Amritsar, India

The other math teacher, Jordan is moving this year so he’s trying to see as much of India as he can so we headed off to Amritsar this weekend.  The school driver picked us up at 4am for the airport. We flew to Delhi and stayed on the plane while new people boarded.  OMG.  Indians boarding a plane is a nightmare – pushing shoving etc.  but Mumbai is a little more civilized so it isn’t too bad.  Those people getting on in Delhi – horrible.  Getting off was just as bad – this guy kept laying on me to get his luggage instead of just waiting until he could get in the isle.

Amritsar is a small town – 1.3 mil near the Pakistani border.  The pollution is better, the weather is cooler – we got to wear jackets!  We both got rooms in a  hotel  called Hong Kong Inn – Jordan thought it had good vibes since that is where he is moving to next year.  It’s kind of loud, but it has hot water 24 hours a day and the people are nice. 

We got in around 10am on Friday so our rooms weren’t ready. While we waited in the lobby, we met a Turkish woman who was traveling northern India on her own and she wanted to share a ride to the border ceremony that night.  She went off to see things and we went for lunch.  I had garlic naan and garlic chicken so you can probably smell me from where you are and Jordan had butter chicken and butter naan so you can probably see a greasy sheen on his skin in pictures :) We took a nap and then met the woman to go to the border - I will write a separate post on that because it was such an event :) 

When we got back, we went to visit the Golden Temple - the most holy place for Sikhs.  Here is some info on it. Golden temple info It is lit up at night.  You have to walk through some crazy streets to get there and it was dark and we didn't know where we were going.  We live in Mumbai so we have a lot of tolerance for dangerous roads, but this scared us a little so we did something we thought we'd never do - took a bicycle rickshaw.  Poor guy had his work cut out for him try to pedal two big North Americans through the streets!!  We got to the temple and there were tons of people there, but it still felt peaceful and religious.  Not all religious sites do.  You have to take your shoes off and walk pretty far through streets to get into the temple area.  It was cold and lots of puddles from when it rained this morning.  There are some mats laid down to help people keep from slipping on the tiles and mats on the roads so you don't hurt your feet too bad.  It was cold and uncomfortable and we kept making jokes about athlete's foot.  Once we got into the temple area we didn't have to walk through freezing water so  my feet were a little warmer.  The view was amazing.

My friend Paula said I looked good in scarves :)
Good because I wear this a lot in rickshaws

Even the men had to cover their heads

It is pretty spectacular

We got some pizza on our way home and called it a night - after we scrubbed our feet!!

The next day it rained.  and rained.  Now that we knew where were going and it was light out, we walked to the temple.  We stopped at a coffee shop on our way there and ran into some Americans who worked in Delhi.  The temple looks different in the day and there were a lot more people there.  I am glad we went the night before so we could actually go in it.  I didn't take a lot of pictures today because it was so cold and miserable.  The barefoot walk to the temple was miserable.  It was so cold we could see our breath and we were walking in ankle deep water at some points.  We went to see where they feed all the people daily - that is in the link I put above.

Next we went to the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre site. It was a short walk, but by this time, I was soaking wet and freezing cold.  I took very few pictures today because it was too wet to take my phone out.  My shoes were soaked through - my only pair! so I will have a wet ride home tomorrow. My jeans were soaked to the skin.  We decided to take an autorickshaw to the hotel.  I got some video of the flooded roads, but am having trouble uploading them :(

I took a nap and did some school work.  We went to dinner at the same place we had lunch yesterday  - crystals. I had tomato soup and a cheese omelet.  Yummy. and warm!

I usually travel with a poncho - extra shoes etc. but it never occurred to me that it would rain in India in February.  It was good to be out of Mumbai for awhile, but I have a lot of work to do when I get home tomorrow.