09/12/16 Post by Tes and Trinity

From Tes:  This morning (technically speaking, 5:30 am) I got a total of 5 1/2 hours of sleep!! Don’t worry Mom, I drank lots of water and I’m not dead…yet. All joking aside, today was extremely fun! First, we got to say goodbye to American food for good! Our homestay hosts cooked us eggs and make us toasted bread with jam and butter which were, for the record the worst part of the meal! The Indian food was 10,294,987 times better! We had a combination of soups, curries, bread, buns, and other traditional south Indian breakfast food. FUN FACT: Even their tea is spicy! They put black pepper, cinnamon and cloves in the chai tea, which of course, was amazing (apparently I am the only one between Trinity, Amelia, and I that actually liked it…actually l loved it). After breakfast we walked to Fabindia and here is Trinity to talk about it! 

From Trinity:  We arrived at Fabindia and the whole experience was really interesting. Directly after entering the heavily guarded entrance, jewelry and Indian-style clothing was seen all over the store. There was also a selection of spreads that you could put on bread and crackers. I didn’t realize that clothes and crackers made such a good combination! Maybe I can write to the owner of The Gap and suggest that all the stores sell chocolate peanut butter. They’re bound to have an increase in sales. It was a brief trip and money was a momentary issue. Everyone couldn’t use their beautiful, bright pink rupees! After we all finished shopping we took two buses to this town-like meditation area called “Art of Living”.  Before Tes gets into detail about that, I want to explain the bus ride. It was bumpy and chaotic. Every once in a while there would be stray cows and dogs. There were very few street signs and pavement markings to guide vehicle traffic, and it was interesting to see how defensive and aggressive our driver had to be. After about 5 near motorcycle/bike crashes, 4 (hundred [EXAGGERATION]) cows, 3 (hundred [NOT EXAGGERATION]) dogs, 2 people peeing on the side of the road, and 1 extraordinary shopping experience, we finally arrived to Art of Living. I think Tes really enjoyed it so here she is to talk about our experience!

From Tes:  The Art of Living is a sanctuary for worshiping the spiritual leader Sri Sri. The place was absolutely beautiful and was truly a sanctuary. To consolidate all of the cool things we saw and experienced, I will be writing this section of the blog post in chronological order. 

1. We were dropped off by our two buses and I personally got to experience for the second time, a little boy proudly peeing while holding eye contact with me (first was at the airport… in a distinctly marked women’s restroom!!) 
2. We watched dogs playing tag! 
3. We discussed what good henna looks like and what bad henna looks like and that yes… we will be able to get henna at the end of the trip! I will be coming home with sleeves of body ink Mom and Dad! 
4. We had an in-depth info session on Sri Sri and can proudly state that he stopped terrorism in the Middle East. Well, maybe not now but two years ago he took part in trying to bring peace to that part of the world. He believes that peace and love should unite the world and that anyone can join his community. He has won many honorable awards from multiple countries and his religion has millions of followers. However, he has not won most followers on twitter or FaceBook. Follow him @srisri and like his page on FaceBook!
5. MEDITATION!! Yes, we got to sleep for 15 minutes and were extremely happy about it. 
6. We visited a temple which was absolutely beautiful and truly reflected that anyone could join Sri Sri’s community. Inside the temple, carvings of the symbols of many religions were all over the pillars.

This was the first of the two temples we visited and Trinity is here to tell you about the second one:

From Trinity:   It was hard to determine whether or not we were at a Christmas tree lighting or truly at a Hindu Temple. Ms Bilodeau warned us that Indians are truly festive people for they have so many god and goddesses that everyday is a holiday and celebration! So, as you’ve probably already concluded Rajijudda temple was covered in red, white, blue, green and orange lights to celebrate their religion! Just like at the previous temple, we had to walk barefooted in it. However, I wouldn’t really consider it “inside.” The whole temple wasn’t actually a building, it was a maze of paths covered in trees leading to various Hindu statues. Of course us American students (said in a southern accent) we didn’t know what we were doing, so we followed our homestay host and other believers of Hinduism through the maze of praying with fire, rice and chanting. This was not the only new thing we had to embrace, we also had our picture taken (involuntarily) by a stranger who was really very nice, but who I’d rather not shake hands with (India Study Tour inside joke). Next was dinner narrated by Tes:

From Tes:   She walks into the lobby of what she thinks is a hotel. The elevator doors are open and, like a sheep, she follows the rest of the group to the elevator but her tour guide says to take the stairs, so she follows the group to the stairs. She gets to the top of the 5 cases of stairs wondering why she had to walk up the stairs when her tour guide took the elevator. She is still confused if she’s in a hotel, or an apartment building or if following her group into an unknown building was really a good idea, but turns left, while still following her group, and finds a restaurant! She and the rest of the group sit down at the table and are ready for their second Indian meal of the day! Thank gosh for elevator-taking tour guides because if it weren’t for them, she wouldn’t have known how to order her dinner, let alone how to read the menu. The appetizers come out and she is confused, “Is it bread? Is there something inside it?” Turns out it was pouri, a hallow, balloon-like traditional south indian appetizer. The waiter places two sauces on the table and she digs in! Everyone at the table was saying things like, “OO try this sauce,” and, “I like this one better,” or in Natalia’s case, “It kinda looked like puffy skin.” Next, came out her individual dosa! (Side step out of the story for a second: I would describe dosa but no description will do it justice because it was so darn amazing!!!!) Dinner was too good and she had to loosen her belt a little! She was dreading the 5 flight walk back down the hotel/apartment/AMAZING restaurant and then the walk back home. END STORY

Trinity and I can talk on behalf of the whole group that we are having so much fun, and India truly feels like home. We feel safe, well fed, well comforted when needed, and don’t miss our parents at all (JUST KIDDING!). We hope that the rest of the trip is just as fun as today was! Goodnight!