Gokarna - the last two weeks

The last two weeks at an idyllic beach with not many tourists - in the south of India.
Relax. Get some sun. Think about the past 6 months. And getting ready to go home. This was my plan and it worked out even better than I had thought.
I met even in these last two weeks a few really interesting people and had some really good conversations amongst others with two german tibetian monchs who stayed at the same beach.
I realised how much I have learned in these 6 months. How much I have seen and how everything seems to be how I hoped it would be and even a lot better.
This trip actually changed me a little in a very good way. I knew that could happen, but I wouldn't have thought, it is so obvious and noticible to me.

Here are some pictures from Gokarna and then there is one more post to come, where I try to compare Ghana, Nepal and India in various aspects. But this might take a few more days, if not weeks, depending on how much time and motivation I have to do it. :-)

One thing I learned for sure and want to tell everyone: Travelling is the best! Alone, with other people, voluntary services or just travelling for itself, what ever way, it's great and this won't be the last time that I've "explored" a little part of the world. :-)))
Livia's Journey isn't over yet. :-P

A few beaches on the way to our beach 'Half moon'

Half moon beach

Watching the sunset

Some chess in the evening

Another nice beach next door

Agra, Varanasi and Mumbai 2.0 - Slums!

First of all my route in the north of India:

And this was my route all together:

Agra is a huge city. It's supposed to be ugly and expensive. Therefore I planned to come in the evening of the 7th, sleep, go early to the Taj Mahal and then leave in the evening of the 8th to Varanasi. Worked out perfectly and Giani, who I met in Pushkar, joined me. To the Taj, during the day, chilling in Agra on a rooftop, taking more pics of the Taj and then also going to Varanasi.

This was my beautiful deluxe hotel room in Agra:

I forgot to take pictures of the most "beautiful" parts of the room - under the "matrass", the "windows" and behind the bed... :D

Giani and a police guard in Agra:

Such a good picture! :D

We reach Varanasi in the morning after the interesting train ride in general class (remember the post Indian Railway).
'Kumiko' is our new japanese hostel after quite a long search.
A boat ride, enjoying some good food, watching the everyday evening ceremony at the Ganges, having one of India's best Lassis..... and the three days in Varanasi are already over.

Huge Langur monkey chillin' on a motorbike

Evening ceremony

The Ganges

Child labour?

Dead bodies get burned here

At 12 o'clock, the 12th of february we arrive in Mumbai. (Back down south again, because my stay in India is about to end and I wanted to stay the last days at the beach in the south.)

So it is Mumbai 2.0. This time I actually like it more, maybe because this time I get to see the slums, which are more interesting than I had even thought.

Unfortunately it's not allowed at all to take pictures and we didn't want to try. Instead we took that opportunity putting the cameras away and only using our own eyes at least once during the travels. (Even though I really enjoy playing the photographer. :-P)

No pictures, but I'll tell you breavely about the slums.

First of all two facts from the Lonely Planet:

60% of Mumbai's population lives in the slums and the annual turnover of business (export) from the biggest slum 'Daravi' is over US$650 million.

There are slum tours, but Giani and I decided to have a look on our own:

A lot of small paths framed by houses a few floors high, that look like they are about to break down. The ground of the paths consists of trash and mud. Small entrances to the flats and on the other side the families' businesses. Tailors, barbers, restaurants, snack shops, bakeries and so many different trades. A whole world is in there.Often your nose catches an ugly smell in one moment and then a very nice one the next moment from somebody cooking. Giani and I sit down after half an hour walking at a small restaurant to get a chai. We start talking to two men sitting at the table next to us. Both business men working outside the slums. They tell us it's about time for the muslims to pray (around 1pm), we should have a look at the streets.

In fact, suddenly thousands of men come on the street, everyone with the white small cap on their head and a carpet or plastic tarp to pray on. All streets fill up. More and more. Almost no space to walk anymore. Young and old men. Fathers with their sons and grandfathers with their sons and grandsons. Everyone facing towards Mecca, praying on their carpet or tarp for those who don't have the money for a carpet. (Sorry if I'm not using the right words for carpet and the caps they're wearing!)

This scene was amazing to watch.

"Where do the women pray?" "At home or not at all."

Unfortunately after one and a half hour we have to go to catch our overnight train in the afternoon. But the slums are definitely worth it to have a look at. Who ever comes to Mumbai shouldn't miss this. I really wanted to stay some longer, because it's like a different world and one and a half hour is not enough time.

But well.. we really had to go and again even almost missed the train, but in the end still got in. Now we're both going even more south, but Giani gets out at Goa, Madgaon and I get out at Gokarna, a town beneath Goa, where there is supposed to be a very nice beach as well.

4am. "The train is delayed enough. It'll be bright, when you arrive in Gokarna. No problem for you to get out there on your own. We're in Madgaon. I need to get out. Safe travels!"

A kiss on my cheak wakes me up. "Wait, what?" I see him turned around getting out of the train. Hmm.... I keep on sleeping.

One thing you have to learn, while travelling "alone", is to say goodbye. Even though I often just spend one or two weeks with the people I travel with, it's everytime again a kind of sad goodbye.

At 6am I get out at Gokarna Road station. The last part of my journey starts now.

The Taj Mahal

"You have to see it."
"If you haven't seen it, you haven't seen India."
"The golden Temple in Amritsar is way better. Don't go to the Taj Mahal."
"I thought the Taj is just another nice temple, but when I saw it in real life, it was breathtaking."

When I thought about, what I want to see in India, I was considering to skip the Taj Mahal. Even after all these comments above from other travellers. The golden temple as well, because it's way too far north. But in the end I passed by the Taj Mahal, which means I came to Agra (that's the City the Taj Mahal is at), because it was on my way anyway. It fit into my route.

8th of february 6am. I am sitting in front of my hostel to wait for Giani.
This early because the Taj Mahal has two special rules. No, not the Taj Mahal.. Travellers have two special tips, which seem to you like rules:
1.: You have to come at sunrise, because then it's supposed to be more beautiful.
And 2.: You have to be the first in line to get a picture of the Taj without any tourists on it.

And the two rules of the Taj Mahal are:
It opens at 7:15 (depending on when the sunrise is) and it costs 750 Rupees (ca. 10,50€), which is really a lot in India. (Indians pay 20 Rupees..... (ca.30 cent))

Giani shows up at 6:30am blaming his rickshaw driver. Giani is also half Italian - I don't think it was just the rickshaw driver that was delayed. :-P
Anyway we arrive way too late, when the queue was already huge. Still we got some nice pictures:

From another side (it looks identical from all sides)

Standing with the Taj in the back, looking towards the entry of the whole Taj area.

Behind the Taj

Typical tourist pic no.1

Typical tourist pic no.1 - fail

Typical tourist pic no.2

From far away

I have more.. But now it's getting boring.

Travelling alone

The 3rd of february I went on to Jodhpur with the bus. The first time since Goa I didn't have any appointments with other travellers. This time - compared to Goa - I really enjoyed the thought and was happy to be on my own at least for a few days.

I arrived in Jodhpur (a 1mio. city, which is quite average population in India) in the middle of the night (3am) and went to the train station nearby to wait there until the sunrise. The whole station was full of people sleeping on the floor covered by blankets (no foreigner, all indians). I squeezed into one corner, put my bag down and half standing, half sitting I leaned against it for the next 3 hours. I would have never sat in the corner at a train station in Germany - way too ugly. Well, in India it's not cleaner...
After few minutes more and more people started staring at me. When a person saw me, still half asleep, he/she would not turn around and keep on sleeping. To look at me was way more interesting than sleeping.
But I didn't just attract Indians, after a while also two helpless South koreans came up to me, to ask me what to do.

In a really surprisingly good mood I left at 6:30 , happy to escape the smell and stares, and went to a travel agency I had looked up in the guide, because I had to book my ticket onward already. It was still dark and there was still the same scenery I had seen on my way to the train station: A lot of beds with a lot of people on them, blankets even above the faces, covered the whole street. Homeless people or what? Don't know.

The travel agency wasn't open yet, but a little chai shop next to it. Still in a good mood, the shop owner raised my mood even more. He was such a funny nice guy. He even showed me his best-friends-hand-shake. The only problem we had was the language. He no english, I no Hindi. But hand gestures and smiles everyone understands. And when I started playing some Ukulele, all 4 old friendly men I was having a Chai with seemed to like it a lot. What a good start to the day.
At 7:10 the agency opened, I booked my ticket and then I went to look for a good hostel. I found one, relaxed at the luckily empty rooftop and enjoyed to have some time for myself. Afterwards I went up to the Fort and met two guys from Holland and Chile and we spent the evening jamming and eating. For the evening it was nice to have some good company.

The blue town - view from the fort

The next morning I took the bus to Pushkar, my next destination. In the afternoon I arrived at the small touristy town next to a lake.

Really delicious desert!!!

Two nights I stayed and on the 7th I took the train in the afternoon to Agra (the city of the Taj Mahal).
On my last evening I met Giani from Australia at a Burger shop. He was in a hurry to catch his bus to Agra. After 5 minutes talking we said we'll meet the 8th in the morning in Agra.
My travelling alone was over already. Nothing sad though, a few days on my own were good enough.