Author Topic: Travel Culture  (Read 6461 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

guest7

  • Guest
Re: Travel Culture
« Reply #75 on: January 22, 2018, 08:47:31 pm »
Imagine if you see someone you work with!  You could have so much fun with them...

Offline Michael Hardner

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 12477
Re: Travel Culture
« Reply #76 on: January 23, 2018, 05:13:08 am »
I like seeing you beautiful people.   :)

Wow.  You are pretty !

Offline Michael Hardner

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 12477
Re: Travel Culture
« Reply #77 on: January 23, 2018, 05:13:41 am »
Me neither.  Wouldn't want crackpots who disagree with me showing up on my page.   But here's a pic of me at work.

:)  Smiley face !

Offline Michael Hardner

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 12477
Re: Travel Culture
« Reply #78 on: January 23, 2018, 06:34:02 am »
I love a cutie smile !

Offline BC_cheque

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Posts: 2237
Re: Travel Culture
« Reply #79 on: January 23, 2018, 03:39:25 pm »
Goddess and dia, you brave souls!  I can't bring myself to post a pic (maybe one day) but it's very nice to put a face to your names. 

You're both beautiful.

Offline msj

  • Jr. Member
  • **
  • Posts: 368
  • I'm outta here...
  • Location: Vancouver Island
Re: Travel Culture
« Reply #80 on: January 23, 2018, 11:38:24 pm »
On with the tour.

We arrive at Khajuraho airport and we are the only plane there.  Probably about 150 people total so the airport is quiet as we pick up our bags and head to the bus.  Beautiful airport with art all around.

We are going to visit the western temples famed for their erotic sculptures featured in the Kama Sutra.  These Hindu temples are spread out over a wonderful landscape that felt more Buddhist than Hindu.  Saw the famous 69 sculpture and the ones with bestiality and everyone had a good laugh.

 The following day we leave by bus and then train for Agra. 

But, the bus gets a flat tire so the spare is put on and we drive down the road and find the nearest tire repair shop for a fix.

This part, between Khajuraho and Agra reminds me of Eastern France with the mustard seed in full bloom and the yellows and greens bright in the hills and fields.

Agra:  it is now December 30 and we are waiting in line outside the Gate to enter the Taj Mahal.  It is dark and foggy and cold (well, for the Aussies it was cold, for us Canadians it was warm - probably around 8 degrees or so).

Finally, the gates open and we rush forward. 

Then we stop, wait our turn to get patted down, women to the left and men to the right.

Once through security we explore this wondrous site.  The history, the glorious white marble, the ... fog so thick you can't see a thing.

Finally we find the temple but the fog is so think you cannot see the domes even when they should be right in front of you.

Fortunately, we manage to get inside before the crowds are too much.

Some of our group are disappointed.  I don't mind as it is a truly unique experience and, well, I did not go to India for the Taj.

Later, as the fog lifts, we go to the Agra Fort. This is more like it! Moats that held crocodiles (or is it alligators?) and pens for tigers.  Boiling oil could be spilled from there and huge boulders could roll down the slope crushing any attackers over here.  Sharp turns are used to prevent elephants from using their strength/speed to batter down gates since they cannot turn sharply. 

This Fort is awesome.

Then, we are off on a very long bus ride to Ranthambore National Park. 

Ranthambore National Park:  We arrive for a late dinner and head off to bed.

In the early morning we rise, have breakfast, and head out on a large open canopy bus.

We find a tiger "pug mark" and scan for tigers.  In the end we see a variety of wildlife but no tigers.  A very peaceful way to spend the morning.

Arrive back at our hotel for lunch and soon we head out again for the afternoon safari and a walk amongst some ruins.

We do not see a tiger this time either but we get very close. There are so many tourists here that vehicles are doing everything they can to not collide as they head off in various directions chasing the poor tiger(s) that has been sighted.  At one point I fear that a vehicle is going to hit ours at high speed as they are reversing so I brace myself for an impact that is averted at the last second.

It was quite exciting but my favourite part was watching the sambar deer sitting down chewing and not giving a f^ck in the world about us being 10 feet away.

Now it is nightfall so we head back to the hotel in preparation of dinner, some traditional Hindu music and dancing, and then the fireworks to celebrate a new year.  The fireworks are fired off right above our heads so debris is raining down upon us because India, like Ecuador for example, understands fun rather than safety.

Then the dance music comes on (as in EDM) so we can dance the night away since tomorrow is yet another long bus ride to Jaipur...

I've gotta have more cow bell! -Bruce Dickinson
Like Like x 1 Love Love x 1 View List

Offline msj

  • Jr. Member
  • **
  • Posts: 368
  • I'm outta here...
  • Location: Vancouver Island
Re: Travel Culture
« Reply #81 on: January 28, 2018, 10:37:35 am »
On to Jaipur: we would spend two nights here in the “Pink City” (which was more of a salmon colour to me, but whatevs).

We got to see the “wind palace” which is this weird looking building ... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawa_Mahal

Also visited the city palace, Amber Fort, and the Jantar Mantar observatory which is a highlight: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jantar_Mantar,_Jaipur

I was getting cranky with the tour group by this time so I skipped a dinner with a local family. My wife is a little less introverted than me so she went along with the tour group.

They went to the local family’s house where they prepared a wonderful meal. The food was good (no surprise) and the family very interesting.  It was a nice experience to interac with the locals and see how they live and blah blah blah I was so tired of eating 3 meals a day with these people even though I really am fond of them....I had a lovely curry meal, alone, in the hotel restaurant while trying to pick out bits of conversation from a French couple who were speaking french at a table across from me. 

With my “me” time satiated I was willing to spend free time shopping with the group on the next day.

I wanted to replace my wedding band in India. My current one was purchased at the Comox First Nation back in my university days (so it is on the cheap side).

I also was feeling miffled towards the FN artist community for their usual bullshit complaining about appropriation of “their” art. 

So, in a fit of (racist?) rage I swore to my wife that I would replace my wedding band with, ha, isn’t this so ironically funny?, a plain gold band purchased in INDIA. 

Meh, by the time I got to a decent jewellery store months after my “post CBC radio rage moment” I no longer cared (although I am unlikely to purchase FN art going forward but this is a topic for another thread).

Anywho, almost bought the wife some nice earrings but at $1,200 US, and being large hoops, even the wife wasn’t interested.

Much of the jewellery was nice but very bling-y and too close to being like costume jewellery. We prefer minimalistic pieces so we passed and I promised to make it up to her next time we are in Greece (which is a clever way to convince her to go back to Greece, no?).   

Jojawar: after a long bus ride we arrived to this small town. The hotel was more like a luxury boutique Hacienda.

We arrived in the afternoon and soon headed out for a train ride.

First, getting to the train was an experience. We climbed aboard an old (1940’s?) Chevrolet pickup truck. 

Drove through town and then down some winding roads (past a cow carcass being enjoyed by some feral dogs) to arrive at the train station.  Very rural: this was not the train station from Mysore or Chennai we had experienced earlier in our trip.

It was like a scene from the old west but with “east Indians.” We got on the train for a bit of a joy ride.  The doors are left open so you get to hang out of the train as it moves slowly to the next towns/villages. A very relaxing ride involving numerous stops, monkeys climbing onto the train to get some food from the locals (the train is more for tourists but the locals still use it to get around), and beautiful vistas.

After a while we get off, climbed aboard the Chevrolet that has followed us, and headed back to the hotel to watch the sun set from the roof and then have drinks and dinner before heading off to our last stop the next morning.

Udaipur: before coming here we walked the small town of Jojawar in the morning. Came across a woman with bracelets up and down her arms and with her head loaded with kitchen utensils and pots and pans she was trying to sell.  I was already overweight for the flight back to Dehli so I passed buying any of the heavy frying pans and pots. 

Then it was a bus ride to Udaipur.  It was very interesting as we got closer as the roadside marble shops dotted the roadside. 

This place felt wealthy and probably is nearly as wealthy as Kerala in the south.

But instead of the sweet/pungent smell of spices, here it was the sweet white dust of marble.

Dump trucks were full of marble carrying marble stone, rock, chips, dust, every which way.

Udaipur is a lakeside town and it reminded me of Kelowna in BC’s Okanagan.

Relaxed, laid back, lakeside comfort.  It was warm during the day and not too bad at night.

We did the usual: lakeside boat cruise, city palace, Jagdish Temple tour.

Did some shopping and sat in restaurants near the lake enjoying drinks and Indian food.

After a couple of nights our long journey was about to come to an end as we flew back to Dehli before, eventually saying good bye to our new friends and taking the long flight home to Vancouver.

But man, showering at the hotel in Richmond was so nice. Clean water that you could brush your teeth with and clean your body with without feeling grimy!

 
I've gotta have more cow bell! -Bruce Dickinson
Like Like x 1 Love Love x 1 View List

Offline Michael Hardner

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 12477
Re: Travel Culture
« Reply #82 on: January 28, 2018, 11:24:01 am »
Ha !  The feeling of my first shower in Reno, after coming back from BurningMan is always amazing.

I really like the look of the wind palace.  The trip sounds too adventuresome for me.  Do you get car sick / food sick much when there ?

Thanks for the shares.

Offline msj

  • Jr. Member
  • **
  • Posts: 368
  • I'm outta here...
  • Location: Vancouver Island
Re: Travel Culture
« Reply #83 on: January 28, 2018, 12:28:31 pm »
We had many opportunities to buy gravol at any number of pharmacies but never did.

Would have made the bus rides more enjoyable.

They treat the lines on the road as guidelines and the movement is constant and too much like Frogger if you ever played that videogame.

Constantly passing and being passed. Constantly dodging cows, goats, people. Speeding up and slowing down.

Avoiding head-on crashes on too many occasions. 

I could not read on the bus so listened to audible books and watched a couple of movies I had downloaded from Netflix.

My type of vacation because I could get reading in while travelling between places which is better than sitting on a beach. 

But my wife had an episode on one of the train rides: she passed out so I gave her CPR just in case (but only 18 reps while trying to get the timing right as I silently hummed “another one bites the dust” at 110 beats per minute), then she vomited all over the train seat, and then we were whisked away to the train emergency medical for some fluid and some other shot to her arm which left a nasty bruise for 2 weeks.

We saw a doctor when we got home but who knows if that was motion sickness/heat sickness or what....

We had hydration type stuff with us so I made her drink that and she got better.
I've gotta have more cow bell! -Bruce Dickinson

Offline Michael Hardner

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 12477
Re: Travel Culture
« Reply #84 on: January 28, 2018, 05:27:40 pm »
Crikey that's a scary one.  I hope I never have to do that.

Offline msj

  • Jr. Member
  • **
  • Posts: 368
  • I'm outta here...
  • Location: Vancouver Island
Re: Travel Culture
« Reply #85 on: February 19, 2018, 03:39:00 pm »
A few more things on India before I forget them:

The men are pigs.  In the South they were not too bad but in the North they are nothing less than sexist pigs.

I pointed out to my wife how strange it was to hardly see any women walking the streets. Even during the day time not too many.

At night, even less.

A few incidents:

1) Indian men would stare at the women in our tour group, sometimes the men would grab their junk, other times make a strange whistle/sucking/clicking sound. 

2) In Kochi (in the South) the wife needed her passport to get the sim card for her phone.  I decided to leave her in the store and walk to the hotel just down the road and bring it back.

While I was gone, the guy helping her stopped talking to her and everything froze until I got back. As soon as I was present they could continue doing business.  Who knows what they think of this strange Canadian who would leave his wife to fend for herself in a store full of men.  But, at least they left her alone.

3) Indians like to take selfies and pictures of tourists and the men especially like to do this of female tourists. Our tour guides explained that they will go onto FaceBook and claim to be the boyfriend of the woman in the picture. Probably harmless fun but still creepy.

A few women did this to me (one of the security guards at the hotel in New Delhi for example) so who knows what they did with the picture of a middle-aged accountant with women who could be his daughter.

4) Locks on the doors.  I thought it was strange that the hotel door would open with a pad lock. Strange because anyone with a padlock could lock you in your hotel room. 

Fine, but what is even stranger is to find locks on the inside AND outside of doors within the hotel (the bathroom for instance).

When we did some homestay/cooking classes in Indian homes my wife noticed this.  Our tour guide in the north is a woman so when asked about this it was explained that those locks could be used for many purposes. It was implied that one of the purposes would be to lock the wife in the bathroom or for the woman to lock herself in the bathroom for defense purposes. 

Either way, I found no reason to try out such a system on my wife and, thankfully, she did not try it on me.

5) There were a few times when we were visiting roadside bathrooms that my wife made sure I hung around (both for her benefit and some of the other women in the tour benefit). 

Not a surprise I guess given that many women in the Indian countryside risk UTI's as they try to only go to the bathroom in the privacy of the night. That is, they will try to hold it all day to avoid the male gaze during the day.

6) Upon returning home we had to wander the streets of Richmond looking for a meal due to renovations at the kitchen in the hotel (and after a long flight we were not happy about this - but first world problems). 

She mentioned how nice it was to not be "on edge" while walking around at night.

She always had to put on this tough/brave face and brace herself to deal with the stares/leering/whistling/junk grabbing pigs in India. 

In Canada she has dealt with piggy men - no doubt, most of us men are pigs.  But Indian men take it to a whole new level.

7) Did see some girls/women dressed in the full burka.  Even walked by one standing on the roadside waiting to get picked up. Fascinating how they have the makeup on to highlight whatever parts are showing (just the eyes in this case)

More often you could see their full face with just as much makeup as most Muslim women wore the hijab.

I often wonder if, in a few generations, there will be a scientific way to measure whether or not the faces of Muslim women changed over time (sort of as a Darwinian selection).

What I mean is - whether certain facial traits will be selected over certain others which will lead to a strong tendency in those traits.

8) In Varanasi when we toured the silk making facilities the men and women from the tour had to be segregated. The women got to go see some Muslim women at work. The men could not go because the women were working and wearing casual clothes to work in.  You would not want to be wearing a head scarf around any of the machinery as it would have been very dangerous.

I saw pictures that were taken by some on our tour and they looked like any other young women working but the rules are the rules.

9) When we left New Delhi we got the taxi ride with a women's group that has started a taxi company that has the purpose of providing jobs for battered/abused women.

The taxi has a sign on it so anyone going by essentially knows that the woman driving has been abused in some way.

The looks she/we were getting from some of the drivers were intense at times. 

I don't know: maybe it's bad enough that a woman is driving but even worse that a battered woman is driving and she is basically holding up a middle finger to the pigs around her? 

10) We jumped on a public bus a couple times in the south. The women go to the front and the men stay in the back. I thought this was unfair as I like to sit in the front but I was not about to protest.

Despite this, my wife still had a good time and still loves India. But no doubt it is much easier to navigate with a man and/or in a tour.


I've gotta have more cow bell! -Bruce Dickinson
Like Like x 1 View List

Offline msj

  • Jr. Member
  • **
  • Posts: 368
  • I'm outta here...
  • Location: Vancouver Island
Re: Travel Culture
« Reply #86 on: February 25, 2018, 10:35:22 pm »
Realized I forgot to tell this little story from the time my wife was sick.

As previously mentioned, we arrived in Chennai by train (about 7 hours) and she goes unconscious so I do the CPR thing, she pukes, we get whisked to the emergency medical at the train station. The tour group gets on the bus for the journey to Mamallapuram.

The tour guide is going to stay with us but is getting the group to the bus after dropping us at the medical room.

While in the room I explain what happened to what I assume are nurses (in training if not for real). They put her on IV for liquids and hook her up to the EKG machine etc. 

Not sure if they realized that I’m her husband as they shoo me out of the room to examine her in privacy.

So I wait outside amongst the crush of people. Even though it is 11pm the train station is still pretty busy.

Finally, allowed back in and this is when the doctor wants to talk to me.

So we talk and I explain to him what happened on the train.

He seemed to think talking to the nurses and me was good enough and didn’t need to examine my wife.

So, now my wife, weak and puke stained, wants to clean up before we get a cab with the tour guide.

We find the bathrooms and I pay 10 rupees. My wife just staggers into the bathroom so I quickly try to follow her in.

Not the thing to do in India.

A young man jumps in front of me to stop me from going into the wrong washroom.

He is looking psycho like I am a drag queen walking into the womens washroom at Mar-a-Lago during a Republican convention.

I try to explain “medical, medical” to no avail. The guide finally explains to the lady who took the money, in the local language, so she goes into the washroom and helps my wife.

The guy, now realizing I’m not some stupid, drunken tourist, was so apologetic to the point of being Canadian.

Finally, the wife comes out looking better-ish and we jump in the cab for the hour or so ride to our hotel (cost 1,200 rupees).

It was quite the night and although we had medical insurance and I tried to get them to take my medical nsurance card they simply passed us through.

It was a strange mix of culture and language that I would only want to repeat if it didn’t involve the medical emergency part.

I've gotta have more cow bell! -Bruce Dickinson

Offline Michael Hardner

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 12477
Re: Travel Culture
« Reply #87 on: February 27, 2018, 07:09:41 am »
Augh.  This is about my worst nightmare.

Mrs. Hardner accidentally OD'd on weed once at BurningMan and I had to take care of her, take her to medical etc.  The worst.

Offline JMT

  • Administrator
  • Full Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 3462
  • Location: Waterhen, Manitoba
Re: Travel Culture
« Reply #88 on: February 28, 2018, 11:16:14 am »
I smoked 'legal' weed in Nevada this week.  It was good.  I pretty much consider it to be my first (and second, and third, and fourth) time.  It was a fun trip overall.  I think it allowed my girlfriend and I to work out some of our relationship issues.  I was happy with our life, but, she wasn't apparently.  She's going to move home with her family, and I'll see her on weekends.  We'll take things from there.  It's going to be a big change for someone like me who hates sleeping alone.
Sad Sad x 1 View List

Offline Goddess

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 817
Re: Travel Culture
« Reply #89 on: February 28, 2018, 12:10:24 pm »
I smoked 'legal' weed in Nevada this week.  It was good.  I pretty much consider it to be my first (and second, and third, and fourth) time.  It was a fun trip overall.  I think it allowed my girlfriend and I to work out some of our relationship issues.  I was happy with our life, but, she wasn't apparently.  She's going to move home with her family, and I'll see her on weekends.  We'll take things from there.  It's going to be a big change for someone like me who hates sleeping alone.

Where did you stay?  What did you do?  How was the weather?  I'm so homesick sometimes......
"A religion without a Goddess is half-way to atheism."