Earthquake Series: Part 3 Monday April 27. So is it safe YET?

Monday, April 27

Wake up at US Embassy Facility - 5:30AM

I woke up REAL early, and REAL hungry, possibly by a tremor, around like 5:30 or 6. My friends had slept in another tent (their tent was full when I had arrived), and were all still asleep. I couldn’t believe how well I had slept, or how much better I felt. I braced myself to eat cold pasta for breakfast, but was informed that if you searched thoroughly enough you could fine OATMEAL. YAY! And I managed to find one!!! I once again failed to properly use the heating packet, so I braced myself to eat cold oatmeal. This oatmeal tasted like muffin batter! Apparently the diet of an American soldier overseas consists of just sugar in different forms, including a literal packet of sugar to make “juice” with and a packet of table syrup (to put on what? My oatmeal?). Not wanting to waste the precious non-pasta meal, I forced myself to keep eating until it was finished. 

The US camp actually had very lovely washroom facilities for us to use. The water was being pumped out of the swimming pool, providing us the luxury of hot showers, which I don’t even have in my apartment here. I didn’t take one on this day due to lack of any shower supplies, but definitely put hot shower on the mental to-do list. I brushed my teeth (I forgot to mention last time that I went about 36 hours without brushing them) and it felt so good. 

Team meeting @ US camp: 7AM

At some point early in the morning, the security guy who has been put in charge gathered us together to inform us that he would not tolerate blanket hoarding, and if he caught anyone with more than 1 blanket in the upcoming night, he would kick them out into the street, even if it was the middle of the night. I actually laughed a little, because, like, what a crazy, overreactive, extreme American thing to say. My American friends later confirmed that they too thought the punishment seemed a little extreme for the crime. He also informed us about the safe haven, the shop part of the building that had bullet-proof glass. We were to run into there in the case of “people coming over the walls”. *GIANT EYE ROLL HERE* Get over yourself US Embassy. We found out later that this asshole hadn’t even been in Nepal for the quake. No street cred.

Leave from camp: 9 :30AM

My friends and I discussed our options for the day, not sure if we’d be spending the night in the camp again or not. My American roommate had left for the airport around 4AM. We had no idea if she would actually get on a flight or not. I decided to leave my stuff there but leave for the day. My one friend had been with me at the farmer’s market when it struck. Here house is on the other side of town, and she hadn’t felt safe enough to go home since Saturday. I offered to go with her to check on her place and her roomate, as she hadn’t heard anything from her yet. We checked with the consular staff to see if it was safe, and she made a displeased face and said “well, we’ve heard of some muggings”. We went anyway, because that seemed pretty unlikely to happen to us in the middle of the day. Before we got in a taxi, we walked over to the hostel (very nearby) so I could check on my friend again. He had been working non-stop since Saturday, all day and all night, helping guests get to their embassies and evacuate and such. So he was passed out, but at least I knew he was still safe.

Take taxi to Patan: 10:00 AM

We jumped in a taxi, but screwed up and took it from the main tourist area where they always overcharge anyway. PLUS earthquake price. We had no idea what earthquake price would be. We agreed to 800 rs, (usually 300 tops) and took off. Along the way I asked the driver how his family was. They were fine. How was his house? His house had been destroyed. We drove past Ratna Park, and he pointed into the tent-filled area and said “my family is here”. This was our first time to drive through other areas of the city, and seeing the tents helped the situation to sink in a little further. Along our way, we still didn’t come across any scenes of total destruction. Mostly we noticed small piles of debris, small walls toppled, makeshift tarpaulin tents in odd places and bumps in the road that we were pretty sure hadn’t been there before. When we got to our destination, I gave the driver 1000, told him to keep the change, and use it to keep his family safe and healthy.

The tents in Ratna Park

Arrive at friend’s house: 10:30AM

My friends neighbourhood was comletely intact. The only noticeable differences were a bus park full of busses that should have been running, more people than usual walking around with nothing to do, and a community electrical plug-in that someone had set up on some steps. My friend’s apartment was even more unaffected. Her water was running, her electriciy was working AND there was wifi. It was like some magical earthquake-proof castle. We pulled out our devices and internetted furiously for like 2 hours. We stress ate a whole bag of Reese’s Peanut Butter cup mini’s. Eventually, I needed to head back to my apartment to meet my German roomate and decide our action plan. My friend decided to stay in her apartment because it was so luxurious, had an earthquake-proof wall and her roomate would be staying there too.

Head for home: 2PM

We walked to the main road, saw NO taxis, but did see a bus that could take me home!! So weird to be riding on a bus, just like it was a normal day. On the way back, the bus passed a temple that had been TOTALLY destroyed. Like, you couldn’t even tell it used to be anything. Part of a statue in a roundabout had come down. The stadium was full of people (no roof). Malls were missing windows and parts of their signs. We didn’t drive by the site, but it was clear that you could no longer see the Dharahara tower where it used to stand. Eventually we got back to the park, and it was full of tents. I hoped to myself that the majority of those people still had houses they could return to when the aftershocks had subsided, and were just sleeping outside for safety like me. At this point, the bus got PACKED, and some of the fear instilled by the Americans started to rise in me. “Shit, what if someone does something? Tries to rob me?”, amongst other silly things. Of course, unsurprisingly to anyone who has been to Nepal, when it came to my stop, I made the helpless foreigner motions, and about 10 people started shouting for the driver to stop, and were moving out of my way, and helping me make my way towards the door, just like they always do. Stupid fear-mongering! Works way too well!

The temple was 10 times bigger than these pillars, now just rubble.

In my apartment: 3PM

On my way home, I noticed that some of the shops in my neighbourhood were open, which I took as a wonderful sign. I got home, talked to my landlord, and chatted with my German roommate. Apparently the German embassy was not nearly was well set up as the British or American. They weren’t given food until lunch that day (so like, almost 24 hours without), and she had shared everything she had taken with others. This includes her sleeping bag. She said three of them were using it! They didn’t provide them with anything, they had to dig their own toilet out in the backyard, and they didn’t help them to figure out flights home or contacting family in Germany. Sounded like the embassy staff were practically trying to be as unhelpful as possible to a bunch of people that had just been through a traumatic experience. Not very cool. 

Leave for embassies: 5PM

While we chatted, there was a knock on the door, our new British roommate to move into the American roommates room! Talk about good timing to move apartments. She had luckily managed to catch us at home. We all agreed to go back to our embassies to spend one more night to get us through the high-risk 72 hour period for aftershocks. This had been originally 24 hours, extended to 48, and finally to 72. We had gone the whole day with no serous aftershocks like Saturday or Sunday, but if they weren’t staying here I definitely wasn’t going to stay here alone. We agreed to meet back at home again the next day around noon. We packed up my German roommate with enough food for the evening, I grabbed my shower supplies, and we headed out again.

Arrive back at camp: 6PM

Back at the American embassy facility, I managed to get a spot in the tent with my friends, as some others had left from there to go to the airport. I ALSO managed to grab a camping mat! WOO! Major upgrade from my cardboard (but I still kept it under the mat anyway because it was like my Wilson). I rummaged through the food and opted for ratatouille. There was a Canadian couple in our tent, and one of them had actually figured out how to use the chemical heating packs! So her wife explained to us how to do it, and we got excited for our hot food! We joked about how Americans and Canadians WOULD be the group of people to survive a huge earthquake but then all get diabetes during the aftermath. So. Much. Sugar. I somehow managed to screw up cooking my thing AGAIN, but it at least was warm. That evening, the couple who had left in the morning were spotted walking back into the camp around 8AM, and we were all like “shiiiiiiiiiiit”. They’d gone to the airport at 10AM, sat around all day with no food or water, were told their flight would be leaving the next morning instead.

People who failed to get on flights arrive at camp: 8PM

Background: the Kathmandu airport is TINY. One landing strip, 5 docking station (is that an airport or a spaceship? Whatever). Their plane arrived at the airport, but had to wait while aid planes landed. Eventually, it had to fly off to Calcutta to refuel. It returned later, but the same thing again. Aid planes were being given priority (understandably, most would agree). Their plane ran low on fuel a second time, and gave up for the day. I cannot even begin to imagine how chaotic the airport was. I landed right after they cleaned up the Turkish Airlines plane that had crashed (just a little, no fatalities), and I thought it was mayhem THEN.

Big bedtime tremor: 9 or 10 PM

As we were settling into our beds, we felt one more large tremor, enough to cause us to sit up abruptly, but not enough to make anyone get out of bed. I think we all went “UGHHHHH STAAAAAAWP IT!” I was immediately glad we’d decided to sleep outside again. I was asleep within 30 minutes from then.

Stay tuned to hear about the end of immediate threat of danger, the beginning of learning about the extent of the damage and incredibly uncertainty. 

Nepal Earthquake 2015 Part 2: It's over, right?

Sunday, April 26

British Embassy: 6AM

After being fed a meal of not so terrible oatmeal, we were briefed by the ambassador himself. Officially, we were told to go back to our homes/hotels and get our stuff together. British nationals could return when ready to leave (the country), the rest of us encouraged to seek out our own government’s help, but told we would be welcomed back if there were any further major occurrences. We hoped (again) that things were tapering off, so we decided to head home and shop for some post-apocalypse supplies (water, hand sanitizer, pasta). My American roommate had a flight scheduled for the next day (Monday), so she went to the airport to see if she would be flying on time or not. Everyone else left for home as well. When we got home, we met our landlord, who informed us that our water tank (on top of the roof) was leaking, and advised us to fill as many buckets as possible with the remaining water so it wouldn’t be wasted. After this crazy exercise, we (myself and my German roommate) were both so exhausted, we crashed on our beds. Unfortunately, we couldn’t help the feeling that we were constantly moving (could have been because we were!). I didn’t sleep at all. At about 10 AM I could no longer ignore the hunger, so I went to the kitchen and devoured an entire BBQ chicken thigh I had purchased the day before at the farmer’s market. It was delicious, and I was much happier afterwards. I went back to bed and tried unsuccessfully to sleep some more.

Arrive at home: 8 AM

We had been feeling small tremors all morning, but nothing very large. Then, at about 1PM, the house started to shake, but instead of subsiding after a couple seconds, it intensified. I dove under my desk, which I had left placed in the doorway (apparently the safest place to be if indoors). I yelled to make sure my roommate was awake and doing the same in her room. I could hear the water in the buckets we had filled sloshing around and spilling all over the floor. Finally it stopped. With our adrenaline pumping again, we found each other in the hall and decided it was definitely time to go back to the British Embassy. This was the second big aftershock, 6.7 (some information says it was a second earthquake, some say that even if it is a second earthquake it still counts as an aftershock because it was triggered by the first one). After experiencing that inside my apartment, I can truly not imagine what the bigger one must have done to the place. We took a few minutes to pack our bags so that we were better prepared than the night before, taking warm clothes, medicine and some food, and headed back to the embassy. We bumped into our landlord and he agreed that we were probably best off there. 

6.7 Aftershock/second earthquake: 1:09 PM

When we got back to the embassy, they were a little more hesitant about letting us in this time, but we promised that we wouldn’t use up their resources and just wanted to sit on the lawn and be safe from earthquakes, so they let us in. Surprisingly (to me, the one who clearly forgot to think for a while), there were more people arriving on Sunday than there were on Saturday. In hindsight, obviously, these were the people who had been outside of Kathmandu Valley on Saturday. We chatted on one group of British people who had been rafting when it happened. They said they were in a gorge and the rocks started to fall around them. Their boat guide freaked out and jumped out of the boat and left all the tourists on their own to try to navigate. Luckily, they were able to survive the incident and make it back to the city in one piece.

Arrive at British Embassy again: 1:30

After sitting and relaxing at the embassy for a while, we were informed that most nationalities were being redirected to their own embassies. My roommate and I were determined to stay together, and I ignored the call for Canadians to load into a van to be driven to the American Embassy recreational facility (embassy workers get their very own complex with a pool, spa, full size baseball diamond and tennis court, exclusively for them to use. Even regular American citizens can’t get in there without a special invitation!). Eventually, we were all gathered together again to be told that we would be asked to leave: Canadians to the US camp and Germans to their embassy. They told us that they didn’t WANT to force us to leave, but they would have to place priority on making space for British nationals. They were still so polite, and they insisted on cooking us up some food before we left. We walked part of the way together, and split up, not sure when we would see each other again. I headed into the US camp.

Arrive at US camp: 4:30 PM

Now, don’t get me wrong, I know plenty of Americans that I like A LOT. However, I was a little apprehensive about entering into this American sphere of abruptness, fear-mongering and libertarianism (all just hunches at that time), especially after the good humour and politeness I experienced at the British embassy. First impression: in a city where almost every neighbourhood had lost power, this US facility was still running their metal detectors and x-ray scanners for bags. I was asked to hand over the butter knife stashed in my bag to spread peanut butter with. After this, a consular service worker asked for our details and whether our families had been notified that we were safe. Right after speaking to the consular service lady, I spotted my American roommate who had braved the chaos of the airport earlier that day. I wasn’t very surprised to see her, as I’d been hearing that it was total madness. She told me that she got there, looked around for about 15 minutes, and without speaking to anyone decided to leave and return to the city to the US camp. She said there WASN’T anyone there to speak to, and had decided to just try showing up the next morning at the time her flight was scheduled and see what happened. I also met up again with all the people who had been at the British camp the night before. Some people hadn’t even bothered going home, even before the big quake at 1PM.

The American Camp. Not too shabby.

Meet with friends at US camp: 6 PM

The American camp was mostly operating on an every man for himself principle, so I scavenged a piece of cardboard that was about the length of my body, and traded some precious 3G time for a blanket with my American roommate (like straight up prison/refugee camp style). I found a nice spot on the ground to set up my bed, away from the edges of the tent and near a big group of other Canadians (strength in numbers plus they are friendlier!). Then I searched through the boxes of MRE (Meals Ready to Eat?), aka Soldier Food, and found some pasta, which I ate cold because it turns out you have to have a degree in physics to figure out how to cook that stuff. Much to our surprise (and delight), the MREs contained Poptarts!!!! Now, I’m old enough to know Poptarts are gross, but if that wasn’t the most comforting thing I’d seen in a long time…Unfortunately, the ones I got weren’t frosted, so that was disappointing. 

"Soldier food". Not amazing, but very appreciated.

I chatted with my friends for about 20 minutes (discovered they were ALSO stoked about the Poptarts), managed to get ahold of a couple more Nepali friends on the phone, and promptly fell asleep at about 8PM. And I slept like a log through the whole night, with my cardboard mattress, my backpack pillow and my one blanket, unaware of the continuing tremors and the heavy rain, because that’s what 36 hours of cycling between adrenaline and anxiety does to a person. 

Asleep by: 8 PM

And that concludes the second day of post earthquake life. Stay tuned for more about Camp USA, venturing into the south side and stories from the German Embassy.

Nepal Earthquake Saturday April 25: Minute by Minute account from an extremely lucky individual

Saturday April 25th

Written on Tuesday April 28

By the time you read this, it will have been 1 week after these events took place. I managed to think about/have time to record them on Tuesday. I am finally getting the chance to type them up and post them now. Here’s a very very detailed account of what happened when the earthquake struck.

Wake up: 8AM

It started out like any normal Saturday. Actually, better, because I woke up early, cooked a nice breakfast, worked out, had a nice bucket shower (showering with a bucket is a real accomplishment because it takes much more preparation than a regular shower) and made some plans with my American roommate for her last Saturday in Nepal. I then headed off to the weekly farmer’s market to purchase my fancy foreigner delights. 

Farmer's Market: 11:30-12:00

To finish off my shopping trip, I ordered a panini to go. While waiting for my delicious weekly panini, I felt the ground shift ever so slightly. I stared at my feet confusedly, trying to figure out if I was about to faint, if I was standing on a deck or something unstable, or if I was crazy.Before I could finish assessing what was happening, the ground REALLY started to shake, and I finally realized that this was THE earthquake we had been warned about, and the adrenaline shot into my veins like icy fire. This was the first earthquake I had ever truly experienced, and I wasn’t completely sure on the emergency protocol. I managed to run a few strides (turns out one of the protocols is DON’T RUN) to get out from under the tent and grabbed ahold of a stair railing. I managed to look around to check for anything that might fall down and hurt me, and remember feeling relieved to see nothing too hazardous. At the time I wrote this in my notebook, I still had no idea how long the quake actually lasted. But after checking Wikipedia, it apparently only lasted 20 seconds!? WHAT!? My conservative guess had been 40 seconds, but it could have been a full 2 minutes as far as I knew. I remember looking around at everyone else freaking out: screaming, crying, grabbing for support, running out of the nearby restaurant to the parking lot. Some of the people running for safety were people I knew, friends I’d met in just the last few weeks. Finally, the shaking stopped, and I kind of just stood still while I caught my breath and calmed my nerves. My heart was pounding and my breathing heavy. The water from a tiny stream had sloshed around furiously and my leg was wet. Tables and umbrellas and people had fallen over. Mothers with worried faces searched frantically for children who had left their sight at the wrong moment. I knew that we all had been lucky. Nobody was hurt. 

Earthquake time: 11:56 AM

Now, you’ll maybe recall, I was still waiting on my panini. Naturally, in hindsight, what I did was totally ridiculous, but I REALLy wanted that panini. So, I politely said “Excuse me, that ham and cheese panini is mine, could I still have it?”

“You want it to go ma’am?”

“I think that’s a good idea.”

So he wrapped up my panini, and I made my way to leave the farmer’s market (to go where? I have no idea guys). When I got to the parking lot, I discovered a group of people, including my friends, sitting on the ground. “Is this the safest place to be?” I asked, and sat down with them. They had been eating brunch and drinking brunch wine when the quake struck. I’m not sure how long we sat there, but it must have been at least 30 minutes because I don’t even remember feeling the first 6.6 aftershock, so that must have been before I’d recovered from the initial shock of what was happening. All I remember is watching a van rock back and forth at one point, so there’s a good chance that was the big aftershock. Who knows? Not me.

Start to walk in streets: 12:45 (ish)

Somewhere around 45 minutes after the initial quake, we decided to part ways. My American roommate had been home alone and I knew she must be scared nearly to death. I planned to go home to check on her, and stop in Thamel (the main tourist neighbourhood) to see if my friends at the hostel were okay. My friends from the farmer’s markets wanted to go back to grab the rest of their wine and cheese. We made plans to meet later that afternoon and get some drinks. Again, in hindsight, I know this all seems ridiculous, bit it took a LONG time for us to wrap our heads around the gravity of the situation. We were worried about grants proposals due on Monday! In my defense, having never experienced an earthquake, I had no idea where it might have ranked on the Richter scale, and probably would have been equally as terrified if it was like a 3.8. We had also not seen ANY destruction on the scale of collapsed buildings or dead bodies. We just didn’t know and couldn’t process the seriousness of the situation.

Arrive in Thamel: 1:00 PM (ish)

Anyway, I set off alone down the street. When I arrived at the intersection near the Garden of Dreams (the main entrance into Thamel) it sunk in just a little further, as a huge crowd had congregated in the middle of the intersection, a safe, open place away from tall building. My mind was like “Oh! Wow, ok, so this was a thing that a lot of people are scared about!” When I turned to look up the street into Thamel, I saw a hydro pole crashed onto an empty taxi, wires everywhere and a pile of bricks from a fallen wall. Even then I knew, this was the kind of street not to be walking down only an hour after a big earthquake. I searched for my friends in the crowded intersection and couldn’t find them. I looked at the fallen wires again, and I bet you can guess what I did next. I walked towards the danger, but as safely as I could. I looked down the alley toward the hostel, and there they were, standing on a pile of bricks that had been a wall an hour before. I joined them in the alley, relieved but still scared. As we hugged and and sputtered our anxious words, another tremor started and we all took off towards the safety of the larger road. Turns out that if you can run without losing your balance, you can’t feel the shaking as badly. I led my friends towards the relative safety of the large intersection, where I bumped into my farmer’s market friends again. At this point, I lost my hostel friends in the crowd, but assumed they would be super busy taking care of the guests, and that if they had survived the big one they would probably continue to be fine.

Leave Thamel 1:15 (ish)

Back with my farmer’s market friends, we decided to not split up again, and to go search for my American roommate together as we were all a  little worried about her. At this point, the phone networks were still down, and people were only able to call to numbers outside of Nepal. According to my phone log, I was able to receive a call first at 1:30 PM. an hour and a half after the initial quake. My German roommate was safe in the garden at her friend’s house. Then , my friend, who is living in India called, with the best intentions, but I curtly told her “leave me alone, I’m busy!!!” and hung up (sorry Abby!).  I finally got ahold of my American roommate, and we set off to find her in a park near our place, across from the British embassy. One of my friends became desperate and ducked behind a bush to change her tampon, I had to do a #2, basically since the initial quake shook my bowels up, but opted to continue to hold it. Two of the girls set off to check on one their boyfriend’s parents, and I stayed in the park with my roommate. 

Sitting in park: 1:30 - 4:00 PM

The ground continued to move all afternoon. It was like being on a boat. The park began to fill up with Nepali families. A friendly shop owner was there with his family and he was the one who told us about how badly the other areas of Kathmandu had been hit. “Patan, Basantapur and Bhaktapur are gone,” is what he said. It sunk in a little further. Around this time, the 3G network started working, and at 1:36 PM I was able to get on Facebook to post a message that I hoped would be enough to placate all my concerned friends and family who were about to wake up to the news of a huge earthquake in Nepal. I knew the 3G was fleeting, so I had really hoped that message would be seen and I wouldn’t have to worry about a flood of messages jamming up my phone while the networks were still spotty. While on Facebook, I was also able to see that a few Nepali colleagues had been able to post that they were okay, which was a huge relief, although it left me with many concerns for all the rest of them. We were able to learn that the earthquake had started in the Gorkha district, about half way between Kathmandu and Pokhara. We learned that many of Kathmandu’s ancient structures had collapsed, leaving nothing but rubble. It sank in a little more. My roommate and I talked about how in awe we were of the earth, and decided that we would probably convert to whatever religion it is that worships the earth as the all-powerful being it is. The earth is alive and we must appease it! 

British Embassy 4:00-5:00

Around 4pm, the 2 other girls returned, with news that the British Embassy was taking in anybody from North America, the EU and Commonwealth countries. We decided to go and check it out. We had no problem getting in (thanks Western privilege!), and no joke, were promptly handed cups of tea. Bless the British. The man in charge informed us that they were the ONLY embassy taking in ANYBODY. As in, Americans couldn’t even go to their embassy, nor Canadians to their consulate, and expect to receive any help, a fact which was confirmed by numerous others later on. The embassy had a nice, large lawn, an earthquake proof building, working toilets (which I immediately relived myself in), water, food and blankets. Also, a small British boy named Henry (awww) who was on rubbish patrol (AWWWWWW). 

At my apartment 5:30-7:00

We STILL hadn’t fully wrapped our heads around the situation, except for my American roommate who we usually tease for being overly paranoid. 3 of us decided to go home to spend the night, and she said “No way, I’m sleeping here!” We thought she was being over paranoid. As our apartment is near the British embassy, she decided to walk back with me to grab some of her stuff, and went immediately back to the embassy. I stayed outside with some of the neighbours who were sitting in the front yard. The told me that they’d be there all night. I went into my apartment (stupidly) and noticed that by some miracle, the wifi was still working! So I quick Skype called my mom, during which there were a couple scary tremors, and an interruption when my landlord came to chat. My building was (is) is great shape. No cracks on the inside, outside, or even on the roof. 

Start of Skype call to mom: 6:00 PM

My German roommate finally returned home, and after experiencing a couple more tremors, she said she thought we needed to go outside. We saw that many of our neighbours were choosing to spend the night outside for safety, and finally I relented. After all my stubbornness, I also ended up back at the british Embassy, because it was the safest, closest place to sleep. When we got inside, we found that my friends, who had also decided not tot stay, were back too. Apparently, they had driven to one of their homes, seen all of the people preparing to camp outside for the night, and turned back for the embassy. Again, in hindsight, of course this was the right decision. It was totally not safe to be sleeping inside a building.

British Embassy 7:00 PM onwards

So, about 8 of us gathered around and shared some cheese, bread, cookies and candies that had been purchased at the farmer’s market and then carried around all day. I finally ate the second half of my apparently more-important-than-life panini. The ground continued to move beneath us all the while. We began to feel tired, and 5 of us opted to sleep out in the open. We found a tarp and some blankets, and I managed to drift off into an uneasy sleep. 

Sleeping outside: 10PM- 1AM

I was woken around midnight or 1AM when it started to rain, and we decided to move inside to avoid getting wet, cold and sick. The floor space was full and we all ended up having to split up. After I had got all settled down and cozy in my blanket, it only took about 5 minutes for a big tremor to hit and get everyone running out of the building. I personally only made it as far as slipping my shoes on before it subsided and I decided to just like back down. A few people remained outside for about an hour to calm their nerves. Another big tremor woke us all up at about 5AM, causing people to run outside again. The sky had begun to lighten and the birds were chirping, so there was no getting back to sleep after that. At about 6AM, the soldiers in charge came through with the official wake up call and informed us that breakfast was served. These guys were absolutely amazing, all charm class, patience and competence.

Breakfast served: 6AM Sunday

And here is the end of my first day and night of earthquake. Stay tuned for what happens next! Spoiler alert: I manage to survive!!

India Part 3: The South

We arrived in Mumbai in the morning and needed to take the local train into town to get to our hotel. The Mumbai local trains are infamous for the organized chaos you experience while taking them. You have to find the right platform, make sure it’s the right train, figure out which stations you are coming into, and, once you are at the right station, you need to move fast to get off the train before it starts to move again. Luckily, everything went smoothly for us, excpet that the train we thought would take us all the way to our hotel’s neighbourhood stopped halfway and we had to ‘alight’ (fancy British word for getting off a train or bus) and find another one. Since I am a natural master of deductive reasoning, we found the right train and carried on. But I’ve spent too much time talking about trains! We got to our hotel, and it was exactly what we expected. Nothing amazing, but in a fantastic neighbourhood (called Fort) near to some NICE food spots (very important). That evening, we hopped on a bus after figuring out the numbers (different from Roman numbers!) and went to Chowpatty Beach on Marine Drive. My first impressions of Mumbai were GOOOOOD! It was the first Indian city we were in where I didn’t have to watch out for cow poo on while walking down the road, and it truly felt LUXURIOUS. Marine Drive was lovely, and Chowpatty Beach was a hub of evening activity. We got some food from a group of stalls set up on the beach and watched the families relaxing and playing on the beach. 

Chowpatty Beach

We walked back along Marine Drive and laughed at the awkward couples trying to be typical young couples but in a place where public displays of affection are not exactly approved of. The next day we walked around Colaba, which included walking by the India Gate, the Taj Hotel and Leopold’s. 

India Gate

In the afternoon we hopped on the same bus going down Marine Drive to see Ghandi’s old residence. now a Ghandi museum. This was the Ghandiest thing we did while in India, and I think we were both glad to have made the point to go there. The next day we opted just to walk around A LOT all over town. We walked to the Central Train Station, then we walked to a temple, then we walked to Dhobi Ghat, a slummy looking place where a huge percentage of the city’s laundry get done, and we walked to a mausoleum, then we gave up and went home. 

Dhobi Ghat

Alcohol isn’t cheap in India the way it is somewhere like Thailand, so we actually didn’t do much drinking! I promise! The next day we had a train in the morning. We had a gruelling journey ahead of us. We got off the train at 4am, waited around a train station in some other city until 6am, then took a second train toooooo

Hampi! The journey was totally insane and we were crazy for planning it like that, but it was so worth it. Hampi is like nothing I’ve ever seen…it looks like the set of The Flintstones. Instead of trying to describe it, you just need to look at the photo. It was beautiful. We had a bit of a trek to get to our guesthouse, as we’d booked one a little far away from the main action. Again, so worth it. We were surrounded by peaceful rice paddies and boulder piles. 

Hampi

We rented out a scooter every day we were there and just drove around. I also drove the scooter, and nobody got hurt! We did a lot of lazing around doing nothing, but one day we got really adventurous and rented bicycles and biked around all these old ruined temples and stuff in the area. That was pretty interesting and fun, although a little on the sweaty side. Our days in Hampi kind of blend together in my memory, and the photos are really more effective than any of my words could be.

ruins in Hampi

 When time was up, we headed out to catch our sleeper bus. This was a silly bus, and we had an unpleasant experience…the bus stopped at like 3am, they made us all get off, and wait around for 30 minutes, then made us get on ANOTHER bus. WHY!?! There was no explanation, of course there wasn’t. Anyway, we did eventually arrive in

Goa! But we didn’t arrive at the right place exactly. We got off the bus and onto another bus to a placed called Margao, and then got on ANOTHER bus to take us to Palolem, which was at last, our final destination. We alighted from the bus and were instantly bombarded by guys trying to hustle up some business for their guesthouses. We were prepared, and decided they seemed nice enough and had the right price, so we followed them down the beach. After a bit of negotiating, we ended up with an adorable little beach hut for an INCREDIBLE price about 50 meters from the water’s edge (more like 25 at high tide haha). Then we kicked into full blown beach mode for the next 4 days, leaving our beach beds only to go to a restaurant, bar, or to another beach. It was grand, we were so relaxed we forgot to take photos, sorry! 

beach

Our next journey was going to be so much more straightforward than the last two and we were totally prepared for it. We took our night train down to

Alleppey (or Alapuzha), our first stop in Kerala, God’s own Country. Our main objective here was to explore the backwaters. Most people do this on a beautiful, all-inclusive houseboat. 

Because we were on a budget, we figured that was waaaay out of our price range (we were right too haha) and opted for a day trip on a canoe instead. Our guesthouse arranged the whole thing and we were off the day after we arrived. 

our canoe

Alleppey was really cool. Kerala is an elected communist state, and they are REALLY communist! There are also A LOT of Christians there, and between the Communist things and Christian things it really feels incredibly different from anywhere else we went in India. So we got paddled around the waterways where people live and work and it was beautiful and lovely and there was so much to see.

comrade

 The tour finished off with lunch prepared by our boatman’s wife at their beautiful house in the middle of a bunch of rice paddies. It was a lovely day! 

rice paddies around his house

There didn’t seem to be a whole lot to do in Kerala other than see the backwaters. I kept wishing there were some guesthouses outside of the town and along the banks of the water so we could just sit and relax and watch the world go by, but there wasn’t. The next day we took another bus (a long ride again) to

Munnar! Munnar is a Hill Station up in the Western Ghats. It’s tea fields. It’s so much tea! We arrived at night and were happy to find a cooler climate (higher altitude yay!) and disappointed to find really expensive hotels. Our first day there we just wandered around in some tea fields (we MIGHT have been trespassing, whatever) and ate some AMAZING food at a restaurant that we visited two more times before we left. 

tea everywhere

The next day we went for a guided hike up higher and onto some mountains. Unfortunately, the visibility was terrible and our views were not as extraordinary as they should have been. But it was still a nice day and we learned some things about tea. Did you know that black, green and white tea all comes from the same plant? Did you know that the tea plants in India were just transplanted from China? Did you know the British are literally obsessed with tea to the point where the whole country should have gone to some kind of therapy for it? So many interesting things about tea. 

So-so view from the top

 I think on this day we also went to the tea museum. It was a little odd (there were dead animals hanging on the wall!) and propaganda-y (LOVE THE TEA COMPANY. THE TEA COMPANY WILL TAKE CARE OF YOU. DO NOT QUESTION THE TEA COMPANY), but they did have an active tea processing exhibit that showed all the steps between tea leaf and tea bag, so that was cool. On our third and final day in Munnar, we hired an auto to drive us up to Top Station, and to stop at some of the attractions along the way. We were happy because the sky was clear and blue when we started up. We got almost all the way up there before we turn one corner and the sky was suddenly grey and cloudy. Just like that. So again, our amazing view was ruined, but luckily I’m very imaginative so I could figure out what it probably looks like when it’s clear. Unfortunately my camera can’t do that and the photos are terrible.

From Top Station

We came back down and to cheer ourselves up we rented a paddle boat and went out on this beautiful lake for a bit. Then we ate some food and saw some crazy honey bees. 

paddle boating

Our last mission in Munnar was to stock up on spices. The next day, we caught a short and pleasant bus ride to:

Kochi (Cochin)! Our last stop of our epic pan-Asian journey. We walked around the touristy Fort Kochi area, saw the famous Chinese fishing nets, the Portuguese Basilica, the Dutch Palace, Jew Street, and one last temple (but our first/only Jain temple!). It was a super multicultural day. 

Jew Street?

Then we finished it off with THE BEST SHRIMP CURRY that has ever existed probably, and then Conor headed off to the airport. The end of an era!!! The next day I moved into a hostel so I wouldn’t be so lonely. I had a few very idle days planned for myself. My visit to Kochi happened to coincide with a huge international art festival taking place, and I spent a couple days just walking through the huge exhibits. During the evening I would go to cultural shows, and was able to take in a puppet show, some dancing and some martial arts. 

Kathakali Dancing

I also managed to squeeze in an Ayurvedic style massage. Turns out I don’t love Ayurvedic massages. They are oily and gentle, and I prefer less oil and lots of pressure. But it was worth trying out. On my last day in Kochi I went on a mission to find specific items to take up to Abby’s house in Lucknow. I needed a cake pan, deli meats and blue cheese. Once these items were found, I went “home” and relaxed. The next day I flew to Lucknow to meet Abby! That’s for next time

India - Rajasthan

Our next stop was also our first stop in lovely Rajasthan, maybe the most visited state in India after Goa. Jaipur was our first stop that we really enjoyed. We hired a tuk tuk to drive us out to our first Rajasthan fort, the Amer Fort. We grabbed an audio guide (definitely needed it for our first fort, not so necessary by the end). These forts are built to withstand siege and battle. There are walls around walls, steep staircases with sharp turns, spikes sticking out of the walls to gouge elephants, etc. That’s enough about forts for now. 

The Amer Fort

In Jaipur we were also lucky to cross paths with a lovely British couple that we had hung out with for a few days in Myanmar back in November! We met them for dinner and swapped our crazy India stories. The next day we walked around the old city, ate some amazing Indian deep-fried sweet called jelabi, and looked at the Hawa Mahal, or Palace of the Wind. It was built so the royal ladies could sit and watch the going-ons of the city, without being seen by commoners. It also turned out to be the only thing within our price range (a palace and an observatory were WAY overpriced). 

The Hawa Mahal

That night, we went to see a Bollywood film at this fancy old vintage decorated movie theater with our British friends. Although the movie was in Hindi with no subtitles, we were able to understand most of what was happening, especially with a little help from Wikipedia. Indians, at least the ones in Rajasthan, make a tonne of noise in a movie theatre, whooping, cheering and yelling at the appropriate moments. It was a neat experience! I can’t remember what else we did in Jaipur so it must not have been that amazing, but I do remember getting on our FIRST NIGHT BUS in India. Like the train, we were a little (or a lot) cold due to windows that didn’t quite close, and were additionally kept awake by an insane melodic horn (it sounded like he was playing a keyboard to produce the sounds!). We at least had our own nice little compartment and had some privacy from the rest of the passengers on the bus. It was kind of like sleeping in a coffin for two with windows. Finally, at some point, I was asleep, and when I opened my eyes we were in…

Jaisalmer! Our second Rajasthan stop. This was the desertiest of our stops, and the first thing we saw out of the window was the fort, rising out of the center of the town like a giant magical sandcastle. We lucked out again with our guesthouse, scoring a huge room and private bathroom for very cheap. The owner insisted his name was Aladdin (I say too good to be true) and was super helpful. The main reason we went to Jaisalmer was to do a camel safari out to some real sand dunes. Aladdin arranged this for a great price, and we were off the next day. Conor and I and our guide, Leelu, set off to wander around the desert for a few hours, then we (Leelu) set up our camp and cooked us dinner (it was delicious!). We slept out under the stars, and nothing even tried to eat us, although at one point I thought maybe I had to go pee, but when I peeped out from my blankets there was a dog just standing there investigating us, so I stayed where I was. I slept SOO well I actually missed the sunrise by like an hour and yelled at Conor for not waking me up to see it! Our camels had tried to run away in the night, and this 13 year old kid that was helping Leelu had to go chase them down for us. We rode them back to the village, then jumped in a jeep back to town. Pretty neat. We spent the rest of the day chilling with another cool British couple we met in our guesthouse, and went out for dinner with them at this restaurant with a slightly insane lady hostess, who chatted with us while we ate. The next day we wandered around trying to find these old haveli things until it was time to get on our bus. This was a shorter distance, only like 5 hours and then we were in…

In the desert with our camels

Jodhpur! Jodhpur is famous for, you’ll never guess, a FORT. This fort was impressive. The royal family has maintained it and turned it into an impressive museum. Jodhpur is also known as the blue city, because there are about 20 blue houses clustered together and if you take a photo just right it looks like the whole city is blue. 

blu city?

So the fort was informative. In Jodhpur, we were also able to meet our pal that we met in Varanasi a couple times! Saurabh took us to a fancy thali place where we ate until we were just about to throw up, then tried to have some drinks, but soon realized we were way too painfully full for that nonsense. So the next night we got smart and did the drinking first and the eating second. Conor and I hadn’t eaten much meat for about a month prior to this point, and Saurabh promised us amazing tandoori chicken, and he totally delivered. On our last day in Jodhpur, we decided to try out ziplining beside the fort, mostly because we heard that you get to zip over the opening of the prison that Batman has to climb out of in the latest Batman movie (you know the one with Bane!). It was a total bargain and lots of fun, and, what a coincidence, we were joined by a group of 4 Korean teachers vacationing together. 

ziplining

After ziplining we were off on another bus, a bus which ended up taking approximately forever it turned out, toooo:

Pushkar! We arrived in Pushkar after like 8 hours on a bumpy local bus. It was dark, we were the only people still on the bus, it was EXHAUSTING. Luckily, our guesthouse was very easy to find and we were able to eat dinner and go straight to sleep. Pushkar is home to a holy lake, and has drawn all the kinds of tourists who feel the “vibrations” that always elude me. The very positive side of being in a town full of hippies was that Pushkar was full of AMAZING restaurants serving unique and flavourful dishes with fresh ingredients. We had already designated Pushkar as a do nothing place, where we would relax and recharge. We didn’t end up doing anything special, just walking around the town and planning out the rest of our time in South India. Our visit did coincidentally coincide with a holiday (Kite day? New year? Both??) which let us see lots of kite flying, some colourful processions through the streets to the holy lake, some extremely loud music, and a booze-less rooftop rave for teenage boys. All very interesting. When it was time to go, we easily made our way into the next town over to catch a local bus, which was much less painful than the previous one. We arrived with plenty of daylight left to go, in…

The holy lake at Pushkar

Bundi! Our smallest and least touristy stop of the entire country had a fort, but an old, abandoned, ruiny kind. We arrived and immediately asked advice about a good place to get chai, not realizing the gravity of our question. Within minutes, we were off, accompanied by the guesthouse owner, his brother, and 3 other guests, because getting chai is an event in a small town like Bundi. We arrived at Krishna’s, where we were told we would be drinking the BEST chai in India. Bold claim. It was, however, VERY delicious and unique, with a bouquet of flavours exploding in your mouth. Unfortunately for me, one of these flavours was black pepper, one of my kryptonite foods. :( So I didn’t get to drink all of mine. After tea, the guesthouse owner, Shivam, decided to send his brother to get us all some butter chicken while he built a fire,a nd we sat around the fire eating chicken with our hands. Good start! The next day, we walked up to the old Palace and Fort. The palace was REALLY cool, very ruiny and crumbly, but with a few rooms in amazing condition. Apparently it was never conquered by the Mughals, and the British also left it alone because they were on good terms with the royal family here. So it wasn’t RUINED, per se, it was just disused. A lot of fun to explore. 

room in the palace at Bundi

We also walked up to see the fort, which was a little less exciting, and a lot more terrifying due to a monkey family siege in which we both decided the best course of action was to run away. After Indiana Jonesing in the ruins, we decided to have a beer by the lake. It was a good day. I’m pretty sure the next way we walked around and saw a few more of the town’s monuments, including a much better than expected Queen’s Bath. 

The Queen's bath

Then we relaxed and drank some rum by a campfire. Early in the morning, we set off early in the morning, a little apprehensive about our instructions for getting to Udaipur. We caught a train at a totally different time than what we were told it would come at, but apparently it was ok, and then we got off the train and caught a bus the rest of the way. We must have been pretty pro at this point, because everything went exactly as planned, and by the evening we were in:

Udaipur! Our last stop in Rajasthan. Udaipur’s pop culture claim to fame is that the James Bond film Octopussy was shot there, and you can watch the film in dozens of restaurants in the main tourist streets. It is also known is the “Venice of the East” but if you’ve been to Asia you know there are like 50 Venice of the Easts and none of them are much like Venice at all. (I’m looking at you Tai O Hong Kong!) It DID have a nice lake, with a palace by the lake and TWO palaces on the lake. We went to see the palace, which is still VERY intact, with many rooms still fully decorated in what I’m calling “colonial-chic” style.

indo colonial chic

There was also a tree growing up of the second floor balcony. SECOND floor. Because Kings do what they want.  After the palace, we looked around a nearby temple with some very intricate carving. 

large temple in Udaipur

The next day, we checked out a vintage car museum that houses the old royal cars AND horse carriages. The next day we took a boat ride on the lake and got a really nice view of the palace from the water. The last thing we did here was watch a cultural performances that was pretty mind blowing. An older woman balanced like 10 jugs on her head and performed tricks like stepping on glass and balancing on a pan. It was pretty memorable. That night, we jumped on a train heading south, and in the morning we were in Mumbai!

dancing with jars

India #1 Delhi, Varanasi, Agra

I’m just gonna jump right in! We arrived in Delhi on December 23. At first we were like “wow what a nice metro! This isn’t how we pictured Delhi at all!” But that eventually faded after we arrived at the New Delhi railway station and exited onto the street, where we did immediately find what we were expecting from Delhi. People, traffic, garbage, an insane man to woman ratio everywhere you look (think like 20:1), open urinals, etc. To add to the experience we were expecting, we then got into an auto (tuk-tuk, rickshaw, what have you) and were totally ripped off on a ride to our hostel. It wasn’t so bad, because we really were expecting it haha. So, December in Delhi is actually a little cold and I was pretty glad I hadn’t jettisoned my warm clothes from Nepal. On Christmas Eve, we walked  to Connaught Place, a well known shopping area, and were pretty unimpressed, although we found a pretty nice cafe, which is never bad. Our main goal on December 24th was to get tickets for…The Hobbit! This was our only plan for Christmas Day, but it ended up being a little harder than planned. A Bollywood film called PK had just been released, and the director is the same guy who did Three Idiots, and is thus mega famous. He released his film on condition that any theatre showing it could show ONLY it, and no other movie. So, instead of watching it in the commercial district 20 min from our hostel, we had to drive an hour out into the suburbs. Luckily it didn’t matter, because it was Christmas and we both wanted basically nothing to do with India anyway. Later, we both attempted Skype, but the wifi at our hostel was terrible and we were mostly unsuccessful. 

Now, cut to sometime between Dec. 25 and Dec. 26 - Mary is in the shared hostel bathroom, having the most epic food poisoning of her life! Merry Christmas! As you can guess, most of Boxing Day was spent in bed recovering from my epic purge. Luckily, it was the only time I got REALLY sick in India, and it only lasted like 20 hours. I should also point out that I probably got it from some expensive Western restaurant!! Our last day in India, I had mostly recovered, and we managed to squeeze in some sight seeing. Delhi has quite a few historical sites scattered around. We went to Old Delhi to see the Red Fort, our first of like 1 trillion forts. It was nice, but not amazing, and we enjoyed learning about how terrible the British were during their time there. One British prince managed to shoot like 25 tigers in one go during a visit! TWENTY FIVE! Then we checked out the biggest mosque in India, then decided that Old Delhi was way too crowded and crazy and that it was time to GTFO. We jumped on the Metro and whizzed down to see Qutab Minar, a super old Minaret, mosque and ruins complex. It was similar to what happens when you go to Rome and see the field of ruins there. THEN we headed over to Hauz Khas because I heard that’s where all the cool kids go. We watched the cool kids and got some pizza, and I was happy.

Qutab Minar

The next day, we had a train booked to go to Varanasi. We had heard that trains could be late, so we were prepared to wait a few hours. When we got to the train station, our train had been delayed TWELVE hours. As in, the next morning. PANIC! Luckily, the staff at New Delhi station must be used to foreigners freaking out about such things, and several security guards and ticket agents helped us cancel the old tickets and purchase new ones on a train that had also been delated 12 hours that happened to be leaving when we were planning to leave anyway. So we jumped on that (they made us run!! I almost died! We didn’t even need to!). This was our first train journey and India, and we’d heard soo many stories. Because of the delay and reschedule we had landed in sleeper class, which is technically the 4th class of sleeper cars. We had planned on being in one class up, where they provide blankets, pillows, heating, and windows that close properly, so we were totally unprepared for the bare bones conditions on the train. We were probably both going to freeze to death during the night. Then, we met Ravinder, a young Punjabi boxer, traveling to Varanasi for a match (fight?) with his nephew. He was keen to practice his English and told us if anyone messed with us we should just call for him. Then, in an extraordinary act of kindness, he offered us one of their blankets, saying that they were family and could share one bed and one blanket no problem. Any anxiety we had had about taking sleeper class was totally gone. In the morning, the train was moving REAL slow, and what should have been a 12 hour journey turned into a 24 hour journey. Our train car emptied out over the day, until there was only us, Ravinder and his nephew left. We were bored out of our minds and glad to have some language-barrier induced laughs. We FINALLY arrived in Varanasi, cold, hungry, tired, and said goodbye to Ravinder and wished him luck in his fight (he won btw). That night we slept so early!

Another friend we made on the train

Our first day in Varanasi, the guesthouse owner arranged a tuk-tuk tour for us, mostly to temples. It’s difficult to travel through Asia for 6 months and still get excited about a temple, but it’s still something to be done. AND, the driver let us try to drive, and I think we were both pretty good at it. Just like a 3 wheeled motorbike with a box built around it haha. 

Conor driving the tuk tuk

The weather was still cold and grey and not beautiful. Varanasi itself was a little (more than a little) odd. Everybody hypes it up, people say it’s their FAVOURITE place in the country. We found it kind of less interesting, we decided it might be because we don’t feel the “vibrations” all the yoga hippies are always talking about. Varanasi is famous for the Ganges and the cremations taking place by the river. The river WAS an interesting sight, and you can easily walk the length of it in a couple hours and see lots of great stuff, just making sure to dodge the cow poop, beggars and narcotics salesmen. 

The burning ghats

We watched Aarti, the nightly ceremony performed by priests for Lord Shiva:

We were also lucky to meet our second Indian friend, he was staying at the same guesthouse as us. By this time it was New Years Eve, and Varanasi is probably one of the least interesting places to be on Dec. 31! We were lucky to have our friend Saurabh to show us where to go to buy alcohol and what Indian rum to buy that wouldn’t be too expensive or we would have been totally sober on NYE because Varanasi, a holy city, is also a DRY city. Planning fail on our part haha. We drank, walked down by the river and got yelled at because apparently there is a 10:30 pm curfew and went to bed. Next day, We went with Saurabh to see the location of Buddha’s first post-enlightenment lecture. It’s now just a bunch of ruins and a museum, but it was interesting. At this point we were still trying to get a handle on all the different Hindu gods so it was pretty helpful. We had a bit of an issue when we entered the ancient site, as the officials there refused to believe that Saurabh wasn’t our illegally hired tour guide. I jokingly asked if it would be acceptable for use to walk around separately from him and they very seriously responded with “yes that’s fine”. When told “you have no proof that he’s a tour guide” they said “we have no proof that you are not a permit-less tour guide”. Whaaaaaat!? Somehow, eventually, they relented, and we toured the grounds. I’m pretty sure, that day we were supposed to take our next train. Saurabh had not only shown us which rum to buy, he had shown us an app to use to check to see ho late our train would be. Due to human error, I neglected to check this app before leaving for the train station, and when we arrived we discovered that our train was again delayed. This time, every couple of hours the delayed it by a couple more hours, until again, we left 12 hours later than schedule, and our night train turned into a day train. We did FINALLY arrive in Agra, home of the Taj Mahal, a fort, and not much else…a Pizza Hut I guess. 

Checking out Buddha with our fake tour guide

We had one full day in Agra. We spent part of it at the Taj Mahal, the most expensive attraction in all of India. Foreigners: 700 rupees. Indians: 20 rupees. But, they get away with it, and they always will, because that thing is totally as beautiful and amazing as everyone says it is. Not overrated one bit, and I was so annoyed. I would have been way more satisfied if I could report that the whole thing is a big scam. It’s not. It takes your breath away, and the sun wasn’t even shining when we were there. You’ve seen the Taj Mahal, I won’t waste my time describing it :). After the Taj Mahal, we walked over to the Agra Fort, which we entered from the wrong direction, and had to jump a fence to get to the main entrance. On principle of being cheapskates, we don’t often hire guides, but this guy gave us a GREAT deal because the weather was bad and he was having a slow day, so we succumbed to his persistence, and I think we’re both glad we did. He was good at his job and the signage wasn’t great so we were able to gain a lot more from it. He made us take some silly perspective illusion photos. I think that’s all of importance that happened in Agra, unless you wanna count Pizza Hut, which I DID, but I doubt you want to hear about my pizza. Tis a silly place, and if the Tah Mahal didn’t happen to be there, it would be a pointless place to visit. Our next train was at 6am, and naturally, of course, even though this train being a few hours late would be LOVELY, it was RIGHT ON TIME, because even though I swear Conor had been building up a TONNE of karma for the month before that, the universe is a jerk.

Stay tuned for Rajasthan next!