Plan B: India

Showing posts with label India. Show all posts

The Afghan Girl vs the Rajastani Girl

Maybe like the photographer of the infamous Afghan girl I too will one day go back and try to find this Ragastani girl, who struck me with he confidence and curiousity.

India

Jaisalmer - The Gold City

Udaipur - The White City

Jodhpur - The Blue City

I have always wanted to see a real sand dune. Part two of this wish would be to roll down it... all the way from its highest point to the bottom. I told this to my travel partners (who were old experts at it) and we did it our first night in the desert. Then we did it again. The picture shows each of our different techniques for protecting out faces. I am still finding sand. haha!

The Holy Rat Temple - Bikkaner

Later this day we went to the market to buy fruit and met an aspiring school teacher. We told jokes with him and his friend until the sun went down. Witty jokes and not-so-witty jokes. Here is one of my favourites translated from Hindi.
"There was a man named Syd who was going abroad to work. He needed to pack a suitcase so he went to the market and bought one. Wne he got it home he realized he needed more room, so he went back to the market and bought a bigger one. He brought it home and realized that it woo was too small for all his things. So once more he headed to the market, found a large trunk and much to his delight, the trunk was large enough for his things and he left for the airport. During his flight, the aircraft encountered terrible mechanical porblems and was heading downward towards earth. To buy some time, they began throwing access cargo out of the plane one by one. The man was extremely saddened when he found out that his trunk was thrown out. He ran to the back even to see if it was real and it was. Now he would arrive in a new world with no belongings. If he arrives at all! That is the end of the joke wanna hear another one? [ok] A young couple was hopelessly in love wiht eachother. The man says "I love you so much I would do anything for you. I'd go to the moon. I'd bring you the stars. I'd even die for you." She says. "Ok die" So he starts to walk up a tall mountain and she follows. He looks back and says, "I'm going to do it honey", and she says, "ok". He walks a bit further and says, "I'm really going to do it honey" and she says, "ok". But before he could get to the top or ask again. He dies.
How?
Well, it was Syd/s trunk falling from the sky!

I'll never see those two again, they kind of dissappeared into that night, but the jokes made them legendary to me.

India

'Exciting' Tuc Tuc Ride through Beijing

We spent the day at Tianamen Square celebrating the National holiday and when it came time to return back to the hotel, the streets were full of people and no cars. So instead, we negociated our transportation through sign language with a parked man sitting next to a peddle-bike-meets-lawn-mower tuc tuc. What we got was a five inch seat backwards off the back of the bike, a good time and my favourite low-quality camera video was created.

The jokes on Ms. Kothlow

For a change, I often give my students a countdown from ten to pick up their books and quickly run to a new desk in the classroom. This was one of those times. New desk, new partner, new beginning. So 10… 9… 8... [students are scrambling] 7… 6… 5… [I turn to write on the board] 4… 3… 2… [I turn back to the class. The last students sit down. Now everyone is ready, quiet and waiting. But one desk is empty. I look around.] “Where did Alan go?” I ask. Two students giggle. I turn around and Alan, hiding crouched behind the back of my legs, jumps up right against me with this huge grin across his face. I don't smile right away; it was more of a shreek at first. Everyone laughs. I have no idea how I didn't see him. Alan grins, touches my shoulder and looks me in the eyes, slightly apologetically, then turns, throws his fists into the air in triumph and walks to his new desk. A new beginning with a surprise is a good sign for a new beginning I think.