Aurangabad - Cave temples

Arrived at Aurangabad - yesterday 2pm.
As soon as you get off the train you can tell its a tourist town; about five people harassed us to come with them to some hotel. One even followed us down the road in his auto rickshaw, nagging us to come with him. We couldn't get rid of him. He followed us all the way into the foyer of the hotel.
This hotel isn't half bad. The floors are made of marble, the windows have mosquito netting and there's a pool table in the decent enough restaurant. The downfall is that the power keeps switching on and off; although it seems to be a common part of Indian life, it's extremely regular and irritating at this joint.

We went to the Bibi-Qa-Maqbara, known as the mini-Taj just out of town. The ruler who had the original Taj Mahal built was killed by his son, Aurangzeb on account of his extravagance, a fair enough claim. Aurangzeb then went on to build the mini-Taj at Aurangabad to serve as the resting place of his beloved and quite dead wife. The mini-Taj might not have anything on the real thing, but it sure did cost a load and a half to build. Unfortunately, Aurangzeb's son didn't do his father a favour by killing him.

Slept like a baby that night. I think I might finally be over the jet lag.

Today we rose and went by public bus to the Ellora caves, situated about 35km out of Aurangabad. They're a world heritage listed site comprised of thirty four temples cut into the rock of a mountain. Staggering to see. They were made by Buddists, Hindu and Jain over four hundred years. Most of the temples are much the same; all of the religions having their own subtle style. The most amazing of the temples, and the only one I'm going to bore you with, is the main Hindi temple. It took over one hundred and fifty years to build and was made by removing the unwanted rock from the mountain. This makes it a single piece of stone and the largest monolithic structure in the world; another achievement I can tick off my list.

Our ride home was a a joke. A jeep driver with a full jeep was offering us a drive to Aurangabad for only a wee bit more than the bus. Besides which, it saved us the wait. We got into the jeep and off we went. The guy drove about five minutes in the wrong direction to drop off all the people in the jeep at some other country town. He then drove around slowly in the streets of the town advertising a trip to Aurangabad. It was infuriating and after about a half hour of this we bailed on him, leaping out at a bus stop. He exploded and insisted we get back in.
I think not little man, I think not.
Anyway, all the other people at the bus stop gave him a funny (nasty really) look and I threw some pocket change at him and he stormed off to his now empty jeep. Should have just taken us.
The bus turned up after about a minute. Everyone at the bus stop was helpful and friendly. Once on the bus, people moved over to let Kate sit down. Nice as.

The thing is that if they can make money from you then they will do anything. Nothing seems to unreasonable. If they can't make money then you get to see some of the true 'Indian spirit' if you'll have it. Everyone on the buses and train are friendly. They move over to let you sit down and give you advice and directions. They always smile and waggle their heads and will try to make conversation if they speak any English. I would much rather catch their public transport than a taxi or auto rickshaw.

Tomorrow is the Dulghabad Fort, a city that was built by an arguably insane Emperor who decided to move the capital of India from Delhi. He wanted to move it south so he could better protect his lands from invaders. He force marched the entire population of Delhi 1100km south to Dulghabad. Tragic idea I must say.

Anyway, more on that some other time after we've actually been there.

Nicholas&Katey.



Main Hindi temple.















Most impressive Jain temple. This photo shows the adornments on the top of the shrine in the courtyard. Its amazing how well this shrine has weathered. A lot of the others are shadows of their former selves.










By far the best Buddhist temple. The roof was carved to look like wooden supports.

Nasik - Small country town

Nasik. Awsome as.

Everyone is really friendly. Some guy even bought us tickets for the bus because we were struggling to get together enough small change. Unbelievable. Someone in India giving us money not asking for it.

Nasik seems to be a rather wealthy town despite of its relatively large size, 1.5 million. Many people own real cars or motorbikes and there aren't many slums. It manages to keep a really communal and friendly feel to it with people coming up to you on the street to help you with directions, communicating with less understandable Indians and just to have a chat. Sometimes they just want to know your country and name, then shake your hand. Just when you think they're going to ask you for money they just walk away. So much better than Mumbai. Unfortunately, all they seem to want to talk about is the cricket and the Mumbai bombings, neither of which I wish to discuss.

We found the bestest snack bar that serves wicked as Dosa (rolled up pan fried rice flour pancake with curry inside) and not only that, its super cheap. 72rp for both our meals.

We spent the day chilling down at the ghats and temples by the river. Its the community centre of the city offering a market, temples, washing, bathing and food. Its trully a sight to behold. There are so many temples that you tend to forget what each individual one is like however the overall experience is great. The temples are mainly hindu and budhist, which tend to be the friendliest. They always welcome you into their temple and tell you everything you could possibley want to know and a whole lot more. One temple even gave us a book on the thing. Great service, +A.

Nasik is such a relief after Mumbai, it really is great to just sit down and relax without being hounded for cash rupees.

Temple A, the only temple I am going to bore you with today.

People washing clothes and bathing off the Ghats.

Unbeknownst to us all, Nazi's have actually been around as an underground Indian movement for the last 500 years or so.

My sisters bedroom back home. Just for the lol's.

Still Alive - Fuck Yeah

Omg, we have hit the ground. Very wild country.

The plane trip was terrible. One thing I never did as a child was stay up all night. My friends would tease me about it as though I was missing out on something truly wonderful. I'm now kind of proud to say that I haven't done an all nighter. The plane trip tried its hardest to break my achievement by keeping me awake for 48 hours. However I am not going to count this in as we travelled through so many time zones that it wasn't really a whole night. It was more like 3 nights without day. Confusing.

It was all over and we arrived at Mumbai airport safe and sound, feeling tragically tired. You can actually see slums from the runway, you don't even need to get off the plane.
The hotel was wonderful with no flushing toilet and no hot water. It was also 'conveniently' placed next to the Khar railway station. The sound of 3rd world trains braking mingled with amplified prayer chanting does miracles to ones jet-lagged and sorry head. Anyway, the first night passed rather uneventfully, which I would argue is a good thing.

The next day we set out to do real exploring.The photos you see in guide books and on the internet do not do justice to the true grit of Mumbai. There is something filling every square centimetre. Rubbish, useless signs in other languages (Hindi, Marathi, Urdu & Indian english), people, dogs, cats, crows(different markings to australian crows you'll be glad to know father), debris from buildings, bright cloth, plastic, plastic, plastic and cars/motorbikes/auto rickshaws/bicycles. Everywhere. At about 9 in the morning we went down onto the street outside the wonder-tastic hotel to find what would have to have been about three thousand people just milling about in the square. You had to push to get through them all. And there really wasn't anything special happening. The Beatles were not resurrected, drawing crowds of thousands. Mahatma Ghandi was not sauntering around amongst his people. Nothing was happening, yet a few thousand people had decided to just hang out together in the square. Crazy.

We had to get a cab because the trains are so bad during peak. We went to the crawford market where we got hounded to buy shit for about an hour (which is all that is possible to stand). Then we went to the main train station where we bought tickets to Nasik. We got ripped off trying to buy train tickets, which was all good fun and games. Then some good man named Bali approached us and offered to show us around the city. This would normally seem like a nasty way to rip us off except that he actually made the initial rip-man give us some money back. Not half bad.

We accepted his offer and went on a little tour of the city. First stop was some temple, not really all that. Next was the hanging gardens. Pretty colonial and in the rich part of town. There is a laughing club that congregates at the gardens every morning to laugh. Supposed to relieve stress and shit, something everyone needs in Mumbai . Then we went to the house where Ghandi stayed in Mumbai. Now its a museum/library dedicated to the fellow. Pretty amazing life he had. The museum itself was disappointing, lacking in information but it was nice to just hang out there. Nice and clean and all that.Then we cruised down to the laundromat for the city. A huge shanty town built around a giant collection of small pools. People would base the wet clothes against rocks until they were clean. The clothes were then hung up to dry; string tied between rooves acting as support.

Then I wanted to go down to Colaba and see Leopalds (best bar thing around) and the gateway to India (jetty). Fortunately, we were too tired to do anything more so we bailed back to our hotel which was an extremely good idea seeing as a bunch of extremists went downtown to Colaba and shot and blew and stabed a whole lot of tourists into the grave. Not very nice at all and just a wee bit too close for home for my liking.

We went to the hotel, did some relaxing. Listened to some beats. Read some Conrad. Had a shower. Oh yes, that reminds me, everything stinks. Even the water out of the taps smells like feaces. Totally unappealing but you get used to it pretty quickly. Today we got up and took the train too Nasik. Much nicer town than Mumbai, less people trying to rip you off and much more friendly people. We found a hotel with a room for 624 rp (about $20), about 1500rp cheaper than the dump in Mumbai. Not half bad either, although the beds leave something to be desired. We'll see how they pan out.

Still alive and kicking.Nicholas&Katey

View from our window. Take note of plasic fields and train platforms.

The Loundromat of Mumbai.