by Gary | Jan 16, 2007 |
I now know there are sixteen official languages and another few dozen dialects that people really use. There are hues of skin color from very dark to very light. There are regional modes of dress with great distinction and variation. There are as many cusines as there are villages (I’ve been told about 56,000), and few can name but the top four or five of the dozens of religions that ebb and wane. Although officially outlawed, there are dozens of casts and hundreds of sub-casts that add texture to an already complex society. The economic structure supports at least six major groupings…..At the top there is The Very Rich, which every society must...
by Gary | Jan 15, 2007 |
Jaipur is the capital city of Rajasthan state situated on the edge of the Thar desert. It has a population of about 2.4 million with the roughly the same ethnic/religious make-up of the rest of northern India. That is to say Hindus comprise about 80% of the population. There are 53% males and 47% females….now there’s an odd statistic. Much of the city was actually planned by one of the many Singhs in the line of Singh Maharaja rulers, Sawai Jai Singh. It, unlike all other ancient Indian cities, is layed out on a rectangular block basis with streets running perpendicular to one another. Inside of the old city all buildings are painted pink (hence...
by Gary | Jan 14, 2007 |
The Delhi Belly, known in other parts as Montezuma’s Revenge and several other names, is what keeps most Americans at home. We’re so afraid of the food, and our stomachs have become so homoginized that we’d rather stay in Des Moines and eat Big Macs than venture out of our own shadow. Unfortunately, it’s more or less with good reason. There’s the odd thing is it doesn’t just effect tourists. Jonathon, the manager of the Aman I Khas said that they had to put in a water purification system in the nearby village where most of his workers lived to keep them healthy and coming to work. I took a “walkabout” with Jonathon through the grounds of his hotel to see...
by Gary | Jan 12, 2007 |
The reason people come here is to see the bengal tigers in the Ranthambore National Park which is also a game preserve and one of the few remaining places on the planet where there are active efforts to protect, preserve and increase the number of bengal tigers in the wild. At one time it is estimated that there was a population of over 3000 of these creatures in an area of only 300 sq km. Until relatively recently it served as a hunting preserve for princely majarajas and other dignitaries. Even after official hunting was outlawed, poachers ran rampant eventually almost decimating the tiger population in order to serve the chinese market for tigers paws...
by Gary | Jan 11, 2007 |
There’s no particular reason for headlining this picture other than I took it yesterday at a bird sanctuary. Not exactly what we’d see around Lyday Farms. I’m writing this in the aftermath of listening to Dubya’s speech escalating the war in Iraq, so I’m a little morose. I’m determined to put it aside for awhile and continue to enjoy our experiences here, but it’s hard to put aside the thoughts of the men and women who are fighting and dying (soldiers and civilians alike). There are many countries in the world in which the words “yes or no” have various shades of meaning. In Japan, for example, most of us know that “Hai, hai” could mean anything from...
by Gary | Jan 9, 2007 |
Our tour of Delhi was good as far as tours go. Most of what we saw you can see in any guide book, so I won’t bore you with the details of the mosques, temples, and memorials we visited. Our main challenge was to make it through the tour without dozing off. The eleven and a half hour time zone difference and twenty-three hours of travel was laying heavy on our enthusiasm. I, on the other hand, kept worrying about where I was going to find the next restroom. Even having limited myself to one cup of coffee wasn’t enough to give me comfort for long, and Delhi is not long on public toilet facilities. I think the highlight was our bicycle rickshaw ride through...
