-  A Passage to India and Nepal? -
                      - Aw ya can't be serious -

A travel-story by Rick Vermunt

Introduction:
My diary was rather long so I'll sustain with taking the more interesting 
bits from my journey. 
I hope it will make you consider about going to India and Nepal.

Note:
Hindu readers are bound to find errors in my explanations of India. 
I do not pretend to be accurate. Many of the things I tell are personal
impressions, facts from my travel guides, my tour guide and some of what I 
remember from coversations with Indians. I ask them not to feel offended.

INDIA

India, land of a great old civilization. A country also, still much under 
the influence of the colonial period. A country in which religion claims
a prominent position in daily life, whether it's hindus or muslims. Land
of extremes: dire poverty next to filthy wealth, hand in hand with a
magnificant cultural heritage. Not like an old monument, but as the centre
of social life.
India, a country in which its inhabitants are reluctant to let go of the
old views and values in exchange for modern western life on the road to
the 21st. century.

                           Delhi

The first day.
The moment we left the airport the humid heat struck us in the face. Over
thirty celcius, and it was not later than seven in the morning. That promised 
something for the rest of the journey.
After settling in in our hotel (Imperial Hotel) my travel mate Andre and me 
decided to check out the city. Much time to do so wasn't there anyway, we had 
to leave for Jaipur the next day. Our guide gave us some tips for the rest of 
the holiday: "You don't h a v e to get sick if you take the proper 
precautions."
Barely we had left our hotel or a little boy asked us if we needed a rikshaw.
Why, yes of course. What other possibility was there in this huge, strange
city? He lead us to some stubby, unsavoury looking man. He smiled at us to
show he was trustworthy revealing two rows of bloody red teeth. 
"It's a good price. Trust me. 300 rupee for the whole day. I take you to Red 
Fort and Jami Masjid (a mosque) and also to Khasba, if you want."
Every couple of seconds he spat on the ground. Apparently he was having a 
chew.
According to western standards it was a bargain indeed, but according the 
wage-averages in India he was making loads of money this day. 
What we had to learn is to think in rupees as in dollars, and a
reasonable price for a ride into town would have been 20 rupees. 
 
Traffic in Delhi cannot easily be described. Like in England traffic keeps
left, but that was about the only traffic regulation I could distinguish.
Smog hovers over the city in such enormous concentrations that traffic
at night appears to be moving in a thick fog. I'm not sure about what will 
prove to be more hazardous to people, smoking or living in Delhi.
First of all, there was the omni present flavour of the city. All kinds of 
smells I wasn't used to struggled to make their introduction to my 
unaccustomed olphactory system.
Traffic itself seemed to be one big chaos. Without minding any fellow
trafficers cars, rikshaws, mopeds, trucks, bicycles, pedestrians, an
occassional bus, taxi cabs swarmed amongst oneanother. Even animals like
cows, and waterbuffalos were claiming their place amongst the traffic.
Apparently there was one main rule to be obeyed: the largest participants
were having the most rights, pushing their way through the crawling mass
of moving objects. The only exception are the rikshaw-drivers: they are
the often cursed trafficers, recklessly ignoring any signal, or size of 
fellow trafficer.
The heat was incredible. I can't recall sweating as much as I did in India
(well maybe playing an indoor soccer game) but certainly not while I was
just sitting in the back of this rikshaw as it rushed through the slowly
moving traffic.
That was our first rip off (but as we were told: the first days you're bound
to be get harassed by the vendors and ripped off if you're tricked into
some bargain).

Andre and I went to do some shopping in the surroundings of the hotel in 
order to get some drinks and food for the trip to Jaipur. We were struggling 
our way through the crowd-filled sidewalks pushing off beggars and vendors.
The thing is: there are only some many tourists visiting India each year, and 
there is almost a billion people living in India and most of them are poor
beyond imagination. Can you blame them for trying to make little money? In 
their view any western is rich. (As a matter of fact we are, being capable
of buying a holiday-ticket to India).
Getting angry at them for tugging your shirt, and asking for your attention
and asking an outrageous price for some junk you don't really want, makes no
use. They simply don't understand that. They are investing their precious 
time in you, so why get angry? Ignoring them is best ways to handle it, and
any tourist will learn in time spending in India. At that time it'll be 
a lot easier to select the items you want to take home.

He pointed me to the flockes of birds of prey high above us that appeared 
to search the city below for bits of food lying in the city below.
"There seem to be as much of them as are sparrows in Amsterdam" we decided.
A shoeshine man stopped me.
"Excuse me sahib."
"I don't want a shoepolish," I said and was about to walk on.
"There is big bird dropping on your shoe."
He was quite right about that. A big slab of some greenish, jucky shit
covered most of my left shoe.
"Shit!" I exclaimed and looked franticly around for a scrap of paper in 
order to remove it.
"I clean shoe for you sahib," the shoeshine man said.
What a coincidence.
Admitted, he made a rather thorough job of it.
Since people working in the shoe business mostly belong to the lower
casts, and certainly shoeshiners (I guess they are what one calls the
so-called untouchables) because the human foot is considered one of the
mostm unclean bodyparts, I expected this wasn't going to cost me too much.
How naive I proved to be.
Later I learned that shoeshiners are known to  swindle tourist by putting
shit of any kind on their shoes (tourists are easy prey, aren't they?) and
then ripping them off by asking way too much for a shoeshine job.

The next morning we took the train to Jaipur.
Poverty in India is that severe that many many people are living on the
streets often owning not more than the clothes they wear and maybe a
stretcher to sleep on (the streets are littered with them).
Going to the toilet results therefore in some folklore of its own.
Leaving the station we noticed hundreds of Indians squating at the railroad
tracks with a bottle of water next to them to clean their buttocks. They do
so with their left hand, which is considered unclean. Whether the left
hand is considered unclean because they wipe their ass with it, or
because it is unclean they wipe their ass with it I don't know. 
But food has to be taken with your right hand, and handing over money as
well, or else they might refuse to accept it.
Left-handed people like me are, I guess, frowned upon (even though I
wipe mine with my right hand). It was hard getting used to for me.

                           Jaipur

In Jaipur we stayed in hotel Bissau, a former palace of one of the 
Maharadjas (rumour went that this man still lived in the palace and tried
to make some money on the wealthy tourist).
Photographs of 19th century Prince of Wales, Edward, showed that the great
of this earth had preceded us in staying in this palace. As far as our
damp, dark tiny room was concerned I knew that this romanticism had since 
long passed. Jaipur, also called the Pink City, because the walls of the 
inner city were painted pink to enlighten the visit of this same prince.
If we had thought Delhi was a dirty city, Jaipur proved us very wrong.
Looking around the city we noticed that only a rather small part of the city
was connected to some basic sewerage. The rest of the city's sewerage
consisted of nothing more than a gutter in which the people's excrements
floated in a greyish kind of water. It was a bit of a shock to me to witness 
Jaipur's inhabitants doing their needs squatting over the gutter and a couple 
meters ahead a woman carfully taking water from it. Scrawny little pigs 
sharing their meals with dogs and holy cows from various garbage heaps that 
flank the streets, that were packed with people.
Next to the doors of the houses lay patches of camel dung drying in the sun
later to be used as fuel for home-cooking.
Women don't dominate this colour locale, but if they are outside at all, they
immediately strike the eye: compared to the men (the western tourists easily
included) they are a graciously walking feast of colours.

The next day, as we were planning to hire a rikshaw that would bring us to
the inner city, we were greated by a man that asked us whether we were from
Holland. Well, yes. In answer he claimed to have been in the Netherlands.
"Yeah, Right.."
To prove it he showed us a couple of pictures of him posing at the Amsterdam
canals, and one of him holding a huge lump of snow.
"Holland is cold."
He turned out to be a Foster Parents Plan child, now grown up, but still in 
a close contact with his Foster father.
He introduced himself as Tuveer, which was to be pronounced as Two beer.
"Call me Heineken," he laughed.
The next couple of days he persisted in refusing the fares we had to pay him,
but finally we covinced him that his boss would appreciate to receive some
money in the end. That we tipped him quite generously may be clear.

                           Amber

One of the places we visited was the deserted, ruined city of Amber, known
for the splendour of the Amber fortress.
Situated next to a stinking green lake the Amber fortress overlooked this
ruined city. We took an elephantride up hill to the entrance.
Our guide told us about the average daily wages of the Indians, which is
30 rupees (remember our rikshawdriver?), so 900 Rs. a month, which estimates
a small $ 25,--!
The Amber fortress was enormous, and to my joy I saw the first monkeys
(impudent rascals, ever on the prowl for snatching the food of unwary
tourists). Surrounded by miles of walls, it appeared that when this palace 
was built by the great Akhbar, the third mughal sovereign (1556-1605), 
they certainly didn't cut back on building budgets. (Probably these palaces 
and fortresses were built with the unvoluntary help of slaves, but I'm not 
sure about that).

In order to keep up our role of tourists, we went the next day on a camel
safari. A small bus took us to the countryside. The highway consisted of a
twolane road. The same traffic regulations seemed to neglected on these
roads as well. Passing slower vehicles was usually accompanied by
continuingly honking their and keeping the other lane forcing oncoming
traffic to step on the brakes and take the verge of the road.
The camels were of the usual arrogant looking kind, blandly bearing the
people riding their backs. Our route took us to a country village where
we could meet the peasants. To put it mildly, I could sustain with saying
their housing is adapted to the warm weather conditions of India. On the
other hand, the houses are constructed of loam and the plastering outside
has to be renewed every after the monsoon because the heavy rains tend to
wash away the walls. These farmhouses are made up of three walls, there's
no front (and no frontdoor). The farmers were of a different kind than the
city people. They were a tiny bit more curious than shy, but they kept their
distance. The children however knew from previous visits that tourists
were likely to have ballpoints, pencils and little toys for them. In their
enthusiasm they were prepared to take a black eye for it, because it was
survival of the fittest in obtaining these treasures. The only toy they
didn't understand was ship toy (of course not, they'd probably never
seen the sea).
Later that day we left the camels and went for a hike into the hills to pay 
a visit to a holy man. This holy man, a so-called sadhou, lived the life of a 
heremit. Supported by a couple of apprentices he lived in sobriety in a 
little cave abstained from all life's luxuries. At least, that was what I'd 
expected. In fact, however, his cave was supplied with a television set, a 
refrigerator, airconditioning and, most astonishing of all, an antenna for 
receiving satelite television. 
It cost me a little amount of money to receive my ticca (a red dot of red
pigment on my forehead to show the world that I was blessed by a holy man).
Not bad for this guy eh?
That night Tuveer brought us to the Raj Mandir, the largest cinema in Jaipur.
Man, if I say large, I mean large. The room in which our particular movie
was shown could easily inhabit 3000 spectators. Birds nested under the roof,
and according to the cast system the cinema had three entrances. We took the
middle entrance, which again was frowned upon, because western people are,
beause they are mostly white, automatically considered part of the higher 
casts. Ok, sorry, I greet the God in you.
The movie we saw was successmovie Hum Aap ke hain kaun, starring Madhuri
Dixit, and if I say Madhuri, the hearts of hindu men start to skip. I can
say, if you visit India at all, at least try to see a movie. Not understanding
the language makes no problem, the plot is easy enough to follow. And 
besides, these movies are quite spectacular with lots of sing and dance
and, admitted, often very violent.

                           Agra

Agra is the city of the Taj Mahal, and an obligation for any tourist visiting
India. This was also, the city where I was struck by a severe case of
diareah, burning like hell because of the spicey food I'm so fond of.
The gates of the Taj Mahal open at six. This means that hordes of tourists
swarm inside to witness the in all the travel guides oh so recommended famous
sunrise: the light is oh so beautiful on the white marble of this mausoleum 
(the same guides are jubilant about the sunset as well). If only that one 
cloud....
The Taj is magnificant indeed. When walking towards it I was approached by
a man who pointed me the best spots for taking photographs (for a fee of 
course, that is). Sjah Jahan was struck with grieve when his wife Mumtaz Mahal 
died in 1631. So he had the Taj Mahal built as a memorial grave for his 
diseased wife. It took 20.000 laborers 22 years to complete it. Their son
Aurangzeb had his father put next to Mumtaz when Sjah Jahan died himself.
Later that day I learned that one guy in our travel company (Jan) had been 
willing to pay one thousand rupees for the same service!
That guide, certainly wasn't going to show his face for the next couple of
days. Enough money to buy food for some time to come.

                           Khajuraho

Our next destination was Khajuraho, a little village in Madhya Pradesh.
But first we had to travel through, what our guide Rene called, barrier
land. This meant that every so much miles the busdriver had to stop to pay a 
little toll and have the passenger list checked. Rumour went that the roads
were that bad that the police wanted to have knowledge of the travellers on 
the road, so if a vehicle wouldn't show up at the barrier something must 
have gone wrong. Certainly a much cheaper way than a thorough road 
construction job, for the roads are bad, I can tell you.
Illustrative may be the average speed the bus made: 20 - 40 miles an hour.
The next day we got up early, well sleeping in this holiday meant getting 
up at eight. Getting up early meant four o'clock in the morning.
The programme for the day was visiting the temples of Khajuraho. We rented
bikes for the day. Traffic in this village was that sparce that us
Dutchies, all of used to biking <on a population of 15 million Holland
has got 15 million bikes, that's almost the same amount> were glad to use
our stiffened legs for a change.
The temples of Khajuraho, constructed in the period 950 - 1050 are worth a 
visit for their statues. 
The entire body of each temple is covered with the most magnificant carvings. 
As our guide explained illustrating all aspects of life as it is from earthly 
at the outside to spiritual inside a temple, which is a shrine for some Hindu 
deity.
How surprised I was to notice a Buddha inside such a Hindu temple.
Earthly, means the most detailed erotic carvings, picturing all kinds of
positions from the Kama Sutra. The philosophy in the past behind this kind of
lucide attitude towards sexuality was a practicle as simple: most Hindu 
marriages were arranged and very often predestined and planned according to
astrology. "Love will grow with the years." Since sexuality would be an
inevitability, people considered that one might as well make as pleasant as
possible. For both spouses, that is.

                           Varanasi

The road to Varanasi was long and exhausting.
Heavy showers accompanieing us along the way. Hours behind schedule we
finally reached Varanasi and we learned a new aspect of Indian cities.
As far as I could see such a city doesn't really have city lights. The 
streets were packed with people and vehicles, and all these participants 
moved in utter darkness, only illuminated by the headlights of the cars and
trucks. Eerie.
Varanasi is the most holy Hindu city of India and many old people, if they 
can afford it, go to that city to die and be cremated at the banks of the 
Gangha (Ganges). Varanasi is therefore also reputed as a place of pilgrimage
where people come to pray, meditate and have a purifying bath in the Ganges.
The old people that come to die often have dismissed all their earthly
belongings and lead a marginal existance until the moment arrives. 
As Hindu philosophy tells: "Hey, they came to die anyway."
We decided to have our meal in the hotel (Pallavi) restaurant. As soon as we 
left our room heat slapped us in the face. It seemed that humidity in 
Varanasi was worse than any other place in India we'd been sofar. Clouds of
insects circled the lamps at the ceiling while we walked towards the 
restaurant.
Inside we were greated upon by some fellow travellers from Limburg.
Again it struck me how many servants were busily walking around the
customers. It never failed to make me feel a little bit ashamed for being a
rich white European. When we got our menus we saw to our shock that
we were staying in a muslim hotel. No alcoholic drinks.
"There is a solution," the waiter whispered.
"There is?"
"Yes, sahib, you must order a special tea."
That special turned out to be beer served in a teapot and you were
obliged to drink it from a cup. That sacrifice was easily made of course.
As a matter fact, large parts of India are prohibitioned these days.
It made us feel like mean old gangsters from Chicago in the roaring twenties.
Andre and I decided the next afternoon to go the banks of the Ganges and see 
how much is true of all these stories. We took a stroll dismissing the rikshaw
riders that offered us their services.
At the banks we ran into some of our friends from Limburg and together we
went to the burning ghats. (Were the dead are being cremated).
Strange, one moment we were walking down a narrow alley stacked with silk
vendors and the next we knew we were standing at the edge of the main
burning ghat of Varanasi.
An Indian guided us into a temple to take us for a better view from the roof. 
Inside the temple we ran into a funeral service, so our Indian told us. A 
Brahman was leading the service. Funny thing was nobody appeared to be 
grieving very much. They laughed and clapped hands, suddenly changing into 
wails of despair.
Our guide told us that dieing at the banks of the ganges is a happy
occassion. Cremation here means that the cycle of reincarnation was broken
and the soul of the expired would go to heaven? Walhalla? (Here I didn't 
understand my guide too well). Strange, here I was talking with an Indian
about the rituals of cremation and less than forty feet away untouchables 
were cremating the dead. My guide told me that seven categories are saved
from the necessity of cremation: sadhous, pregnant women, children below 
twelve, lepers, people died of snakebite, pox victims, and animals. They
are wrapped in cloth and thrown in the Ganges. Women are wrapped in red and 
men in white. The oldest son has to fast and shave his head in order to 
purify himself, for he has to light the stake. After the cremation the
fire has to be extinguished with five jars of water from the Ganges.
The ashes and what's left of the dead is dumped in the Ganges. To prove that
one man's meat is another man's poison, is the fact I saw a so-called corpse 
sifter right underneath the spot where the ashes is thrown in the water, in 
search for rings and the like.
(The story my guide told me was rather complicated and I reckon parts of it 
will be wrong).

NEPAL

What does one know about Nepal at all? Yes, the mt. Everest lies on the border
between Nepal and Tibet, so it must be a mountainous country. Sherpa's live
there that love to run uphill carrying hondred kilograms on their heads. What
most people don't know is that it is the only Hindu monarchy in the world.
That in a range of barely 200 kilometers the land rises from 200 meters above 
sealevel up to more than 8000 meters.
This implies that Nepal's climate varies by the kilometer. 
The funniest thing however was, that many Nepali people told me when I
said I was from Holland that the highest mountain in Holland was 321 meters
high. (How can they know...)

                           Chitwan National Park

Near Chitwan we said goodbye to our busdrivers and switched over to jeeps
that'd take us across river to Chitwan National Park. Anyone visiting Nepal 
is more or less obliged to visit this National Park. I never noticed any 
luxury accomodation, which explained names like Safari Lodge and in our case 
Jungle Lodge. Yes, Chitwan is rain forest. Not in the sense of tropical 
rainforest, but moderate rain forest. But rainforest anyway. Various parts 
of Nepal take an amount of rain that measures a good three meters a year in 
the period June till September. Chitwan is famous for its rhinos, but next 
to these animals one can run into Benghal tigers, leopards, civetcats, 
jackals, otters, martens, bears, various monkeys, pythons, king's cobra, 
craits, the ganges dolphin and a fish eating crocodile.
Our lodge was a very confined damp and dark little room with a bathroom next 
to it. Worn down mosquito-nets hung down from makeshift frames above our 
beds.
Chitwan is also one of the Malaria areas of Nepal. With some cello tape I
fixed mine a bit. The owner told us there would only be four hours of 
electricity a day: between 6 p.m. and 10 p.m. 
Time to have a shave and take a shower.
After that time the night would be pitch dark. No need to tell all of us went 
to bed quite early that first night. Certainly after that eighteen hour drive 
from Varanasi.
The next day there was an elephant safari on the programme. Nobody wanted to 
miss that for sure. The elephants took us into Chitwan National Park after
a stroll through elephant grass. A kind of sharpleaved man high grass.
Said to be a favorite niche for tigers on the hunt.
Our main goal of course was the chance to witness rhinos in the wild. 
Riding an elephant was a pleasant experience. The animal walked in a relaxed
trod that maked te passengers waver in all possible directions. The driver
uttered one-syllable commands, and if the elephant didn't listen too well, 
he smashed on the head witha bamboo rod. Which sometimes made the animal
trumpet violently.
After awhile we reached a pond where eight rhinos were taking a bath minding
their own business when this horde of tourists suddenly disturbed their
peace. 
Apparently this early was the time for rhinos to take a bath and therefore 
we had to get up at this early time. Rhinos aren't the most friendly type of 
animal. Since they are big they don't bother trampling passer by, and the
junglewalks organized in Chitwan take some casualties every now and then.
A couple of days before a guide was trampled by a rhino while he was trying
to save the members of his group. Questions were raised whether to stop these 
safaris at all. No need to tell the outcome of this affair. A couple of
days later we all went on a walking safari (and didn't spot anything more
than one snake and a couple of monkeys shouting insults at us. Sitting 
on my elephant gave me a save feeling. Elephants are much bigger than the 
not in the least small rhinos, and they make way for any elephant. Rhinos are
that shortsighted that they only see the huge masses of the elephants
and not those little passengers it is carrying. Speaking of camerafood.
In our town zoo there was always this pityfull single rhino scraping its
oner horn against the metal door of its denn, and here they were in all
their glory. This is the way animals should be able to live without the 
threat of being hunted because of some stupid folk-tale going around
that ground rhino horn would be an aphrodisiac.
Maybe that was the reason I had seen that funeral procession the former day.

That afternoon I went for a ride with an oxen wagon to visit a country
village. One who travels by oxen wagon mustn't be in a hurry. The wagon
moves at a leasurely pace while being overtaken left and right by 
pedestrians. Believe it or not, this pace was enough to escape a severe
monsoon shower which we saw passing by at a few hundred meter distance.
The village was crawling with children varying from nipper to adolescents.
Our guide was telling a story how people used to avoid contamination
with malaria. Their houses consist of one single space that don't have any 
windows save some slits in the walls. The women are cooking on smokey
woodfire which reaches any spot inside the houses. it keeps the insects
away, and so the mosquitos. Next to this they are used to eating very
spicey food and the men drinking homebrew containing over 70% alcohol.
Some programmes have started to decrease the illiteracy of the population
by installing compulsory education, but that for schooling money is too
tight to mention. The reason for having that many children in the village
was simple. On the first hand the birth rate's still very high in Nepal, and
on the other hand life expectancy in Nepal is 55! Which causes that
50% of the country's population is younger than 20.

                           Pokhara

For the first time this holiday I had the impression I was in a tourist
trap. The centre of the small town merely consisted of vendors, restaurants
and hotels. Maybe it was because this town was the since tourism came up
in Nepal the traditional startingpoint for mountain treckings in the 
Hymalayas. Unfortunately there was no time for us to go on a mountaintrecking,
so we decided to have a little alternative of our own. The next day we
went for a climb uphill from the valley to the top of the Sarangkot, as
was said that the view on the peak of the Anapurna massive would be
magnificant. The threatening overcast we saw around the top would
disappear in time we were certain. Being amateurs from Holland, and therefore 
not used to climbing hills, none of us had thought of taking along fresh and 
warm clothing, and I can tell you it was very very cold at the summit.
As for the notorious view at the Anapurna massive, we were glad to see 
fifteen foot ahead of us at all, so at least we could see where we were 
placing our feet during our descent. That afternoon most of the participants 
of this climb were struck by foodpoisoning, but I'd rather see it as a severe
case of exhaustion. The tight regime of rising each day appeared to be 
taking its toll.

                           Kathmandu

This day is the start of the Durga Puja, an important religious Hindu 
festival. What it really is about I didn't come to know, but it was 
much easier to witness how they celebrated it. This celebrating is
done by sacrficing animals and than having the blood poured from the 
animal's head by a preast over all kinds of objects like cars, bicycles, 
whatever for blessing by walking around it a couple of times. In our western 
eyes maybe a rather gruesome ritual, but I think it has to be viewed for 
what it symbolizes. Durga Puja is a very religious festival, and the Hindus 
taking part in it take it very seriously.
Kathmandu is a truly wonderful city. One could call it an open air museum
indeed. The Durbar Square for instance is littered with all kinds of 
temples which are built in their typical multi-roofed style. Which means
that a temple a several roofs on top of each other.
Durbar Square also inhabits the house of Kumari the living godess. 
Kumari is a little girl that's been selected from a broad choice of girls.
As far as I understood it, the girl has no saying in her selection, and she 
stays Kumari until she has her first period. From that time she's considered
unclean and another Kumari has to be selected. The worst of this all is that
almost not any man is prepared to marry a former Kumari, since legend
goes that any man marrying a former Kumari will die within hald a year.
I don't dare to think of the terrible fate I imagine that awaits any Kumari. 
No support, sort of being an outcast I guess.
The Kathmandu valley is rather compact, and the surroundings of the city
are worth a visit for their Buddhist temples like Bodnath (the largest
stupa of Nepal, with a little temple next to it containing a gold
Buddha), or Swayambunath (which is more beautiful, and has to be reached 
by climbing a long and steep stairway flanked by all kinds of colourful
statues and beggars). another place worth visiting are Pashupathinath, the
most holy Hindu city of Nepal, where one can find burning ghats, which
are just as good a spot to be cremated because the river banks they
take place are a tributary to the Ganges. Or one might go to Bakhtapur, a 
city so beautiful that the German government has taken it as her duty
to maintain and restaur the city.
One last thing: the rich and the jet set go to new York for shopping
and having them ripped off by all these overrated designers.
Kathmandu is an alternative shoppers paradise, but the main difference is
that the goods that can be purchased are cheap beyond imagination.
Another last thing: I should never be the main reason to go to this
magnificant and beautiful city.

Rick Vermunt
Librarian 
Free University Amsterdam, 
the Netherlands

If you have comments on, or like a copy of, this lenghty document you are 
very welcome to mail me at:
Grex: clees@cyberspace.org
Work: R.Vermunt@ubvu.vu.nl

98 responses total.

If you've come this far you must 've enjoyed my story
Thank you and lots of hugs abnd kisses.
(It took me several hours to put it here without
damaging it, and then I had te quick learn how to ftp and after
that how to get it here.)
Yes....

ucky me, I had a few minutes to read the whole tale.  Thanks for posting it,
clees, I enjoyed reading it.  I have difficulty breathing in extremely hot
climates, especially ones with high pollution levels, so a trip to Bombay and
Jaipur are out for me.

 Thanks, clees. It was very interesting to say the least.

I read and enjoyed the whole thing.

I enjoyed this too.  My brother is in Delhi as I type this. He will also
be spending some time in Ahmedabad.  About three weeks all totaled.

I bet he will be influenced by India as much as I am.
Even though India is not what one might consider a great country
to live in. It's not. It's something else.

Hell... 
Helllo....
My name is Satish, I'm from Banglaore, Karnatka, INDIA, It is good
to read about your INDIA & Nepal could you dned this report to my EMAIL a/c
it will be more needful to how about our country to our freinds rega this
I hope you do this favour.  My EMAIL A?c satish@vsoudha.kar.nic.in

Sorry for first two lines it is typing mistake

With regards
satish@vsoudha.kar.nic.in

wonderful descriptions clees and good writing too.
  
Traveling to another country is just about the only way to appreciate
or even comprehend the advantage we consider "normal." And it also
demonstrates why sooo many ppl risk sooo much to reach Europe or
Canada or the US. WEsterners just have no clue without travel and
comparison.

Re #6: n8nxf's brother (and mine) has been to India before on lengthy trips
(work related).  He does say that every American should see it.

Some of us can appreciate what we have here without having to go elsewhere.
I'm sure I'd get a lot more out of a trip like this than to a typical 
american tourist trap.  My youngest brother, however, remains the undisputed
globe-trotter in the family.

Thanks clees!  What detail!
I am wondering - are there places in India in the country that are cleaner
and more peaceful than the cities you described
I am studying Ayurveda and Yoga and with the emphasis on clearing the body
of toxins - well it is just hard for me to understand how these systems can
coexist with a lcak of pure drinking water, etc.  IO guess it wasn't always
that way.
learning.
I also have trouble reconciling the caste system, something I don't understand
very well, with the spiritual concepts of Yoga.   Does the caste system
originate with the purest form of the Hindu religion,  or is it one of those
things that happens when religion and culture get mixed up?   I am afriad none
of thios makes much sense but maybe someone will comment around my questions?

Thanks for posting this clees. I thoroughly enjoyed it. 

I'm going to save this to disk and read it offline; what I've skimmed through
sure sounds exciting!

This is item 71 in agora and 52 in travel.

  I just read through this myself.  A wonderful journal, clees!
It sounds like that was quite a trip!  One thing I find interesting
about India is its many similarities to Western countries in years
gone by.  I've that read well into the 19th century, visitors often
commented on how many hogs roamed Broadway in New York City.  And
"buffalo chips," or dung, was often the only fuel available on
America's western plains...I read an account of a traveler who swore
that steaks cooked right on the burning chips were the best he'd had!
 
  Marisa, impure water is not necessarily unhealthy.  People adapt
over time to microbes in their water, so what may cause a foreigner
sickness, may be fine for locals.  This makes the definition of "toxin"
somewhat relative to what one finds toxic.  (As Clees says, one man's
meat is another man's poison!)  Though I'd think even locals would boil
sewage-contaminated water carefully.
 
  I just forwarded an e-mail copy to Satish, as per his request in #7.

The similarities are only at a very superficial level, it sounds as though
you are falling into teh trap of many "develpment" theorists in your
assumptions...

People can certainly adapt to many microbes in their water, however some such
as Cholera, which has been mutating rapidly recently, nobody has much
resistance to...

  By the trap of development theorists, do you mean an assumption that
undeveloped countries are merely behind developed countries, but will
catch up given another hundred years?  I can see where that falls down
in a country like India, as the ratio of people to resources is much
lower than more economically prosperous countries.  Cultural differences
are also big factors, although political and economic policies in India
seem fairly conducive to a continuation of the steady economic growth
they've been experiencing lately.

Don't you mean, the ratio is much *higher*?

  Oops, definitely!  (Higher, lower, hey what's the diff?  :-)

Sorry for being away for all this time.
Re 11: Marisa. As for the cast system: I think the best people for explaining
this system are the people from India itself. What I know is this: you're born
in a cast and can therefore never be part?becomme part of another caste.
Marriage won't help. The next logical step is to marry inside your caste.
Reincarnation will get you in a higher caste when you've lived a good life. The
caste system is prohibitted in India, but is still widely practiced. The
origins as my travel guides told me lie in the early days of the millenium,
invented by the Ariens who had invaded in India. I think it was away to be sure
that the rulers were to rule and so on. But I'm not going to bet my life on it.
Drinking water: you can buy spring water in bottles almost anywhere (only be
sure the lid is sealed or else it will be water from tap). In this case you
gotta be careful about eating salad in restaurants, they might be washed with
tapwater. It was no problem. If you're having difficulty in combining Hinduism
with your own pratices, try to learn some about Buddhism. Buddha, after all was
a hindu who merely seeked truth within himself. What I'm trying to say is this:
buddhism is not so much a religion as a philosophy of life.

And so they built all those huge (and small) images of Buddha in
order to get a better grasp of the philosophy....

That's cynicle. Just as I am, you are aware of what happens
so often. Even though it was not intnHended likeways, the
result was another. Buddha is no god, but is considered a god.
What is right?
Correcting a mistake: the caste system was not invented this millenium,
but the one before (so approx. the start of of our counting,
or what it is called, I don't know).

You could also think of Jezus as the son of God, or
just a very gifted/enlighted person. What is right?

That was not meant cynically. It was an observation to correct your
statement that "Buddhism is not so much a religion as a philosophy
of life". To most Buddhists, it is a religion, and I used the classic
manifestation of many religions, which are religious objects or idols,
to demonstrate that. (Yes, I stated it somewhat ironically.)

There is no "right" in religions. It is what its practitioners say it
is, and it is different for each practitioner. Religions are all human
inventions, made up to satisfy some emotion or in response to some
very powerful personalities. 

  I happen to agree with you, but there are a sure a lot of people
who don't (i.e. those of the "Right," divinely-invented religion!).

There are dozens of those.....

As long as we are all aware of this, our differences in opinion aren't
that big.

If it weren't drift from this item, I would write that I don't happen to
agree with rcurl's sweeping generalization in #22.

What kind of generalization would you like instead? (If you'd like to
discuss it, start an Item somewhere - I don't know with what you are
taking issue.)

"Religions are all human inventions, made up to satisfy some emotion or in
 response to some very powerful personalities."

Hmmm, that sounds pretty general to me...

But this isn't a religion item. This is about my trip to India and Nepal.
(Religion is merely a sidestep).

It doesn't sound like a generalization to me. Who else could invent
religions, besides humans? Sounds more like a truism. The peoples
of India invented many, by the way, just to keep it on topic. 

This item has been linked from Travel 52 to Intro 27.
Type "join travel" at the Ok: prompt for discussion
of distant lands and cultures.

To respond to the issue I brought up before, I would liek to say a fe words
that are most certainly DRIFT, but here goes, really fast.
Development thory assumes that all countries can "develop" just as western
campitalist countries did, because the growth of capitalism is organic in
nautre, it just grows and if the right prinicples are applied everythign will
proceed just "fine".  Unfortunately, much of the growth of capitalism was fed
on the natural resources of countries such as India, this is why India was
"the jewel in teh crown", because the incredible natural resources of India
allowed England to have its industrial revolution.  (not to mention Indian
tea keeping workers up as they worked in factories in England..)
However, the trap I was referring to before is the assumption that
"underdeveloped countries bear a significant resemblance to currently
developed countries in their "pre-industrial" age.  This is simply not true.

About Buddhism, The images of Buddha are there to remind us that a man of this
world was able, through his various revelations and dedication, to escape the
ties of worldliness and achieve nirvana.  He is not considered a god.

I think it depends on the "underdeveloped" country.

What were the natural resources of India that allowed England to have its
industrial revolution? I concede cotton and silk and spices (and tea), but
I thought the main economic interest of England in India was the
*factories* they built there, for weaving with cheap labor. I agree with
your thesis, though. Most "developing" countrie do *not* have the natural
resources either internally, or (affordably) externally. They are not
likely to be able to follow capitalistic growth except as out-factories
for the countries that do have abundant natural resources (as Japan has
done), but this requires social order that depends in part on some
prosperity. 

In regard to Buddhism and its many idols: no one said he is considered
a god, but I am curious why so much effort and resources were devoted to
making immense, elaborate, extremely artistic and rich, images of Buddha,
if the images only serve to remind the viewer of this man? What does all
the corpulence represent?

the ability to survive varying periods of starvation.

I don't believe the natural resources explanation for why developing countries
find it hard to develop.  I think developing countries can buy natural
resources in the global market for pretty much the same prices that developed
countries can.

What they lack is technical infrastructure and human resources.  Sure, they
could build better cars than the US did 40 years ago.  But those cars won't
sell in the current marketplace.  Not when Japan can make vastly better cars
much cheaper.  The US was able to develop it's industry gradually, starting
with slow, clunkly and unreliable cars, which people bought anyway, and
gradually improving them, having a market all the way.  This leaves lots of
time to develop all the infrastructure you need.  In the 1970's Japan's cars
started getting noticably ahead of us, and it took a huge effort for the US
automakers, backed by government imposed trade restrictions, to (almost) make
up even that small differential.  Imagine how hard it is to start from near
zero.

As technology advances, the gap between high-tech industry and low-tech
labor intensive industry broadens, and it becomes harder to step across
because there isn't much market for anything produced in the middle ground.

I don't think the situation is hopeless though.  Technology sometimes turns
corners, and you can catch up by cutting the corners.  India seems to be
doing this in the computer software industry.  They have built up a good-
sized collection of quality computer experts, many foreign-educated, to the
point where foreign education is no longer necessary -- they have a self-
sustaining population of world-class software experts.  It's not a reprise
of the western pattern of industrialization, but it might well work.

India is a sub-continent.  Natural resources abound.  In fact, during
"ancient" times, the biggest drain on Rome's resources was on gold that went
to India to pay for all the things they got from there, because the only thing
that Indians would take in exchange was gold, they had everythign else they
needed.  Actually, during colonial times, there were few factories in India,
the idea being to take the resources out of India cheaply, and then make it
into stuff in England, and then sell it back to the Indian people, because
they were not allowed to industrialize themselves.  That is where the whole
issue of swaraj, or only using Indian-made products came from (this was big
during teh struggle for independence).  At the heart of the issue of
development, though is this:  the US could not be the industrial giant it is
now if it did not use the resources of other countries.  Therefore, if you
have a country that is trying to be like the US in this respect, but has no
other countries (because most likely it is being used itself) to do this to,
it's just not gonna happen.  It is this idea that is at teh heart of
dependency theory (which has its own problems, etc, but still brings out some
good issues).  Okay, then there's the issue of multinationals... this is why
so many products (clothes especially) that you see today were "Made in ..."
(fill in your favorite cental american, carribbean, african, asian country)
but really, unless someone wants to talk about it, I won't go into it here...

What were "all the things they got from there" (say, the ten largest
exports)? My encyclopedia emphasize the "Indian factories", but maybe
they meant a *factory* in the old sense of a trading post (like, "Moose
Factory", Ontario). 

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