India

For the past two weeks I have been traveling in northern India. It was an exciting adventure for me, and everything I dreamed it would be. After reading Roger Housden's book, Travels Through Sacred India, I have been wanting to experience India for myself. It would be difficult to summarize this experience in a few short paragraphs, but I can say that this was an amazing time, and that I am still being seasoned by what I saw and learned.

I began my trip in Delhi, and traveled by car through Rajasthan, through the cities of Mandawa, Khimsar, Jaisalmar, Jodhpur, Udaipur, Pushkar, Jaipur, and finally to Agra to experience the Taj Mahal.

As a tourist, one is offered an itinerary that includes seeing a lot of famous and historical sites, such as the Mehrangarh fort in Jodhpur, and many temples, shrines and palaces. After a while, though these were all very interesting, I found I was gravitating to just wanting to find out more about the people of India - experience their schools, see their hospitals, their market places, their farming and industry, experience the riverbank laundry, learn to cook traditional Indian foods, and visit a children's home. So that is what I did. These experiences enriched my time tremendously, giving me a feel for India that as only a 'site-tourist' I would not have had. Here are a few favorite photos...

All for now (Blogger is sooo slow). Watch the photo stream on the right for photo snippits. I'll post more soon, when I recover from my jet lag.

It is so good to be home!