism turned into total astonishment when he was unbelievably accurate ... read more

Geo: 26.8616, 75.6958It happened again! This is the 3rd time on this trip that I have to rewrite an entire blog post because that damn TravelPod site keeps losing my draft information. This is also the reason why this will be my first and last travel blog. Next time I'm going back to writing a journal. This is way too annoying. I don't have time for that kind of bullshit! Especially when you have to do it in two languages.Today I first visited Jaipur's City Palace which is actually pretty nice. At least from the outside. Inside isn't too much to see. From there I walked to the famous Jantar Mantar Observatory. Then we drove to the massive Amber Fort at the outskirts of the city. As everywhere those buildings impress rather through their size than ... read more