Amazingly, we've survived the raucous and non-stop India. Horns seem to blare at all hours of the day and night and everyone is selling something. We managed to spend a day in Agra checking out the Taj, Agra Fort and Akbhar's Tomb (though not via train as we had hoped.)
What you can't tell from this picture (reduced quality and blocked partially by autorickshaw shade) is that this is a school bus full of kids. The capitalist mindset of India never ceased to amaze.
A must after traveling so far.
Kareem and the Taj from Agra Fort. I doubt all 20,000 of those workers were "volunteers" but its still an incredible testament to a man's love for a woman.
The Indians really have the English thing down but something is always lost in translation.
Red Fort in Delhi. Not quite as cool as the National Museum which has some pretty spectacular pieces of history in addition to A/C.
People on the whole are very friendly and just like to talk and find out where we are from (if they are not selling something or we've convinced them we're not buying), except for this guy, who we finally figured out wanted us to get in his car. Needless to say, it didn't happen.
View from the back of an autorichshaw.
Finally escaping to Nepal, we spent several days recovering from our wounds (real and imagined) in touristy Kathmandu; seeing the sights, soaking up some western tinged culture and learning Nepali. The street vendors here are a bit friendlier and there seems to be a constant chant at some corners, "Smoke? Hash? Marijuana? Trekking? Sex? Injection?" After a few days this subsided - though only slightly. At least we have a pretty good view through the smog from the top of our hotel.
Our teacher for a few days was the stunning Urmila, a college sophmore who also doubles as an excellent teacher. She held our attention much better than any alternatives we could see.She also served as a tour guide to several temples and Durbar Square, below.
We met another Yankee, Dan Keezer of NY who was doing the same thing as us but in agriculture and teaching rather than the medical route. He was a great guy to hang around with (which is more than he had to say about the monkeys.)
The local food is pretty awesome, I highly recommend the Buff Kothay Mo-Mo (half fried/half steamed ground yak dumpling). No picture, but instead you can look at the cute son of Mr. Rijal Matrika our coordinator for the clinics and hospitals we plan on working in.
The history of the western world pales in comparison to some of the Stupas and temples we've seen in more than age.
The largest Buddhist Stupa in Nepal, Boudanath, is located in Kathmandu as is Pashupatinath, temple of Shiva where cremations are held on the holy Bagmati River (feeds the Ganges.)
Turn the wheels for good fortune.
The eyes are watching....
Dan found a thousand rupee note on the ground and gave it to the monks at Boudanath. In return we got to light incense and candles and received these sweet prayer scarves.
We were incredibly lucky to see the end of one cremation and the beginning of another at Pashupatinath. Below the temple on the right is where the funeral/cremation for the deceased members of the Royal Family was held. We left Kathmandu on 9/14/09 headed for Lamjung province to begin working in a district hospital and as we were told eating Dal bhaat for lunch and dinner (Nepali's don't really do the bacon and egg thing - they stop after some delicious chiya) . After and 7 or so hour bus ride we arrived - the hospital is a great resource to the community and we jumped right in rounding on the inpatients at 9am each day and then flexing our medical might in the ED. There are an astonishing number of abcesses, broken bones and of course enteric fever..... as well as good local places to eat when we want a change from lentils and rice.
This is just a snippet of where we've been and what we've seen so far. Updates have been and will continue to be spotty as we really don't know what lies ahead and can't always remember where we've been. In addition to seemingly scheduled power outages there are also the random flickers and blackouts that make life here interesting. More pictures of our time since arriving in Nepal to follow as soon as a reliable computer becomes available.
