Sunday, February 27, 2011

No, we are not greedy!

What we were eating yesterday (2 people):

2 Lassis
2 Croissant
2 Brown Roll
1 Momos
1 Veg. Pulav
1 Chai
1 Veg Noodles
1 Veg. Biryani
2 special Lassis
5 big peanut cookies
2 big almond cookies
2 strange veg burgers
1 Masala Dosa
2 Bonbons

Maybe we should mentions the fact that we had half of the things between 7 and 9 pm. Just for your information.


Rrrrrrajasthan!


So we're finally officially in the north of India.
We started our Rajasthan-tour in Jodhphur, followed by Jaisalmer where we are now.
Tomorrow we'll catch a train to Jaipur. (lots of cities that has a name starting with a J here...)

This is India as you know it from the postcards.
Sandstone buildings, women dressed in the most beautiful coulours and the biggest jewellery,
camels, men in turbans. Gatherings of men here and there watching the world championships in cricket
on small TV-screen. And the temperatures here suits us better. You don't feel like melting all the time.

The only clouds on our sky is that:

We had such good Khir (ricepudding) in Mumbai and have been haunting for it in every restaurant since.
Mission unsuccessfull  so far.

You can't have everything.

Tomorrow we're renting a motorbike.
The Rajasthani fairytale to be continued, now we're going for breakfast.




Thursday, February 24, 2011

This is for crazy Neo: the monkey incident

 It was in th middle of the day at Elephanta Caves in Mumbai.
It was hot. I was really really thirsty and I bought a cold bottle of mango juice.
To make it clear to everyone how serious this situation is I first have to explain
that it's not everyday I buy mango juice just like that. It's way more expensive than water and
usually I would have a bottle of "homemade" (Simi has these pills she uses to clean tapwater with )water instead. But now I was out of water. I was enjoying time in Mumbai and I allowed myself this treat.

This badass-monkey came up to me and tried to take my dear mango juice-bottle from me.
Since first of all, think stealing is wrong and for the second I don't like to be messed around with it developed into a fight about the bottle.

I don't really know what happend, but I lost the fight.
And the monkey happily sat down on a stone an unscrewed the cap and drank the rest of my
juicy cold mango juice.I really think he was smiling. Smiling out of happiness only such a victory like that can bring.

I was pissed about loosing against a monkey in a fight, and about having no juice left on
this very sunny day.

So, just wanted to tell you guys. In India: guard your mango juice.
.


 

A bisserl raunzen

Es gibt ein paar Dinge, and die ich mich in Indien einfach nicht gewoehnen kann. Und weil heute so ein Tag ist, an dem ich sie wieder mehr als sonst gespuert hab, gibts einen Blogeintrag:

1) Das Hupen. Irgendwie haben die Inder verpasst, warum Autos und Motorraeder Hupen haben. Also was der wirkliche Sinn dahinter ist. Die Leute hier moegen das Gerausch anscheinend so sehr, dass sie rund um die Uhr die schoensten Hupkonzerte veranstalten, sehr zur Freude meiner Ohren. Wirklich: Es wird gehupt, wenn jemand auch nur irgendwie in der Naehe ist, wenn man um die Kurve faehrt (weil man nicht um die Kurve sehen kann), wenn jemand im Weg ist, und wenn gar nichts ist, kann es ja auch nicht schaden, zur Sicherheit mal zu Hupen. 

2) Zuege in Mumbai. Es ist echt unglaublich. Sobald der Zug stehen bleibt, fangen alle Frauen (es gibt getrennte Maenner- und Frauenwaggons) an, sich zur Tuere zu draengeln, um sich dann einen gnadenlosen Boxkampf zu liefern, wenn der Zug am ausrollen ist. Es gibt naemlich keine Tueren (das mag ich allerdings sehr). Wenn man dann endlich im Zug drinnen ist, gibt es eine Ordnung, wer wo sitzen kann, und man darf auf keinen Fall im mittleren Gang stehen, wenn man nicht bei der naechsten Sation aussteigt, sonst wird man angekeppelt. Das Aussteigen ist das Schlimmste. Man koennte doch meinen, dass alles schon ueberstanden ist, aber nein. Schon 5 Minuten bevor der Zug in die Station einrollt, schubsen alle Frauen und erklaeren, dass man sich doch gefaelligst beeilen soll. Und wenn man sich nicht wirklich beeilt, wird man einfach von der Masse mitgezerrt. Und man muss ernsthaft aufpassen, dass die Hand nicht im Zug stecken bleibt, wenn man endlich draussen ist.

3) Warteschlangen. Siehe Punkt 2. Es gibt keine Regeln, nur Aug um Aug, Zahn um Zahn. Anstehen hat keinen Sinn, man muss sich nach vorne pruegeln. Das alles geschieht dann auch noch bei so einem Laerm, dass einem die Ohren fast abfallen, weil unzaehlige verrueckte Inder gleichzeitig schreien, dass sie an der Reihe sind.

4) Bettelnde Kinder. Das ist ein schwieriger Punkt. Und ich sage es sehr ungern, aber es nervt. Bettler lieben uns, und bleiben immmer eine halbe Ewigkeit vor uns stehen, bevor sie uns endlich in Ruhe lassen. Aber die Kinde rennen uns sogar nach, ziehen an unseren Haenden, klopfen auf die Arme und ziehen an den Kleidern. Und ich weiss einfach nicht, wie ich damit umgehen soll.

5) Und das ist keine Ueberraschung: Maenner. Obwohl wir kleidungsmaessig schon versuchen uns unter die Bevoelkerung zu mischen, fallen wir natuerlich auf. Und es vergeht kein Tag, an dem wir nicht mindestens 10 Mal gefragt werden, wie es uns geht, woher wir kommen und wohin wir gehen. Oder einfach nur ein simples "Hi!" Dabei bleibt es dann auch, es ist also nicht bedrohlich oder besonders unangenehm, aber es is sooo nervig.

6) Leute die uns "unauffaellig" fotografieren oder filmen. Viele indische Touristen fragen uns, ob sie ine Foto mit uns machen duerfen. Das ist ok, manchmal sogar sehr nett oder witzig. Aber andere fragen nicht, sondern tun es einfach, was nicht besonders nett ist, wenn man gerade am Essen ist oder einfach in Ruhe gelassen werden will.

So, das war mal meine Top 6 fuer heute. Ich liebe Indien!


Sunday, February 20, 2011

We're in Mumbai, Baby!






Our four days in Mumbai were intense. Nearly no sleep, bollywood movies, a museum, a ferrytrip and UNESCO-caves. Long conversations. Scrambled eggs, crowded trains, some clubbing, bazaars, in-the-middle-of-the-night-car-rides, good coffee at a real cafe.. you name it.


Our Mumbai stay had it all.
Thanks to the "Mumbai-gang", you made our stay.



Thursday, February 17, 2011

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

What's so special about India #3

Yesterday we arrived in Calicut, the sun was already going down, and so we wanted to find a hotel as soon as possible.

So we looked down the road. Hotel- signs everywhere. Yipiiie! For sure we are going to find something here! But then (and as experienced south India travellers of course we've known that for a long time) we discovered that about half of the so-called "Hotels" are only restaurants. To make this more confusing, hotel CAN mean hotel, but not necessarily. All the restaurants are called hotel, and all the hotels too. I wonder who got this amazing idea!

Sunday, February 6, 2011

A day in food :

The Indian cuisine has so far provided us with mixed experiences. Ordering in restaurants is not easy when the menu (if there is one) as well could be written in hebrew. This is what we might eat during one day. Forgive us for maybe not knowing the exact name of all the side-dishes. We are still learning :)

For breakfast: Puri, dough that when is being deep-fried. puffs up to a ball. 
Here served toghether with Vadai (lentil-dough-also-deep-fried-thingy)
coconut chutney and potatosauce.
Puri is so far our favourites among the Indian breakfasts
Lunch this day: Thali. Rice and appam (the crunchy bread) toghether with severeal different kinds
chutneys, pickles and sambar. Served on a  banana-leaf. Of course.

For dinner: Masala dosa. A big "pancake" stuffed with potato.
Simis favourite.







A glimpse of the Keralan Backwaters





Travellers jokes:


The Lonley planet India is our bible.

N: I'm thirsty!
S: I read about it the lonley planet. It says you should drink.






Friday, February 4, 2011

Once two kids were playing in the pool..





what's so special about India # part 2


The mysterious headshake.

We're used to the that shaking your head means "no".
In India on the other hand it means...guess what? - yes.

This might be confusing to travellers like ourselves.
Many times this is the only answer you'll get. The person you are speaking to won't
say anything, he or she will simply shake their head.

- Is this bus going to Chennai?
-headshake
- Simi he says the this isn't the right bus!

-Is this the right way?
-headshake

- Do you serve dinner?
-headshake


You get the point.
To make it even more interesting, sometimes it means "maybe" too.
Well well, when you start understanding then comes the difficulty in changing your own habits.
Today Simi was haggling about the price with a rickshaw-driver. He proposed it would cost us rs 150. Simone didn't agree so she shook her head, and the driver was happy about a good deal for a few moment.





No, I'm not dead.


The doctor told me I could leave the hospital today.
Which makes me happy. Staring out the hospital window was driving me crazy;

I have been in better shape. The 15 minute walk to our hotel made me wanna fall asleep,
most kinds of food isn't tempting at all, and my stocmach really has a life of it's own.(This I am not
going to give you any details about, it"s no fairytale) I guess this is just something you have to prepared for when going to India. My antibiotics is starting to do their thing and sooner or later I'll be back on my feet.

So no worries poeple!
Next week I'll get the result of some tests they took,
and until then we'll do not too exhausting things .
(like walking around a mountain twice a day or something as clever)


Puss&Kram!
/Nina


Thursday, February 3, 2011

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Becoming Indian

After visiting Madurai and Kanyakumari (the southest point of India!), and after hour of painful bus rides, we finally arrived in Kottayam, whereone of Ninas friends parents-in-law live. Jacob and Jaya have a very nice house a bit away from the centre, and they welcomed us as if we were their own grand children.

And so we got our first Indian culture lessons: how to wear a saree, how to eat properly, how to pronounce Malayalam (the language in Kerala), how to open a coconut the right way (there are so many coconut trees here!)... after some days and clothes shopping they told us: Now you are Indians!


Unfortunately Nina became sick after the first day, and so I had to entertain myself a bit. I made an apple duck, and Jaya showed me some traditional Keralan dishes. On the picture you see Achappam (yes, I remembered the word!), some deep fried cookies/crunchy things.



After nearly a week Nina felt better, and so we left for Alleppey, which we reached by ferry. But then she felt sick again, and so we decided to change our plans and go directly to Kochi, where we are now. Nina is in hospital for a day or two (dhe has an infection), and I wander along the streets here. It is a beautiful city. A bit too many tourists maybe, but really beautiful. In the morning I took the ferry to come to another island (Kochi is spread over some islands), and I really enjoyed the view over the sea. So now I just hope that Nina gets out of hospital soon, so that she can enjoy it too.

Remembering Tiruvannamalai

Every full moon, thousands of pilgrims come to Tiruvannamalai, to walk 14 kilometres around a holy mountain. We decided to join them. When we arrived we were not uite sure if full moon really means full moon, and so we did the walk during noon and the afternoon. We were not the only ones, but there were definitely not thousands, and so we thought, maybe the guide book is wrong. But after dinner we realized that full moon really means full moon, and as we like to do things two times anyway, we joined them again. It was amazing. Though still - the Hindu rituals seem quite unusual for a Westerner. People begave more like on a sunday excursion with their families: There is a lot of food, entertainment, people are shouting, laughing and enjoying themselves. With bare feet. As an honour to Shiva the walk has to be done with no shoes on. (we did it bare feet the first time, but not the second)