I know you've all been glued to your computers waiting for my next post. So, here it is, a mere day and a half after the last one. (You should all try visualizing someone whose face is literally glued to their computer screen... It made me laugh... Twice.)
Anyway, last Saturday we went to the city of Haridwar, which is on the Ganges River and has an important Hindu temple, along with a huge Shiva statue. Shiva is said to be the destroyer god, but he also brings about rebirth, and the Ganges is supposed to flow down his hair. (River... rebirth... and all that). The Ganges was not as nasty as I expected it to be, but I'm told it gets worse at more important holy sites like Varanasi. We saw people swimming, drinking the water, washing their clothes, and there were idols in it too, among other things. There was no sign of the alleged red skin eating sludge though. In any case, I opted not to get in the water. The temple was high up in the mountains, and we took a gondola up there. It was like getting in a Ferris Wheel at Frontier City. We wandered around, looked at all the gods, and then made our way back out. Before you can leave, you have to walk by all the vendors that sell everything from tiny idols, to jewelry with scriptures on it, to Hannah Montana toys. Not to mention "Famous American Corn". The lines to the exit are long and narrow. They have to be narrow otherwise there would be no such thing as a "line," it would be a huge number of people all crowding their way on to gondolas. At one point, we saw the "emergency exit". It was a door that opened off the side of a cliff. I guess the idea is to gauge the emergency and decide if there's a chance you might survive, or if you should just leap off and die faster. Mercifully, we did not have to make such a decision.
Yesterday, we went to the Commonwealth Games. It's kind of like the Olympics for former members of the British Commonwealth. There was a choice between Badminton and Squash. I chose Badminton because I could not imagine anyone taking that game seriously. So, my friend and I set out. We walked quite some distance before we found a baby taxi to take us the rest of the way. Or so we thought... Our driver took us exactly 3 blocks, before arriving the athletes entrance to the game. Obviously, this was not where we wanted to be and we tried everything to convince our driver of that fact, but he would not believe us. He even brought over others to confirm his wrong opinion. Finally, out of options, we got out and continued on foot. What should have been a 5 minute ride, took us an hour and twenty minutes to walk. Then we went though security. The policewoman patted me down and then for some unknown reason took my hand and put it behind my back. Just one hand. She proceeded to move my hand from place to place on my back and twist me around, all the while speaking to me in Hindi, clearly expecting me to do what she said. It was really frustrating. My thought process went something like this:
Do you see me? White skin, blond hair, REALLY confused expression? Obviously, I don't understand and I have nothing remotely dangerous with me.
Finally, she let go of my hand. I don't know if we were done or not. I was still confused, so I just left. Eventually, we made it to venue and since we had just walked forever we brought drinks. After entering the stadium and walking up to our seats, we were told there was no food or drinks allowed and had to go back out. After chugging our drinks, we re-entered the stadium, and finally got to watch some Badminton. All I can say is, I'm sure it's much harder than it looks. We watched India beat Malaysia and England beat Canada in the quarter finals. The audience was really into the India game. It was actually fun. Afterward, exhausted, we took the first baby taxi we saw, and paid him way too much. We were just grateful we made it all the way home in a vehicle. Bring on the unique experiences!
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