End of India... beginning of Israel (Heidi)

I love reading all the fabulous posts!! Yay! Can't wait to see the Ghanan skirts, and it's just so good to hear that everyone is having an amazing time, even if there are gunshots involved (hope you're staying safe, Jeff).

My last week in India was simply amazing. Sara and I took a trip up north to Manali, a mountain town nestled in the foothills of the Himilayas. It was a quick trip (34 hours of travel for 36 hours there), but it was memorable and totally worth it. After a flight to Delhi and a 14 hour over-night drive, awaking to the beauty of the area instantly erased any thoughts of the distressing travel. It was like looking at Glacier National Park (western Montana) on steroids, or getting thrust back into an ancient time when everything was bigger - trees, rivers, mountains. After temperatures constantly in the 100s, the 50 degree weather was refreshing and cause for hot tea and jackets, which was fabulous! Being 50 miles from Pakistan, and 30 miles from Tibet, there was tangible Tibetan and Budhist influence here, far different from the Muslum-dominated Hyderabad (which itself is unique in the Hindu country). We did a little light hiking and exploring and found a fabulous Boreal-like forest over looking a river with prayer flags, mist-covered and all!

The second day we had every intention of going on a day hike... but when we got to the trail head we were completely blown away by a mountain carnival at 9000 feet. It was incredible -- paragliding, horse rides, zorbing, blow-up bouncy houses -- all in this little green valley surrounded by white caps. Somewhat reminiscent of Hilton's description of Shangri-La, without the whole 'no contact with the outside world' part. Needless to say, we were distracted from our hike, and eagerly embraced fact we were tourists and this was all here for our entertainment! So we went paragliding and zorbing, and when it rained we sat on the mountain side by a fire created by our paragliding guide. It was so dreamlike and really indescribable. The best part was that there was absolutely no semblance of order, so the paragliders just landed into crowds of running people and zorbs just assume people would move (we actually saw one kid get rolled over by one... but she was ok).

After falling into the rabbit hole... this is the sight of our Solang Valley madness.
Getting ready to jump off the mountain!
Zorbing! (aka: rolling down the hill in a huge plastic ball while two people are inside strapped down in an inner sphere)
All in all I had a wonderful time in India and have no doubt I'll be back. I would love to spend more time in the north and I've been told that I just have to visit places like Goa, Chennai, and the Kashmir province (once it settles down a little bit).

But now, a new adventure begins in Tel Aviv! Yes, India is over and I'll now start working on my summer GFE in Israel. A couple days before I was to arrive I found out that I was granted access to a national drill that is being conducted here, so my plans quickly changed and I've been staying in Tel Aviv (instead of going strait to Beersheba) for the past couple days. I will be spending my first 10 days here and it should really be an incredible learning experience. They're going to be sounding the missle siren on Tuesday! Too cool! Here's an article about the drill: http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1243346492354&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

So far I've been really impressed by Tel Aviv -- it's really clean and has a beautiful charm about it. Plus, my hotel is right on the beach... and since everything shuts down here during the Sabbath, I've been spending plenty of time on the sand! I do think I'll be learning some Hebrew -- while most people speak it, aside from menus, most writing on stores and signs don't have English. Oh, and the airport security that I was so worried about going through turned out to be practically nonexistent. It was just simple questions at the passport counter, took 10 minutes. But there was one lady who I chatted with in the hotel and she's a US citizen with no Arab stamps, but she has an Egyptian middle name or something, and she was there for 9 hours.

Welcome to Israel, I guess!

Being a tourist in India... (Heidi)

So I have finally been able to take some pictures that I think accurately reflect my experience here thus far... and I don't feel now that I need to do the pairs thing, so it must mean I'm getting comfortable with the place!

Sara and I enjoying Chai tea! Her maid Ramina makes the best tea in the world, seriously. I've decided I'm going to learn how to make it before I leave... anyone know if it's possible to find buffalo milk in Atlanta?
Buying tea at the tea market - This is a time where there's no way to fully share the experience without uploading smells... and this guy was just so cute!
Buying sugarcane juice on the side of the road - they put ice in it though, so I only had a sip. But it was delicious!

Sheep hanging out in the shade in Sara's old neighborhood.

So here begin my great adventures. I walked to to the corner and bought a pineapple for 20 rupes (40 cents).

Walking home I found a dog... in a dumpster.

I love this. This was on the way home from the pineapple purchase. It's just really cool to see the old and new way of dressing and the symbolism -- as the modern dress approaches the old very slowly goes away.
There is a construction family that lives right outside the apartment building. I think the way it works is that the families all move to the building site and live in tents, and then they move to the next site when they're done -- if anyone knows for sure let me know. I asked her dad if I could take a picture and he did this head bobbley thing and I had no clue whether he was saying yes or no... so I gestured a few more times and he told the girl to stop moving so I could take a pic...
After I showed her the picture, it created a bit of a stir. Other women came over and wanted their pictures taken... so I did. Even after asking permission, it's always stressful to see how people react, so this was a really fun and memorable experience. Absolutely beautiful people.
Later in the day I took a tour of some mosque tombs that are in the old part of the city. They were quite impressive, but the best part was that I came across some kids playing cricket in one of the open areas outside one of the tombs. I chatted with them for a little while (they spoke great English) and they invited me to play... so I did! I felt like a total tourist for loving the experience, but it was really fantastic. I'm pretty sure my driver thought I was nuts at that point.

The next day was filled with the tourism department city tour. I found that the kids on my bus were thrilled to have the opportunity to try out their English (on a "real American") and so they acted as my tour guides at all the sites. It was just hilarious to see everything from a kids point of view. This was on the way up to one of the temples... the sweepy broom-like things are used everywhere and work really well!
A child coming down from the temple with the powder on his forhead.
A store for doors, or something like that, in the Old City.
A cow crossing the road. Ironically, right in front of the zoo.
The zoo was interesting. It didn't take too long before I realized that I was an attraction... this charming woman only spoke Telagu and so her grandson (maybe) acted as an interpretor. She came up to me really close and looked me square in the eyes and just started smiling and then speaking like I should be able to understand her. She asked if I would take a picture with her and so I had them take one with my camera too. What you don't see is that there are about 50 people on the other side of the camera just smiling and staring. I just can't imagine what they'll say about these pictures.. "we went to the zoo and saw an American!"

At the fort...

Exploring the city... (Heidi)

I've spent most of the last couple days enjoying chai tea, air conditioning, and fabulous food -- Sara really has me spoiled!

But today we went into the heart of Hyderabad, downtown where it tends to be the more "real" Hyderabad experience. Walking down the streets was entirely frightening and I've yet to gain the courage to walk on the outside next to the traffic. She tells me it's safe and nobody gets hit, so maybe in the next couple days I'll get to where I can brave it! And I'm completely blown away by her ability to navigate and drive a car in this city. It's pretty hard to blend in too when there's two blond girls walking down the street here, but aside from the expected stares everyone was incredibly nice. I had Sara take me into a hospital (just to see what one was like) and it was really impressive -- at this point I had no clue what to expect, and I was pleasantly surprised. I LOVE all the sinks available for washing hands before and after meals at all the restaurants... makes sense since you eat with your hands here, but still amazing to see! (The Google cafeteria that we ate at this afternoon had a whole hand washing station that you went to before eating, crazy!) This isn't a tourist town so it's been amazing to know that everything here is for locals, from the Mercedes dealership to the sugarcane juice stand... it's all catering to the local community.

Which leads me to my next topic, contradiction. I must say I had no idea what I was getting into when I was going to India, and it's been really difficult to try to articulate how I feel about it. The people I've met are lovely, the food is spicy-goodness, and the amazing color of the sari's on the street just blow your mind. I was told that the sheer number of people would be overwhelming but that really hasn't been the case in Hyd (we might be going through Delhi to see the mountains this weekend so that will likely be true there). But, it's more the entire state that is overwhelming. There is such incredible wealth and incredible poverty on the same street, unlike in the US where everything is very divided. Here there is an Armani store next to a family living in a blue-tarp tent, and the most expensive apartments in the city overlook an empty lot with children playing and urinating in construction sand. I don't know which India to describe, nor which is "real." We've had some really great conversations about this in the last couple days, and it seems that the only explanation is that "This is India. Whatever you say is true about India, the opposite is also true." Because of this it's been difficult to decide what "India" I want to share on here. So I've decided that I'll only describe and post photos in pairs of two, describing both Indias that I see because it's a dichotomous place -- I haven't taken very many because I've been completely overwhelmed, but I will take some and post the next few days.

The next couple days I'll be exploring on my own so there will likely be some eventful happenings, and I'll keep you posted!

Heidi

Post from India!! (Heidi)

So here is my first official post from abroad! Yay!

After 18 hours of flying I have arrived in Hyderabad! My cousin Sara has been in Beijing for a few days and is flying in later this morning so her concert pianist friend Timothy picked me up at the airport. Today's a big day -- it's Sara's birthday so we're going to be getting all the fabulous things ready for the extravaganza!

Couple things:

• I may start only flying British Airways if only for the accents and generous wine servings.
• Malatrone makes me so thirsty it's not even funny.
  
• Drank hotel water at 7:30am... no diarrhea yet.
• Every Hyderabadi I've met so far hugs instead of shaking hands... very cool.
• It's 109 degrees right now... enough said.
• I've taken two pictures: first of the H1N1 screening at the airport. I went through and then asked to take pictures of the masked people :) -- But my auto focus was off and it was 4am....so it's blurry...sad. I'll have to try again next time!

• ...the second photo was my first feral dog sighting!

I'm not sure what to think as I've only seen the city from the drive home and inside a nice hotel while getting coffee, so but I'll definitely post more as I start to get a better sense of the area! So far... brilliant!

Heidi