Day 19 - Joanna

This morning we got up at 8 to pack our gear for the overnight camel safari we were going on later that afternoon. We were checked out by 9:15 and we put our packs into the hotel storage, keeping only our day packs, which held necessities such as warmer pants, jackets, toothbrushes, toilet paper, and a few blocks of chocolate. Then David and I went and hung out on the roof for a few hours while Mum, Dad and Megan went on some secret business (perhaps present shopping for a girl with fading pink hair whose birthday is in three days?). I wasted a lot of the hotels wifi while David went on Dad's iPad and started mucking round on photo booth, much to my irritation. The others returned to collect David and I, and we headed out to 1st Gate for lunch, a very nice rooftop resteraunt just down the road from our hotel. The time came for our camel safari guide to pick us up, and we all piled into his Jeep. Joining us was a lovely American woman named Samantha, who we learned was working in Vietnam as an English teacher. We made a few stops on the way to the beginning of the safari, first at a ghost towns ruins, and then at a local gypsy village. They delighted in showing us their homes and did henna patterns on me and Megan's hands. We moved on and continued driving out into the desert. Eventually we stopped pretty much in the middle of nowhere. There were a few houses nearby, but other than that it was just us and the camels we could see a hundred metres ahead. We left our day packs in the car, grabbed cameras and drinkbottles and waved goodbye to our driver, who we would see later that evening at the little camp.

We cautiously approached the camels and I watched as David was helped climb aboard his assigned mount by one of the men who would be leading the camels. A younger boy waved me towards a camel and gestured for me to hop on. They were sitting/lying down (I don't know how you would describe it) so I swung my leg over fairly easily. "Hold tight" the boy said to me and I quickly grabbed the handle in front of me that was part of the rather comfy saddle. Then he began pulling on the camel's lead, coaxing it to its feet. Suddenly it lurched upward, but only the front half! I went flying backwards but held tight and tried to lean forward with it. That backfired when it stood up on its back legs too, and I had to quickly shift my weight. Then I was suddenly very high up. Everyone else made it up okay, and we headed off. I discovered that it was a lot like horse riding and relaxed after a few minutes, enjoying the view of the desert, and the dunes in the distance. They didn't tell us the names of the camels so we decided to do that ourselves. Here are the names that we chose.

Mine - Saskia

David's - Sandy

Megan's - Bob

Dad's - Fred

Mum's - Sore Thighs

Megan was having an interesting time because Dad's camel was behind her and the camel didn't like not being in front, so he kept pushing forward and coming right up beside Megan, giving her a fright every time she turned her head. David was also warned that his camel was the jumping camel and he was advised to hold tight, just in case. We stopped briefly for firewood along the way but other than that it was a smooth journey. We arrived at our camp on the edge of the sand dunes in time to have a hot cup of chai and watch the sun set from the dunes. All was well, until we went down to the jeep to get our warmer clothes. I was just approaching the car, David right behind me, when he suddenly yells "SNAKE!" I immediately looked to where he was pointing and sure enough, a 1.5 metre long, yellow, red, black and white snake was slithering slowly towards the car. I'm not entirely sure about the colours, I didn't really stick around to double check. We all ran back up the hill slightly and made enough noise to attract our guides. They approached with a large stick and proceeded to hit it until it was dead, which was a relief, I never would have been able to sleep if they left it alive.

We were all a bit freaked out after that, especially since Mum had said that there wouldn't be any snakes in the desert. We asked the guide though and he said that was the first snake he had seen in the two years he had been doing the safari. Lucky us. We made a fire as it got dark to scare away any of its friends and sat around, just chatting with Samantha while the guides made dinner. They joined us after dinner and after we had shared the chocolate around they offered to play the water drum and dinner plates and sing a song or two. That was nice, until they asked us to sing some songs. We sang the Maori verse of the national anthem and Samantha sang the American national anthem. Then me and Megan attempted to do the cup song, playing the rhythm on the water drum and singing along, but it was quite difficult and we gave up after a while. Soon after we decided to go to bed, some of us going for a nice wee in the bushes before retiring to our mats on the sand, under the stars. We had two very thick blankets to keep us warm, and the guide was so cute, he tucked each of us in so that we were cocooned in the blankets. The moon was very bright but eventually everyone dropped off to sleep, for a while at least. I woke up later in the night to a weird snuffling noise nearby. Turns out there was a stray dog sniffing my head. When in India I guess...

Extra update from Andrew

The secret shopping trip referred to by Joanna included a trip to a fabric shop. This was more fun than it sounds. Megan and Heather got the shopkeeper to bring out every cushion cover, bedspread and wall hanging he had, we all had masala chai and there was enthusiastic but pretty half-hearted bargaining on both sides as the prices were pretty good. 

Day 18- David

Before I start my post we (the Laxons) would like to thank the people who have been commenting on our blog. We also know that some people are not able to comment due to strange technological reasons.

 Woke up this morning (in a proper bed in an actual room) to the sound of the Muslim payer call. The prayer call sounds five times a day and if you are strictly Muslim you are supposed to face Mecca and pray. There are quite a lot of Muslims here as we are only 100ks from the Pakistan border. You can even see a few Pakistan flags flying from the roofs of the neighbouring buildings when you're up on the rooftop restaurant. Anyway, we had breakfast looking out at the Jaisalmer Fort. I now know why mum loves Jaisalmer. The golden stone that makes up most of the buildings makes the whole place look wonderful, and I started to wonder if I was in India or somewhere in the Middle East. We basically blobbed all morning, using the hotel's free wifi to catch up with the outside world via social media. I found out about the missing AirAsia flight and wondered about the wisdom of mum choosing to fly Malaysian Airlines. I would say that it's probably nothing, but that just seems to jinx it sooo... We had a late lunch waited till around 3 until we went into the fort because that was when the masses of Indian tourists went on their camel safaris. Unfortunately Megan had an "upset stomach" and may be sick (I'm not allowed to say any more) so she couldn't come. As we entered the fort, we discovered that all the Indian tourists had been replaced by a huge group of Jain men gathered in prayer. We had to walk straight through their group to get to the city palace (now a museum). We got a few looks but otherwise passed through. One advantage of them being here was that the normally busy roads were at a standstill because they were occupying the main square. We went into the city palace and discovered more about Jaisalmer's rich history. We wanted to go to the Jain temple but it was closed from three onwards today (maybe due to the huge group of Jain men?) so we headed back. We ate out at Killa Corner (Hindi for Fort Corner) and returned to have an early night so we could be energised for the Camel Safari tomorrow.

Day 16 & 17- Heather

Today was a long travel day with a 12 hour train journey to Jaisalmer, the morning was spent preparing for our journey by buying food from the yummy bakery down the road. We arrived at the station with half an hour to spare only to discover as per usual  our train was late by 1 & 1/2 hours.  Our time was spent trying to dodge the pigeons that were nesting in the rafters of the station and firing unpleasant surprises on people below.  After being the recipients of 2 direct hits we found a safe spot - finally onto the train and our journey began. The train was a sleeper and was relatively empty so we were all able to sleep later in the journey. The weird thing was that there was no food being sold on the train so our bakery supplies had to be carefully rationed - eventually someone came around taking dinner orders by this time Andrew was really hungry (!!) so ordered a dinner - he is now wondering about the wisdom of his decision as he has spent the last few hours experiencing eggy burps!!!...time will tell

We arrived in Jaisalmer at 1am - managed to get a lift to our accomodation - unfortunately the message re our arrival hadn't been passed on and there was no room at the inn.

So we spent the rest of the night sleeping on thin mattresses with heavy blankets on the roof top restaurant - the kids took it in their stride and it was magical to wake this morning to a sunrise over the Jaisalmer fort. 

Jaisalmer is probably one of my favourite places in India - I am writing this sitting in the rooftop restaurant in the late afternoon sun with the fort stretched out before me - it is like a scene out of Arabian nights if you can discount the sounds of the pigs forraging in the vacant lot next door!!

We are all looking forward to an early night in a comfortable bed ( we now have 2 comfortable rooms) so we can do some more exploring tomorrow.

Day 15- Megan

It was an early morning for dad, Joanna and I after Christmas night movies, as we wanted to get to Amber fort before the big crowds. Mum and David decided to give the early morning for adventure a miss and met us at the old city at midday because David was still recovering. So our taxi driver took us out to Amber fort, and we were mesmerised. Now I'm sure you're all thinking but there are so many forts in India I'm sure the Laxons would get a bit bored... Oh no.. This fort was stunning and more like an outdoor palace. There was a huge amount of elephants taking tourists up to the gate, which made it even more exciting for photos. When we got inside there were constant photo oppertunities from vast views of the lake, to majestically structured archways and my favourite... The jewel detailing of the walls, which is Rajasthan's specialty. I got very excited and ended up getting lost for a few minutes because Joanna and dad would move on while I was taking photos. (It is important to get the right lighting and angle, then after you've done that you need to pull out your phone to take a few pictures for Instagram and the blog). 

After exploring all the tunnels and arch ways, Joanna decided it was time to leave as the boredom was sinking in. We went to meet mum and david- david was feeling much better, you can tell when he's recovered because he goes back to annoying us again. Anyway we decided to visit the city palace, which was more recently built in the 17th century it was also very beautiful but didn't have the great views like Amber fort. We saw the biggest piece of silver in the world which the king would use to carry his water in when he visited England so he didn't have to drink their dirty water- we thought this was a little ironic since indian water is quite dirty, however in the 17th century Britain's water was probably of a worse standard. Then we visited the textiles museum and the weapons museum- there was one weapon which looked like an ordinary dagger but when you stabbed the opponent you could split the dagger into two, in order to split the person in two( imagine garden shears then you will get the general idea) 

After our sightseeing dad took us on a "walk" ( more like a hike) through the old city to the indian coffee  house which was a very cute place, where our lunch came to a total of about $7 nz dollars... Not bad. After an exhausting morning dad and us girls decided to go back and relax and mum and david decided to stay in town and check out the observetry. Then we headed out to nibs cafe for dinner which is famous for their chocolate deserts. 

Day 12 - Joanna

We got up at 7 on Monday in order to catch the 8:30 train back to Delhi. It was a freezing morning in Jagadhri so we had hot chai on the platform while we were waiting for the train. It was half an hour late due to the thick fog, and the actual journey was much slower than it should have been because of bad visibility. We arrived in Delhi at around 2 o'clock and walked back to Hotel City Star, our "safe haven". We were quickly reminded why we preferred the quieter cities and towns to the bustling, blaring streets of Delhi. There was no food on the train so we headed to Connaught Place in search of some decent lunch. By the time we found a cafe that served kind of average food it was almost 4 o'clock. We considered finishing up our Christmas shopping but all agreed that we weren't up for it so we headed back to the hotel to chill for a few hours. At 7 we went and caught the metro to the airport because we were meeting our family friends the Bayldons. We got some dinner at the airport while we waited outside as they queued for visas. Unfortunately it took several hours, so us kids passed the time by singing Christmas carols while everyone within earshot stared at us like we had gone crazy. We also prepared a welcome rap/Christmas carol for the Bayldons and performed it when they eventually arrived. We attempted to all catch the metro back together but failed miserably when the doors shut with half of us in the train and half out, the result being that our families were split in half. We dropped the Bayldons off at their hotel, which was remarkably close to the train station and then walked back to our hotel, making the most of the nice showers before dropping into bed at midnight.

Day 14 (Christmas Day) - Andrew

Quite a start to Christmas Day. At 3.48am my phone rang. A contact in NZ wanted to tell me about a story for the Herald. Seconds later David announced he was feeling sick. Fairly non-stop vomiting and diarrhoea followed for the next two hours. We got some drugs into him after 6am and everyone managed to sleep for a few hours, more or less. We exchanged presents (it's quite challenging to buy for people when you're all shopping at the same bazaar but we did well) and had breakfast. Sightseeing was considered inappropriate for Christmas Day so the girls and I found some chocolate treats for lunch and we blobbed in front of TV movies and had drinks and read our books on the rooftop terrace. It was all a bit subdued - especially for poor old David - but we had a great Christmas dinner at a rooftop restaurant round the corner, decorated in strings of flashing lights so the Westerners would feel at home. It did the trick for us for a few hours. You can see the effect it had on most of the family.

Day 13- David

Woke at 4:50 this morning so we could catch the 6 o'clock train to Jaipur. When we left Dehli, the visibility was about 100 meters due to heavy fog. Fortunately this only delayed the train by 1 and a quarter hours. We arrived at Jaipur at quater to 12 went to hotel and had lunch on the rooftop restaurant. Mum set up the Christmas decorations in our room then we headed out to the pink city to do some last minute Christmas shopping. As this was our first time in Rajasthan, we were amazed by all the fabrics with mirrors sown into them. There were also heaps and heaps of shoes. We did our shopping (I cannot spend too long on this topic for a few reasons) and went for dinner at a very nice place that served Baskin Robbins ice cream which we ate for dessert. We went to bed nice and early so we wouldn't be too tired for Cristmas (so exciting). I had a weird feeling in my stomach before I went to sleep, probably nothing...

Day 11- Heather

Managed to have a bit of a sleep in this morning before a busy and interesting day.  Our day started with morning tea with Shikuntala  and Nikkil (Avinash's mother and brother)- then it was a quick walk to Christian hospital where we joined the hospital staff for their Christmas staff lunch. It was a lovely opportunity for me to catch up with some of the staff and their families that I knew from my previous visits. One young man came up to me and said that he remembered me teaching his class a Christmas song for the St Thomas school Christmas programme - he said he was in year 3 at the time.....!!

We were then invited as guests of honour to the Sunday school Christmas play - the play was in Hindi but we had no problem following the story line!!  Kids are the same the world over with the littlest waving to their parents, the shepherds nearly had a fight on stage because one of them got their lines wrong and one kid was so nervous he interrupted the narrator because he was so keen to say his lines and get off the stage.  It was brilliant....afterwards Megan and Joanna were in hot demand for photos , David, Andrew and I even made it into a few. 

In the evening we went out to dinner with Kamala and David Singh, Shenu and Vishal (their daughter and son-in-law) to a local restaurant. After which they took us to a local sweet vendor where we had the yummiest galab jamans. The night concluded with tea at Vishals's parents place. We have all eaten so much in the last 3 days we think we might pop...The good news is (I'm sure you are all wondering about this!!)  that so far our stomachs are holding up fine. 

 

Day 10 - Andrew

We went to the Mamraj's church this morning. It's a modern Catholic church in the basement of Abrianna's school, St. Anne's Convent School. Most of the service was in English, so we could follow it quite easily and everyone made us feel very welcome. To my untrained Protestant eye, it seemed like a regular Catholic service in NZ except a bit more colourful - Jesus was dressed in yellow and red, instead of white, and the altar was surrounded by flashing lights. Afterwards we had a quick tour around the school with the Mamraj's friends, who are also from Kerala in the south, like Ambily, and all three families went to lunch at a Punjabi restaurant.

(Anne - you wanted more about the food - this is for you...) The place wasn't much to look at from the road and it was steel trays on plain Formica tables but the food was sensational. We had shahi paneer (cottage cheese in tomato-based gravy) and a channa dahl, made with chick peas, served with kulcha, which are like paranthas, only crispier and with more flavour. To any diehard meat-eaters who are thinking "That sounds really boring", you have to try it to appreciate how good vegetarian food can be in India. Avinash told us the food was typical of Amritsar, which is further north, near the Pakistan border. Everyone had a great time laughing about my bad Hindi pronunciation, which has become a running joke. 

After lunch we said goodbye to Avinash, Ambily and Abrianna, who had made us feel incredibly welcome in their home. Their friend Sanjay drove us the two hours to Jagadhri, home of St Thomas' school and Jagadhri Christian Hospital, where Heather used to work. We checked into yet another Soviet-style small town hotel, with huge rooms, mindless bureaucracy and Basil Fawlty-like dedication to customer service. As Jagadhri is not much of a tourist destination either and the whole place was shrouded in cold and fog, we felt a bit down at this point (full details censored). Everyone cheered up when we went to dinner with Cecil Harrison, the hospital superintendent, his wife Nayana and their three kids. More wonderful food, including tandoori chicken with the vegetarian dishes and our first Indian desserts - Dahl and carrot halva and galab jamen. We are going to have to find a gym at this rate.

Day 9- David

Chundering to Chandigarh:

The 7 hour bus ride to Chandigarh was very windy and unpleasant. Joanna vomited 7 times and I vomited 3 times before going to sleep. So it can be easily presumed that when the bus, one and a half hours late, rolled into Chandigarh we were all very keen to get off and get driven to Avinash’s family's home. We got into bed, completely exhausted, and went to sleep immediately. We woke in the morning and had a lovely traditional North Indian breakfast of stuffed parantha (onions and patatoes) while talking to their parrot, Chikoo. We then went out to explore Chandigarh. Chandigarh is a very different place compared other parts of India because it is India's only planned city. The city is divided into around 70 sectors, each with it's own set of shops and park. We wanted to visit the lake which is the one of 3 main tourist attractions in Chandigarh, along with the Rose Garden and Rock Garden. Unfortunately the lake was closed because some birds had died of bird flu there, causing the Indian authorities to disinfect the area around the lake in fear of bird flu spreading to people. We didn't visit the Rock garden or Rose Garden because it was so foggy and cold. So instead Avinash lead us to Abrianna's second home, Elante Shopping Mall. It was very interesting looking around the mall because if it weren't for all the Indian shoppers, you could have been anywhere in the world. All the models on the posters were either pakeha or they were Indian with so much make up on to make them look white. The brands were the same as brands we have in NZ too, Clarks, Addias, Zara, The Body Shop, Puma, Cathy, ect. The even had a Hamleys Toy Shop which we spent a bit of time in. Then it was a hurried KFC lunch (which was very nice with the Indian spices in it). We had to get Àbrianna (Avinash's daughter) from Sector 35 to Sector 7 for the national under 17 basketball team selection. If she gets in, she will go on a nearly two week long training camp. Abrianna is very good at basketball, she practices for two hours everyday after school so I think she should get in. After we dropped her off at the sports complex, Avinash took us to his workplace, an Apple service and repair company, of which he is in charge of. I got to see the inside of an iPhone 4S, as well as a MacBook Air. It was now time to pick up Abrianna from basketball selection. Unfortunately, she didn't get in the team because she is only 14 and everyone else was older than her. We went back to their apartment with all the Christmas lights turned on. We had a very nice dinner of shahi panner, a tasty (and slightly spicy) chicken dish.after that we jumped into bed and went to sleep.

Day 8– Megan

I awoke to another early morning, freezing because as per usual Joanna stole all the blankets.... Then we headed off to to St. Paul's school to say goodbye to Mrs and Mrs Singh and take a few final photos of the campus. Our tiny taxi arrived at our hotel midday and it took us up a steep windy road... And by steep I mean the wheels were skidding in first gear! I seem to be always writing when we have near death driving experiences. Anyway when we reached our destination it was time to search for western food which McCleod Ganj has a lot of, so we settled for a cute Tibetan cafe where the tables were low and we could sit on little cushions. I have a cold at the moment so I have found out my new love of lemon honey ginger tea, which fills you up and clears the sinuses. 

After lunch we did some shopping for friends and family (what we bought will not be named as the recipients of the gifts may be reading this) then we went back to the hotel and mum got very excited about the nice laundromat down the road where we could do our washing... Maybe a bit too excited. 

"And don't forget it's washed and dried in one hour and the man does it". Then it was time to eat again- this time Italian followed by dessert.  

McLeod Ganj is very mesmerising, like a piece of Tibet perched on the snowy mountain tops of India. There are many Tibetan people living here in exile, due to Tibet being under Chinese rule since 1950, when they came and invaded and destroyed all their temples and banned all practice of Buddhist religion. McLeod Ganj is also the home of the Dali lama, whose temple we visited today, to find out more about where Buddhism originated from - (it originated from India and was then spread north up to Tibet and through many more Asian countries) and the political situation with Tibet and China. After going to the museum, Joanna and I decided we wanted to buy "Free Tibet" shirts. They were not hard to find and seemed to be sold everywhere. Now we are sitting in a cafe passing time, wasting the cafe's wifi and waiting for our bus to Chandigarh, where we will meet mum's friend Avinash and his family. 

Day 7- Heather

Woke this morning firmly wedged between Megan and Joanna. We had decided to all share the bed in an attempt to stay as warm as possible.  Needless to say I ended up in the middle with very little room for movement. It was freezing last night but we managed to stay warm. There is fresh snow on the mountains surrounding Palampur. It is warm during the day but the temperature starts dropping from 3 pm onwards.  We walked to St Paul's school where Mr and Mrs Singh (the principal and his wife) gave us a tour of the school (which included a lovely new block of 17 classrooms) - the location is beautiful with pine trees scattered throughout the grounds and a backdrop of snow covered mountains. We visited the boys hostel, which has undergone iimprovements since I visited last year.

There are currently 20 boys in the hostel between the ages of 10 and 17 years. Eighteen of the boys are sponsored through the Church of North India's PDS model.

After making arrangements to come back after school finished we headed to the bazaar to check out the shawl shop...

The evening was spent at the boys hostel. The boys were very shy to start with but soon warmed up and wanted to talk to David in particular. Andrew put his journalist skills to work, using Mrs Singh as an interpreter, and interviewed some of the boys about their backgrounds and how it was for them coming to school in Palampur. Many of the boys come from very poor backgrounds and it is a struggle for them to keep up with their study as their schooling prior to coming to St Paul's has not always been very good. It was very evident that Mrs Singh runs the hostel in a firm but very caring way.

Now it is time for the mother daughter sandwich in the bed again... sigh.. 

Days 5&6- Andrew

On Monday we visited the Avalon Girls Secondary School in Patankhot. Our church has been supporting some girls who live in the hostel and for most of us (Heather went last year) it was the first chance to meet them. We arrived in the morning and met Manjit Mal, the principal, who showed us around the school. It's a beautiful old building from 1902, with big courtyards and red and yellow painted brickwork, which feels much calmer than the bustle of the town outside the walls.

"Visitors say it's like heaven," said Manjit. "Heaven in Patankhot."

We went to see several classes of girls, who smiled back politely at us in their red and white uniforms while we talked to them from the front. So far it felt like an awkward school visit. Manjit told us more about the school; there are about 900 students, including 50 at the hostel. We are sponsoring 20 through the Church of North India, which runs the school. All the senior students achieved First Division results last year, the equivalent of Excellence in NCEA in NZ. Only about 10% of the girls are from Christian families, most are Hindu. I asked her how the Hindu parents felt about their girls getting an openly Christian education in a country which is split on religious lines. Very supportive, she said, because the girls receive such a well-rounded education. The local governor was initially suspicious of her school but has since come round. Now the government-run schools come to her for ideas. 

We returned to the school at 5pm to meet the hostel girls. Actually, being sloppy Kiwis we turned up at 10 minutes past to find the girls and staff arranged on chairs in the courtyard, waiting for our arrival. They were wearing mufti and suddenly looked much older and more Westernised. They sang us a couple of songs, including one we sing at home, and a Christmas song in Punjabi. There were some brief speeches, a welcome prayer and the serving of tea, samosas and biscuits. We felt honoured and hopelessly under-prepared for not having our own waiata ready. We took photos with the girls, who offered to show us round their rooms. This finally broke the ice. Megan, Joanna and David were mobbed and asked for their favourite colour and whether they liked Justin Bieber. Upstairs we found that each bedroom had between four and eight beds together in the middle, with the girls' belongings in large suitcases and cabinets around the wall. We sat on the beds as the girls performed a Bollywood song, in which Megan was apparently the queen, and a Punjabi dance led by Sarah, our very impressive and confident student MC. Everyone wanted to swap names and Facebook contacts. It was great fun and slightly overwhelming.

Afterwards we went to Manjit's house next door to this school and met her elderly mother, who talked non-stop to me in Hindi. I tried to respond politely and not look at Megan, who was laughing so much she almost spilled her tea. Manjit's mother insisted we should have a bag of her organically grown oranges for our train journey to Palumpur the next day. 

"And guavas," she added. 

"They're not ripe yet," Manjit reminded her. 

"Never mind, they can take them back to New Zealand," she said.

We were in a hurry the next morning checking out of the hotel (and drying out our laundry which had somehow come back dirtier than it went in), so we arrived on the platform with only minutes to spare for the little narrow gauge train, which would take us up to Palumpur in the Himalayan foothills. We had no time to buy food and two biscuits for the six-hour journey. So we were very impressed and relieved to see Manjit's driver Amajit appear just before the train left with a bag of oranges - and other goodies. 

The train ride was slow but spectacular. Lots of cute mountain villages appearing out of the bush, curving viaducts over wide river valleys with hardly any water (the snows haven't melted yet). Megan and David and I stuck our heads out the window and took photos. Joanna looked bored. When we arrived in Palampur, the local St Paul's school principal Mr V. P. Singh and his wife were waiting for us on the platform. They bundled us into a car and a van and took us up through the town to our hotel. Palampur is a hill station town, so the Himalayas loom up right above the winding streets, which was amazing to see. It was also freezing cold and we were starving. We ate at the hotel, then huddled under the covers on one bed, arguing about which rubbish TV channel to watch. Next day - St Paul's School, which we hope will turn into a similar NZ-India arrangement to Avalon.

Days 3&4- Joanna

The past two days have been a little bit hectic and totally exhausting. Yesterday (Friday) we went on a day trip to Agra in order to see Fatephur Sikhri, the Agra Fort, and of course, the Taj Mahal. This meant that we had to get up at 5:30 am to catch the 6 am train to Agra, which I was not very happy about. We joined a tour group and hopped on the tour bus. And then, just our luck, it started to rain. Like thunder and lightning, water bucketing down everywhere. It continued on and off on the way to Fatephur Sikhri, but unfortunately it poured while we were there. Fatephur Sikhri was pretty cool, the buildings were very impressive and our tour guide gave us a VERY detailed explanation about what all the buildings were used for. I felt a bit bad because he was putting a lot of effort into it and I couldn't understand half of what he was saying due to his heavily accented English.

The guide hurried us on to the Agra Fort, where we were very excited to enter and find monkeys scampering along the walls and coming right up to us. Actually if they got too close we had to move away in case they had rabies or something. The Agra Fort was amazing, we had already seen the Red Fort in Delhi but this one was much better. It wasn't raining anymore but it was very foggy and absolutely freezing, especially in the wind. Once we were done with the Agra Fort we hopped back on the bus to go to the Taj Mahal. I can say without a doubt that the Taj was one of the most breathtaking buildings I have ever seen. We were given an hour to explore and do whatever we liked. So of course we took heaps of photos, and also featured in other people's photos too.

I'm kind of sick of that now to be honest, I really don't understand why Indian people want us in their pictures so badly. If they ask from now on I think I might just say no, even though I feel a bit guilty. It was a shame about the weather because it would have been amazing to see the Taj with a blue sky background, but I loved it even with a murky grey back drop. Eventually we got the bus back to the train station and had some dinner. By now it was about 7 pm and our train was supposed to come at 9:30 so we had a bit of waiting to do. This is where it all kind of went wrong, for me at least. Mum and Dad think that I'm exaggerating when I describe it as a disaster, but they don't realise how essential sleep is to my well being and sanity. Anyway it turns out there was going to be more waiting than anticipated. Our train was originally an hour and a half delayed, which was annoying but bearable. Then the train was delayed another half hour. I was at the point of hitting someone. We were tired and cold and we wanted to sleep. Especially since we had to get up at 6 the next morning to catch a different train.

By the time the train finally arrived it was midnight, by the time we returned to Delhi it was 2:30 am. We walked back to the hotel and fell into bed, only to get back up again about three hours later. I'm writing this now on the train to Patankhot, it is almost 3 pm and we have been on the train for about  8 hours, and we still have three to go. I'm going a little bit crazy and honestly I cannot wait to get to Patankhot. I kind of want to keep writing cos it kills time really well but whoever is reading this is probably getting sick of me so.. Bye?  

Day 2- David

I have another word to add to Megan's description of New Delhi:intense and gross. We walked past a few public urinals today, but some people weren't even using those, they were just peeing and on the street. But I have to say, New Delhi has some amazing places, like oases in a desert. For instance, today we visited the lotus temple. It was amazily beautiful, and the gardens surrounding the temple were an extremely pleasant break from the concrete and rubble that that lives in New Delhi. Inside the temple was equally peaceful. We were lucky to arrive in a prayer session, which included beutiful singing that echoed and resounded around the temple. I wanted to stay here forever, but eventually we had to face the stress and hassle of Delhi. We caught the Delhi metro back and faced the rush hour traffic getting from the station to our hotel. We almost got lost but we made it and flopped on the beds to relax after a really tiring day. I think that my views and impressions of Delhi have changed greatly since I first arrived but on the whole, I'm starting to adapt to Delhi and I think that I might, just, maybe be able to handle the rest of our 6 weeks in India.

Day 1- Megan

We arrived in at 5:30am after travelling for 22 hours with 4 hours sleep, so as you can imagine we were very tired and temperamental. Some time later we found our way to our hotel. After catching the metro then a taxi, to get a permission slip to enter paharganj during the election, we then found out that we didn't need permission which meant an  interesting detour of the city for our family.

If there is one word I could use to describe today it would be intense. Everything is intense. The smells, sound,  atmosphere, people- and talk about traffic? I won't complain again about auckland traffic jams. The scariest moment of today was probably hanging off the edge of squashed auto rickshaw with Joanna and mum as the driver wedged us between buses, motor bikes honking his horn loudly at everyone who passed.

The highlight of the day was the red fort built in 1638 by Shah Jahan (the same guy who built the Taj Mahal). It felt nice to be inside and away from the hustle and bustle of Delhi, which interestingly enough was what the fort was designed for in the first place as well as to keep enemies out. It was a great opportunity to take lots of photos, especially on my new SLR camera- which I will post on fb after our trip. Although during the trip it will just be photos from our phones, which seem to be popular device with indian tourists. Some of the Indian tourists asked to take photos with Joanna and I, and subtly asked dad to step aside so he wasn't in the photo, much to everyone's amusement. He was all photo ready- poor dad, don't worry there will be many more photo opportunities.

Anyway gtg food dinner has arrived.