Thursday, March 20, 2008

Food for Thought

And just a heads up, if you are east of the Mississippi this upcoming year (or 5) feel free to stop by and pay me a visit in NYC where I will be getting my edumacation and maybe even the silliest damn PhD (Food Studies) you've ever heard of. (- Leigh)

5 days in transit and one cold shower later:

5 stars to Qatar Airlines, and your beef curry. Your flight provided the most luxury we've had in 2 months.

We've found ourselves in the middle step between India and the West, where sit down toilets abound but TP is still an anomaly. This halfway combination makes for an awakward pause, a shimmy and a search for the antibacterial (thanks moms). Nevertheless, we still refuse to buy toilet paper or pay the extra 6 durham for a hot shower.

Speaking durham: while prices are numerically equivalent it costs us five times as much in terms of the dollar as it did in India. For this reason we will be leaving the cosmopolitan, but beautiful, Marrakech (were a coke cost us 3 dollars) for seaside Essouiara tomorrow. We take the bus after a glorious victory over the swindling bus-ticket vendor, having discovered that good cop/bad cop is an effective method of barganing and intimidation. To everyones great surprise, especially Genna's, Leigh is the good cop- in three different languages no less.

Our proximity to both Spain and Easter (Semana Santa) is apparent by the millions of milling Spaniards in the magnificent Medina. Thanks to our new friends, five of these "spring breakers," we now have five places to crash in Spain. While they may walk painstakingly slower than our hurried American gait, we're pretty sure we wont be able to keep pace with their partying. Not that we won't give it our best.

We'll catch up later with more observations after we've eaten grilled fish straight from the ocean and enjoyed the breeze of the Moroccan coast. Life sure is hard, sigh...

Saturday, March 15, 2008

T is for Transvestites on Trains

Who are hilarious. Strutting through the train, harassing the men into giving them money, slapping the legs on the sleepers and making the most exciting hullabaloo we've had on the train for three days. That's right folks, we spend three whole days on a train getting from the Northeast to Mumbai. The most delightful moment, perhaps for them as much as us, was when one of the found the underwear Leigh was drying on top of her backpack. Old-ladyesque underwear that was once Genna's, then was Leigh's, now is the Tranny's play thing. She inspected the thick (and we mean, thick) elastic waist band, snapped it like a wet towel in a gym locker room and returned them. Too small.

So here we are Mumbai. Clean, modern, expensive Mumbai. We're strung out, we slept on the "ladies waiting room" floor as a result of a late train and unknown city, nothing a little Valium, earplugs and bandanna over the eyes can't fix. We're really dirty- brown skin peeling from your neck dirty- and we kind of smell like fish because we got in the way of a very crowded fish market at dawn. We don't envy the people who have to share the plane from Mumbai to Kenya with us. Or the plane from Kenya to Qatar, or the plane from Qatar to Morocco.

In closing, goodbye India, we will miss you. Hello Morocco, we have no clue what to except from you.

Not your Rainforest Cafe

This is what they call "a truly hair-raising wire bridge" in its description. Genna seemed to not be too keen on Leigh's bouncing up and down to create resonance. Dad (Leigh's), you would have been so proud!

Monday, March 10, 2008

INQUIRIES

...or as they say here, Enquiries. We are on our way out of India in less than a week. Can you believe it? Next we fly to Morocco (not without a pleasant layover in both Kenya and Qatar, heck, why not). After that we can nearly skip across the puddle to Spain. The only problem being our pathetic and dessicated US dollar. To save money we were hoping to enlist the assistance of anyone who has friends/family in Spain with open couches, floors, bathtubs or other surfaces of snoozing potential. You and they will be dually rewarded with good ol' American eats a la Leigh and Genna.

Sunday, March 2, 2008

H is for Hunger Strike in the Himalayas

The toy train ride to Kurseong and back to Darjeeling (with one delightful stop for momos, aloo paratha and chaitastic chai).

For 12 hours they let the channels open. The city had been closed for 10 days, no business, no produce, no nothing; only 2 things came into Darjeeling water and milk...watered down milk 12 hours the city breathed a sigh of relief to help the people, when that sigh opened its mouth for one last breath before it resealed itself it brought us in with it. Somehow, we managed to get off a train from Varanasi and catch one of the limited jeeps (a 13 person cramming record for us) up to a city whose people refused to let a thing pass until their demands had been met.

So there we were in a shut up town with all the money in the world (all 100$ that we have on us collectively at least) and nowhere to spend it. Lucky people take pity on us sorts here. Four days and one protest march later Gorkhaland is on its way to becoming a reality (with a little help from us), one man has stepped down and the condemned "6th Schedule" is at a hault.

This also means that we get to buy momos, ride the toy train (a world heritage site), and sample the first flush number one Darjeeling Orange Ultra Special Pekoe yadda yadda at High Tea at the Windemere (waste of rupees if you ask us). Oh yes, and with a view of the 3rd highest mountain in the world.

That being said, we're soon off to the wettest place on earth.