Happy New Year 2008!

Molly and I are at the end of 9 months of travel with about 4 1/2 months left before we fly back to San Francisco. What an experience it has been so far!! We've taken around 2,000 pictures and met too many people to count across the UK, Europe, Africa, and Asia. The stories are being captured in our journals and blogs (moreso Molly's blog).

Believe it or not, we are getting homesick more and more these days, and we can't wait to return to the US in May and start writing a book (Molly doing the writing, and I'm producing illustrations). Maybe we can't make a living writing a book, but it's our dream and we are going to go for it!

The last two months in particular, we have really pushed ourselves in two tough countries; Nepal and India. We trekked in Nepal at 4,000 meters and as you may know, we are not campers!! But there we were, sitting in tiny 'teahouses' wrapped in sleeping bags with piles of blankets while dreading the walk outside to the bathrooms that would literally freeze over at night. Nepalese people are great and we felt very welcomed overall. Definitely we recommend that country if you are looking for great people, trekking, etc.

India was where we spent December, mostly touring Rajasthan and the famous architectural ruins of forts. We also rode camels in the desert one night, about 100kms from the Pakistan border. (With all that is now going on there, we have a more 'real' perspective on that country's woes than from the comfort of the sofa at home). India is tougher than Nepal for sure, with so much poverty and streets full of people, cows, honking auto rickshaws, camels, dogs, etc etc. Stimuli overload each day is the norm, and add to that being approached by maybe 50 people a day asking for money, or to try and sell you anything they possibly can. 'No thank you' and 'please, we just want to walk alone' are the two phrases we've had to robotically mumble throughout each day. Add to that the leering men EVERYWHERE that stare crudely at Molly. Really gross, and sadly not confined to poor villages. We had this problem at hotels, restaurants, etc. I've become a pro at standing or sitting between her and any guy that can't stop staring and more than once felt the urge to punch some idiot's lights out (which is completely not my nature!!). But India was also magical in ways we probably can't see quite yet. Visiting Varanasi and Bodh Gaya especially, we were really enjoying the spiritual aspects of this country.

Now we leave for Malaysia and Indonesia, and then on to Australia and New Zealand and the next chapter of our amazing trip. We are looking forward to warmer weather and new cultures to explore. It's the rainy season in Malaysia and Indonesia so we may head back to our favorite beaches in Thailand where we know it's sunny and beautiful.

Varanasi and Bodh Gaya so far

we are currently in Bodh Gaya, India. we arrived yesterday after a 'fun' train experience from Varanasi, that will definitely have to be detailed in the book. all we can say now is the European train experiences we had feel like 12 star hotel experiences in comparison.

in case you are wondering, we're on the 'Buddhist circuit' visiting a few important Buddhist sites that relate to the life of the Buddha. Bodh Gaya is famous as being in fact the most important Buddhist site in the world.

Wikipedia states:
"According to Buddhist traditions, circa 500 BC Prince Gautama Siddhartha, wandering as a monk, reached the sylvan banks of Falgu River, near the city of Gaya. There he sat in meditation under a bodhi tree (Ficus religiosa). After three days and three nights of meditation, Siddharta attained enlightenment and insight, and the answers that he had sought. He then spent seven weeks at seven different spots in the vicinity meditating and considering his experience. After seven weeks, he travelled to Sarnath, where he began teaching Buddhism." (we had just completed a nice day trip from Varanasi to Sarnath as well.)

both Bodh Gaya and Sarnath are interesting as they are relatively small Indian cities these days with only tens of thousands of people. meanwhile various monasteries have been built by various countries (in their typical styles) including Thailand, Japan, China, Korea, Burma, Tibet, etc. most are fairly new and while staying in these towns, it's pretty easy to walk to each and where possible go inside and even meditate or just sit peacefully. i plan to do some drawing here too. but the irony is that while these sites are famous for Buddhists and attract tourists and monks/nuns alike, the cities are dusty, polluted, rundown places that are difficult for relaxation and meditation. the noise and air pollution have really clobbered our ears and sinuses and in fact molly is fighting a sinus infection again right now after experiencing one in Kathmandu, where the air quality was equally bad.

i tell ya though, we are still amazed by how different India is from Nepal. we just flew here on the 29th after an awesome time in Nepal trekking and getting to see the sights in and around Kathmandu. the kindness of the Nepalese and the beauty of the country really had an impact on us. while in Nepal, we were fortunate to be invited to the home of our trip outfitter, Binod, on our last night in Kathmandu and enjoyed a typical dinner of papad (basically lentil 'tortilla' chips), dal (lentil soup), curried veggies, and fried chicken, and the best part; masala tea with milk and sugar for dessert. with cinnamon, clove, black pepper, ginger, etc, it's really yummy and a bit spicy. it was so interesting to see his home and meet his wife, son, and mother who all live in a house in the Kathmandu burbs. a particularly offbeat moment: all of us sitting around watching tom and jerry cartoons (Binod's son is 7 years old), but even Grandma seemed riveted.

sadly at the moment, our camera memory card is corrupted with a virus we inherited at an internet cafe, otherwise we'd share images from our time there. we are hopeful to wipe the virus and save the pictures once we get to a more modern country/city (Kuala Lumpur at the end of this month), but we may in fact lose some or all of the 800 pictures we took in Tibet, China and Nepal (except for those posted on shutterfly already). that would be devastating!

flying the 40 minutes from Kathmandu over the border into northern India and Varanasi was so weird. in such a short time, the world feels very different!! Varanasi is an ancient city - one of the world's oldest continually occupied - and frankly it shows! it's just a crazy place with an aged infrastructure. let me paint you a picture....

we stayed at a nice 2 star hotel for about $25/night, and it was probably the best constructed building in a 5 mile radius - but that's not saying much when most buildings look as though they will fall at any moment! right outside you find cows walking the streets eating and cutting off traffic at their whim. no, there isn't a pasture anywhere around, this is their turf (keep in mind that Indians don't eat beef as the cows are sacred and apparently allowed to roam free). the dirt/asphalt road is packed with bicycles, auto rickshaws, bicycle rickshaws, motorbikes, wild dogs, maybe a chicken or two. horns honk incessantly, and the smell of smoke from miscellaneous burning fires (trash as well as outdoor kitchens for people that i assume don't have kitchens indoors) add to the overall feeling of chaos. walking out the hotel door after a peaceful night's sleep and into this is better than 4 cups of coffee at waking up your senses! geesh, if anything it makes you want to head straight back into the hotel!!

Varanasi is famous these days for the ghats that line the Ganges River. Varanasi has nearly 100 ghats, used today for bathing, washing clothes, and cremation. did we mention how polluted the Ganges is? suffice it to say that bathing in it definitely cannot make you cleaner than you already are, but being physically cleaner isn't what it's about here.

Wikipedia.... "According to Hindus the river is sacred. It is worshipped by Hindus and personified as a goddess. Hindu belief holds that bathing in the river on certain occasions causes the forgiveness of sins and helps attain salvation."

we walked from the southern end of the ghats all the way up to the top over the course of about half a day, and witnessed so many strange and unbelievable sights it will probably take a month to fully digest and make sense of them. watching live cremations is something we had seen in great detail in Kathmandu recently which was a good thing because while Varanasi is famous for it, it was harder to actually observe because we were being hammered by locals trying to sell us various things or beg for money. the countless narrow passageways around the ghats reminded us of Venice as well as Morocco, but more dangerous - thanks to the cows and water buffalo that like to cruise around! they occasionally decide to start running through the alleys and we witnessed a small stampede requiring everyone to suddenly run the other way or take shelter (as we did) on small stairways to the side! i am not certain if our health insurance would cover us if we were trampled by a cow.

we are now planning to stay in Bodh Gaya for another 7 days possibly before heading to Agra to see the Taj Mahal and a few days later start our 2 week driving tour of Rajasthan. molly has said she wants to update her blog too, so stay tuned.

In Varanasi, India

It's December, and here we are 8 plus months into our trip now.
We are in Varanasi, India for a few days and heading to Bodhgaya next - the place where the Buddha was 'enlightened' under a Bodhi tree.

We are also currently a bit worried as we inherited a virus from an Internet cafe computer that has messed up our photo memory card with 800 plus photos from Nepal, Tibet, and China. We are waiting to get to a more 'civilized' place in the world before attempting to recover the photos. We are hopeful from reading on the web that the virus should be removed no problem with AVS, but we don't want to take any chances.

We'll post new pictures when we can but at this rate it will probably be in about a month, as our India itinerary for December is full of planned travel and includes a driver for about 2 weeks of it. Otherwise, it's India....so power outages, lame internet connections, etc, are the norm.

More later.

November update

Greetings from Kathmandu, where for the last 5 days we've been recovering from colds and enjoying the 'full world' change of the Thai beaches - think sun, surf, yummy food, massages, etc - to Kathmandu, Nepal - mountain air, city congestion and very 3rd world-y. Quite a shock indeed, but one we are up for!!!

Just posted new pics for China (Guanxi) and Thailand (beaches) on the right. Check 'em out!

Tomorrow we begin a 12 day trek through the Himalayas in the Anapurna Sanctuary. For more info, check this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annapurna

Back in a few weeks with news!

~D

What's New - October

In a nutshell....we were locked out of Blogger during our tour of China thanks to the government's banning of it and about 10% of the world's websites, so we couldn't write much of anything. That's fine as China was occupying our time rather nicely and internet cafe time was rare.

I've posted a link to more China pictures (Yunnan) on the right column for anyone interested. Also Molly has written a new blog recently (albeit about Africa, we're a bit behind here folks!) so check it out!

We're on a small island in Thailand called Koh Pha Ngan, just 45 minutes north of Samui - another popular island destination. This island is infamous for it's "full moon" parties of 10-30,000 people, but thankfully we'll be long gone by the time the next full moon arrives on the 26th!

Seriously though, this island is beautiful from the little we've seen so far. We've enjoyed swimming especially, having not seen ocean/sea water since Greece! The only downside really is the place is literally crawling with Israeli 20-something's. At the pool this morning, I felt that we looked like unhip, un-Euro, grandparents by comparison. It's crazy. Menus are trilingual (Thai, Hebrew, and English) and I'd say the tourist mix is 95% Israeli, and 5% everyone else (a handful of Brits, a few Scandinavians, and maybe one or two Americans). Molly and I have agreed that any place we go that is completely dominated by one tourist country is a big turn-off and something the guidebooks or online resources should do a better job of communicating, without sounding racist, etc. Other Thai islands we've visited are overrun by Swedes, and even Manali, India, was again swarming with young Israeli's. But how do all these people from one country know to come here? Wouldn't they rather go places with more tourist diversity?

Now that we are back to cheap and easy internet cafe sites, I am able to check on the Red Sox again (Yahhhhhh!). I have noted in my journal the playoff brackets and wrote "2007 - the year I missed every game of the season". Things started with a bang in Boston last night as the Sox won 10-3 vs. Cleveland's best pitcher.

Cheers.

New Pictures Posted!

Time has been tight on the internet yet again, but I did manage to upload new photos from our time recently in Bangkok (and a day trip to Ayuthaya), China (Chengdu and surroundings), and Tibet. See the side bar "Pictures So Far" and click on the links to view.

We depart for Kunming by bus tomorrow and then on to Guilin by plane. We are loving our current spot, Dali, where we sit in bright sunshine with cooler temperatures and great inexpensive guesthouses and restaurants.

Hopefully more soon.
Love,
David

What's New...

African volunteering pictures and India pictures have been posted. See right side under "Pictures So Far".

Also check Molly's blog for new stories.