New Year, New Beginning

The rest of our time in Goa was spent with our happy crew, swimming and lazing on the beach and sharing meals that stretched out for many hours. What a joy it was to laugh heartily with six, seven, eight people! Although it was sad to go our separate ways, it's nice to know we have friends in far away places, making the world a little smaller. We left for Mumbai in high spirits, filled with new year's rwsolutions, recharged and ready to begin again.

Mumbai: what a cool city! Compared to the rest of India, it's clean and modern, sophisticated and charming.. Like the New York of Asia! Formerly Bombay (when it was a Portuguese colony), Mumbai is characterized by grand old colonial architecture and lush tropical vegetation, wide cobblestone streets and awesome black and yellow taxi cabs from the fifties. We were glad to meet Sarah here rather than in New Delhi, which by comparison is a dense, medieval shitstorm. We spent a few happy days in Mumbai and then whisked away to other corners of the Indian state of Maharashtra, our first amble through southern India.

Where did we go? First, to Ellora and Ajanta, where enormous Buddhist and Jain temples were once carved into granite cliffs, hundreds of years ago. It was pretty astounding, seeing the remnants of all that work of human hands upon solid rock. We scrambled all over the hillsides and along the gorges, into secret stone rooms where people once lived and worshiped. Sarah wasn't yet accustomed to some of the more peculiar habits of Indian people, like sneakily photographing white people or urinating in every unmanned corner in sight. Boy was she in for a surprise!

We headed further south and spent a few days in Hampi, which was dream-like and otherworldly. In Hampi, more ruins from bygone eras rise up from a golden landscape strewn with gigantic boulders. Rice paddies, pebbles, towering rock slabs, mountains and rivers... We rented mopeds and rode through all of it. Hampi felt like a sort of timeless place-- even the sunlight seemed to stand still, like a long afternoon. We didn't spend as much time as we would have liked (feels like we're really racing the calendar lately!) but I made a secret promise to myself that I would return again in the future. More and more, I'm finding, you can't make that promise about too many places you go.

10:37PM
Mumbai, India

finally popular

S&G in the town of Bedrock

sup Mumbai

Homesickness, Magic, Superstitions

By the end of 2011, J and I were a little weary of traveling. We spent the better part of this year away from home: working in Miami, hiking around the pacific northwest, backpacking through southeast Asia, tackling the Indian subcontinent, and exploring an endless array of pristine beaches, ancient temples, glorious mountains and tropical fruits. Christmas time came and we spent it together--our very first away from home--in a sleepy beachtown in Agonda, eating seafood by candlelight and feeling a little lonely. Those were the plans we made-- to spend the holidays in a beachy paradise, then meet Sarah up in Mumbai and hit the road again for one more ramble around India. But after two months of dust and curry, sleeper trains and Delhi belly, just us two... We missed our friends, and our families, and just being home.

And then, the magic of India intervened! Rather than feel sad and lonely on a deserted beach, we decided to pack our bags and relocate to a place with a little more action in northern Goa. Up there, we serendipitously ran into all sorts of characters we had met at one place or another along our travels, as though the stars had been listening and aligned themselves just for us. India has a way of bringing people together like that, under strange and wonderful circumstances. We shared a beer with the Japanese cats from that long ago Delhi train! I was nearly run over by the Alaskan firefighter from Rishikesh, who was riding into town on the back of someone's motorcycle at 7:30 in the morning (what was I even doing in the middle of the road at 7:30 in the morning?)! We found the lovely Adriana again in an Internet cafe-- our third time crossing paths with her in a country of over a billion people. What else could it be but magic?!

So, at the end of 2011, J and I found ourselves sitting around a bonfire on a beach in southern India, sharing strawberries and rum with a solid gathering of new and wonderful friends. We shared stories of our homes (Colombia, Germany, Morocco, Eritrea, Vancouver, Brazil, New York) and laughed over the mishaps and amazements of the journeys that brought us together from so far away. We mixed up a few new year traditions (superstitions?) from our varying cultures and combined them at the stroke of midnight to insure the best luck and fortune in 2012: We wore underpants with the corresponding colors of our desires (red for love, yellow for luck, green for money); we doused our heads in tea infused with the seven sweet herbs ("for a sweet year!"); we ran a wide circle around the bonfire ("so that you will travel often and far!"); we ran into the ocean and jumped over seven waves, making seven wishes, just as the whole beach exploded with a thousand shouts of joy and a thousand dazzling fireworks on the sand.

Seven wishes is a lot, I thought, while I jumped over waves and thought about this unbelievable year, and this amazing life, and the great bigness and beauty of the world. If I wasn't so excited about this upcoming year, I would wish to do it all over again, from last January until now, and relive each happiness and frustration without changing anything. But, time moves on, and it's important to look forward -- great things are on their way.

8:10PM
Mumbai, India

mud luv

Nights in Rajasthan

Time flies, and goes slow. Two weeks ago we came and left Rajisthan under the cover of darkness, and already we are sunburnt and sandy on the shores of the Arabian Sea. Where did it go?

Under the cover of darkness, we came: the train pulled into the station well before dawn in Jodhpur. We stepped out and into the foggy mayhem of street lights and taxi drivers and chai wallas and groggy travelers, and disappeared into the city-- which was quiet and still asleep, for the most part. In big Indian cities, it's easy to get lost; guesthouses and restaurants often paint their names with arrows on the corners of buildings and in twisting alleyways, so you don't get discouraged and give up. So, we followed signs in a dark and winding maze, finally arrived, and banged on the door until an old man let us in and showed us a room. We collapsed into bed and were moments away from sleep when, out of the darkness, the morning prayers of ten thousand people rose to the sky. Astounded, we crept out of bed and up to the rooftop and saw the whole city sprawled out beneath a massive red stone fort, and the sun making its hazy ascent over all of it. Jodhpur is called the 'blue city', because members of the Brahmin caste paint all their houses varying shades of blue. So, through the fog: a holy chorus of ghost voices warbling from mosques and distant loudspeakers, an eery echo; a sea of blue rooftops, the mountainous Mehrangarh Fort ("impenetrable to this day!") and the blood red sun creeping up and setting it all on fire... It was a pretty special moment to be awake, we thought.

What else did we do in Rajasthan? We visited Jaipur ("the pink city"-- not so nice) and Jaisalmer, which was an ancient city built in an around (another) ancient fort. Like a page out of Lawrence of Arabia-- cobblestones, camels, men in turbans, women wearing big gold chains all over their faces and wrists and ankles.. We spent a night sleeping under the stars in the Thar Desert-- an Indian treat for sure. While our camels wandered off to find greener grass, we slid up and down the dunes and followed the trails of one hundred different desert creatures trekking across the sand. At night, our guides cooked dinner over a fire and we took turns drinking and singing songs from our respective countries. The Frenchmen with us did a poor job, and we did okay with a little Johnny Cash (traditional American music?) but the Rajasthani boys definitely nailed it with their enchanted folksongs about two cursed lovers along the India/Pakistan border, about a shepherd searching for an idyllic pasture to graze his sheep..all in all it was a magic night in the desert, and not one we will soon forget.

So, under the cover of darkness, we left: in the middle of the night, from another filthy train station, with our bags packed and no reserved tickets. The Indian railway system, computerized only ten years ago, has evolved to suit the traveling needs of 1.3 billion people-- efficient, but tough to get a last minute seat. It was a 30 hour ride to Goa, and the next train didn't leave for another week, so it was a toss up between "don't go" and "just get on the train". Easy! I have a T-shirt that says "Sab Kuch Milega" which is Hindi for "everything is possible" and I wear it for extra luck in times like these. We alternated between sleeping in a then-empty berth, sitting with nice Indian families (and sharing their delectable Indian snacks) and eventually bribing the ticket collector to get a sleeping bunk. Everything is possible! Especially in India.

7:56AM
Agonda, Goa, India