Well, Nancy and Lucia left for India this past Tuesday. They’ll be gone for 3 weeks so I get to be a bachelor again. The Netflix has been changed to send only mixed martial arts movies and Nancy made me a ton of food so I don’t starve. Now I can watch DVDs and eat right out of the cooking pot. Hey, that’s one less dish to wash, I say…Life is good…
Their itinerary goes something like this:
Fly from LAX to Chicago
Fly from Chicago to Delhi, hang out a day
Drive from Delhi to Jaipur, see some stuff, hang out a day or two
Drive from Jaipur to Agra to see the Taj Mahal, hang out a day or two
Drive from Agra back to Delhi, fly to Bangalore / Mysore where for 3 days they get massages, hot oil treatments, meditation, and all sort of Ayurveda treatments.
Catch a train from Mysore to Chennai where they are attending a week long World Congress of Poets convention. That is where Lucia is getting an award for a book she wrote.
Fly from Chennai to Mumbai for a few days.
Fly from Mumbai to Delhi, and from Delhi back to the US.
Wooh!
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08/24/07 – Nancy’s called me a few times with some quick updates. I don’t have a lot of details because we’re trying to keep the phone calls short since it’s $0.32 / minute plus I’m sure some kind of wicked connect charge. In any case she sounds very excited. Stories about elephants, pickpockets, beggars, colorful saris, snake charmers, fortune tellers, and of course…monkeys!
And they’ve only been there 4 days!
When Nancy gets back she can fill in the blanks with more details along with some pictures and video.
Nancy said the plane ride from Chicago to Delhi went well — she slept for most of the trip!
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08/27/07 – Nancy and Lucia rode elephants (and maybe some camels, I
wasn’t sure) and Nancy enjoyed the architecture at Jaipur. After seeing
the Taj Mahal I think the heat and all the excitement is taking it’s toll.
She said they were exhausted by the time they got to their room that night.
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08/29/07 – They made it to Mysore where they are getting 3 days of Ayurvedic treatments.
Here’s an excerpt from Nancy’s email:
“I had incredible treatments today.
I had the oil dripping on my forehead which is an Ayurvedic treatment called
Shiroda which was wonderful. I then had a full body massage and PPS
(abbreviation for Patra Pinda Sweda), the Mother of all Ayurveda
treatments.
[ Editor’s Note: In PPS, fresh plants are fried with several other
herbal ingredients and tied into boluses, dipped into warm medicated oil
and simultaneously massaged by all over the body. ]
The girls prepared herbs. I guess they cooked them from what I was hearing
and smelling (all prescribed by my doctor) and then wrapped them in cloths to
make a tennis ball size bundle, then 4 women pounded me with these 8 bundles
of herbs and oil.
The entire time for both treatments was 2 incredible hours.
I had LOTS of oil on me, and they use a special exfoiliant to remove the oil.
I could hardly move. It was wonderful!
This afternoon I have Basti treatments on my neck and low back. That’s
where they make the well and fill it with hot oil for healing in specific
areas.
Tomorrow I am having the Basti for the eyes and stomach and then we leave
to go to Chennai on the train at 2:00.
We had 2 or 3 hours of Monsoon rain today. Mostly I was inside. The
little women would just come and get me with an umbrella for my treatments.
I did use the video camera to capture about 5 minutes of sounds this
morning with the birds and OMMMMM guy sounds. I love the Cuckoo bird
sounds and other sounds although I have no idea what they are.”
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08/30/07 – They arrived by train in Chennai on the 30th. Nancy here
describes the trip.
“The train ride to Chennai was good.
The view from the train was lots of farm lands and rice paddies and
very green and beautiful. Unforturnately aged and scratched windows
prevented us from a good enough view to photograph but I will hold
those images in my head.
Believe it or not my assigned seat on a packed ride from
Bangalore was next to a man that works for Hannu Reddy real
estate (India division).
His business card shows not only offices in Pune, Mumbai and
Chennai and Hyberadad but also you guessed it…Irvine!!
He used to live in Burbank and was very helpful when it was
time to collect ourselves and get off the train as by now
we have about 6 or 8 bags between us and we were
getting off into a totally zooooooo train station and
not finding our connection to pick us up..,
Thank God for Rachna who made arrangements even though we
hadn’t planned for her too!!
After having our bags toted on the heads of 3 or 4 gentleman
porters (who must have very hard heads) we reached the Toyota
SUV. And then we were in Chennai!!!!
Chennai is a big city with lots of “street” shops selling every
thing you can imagine.”
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08/31/07 – I just spoke to Nancy on the phone and she sounded
reinvigorated. She has been meeting people from all over the world
at the conference and I think that has gotten her excited all over again.
“We came back and registered for the Congress and there are
literally people from all over the world — and none of us share
a common language.
Last night’s opening presentation was led by several people including
the Japanese Ambassador to Indian. And of course then there is the
Congress chairman Dr. Yu Hsi. He is a wonderful man, I believe from Taiwan.”
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09/01/07 – Just got another phone call around 11:30am Saturday, which would be about midnight Sunday since Nancy is 12 1/2 hours ahead of California time.
“This morning we got up at 6:00am to visit the beach with a rep of the
Congress. This was the beach that was hit by the tsunami last year. 2000 people
died and the area is still very sad by our standards. Yet it is a beautiful beach with
lots of fishermen.
This morning the opening Congress meeting was led by the same main
guys along with some added dignitaries including the former President
of India….Wow I wasn’t really ready for that — the place lit up
with paparazzi…
The poetry that was read was meaningful and really GOOD…Touched my heart.
I met also a man who is a teacher of American history in of all places…Japan.
And a Chinese man who performed fabulous piano solos for us last night who
now lives in Manhattan.
The small world seems to be getting smaller.
We went to see a professional dance troupe tonight performing
folk dances and afterward Lucia was asked to join the organizers
on the stage and was given an award along with some other dignitaries.
If my mother weren’t already in Heaven she would have been here tonight.
She instilled in me this love for culture and I feel her presence is here
with me in India.”
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09/02/07 – It’s 1:00am India time and Nancy called with a sleepy update. She and Lucia are packing up again to go on a 3 day city tour sponsored by the convention. They are leaving their suitcases at the hotel and just taking one bag each for their 3 day trip.
When they return, they have to jump on a plane early in the morning for Mumbai so they need to have all their packing done and ready to go.
She said she’s running out of memory cards and video tape although she had three 2GB memory cards and about eight 60 minute video tapes. Man, that’s a lot of pictures and video!
Overall she still sounds quite excited about her adventure.
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09/06/07 – Nancy called from their hotel in Chennai after a couple of days of bus touring. Early tomorrow morning they are leaving for Mumbai (formerly called Bombay). She’s hoping to take it very easy for the next few days. Gotta save up that strength for the long plane ride home.
She said all the people at the convention seemed genuinely happy and friendly. She got the chance to rub elbows with some big-wigs. Not exactly sure who they were — I guess Nancy will eventually tell us how big their wigs were…She also made friends with someone from Mongolia on the bus back to Chennai and got some of their conversation on video. I’m anxious to hear what the Mongolian language sounds like.
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09/11/07 – Picked up Nancy at the airport and she seemed in very good spirits! We got home, ate some chicken soup and fruit, unpacked a few bags and as we watched a few minutes of her videos she started to doze off. Not surprising considering she just flew from Delhi to Frankfurt, had a 3 hour stopover, flew from Frankfurt to LAX, and then spent an hour getting out of customs…That’s something like 23 hours of travelling…
It’s 1:00am now and Nancy is wide awake. I think she’s still on Delhi time… *yawn* As for me, I’m going play some sudoku and then catch some zzzs myself.
I’m SO happy my Nancy is back! 🙂