The Deported

Welp, they've I've concluded that India has the stupidest immigration department in the history of the world. Since I didn't register before I'd been in India for 180 days, they'd like to deport me back to the USA. But to avoid official deportation, which would suck pretty hard, the idea is that I have to pay $20 dollars a day for every day I was in india w/o registering (probably ttl around $700), turn in a crapload of paperwork, and then fly back to America for a couple days before coming back to India. See? It's retarded.

So, TRX'll obviously pay the fees and for my flight to the usa. The current plan is that on Monday, TRX'll fly me to New York, put me up in a hotel, and then fly me back to India 2 days later. Flying that much in one week will be lame, something like 36 hours on planes, but at least I get some sweet Frequest flyer miles and a free (for me) couple days in New York. Maybe I'll hook up with old Stevesie and eat vegan food.

Don't Mind The Gap

HI, It's been a while. How's everything going? He did? What jerk. you should break up with him. He's no good. Me? Well, it's been a busy couple weeks. Where to begin... Well, I went back to Nandi Hill, which i got stranded on the first time, but no real issues this time. Except the insane monkeys that tried to kill me. I drove in India too, left side of the road is stange, but I survived. The next weekend, I hung out wiht co-workers visiting from the USA, they were cool and we had fun.

So I bought a plane ticket and a hotel in The Maldives it set me back about 900 dollars. Steph, Tim, and myself went to the airport and immigration would not let me leave India. So apparently i'm an Illegal since I didn't register, so I can't leave india. So I'm out the money for the trip and spent the weekend chilling here in Bangalore. Which had 9 bombs go off on Friday. It's funny how Indians see bombings as a reason to take the day off. Like a snow day in the US. Indians have a "Bomb day". Obviously, I didn't get blowed up, nor do I care about a couple crappy bombs going off a few kilometers from my house. I'm just heavy like that.

The trip - Part 2

Okay, so I'm finally getting around to the other cities I visited. After Shimla, we took the deadly ride back down the mountain and went to a city called Chandigarh.

Chandigarh is the capitol city of two states, and is the cleanest and most organized city in India. It's really just a bunch of gardens and malls all on neat city blocks. We went through a couple gardens and a rock garden, but there's really not much to share about this place. It was kind of like a break from being in India.
More photos here.

chandigarh

After Chandigarh, Rusty and I parted ways with Stephanie back in Delhi, then Rusty and I hired a driver to take us to Jodhpur. That drive was pretty bad, our car didn't have headlights and we had to drive against uncoming traffic for a few hours. Dispite the lack of headlights, our driver still drove very aggrssively. I'm lucky to have made it.

We finally got to Jodhpur, which is in the middle of the desert. It's called the blue city, because everyone in the old part of town has painted their homes blue.

Jodhpur had lots of forts and palaces for Rusty and I to visit. It was a very interesting town. Apparently, here and the next two cities we visited no white people ever go there, so Rusty and I were a specticle. More photos:

Jodhpur

After Jodhpur, Rusty and I went to ahmedabad and Surat. Neither place was anything great, we basically just walked around a lot getting stared at like we were lost. Also, both had lotsa of beggars to keep us harrassed.
Here's some guys who were just excited to meet westerners and they took a bunch of pictures of us, so we took one of them, with me.
It was difficult to get outta there, but we finally reached Mumbai (formerly Bombay). Mumbai was awesome, a lot of really old architecture and cobble-stone streets. It's also very modern, and being westerns there did not make you a specticle. Rusty and I got offered roles as extras in a Bollywood movie, a London night-club, but we had to turn down the job due to time concerns. Anyways, Mumbai was great, probably my favorite city in India. There's some photos of Mumbai here:

Mumbai

So that's that. Check out the pictures.

Sweet Home Alabangalore

Hi there, how are you? I just got back from a 2 week trip traveling in northern India. I went to a bunch of places, saw a few sights and just checked stuff out. Traveling in India is pretty tiring, nothing really very efficient about it. Nothing's on time, no streets are marked for finding out where you're going and whatnot. I'll take you on a tour with me to the places I went to. Follow me.

Life has taught me that it's always best to start with a video of a cute monkey, so here's a short one I made on my trip.


Okay, now that that's out of the way...

Leg 1. First we went to a city called Jaipur. Here's a picture.

We were a bit hesitant about peeping Jaipur because there were some bombings there a few weeks before and all around unrest, but I live life dangerously, so I went. The place had craploads of sights to see and whatnot, so we spent most of the time touring old forts and palaces. The picture above is from a car on a mountain road on the way to a fort, looking down on the lake palace. Jaipur is also where I found out that Rusty is afraid of revolving restaurants.
You can see all my pictures of Jaipur (with comments!) by clicking below.

Jaipur

After Jaipur, we planned on rollin on over to Agra and staying there a few night. However, the gull dern Gujjars (lower caste) were blocking the highways (to protest the gov't), so we had to change our plans and headed on up to Delhi.

New Delhi is the capitol city and home to 13 million people. As you can imagine lots of hussle and bustle and pollution live there too. But it's definitely a neat place with lots going on an many historic sites. We spent one day touring sites, and the rest of the time there just walking on all the crazy streets full of shops. Here are a few photos from New Delhi.

This is the India gate. It apparently had a bunch of jewels and crap embedded in it before the British took them all.

This is Muhatma Gandhi's grave except that he was cremated.

This is the lotus temple, very cool.

There's more photos from New Delhi at the link below.

New Delhi

We took a day trip from Delhi to Agra since the Gujjars hadn't blocked that road yet. Agra is a relatively small town but it houses the Taj Mahal, which is one of the 7 wonders of the world I'm told. We also went and saw the Agra Fort while we were there.

So that there's the Taj Mahal, it's solid white marble and it doesn't really look real even when you're there. It appears to float on air.

Here's me posing in front of the Taj.

And here's a photo of the Agra Fort that we toured.
For more photos of these sites and of Rusty getting attacked by a monkey go the the link below.

Agra

Next place on the trip was to Shimla, it's a relatively small city high in the Himlayan mountains.

Being in the mountains was sweet, you could look down and see clouds and half the time you were in a cloud.

There were a lot of monkeys in Shimla, Rusty and I had to rent monkey sticks (5 rupees) to defend ourselves.

Here's me standing on top of a mountain. Rusty and I walked approx. 15 miles in one day much of it uphill, but it was really fun. Also very tiring.

There's more pictures of Shimla if you click below, but the beauty really doesn't translate to photos, you kinna had to be there.

Shimla

So I went several other place and have a lot photos, but I'm gonna post all this now and I'll put the rest up in a few days. I'm sure glad to be back, even though my Xbox died (got it fixed) and I was deathly ill for the last few days (i'm better).

Gone Fishin'

The Current lack of updates is because I am travelling throughout India at this time. I'm Currently in Ahmedabad, Gujarat. I will update as soon as I get back with all kinds of neat stuff.

You're my little miracle

Toilet humor.
So i've had several inquires involving toilets in India and exactly how people go about their business. Well, Here's a photo of the standard Indian toilet. You'll notice, it's little more than a hole in the ground. Also, the lack of toilet paper is present.

Though I haven't actually questioned anybody regarding the course of events surrounding the usage of that, I can say that the spray nozzle on the side is a large part of the clean up effort. However, I've discovered through my usage of public restrooms ("western style" only, i've yet to go without the bathroom tissue during requiring efforts), that their mother's did not stress the importance of washing your hands after finishing that fact of life. I do know that

At work, their's only "western style" toilets, but the sprayer is there, which results in never having a dry toilet seat. This also means that the need for the below sign in each stall is present.


TONIGHT I'LL SING YOU SONGS UNTIL YOU FALL ASLEEP. I'LL WHISPER EVERY WORD INTO A SMILE. JUST THINK OF JUST HOW GOOD THIS LIFE COULD BE.

Baby, our love is so special.. We need to get the government involved in this.

Saturday, I went to a wedding reception for Vijay from work. He was marrying some girl named Mamatha M. It was not a love marriage, it was an arranged marriage. I'm told about 90% of marriages in India are arranged. The girl never gets a say in it, but the guy can see a picture of her first and choose. Of course, you pretty much have to marry someone in your same caste (social class), or you'll disgrace your family name. But Vijay's woman seemed nice enough. So here's a few photos from the event.

Vijay and Mamatha. Vijay's got a gnarley mustache.

They had to stand on the stage for like 2 hours while people came up to have photos taken with them.

Here is a photo of me and my team at said event.

In case you wanted to see what India looks like, here's a short video I took while driving through the countryside in Tamil Nadu last week.

You're so like woah.

Well I haven't posted on here in quite a while so I figured it's time. So I drug myself outta bed, from the safe confines of sleep to share what's been up. You're welcome.

So last weekend we decided to go to a town on the East coast of India called Ponducherry. We'd heard good things from people. We wanted to take a train, so we caught a 5 hour train to Chennai, where a driver picked us up and drove us the 3 hours to Ponducherry.

This is me riding a choo-choo train.

This is our driver who slept in his car for three days in Ponducherry, awaiting my every transportation demand. And it was extremely hot and humid there. What a sucker, even if he did get $100 bux for his troubles.

Ponducherry is a coastal town, but the beaches left a lot to be desired, especially since the shore was make of giant rocks. That sure makes body surfing way more exciting.

This dude has shunned the use of cars. Camel's are much more efficient. (If they're not spitting on you).

This Dude asked me to help put sticks on his head, then made Stephanie pay him to take this picture. Ungrateful...

Oh thank God...

This is what Ponducherry looks like from above.

In Ponducherry, there wsn't really much to do. Apparently the shopping is good, but I don't like shopping. Also they didn't have mountain dew. They did have a French Quarter though, which was interesting. And also much cleaner than the rest of the city. We ate at several good restaurants there. Other than that we just chilled the whole time. Also, on the way back, we had about 4 hours to kill in Chennai before out train outta town. Chennai is India's 4th largest city, and is by far the crappiest city I have ever been in in my entire life. I'd rather die then ever go there again. Suffice it to say the lack of Mountain Dew was not even in the top 5 crappy things about the city.

Mother told me to be something.

I WILL TRY BUT I WILL STUMBLE AND ALL THROUGH THESE CITY STREETS MY ROBES SHALL DRAG THE GROUND. HEAR THE CHILDREN SWING WITH SORROW. YESTERDAY WAS ONCE TOMORROW. NO MORE I’LL BE TROUBLED BY THE TROUBLES OF THIS WORLD. BUT IF I LOSE MY STEP ALONG THE WAY, AND IF THE SPEECH OF VICTIM FILLS MY THROAT, OUT BEYOND THE CLIFFS THAT SHAPE THE DAY. IT’S THERE I’LL WANDER, THERE I’LL STRAY. IT’S THERE I’LL LOOK FOR YOU WHEN ALL MY TRIALS ARE DONE. I FEIGN TO SLEEP TO SAVE MY BREATH. THIS LOVE IS LOSS THIS LIFE IS THEFT, AND ALL THAT’S LEFT IS SOME VAIN NEED TO CARRY ON.

Ladies Night in Loserville

So Goa is a cool place where I'm gonna retire to in about 10 years. Here are some photos of my recent trip there.

Stampy was there.
There is a beach there.
No mom I don't smoke.
Yes, I wear all black to the beach, i'm just cool like that.
Sunset.

The Recline

Howdy. How's it going? Good? That's nice to hear. My foot is much better and pretty much at 100%. I found my Camera, so it's back, woot. I just got back from a trip to Goa, India, that place was pretty cool. I'll have to tell you about it later, and show some cool pictures. What? Now? But I don't feel like it. And I made stephanie take all the pictures so I don't have any till i get them off her camera. Yeah, I know I just found mine, but I am lazy. GET OFF MY BACK. fine. Go then. I was gonna break up with you anyways.

The Decline

I got medicine for my foot and it was getting much better until yesterday I got an infection under the skin. I then get really sick and so we had a doctor come by. This doctor did a house call, wrote me 6 perscriptions and left, on a Sunday, and I only had to pay him $12.50 That's pretty cool. Stephanie helped me out a lot even though I whined like a baby for days. And i'm much better, though it's been a wasted weekend. Cheers.

Gooooaaalllll!!!!

Yesterday, Took a trip to Mysore and saw a lot of palaces and temples and such. Good times. Even found mountain dew there. No lie. I'd go into details but I've lost the gumption. So suffice it to say the stuff was neat, and the mountain dew was delicious. I have medication for my dying foot, we'll see if I can keep it. My camera has been ganked so no more pictures from it. But Stephanie took the following pictures from the Mysore trip.

This Temple is 1300 years old.

Muslim Mosque, pretty cool.

Huuuge palace.

I'm not touching you, I'm not touching you.

Stampy!

This Camel is gnarly.

Another member of my Monkey army.

Howie got dotted, but I dodged the dot myself, i'm too fast for the priests in the temples.

Marrrry there is no hope for us. if this GM van don't make it across the state line then we might as well lay down and die cuz if Florida takes us, we're taking everyone down with us.

This weekend I went to commercial street with some people from work and I officially decided I hate that place. All kinds of shop trying to convince you to buy stuff, very miserable. Afterwords we went to this place where they play metal music and this guy from work Vikrant talked me into joining an air guitar contest. So I did, thus finding my true calling in life. Needless to say, I play a mean Air guitar and I won the contest. Course the prize was a Megadeath cd, which I'll probably never listen to. If you ask how I got so bitter, I'll ask how you got so vain.