Coming back from the trip was hard. A lot harder than I thought it was going to be. We lost another volunteer this week. She was in the southern part of Armenia and decided that it wasn’t the place for her to be at this time in her life. Mike has been going through some hard times too and has thought about going home. I don’t think I have gotten to that point but the first couple days here, I was just thinking “what the hell am I doing here”. It may be hard to grasp, but when you spend two weeks on vacation and then spend your last two days in a city like Dubai which is ultra-modern, warm, and which has McDonald’s, and then come back to a not-so-modern, blisteringly cold environment with no McDonald’s it makes you think about things again... At the very least, it makes your again appreciate what you had... or at least what I had.
With that said, I was a bit apprehensive about going back to school. I didn’t know what it would be like since I was on vacation while school was going on for two weeks. They cut the winter vacation short because the cancellation of schools due to the flu during early December let the kids out a bit earlier. I walked into school and all the teachers were bright eyed and gave me a very warm welcome. The children did the same thing and wondered about my trip. It was great. Lots of very warm welcomes. At that time, I remembered why I was here.
This week went by pretty quickly. Half because we didn’t have school on Thursday because it was Army day here. We had a little party at school after classes were over. Those are always fun because I get to hang out with the teachers in a non-classroom setting. I can see them as people rather than professionals.
Funny story about school though and this will attest to how fast rumors and stuff can spread in the village. My parents sent me this really large jacket. One of those that people use in Canada and Alaska. It has a fur rim... I look a little strange but in this barren land of cold, I don’t really care what I look like. Anyway, I wore the jacket for the first time to my school and the maintenance man came up and joked and said “are you going to climb Aghmaghan (the large mountain behind my village) today?” I said no. Then as the class periods went on, teachers came up to me in the hallway asking if I was really going to climb the mountain. The right before I left, one of the teachers sat me down and gave me a lecture how it wasn’t a good idea for me to climb up the mountain because of all the snow... I wish someone took a picture of my facial expression when the guy started giving me a lecture, because I remember trying to figure out when I mentioned to anyone that I was going to leave the village, let alone climb a mountain...
The Martuni crowd got together yesterday just to hang out. It was a little funny and a little sad because Hector wasn’t able to get out of his village. They closed the roads so there were no cars coming out of the village. We tried to convince him to come but he just couldn’t make it out of this village. Its alright because I will see him tomorrow.
This week we have another conference called PDM where we learn how to write grants and what organizations are willing to help us out. You may be wondering, “why don’t they teach you that before you get to your permanent site?” Well the idea is that we have to get to our sites first and assess what the community needs. In that way, we can talk to people, walk around, ask questions, meet with the major so we have a better idea of how to better spend the money. It will be pretty intense as it is 5 days away from my site and each day is about 9 hours of “classes.” Really excited... I just hope I don’t get sick like I was last time.
Well, not too much to report. Just laying low. I did my laundry the other day and after 5 minutes after putting them on the line, they froze. Not only did they freeze, the wind was blowing, and they froze together... I just looked out my window and laughed... eh.
Until next time...
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Sunday, January 24, 2010
The American Passport
Make sure you read the post before this one. Also, go ahead and get some coffee ready because this post is really long...
Mike and I got up at 3:30am on the 8th to get ready for our 4:55 flight to Dubai from Yerevan. We took the taxi to the airport, we ate breakfast there, and off we went. Since we only had 3 hours of sleep the previous night, we slept, read, and hung out during our 6 hour layover in Dubai. Dubai was incredible from what we saw. More to come on Dubai later.
We got on our next flight. It was an Emirates flight. We decided to pay the extra 50 dollars to take Emirates instead of Air India and it was worth every penny. For one thing, we would arrive in Delhi at 8:30 on the 8th instead of the 9th at 4:30am. We got to Delhi right on time regardless of the heavy fog. I couldn’t even see the end of the wing when we were flying. Many many flights were cancelled but ours was right on time. Kamran sent me an email saying “when you get out of customs, take the right exit and you will see my smiling face.” Mike and I did just as we were told. No smiling face... Finally I called Kamran using someone else’s phone and he said he would be 45 minutes late. an hour and a half later, he showed up. It was really nice to see him... and his smiling face added with many apologizes.
Then all three of us with our bags took a rik-shaw ( a motorcycle with a covered back where we sat) and drove an hour to try and meet Hector and Marissa. Marissa is Hector’s girlfriend who is in Peace Corps Turkmenistan. They were to Nepal and were flying out of Delhi so we tried to meet up with them. So here we are in this Rik-Shaw. Its funny because we looked at the highway and it had three lanes but if you looked across the line, there were 7 vehicles next to each other. There are countless times when i thought the Rik-shaw driver was going to kill us. He didn’t... Anyway, we met up with Hector (somehow) and we went to place to eat. It was really good because it was the first thing that we had to eat since we arrived in Dubai. My first taste of Indian food. SO GOOD... AND CHEAP.
After two hours, we left. I said my goodbyes to Hector and Marissa and we went to our hotel. “hotel”. Thank God I slept only three hours the previous night and we only had three hours in that hotel. It was a complete dump. Those words do it no justice. We all pretty much slept in all our clothes and covered the pillows with shirts. Mike froze because he didn’t want to use the blanket. So we went to bed at 2am and then woke up at 5am to catch our train. We went to the train station, got some breakfast which consisted on one cup of chai between the three of us and three somosas. Then we got ready for the train. It never came. In fact, it was cancelled three minutes before its scheduled departure. So, we waited an hour in a line to get our money back and we walked over to the bus station and we got a bus. I was completely out of it due to the lack of sleep. After seven hours on the bus, we got to Agra. The home of the Taj Mahal.
I have seen plenty of pictures of the Taj Mahal. Well, it was something else. Everything there is totally semetrical. They don’t show the other buildings in photos, but it was insane. The Taj Mahal was just breath-taking. Literally, I had to find my breathe. It is so beautiful. It is this huge white thing that just sits there. The inner and outer walls and decrated with inlays of rubies and emeralds and other precious stones. It was beautiful. We stayed there for maybe 90 minutes before we had to take another train, hoping this one would actually go. We went to the train station by way of a horse drawn carriage. And if you are thinking about the stereotypical horse drawn carriage... don’t. I constantly thought I was going to fall off the back.
We got to the train station, we got some dinner, more somosas, and got on the train. We sat across a couple who were from Austria just traveling around. It was a 6 hour train ride. And again don’t think Amtrak. It was Kamran, Mike and myself sitting on a hard plastic bench for 6 hours. I did a lot of writing in my journal, did some reading, and tried to sleep.
We finally got to Jaipur from Agra. Holy crap was I happy to get there. We sat down and talked to Kamran’s uncles who were more than nice. It was a really nice place right in the middle of the city. Then... I finally got some real sleep, actually laying down. I drooled all over the place. I woke up in Lake Superior the next morning. I felt like a completely different person after I woke up. Nothing opens up until about 11 so we went onto the roof which is like a patio and we washed our clothes. For the two week trip, I just took a small backpack. I wanted to have only carry-ons and not much to carry since we would be moving around a lot. Anyway, Kamran didn’t know how to hand wash clothes so I washed his clothes. It wasn’t a problem since it is just a way of life in Armenia.
We went to the market. Now. Kamran knows Hindi, and he looks Indian. Those are two very valuable assets to have, monetarily. Basically every taxi ride he negotiated. The taxi drivers would want 200 rupees (4 dollars). Mike and I would be, thats a great price. Kamran would say no. He would get the ride for 40 rupees or about 80 cents. We went to get scarves. Lets just say that we paid about a fifth of the price we would have if he wasn’t there. Kamran was great. I mean first, it was great to see one of my close friends, eight months into service, but he just knew what was going on. Anyway, that day we just hung out and took it easy. We signed up for a tour of 11 places in Jaipur. It was 250 rupees for the whole tour (about 5 dollars). It went from 9 to 6. We had to pay for all the museum fees and for camera fees but that whole day was about 30 dollars to see every sight in Jaipur. It was funny because Kamran would always pay the “Indian fee”. For example. Mike and I paid 750 rupees each to get into the Taj Mahal (about 15 dollars each). Kamran paid 40 rupees to get in... This was the way that all the entrance fees were...
We met a girl who was volunteering in a hospital in Delhi and we hung out with her. After the tour, we went to dinner together. Mike and Rebecca talked together while Kamran and I caught up on things going on back home.
The next day we just hung out. Kamran’s uncle taught me how to make Chai. It was really good. He knew how to make it taste really good and thick. A good way to cap the day. We actually ended up staying an extra day because we decided that we would spend the extra 80 dollars to take a 2 hour flight instead of a 19 hour train ride on a plastic bench seat.
We left on the 19th to go down to Mumbai. Our flight was delayed 7 hours from Jaipur to Mumbai but fortunately, the airline sent us text messages to let us know that the flights were delayed so we got to the airport about 50 minutes before take off. Mumbai was a welcome change of weather. Since I was trying to pack light, I only took my fleece which was not enough for Delhi, Agra, and Jaipur. Mumbai was tropical and I welcomed the warmth. We took a prepaid taxi to the hotel and then walked around mumbai. Kamran wanted to go to some nigh club so we went to try to find it. Instead Kamran decided to throw up all over the road, so we called it a night. The Indian apparently had an adverse reaction to Indian food. (sorry Kamran, I still think its funny). It was great though. There was a lot of power behind that yark. He probably got it to spray a good 5 feet. (ok, too much... Im finished).
So, we went back to the hotel and went to bed early.
The following day, we did some errands and hung out. We went to the movie theatre. Mike and Kamran watched an Indian film, in Hindi and I went to watch Sherlock Holmes which was just plain disappointing. I should have gone to see the other movie. Afterwards, we went to dinner and then we went to the market. I tried my hand at bartering with the people. Here is how the negotiating went.
Me: How much is this
Seller: its 1600 rupees
Me: Ill give you 50
Seller: ok, Ill sell it to you for 1000 rupees
Me: Ill give you 50
Seller: 700 rupees
Me: Ill give you 50
Seller: I am going down in price, you have to go up in price
Me: Ill give you 50
Seller: How much do you want to pay:
Me: Ill give you 50
Needless to say, I didn’t get it for 50, but I did get the price down to 350. I wasn’t really going to buy anything unless they were going to bring the price down to 100 rupees. But at least you can see how much the inflate the prices. And this was the case for about everything... including the taxi.
That night at 2am Kamran left. That was weird. I was like saying goodbye to everyone back home again. That was hard. Mike noticed that I was sad. It was now me and Mike.
The next morning, we woke up early and went to the airport to fly down to Goa Beach. No problem there. We got to Goa around 2pm and took a taxi to our hotel which was in the center of the capital of Goa, Panjim. It was an incredibly beautiful drive. It reminded me a lot of Hawaii with all the palm trees. The air had the right amount of humidity in it. It was great. Mike and I got to the hotel and then decided that we would walk around a little bit. We ate dinner at a restaurant that was recommended by lonely planet. For both our meals which consisted of three beers, two huge plates of prawn rice and kalamari, we paid a mere 9 dollars. I am over estimating. We ate there for two nights.
The next morning, Mike and I wanted to go to the beach. We went to the concierge to try and find a bus. He said there was a bus. Now this is where there was a loss in translation. We thought this was a coach bus straight to the beach. So we packed out stuff up and off we went. We got on the bus looking forward to a day at the beach. We noticed that there were only Indians on the bus, which was fine, but they didn’t look like they were going to the beach. We got the first stop. There was no beach. We talked to the bus driver who surprising knew a good amount of English. Well, apparently we signed up for a day long bus tour of Goa beach. This was one of the 8 stops. The bus driver called a taxi. The taxi driver wanted 800 rupees to go 12km. Which is outrageous, so Mike and decided we would just stay with the bus, because eventually the bus was to visit three beaches. We ate at a restaurant and then afterwards we went to the beaches. We stayed at the first beach for 35 minutes, the second for 25 minutes, and the last beach for an hour and a half. Mike and I milked every last minute out of the last beach since it took the whole day to get there. At that point we were too tired to do anything so we just took the bus back. Looking back it was a good experience. We got to see a lot of the beautiful scenery.
That night we went back to the Lonely Planet recommended retaurant and ate there. We got the same waiter who remembered us and made fun of us for ordering the exact same thing. Mike ordered a cake after dinner and that cake tasted like ashtray. Not that I have tried an ashtray but that is what I would imagine an ashtray would taste like...
The next day, we took our time walking around the city. We got some errands done. Mike sent a package to his parents. That was an ordeal because there you have to get your parcel packaged somewhere else before bringing it to the post office. Its cool too because they sew your box closed with white cloth. After that, we walked around some more and then came back to the hotel to get cleaned up for our river cruise.
The river cruise. What do you think of when you hear river cruise. Maybe a nice boat with a dinner and a tour of the river and some of the landmarks on the shore. Yeah, that’s what we thought too. Mike and I missed the boat we were supposed to be on so we got on the 8:30 boat instead of the 7:30 boat. Mike and I were the first ones to the dock. We couldn’t believe our eyes. We heard this sound coming from a boat. As it got closer we saw that it was a party boat with people dancing on the upper deck with insanely loud music. As the boat came closer we saw the name of the boat... it was our boat. Again, Mike and I somehow managed to find a “tour boat” that was a party boat and again we were the only two white people on the boat. All we could do was laugh. The funniest part was the fact that the boat we were supposed to be on was literally 80% girls, the boat we were on was 85% men. The DJ kept telling the men to come up and dance. Mike and I stayed seated. We were completely dumbfounded by all that... After the hour boat “tour” we went to another restaurant and ate dinner. We went back to the hotel, watched some tv and went to bed.
I commend you for reading this much...
We then went to the airport the following morning around 7am for our 8:30 flight. We got to Mumbai with no problems. Around 10 we landed. This is when I was really ready to get off of that sub-continent known as India. We wanted to take the free transport from the Domestic terminal to the International Terminal. There was a free bus but we didn’t have our boarding passes printed out for our Emirates flight back. It was a catch 22 because we needed to get to the other airport to get the ticket needed to get to the other airport by bus. The armed guards with their huge guns understood what our problem was but they were afraid of their supervisors getting angry with them. So, Mike and i took a pre-paid taxi to the international terminal. The airports in India are not the same as those in the States. We were greeted by more armed guards asking for our boarding passes. The guard said we couldn’t go in and he said that he didn’t have the passenger roster and wouldn’t get it until 3 hours before the flight. So Mike and I tried to call Emirates directly but there was no one there. Finally one of the guards said, if you go to a travel agent, that he would print us out boarding tickets. So, we took another rik-shaw to a travel agent. We got there and I gave him our confirmation number and our passports. Then he said that it would be 50 dollars each to print out the tickets. I looked at him like he had an arm growing out of his eye... I asked him 50 dollars or 50 rupees. a difference of 49 dollars. He said dollars. I laughed in his face. He said “ok, 25 dollars for each”. I laughed even harder. Then he said twenty dollars for both. I about punched him in the face after he tried to convince me that I couldn’t just go to the internet cafe to make print outs. After the travel agent, we went to the internet cafe where I printed out two copies of our boarding passed for about 70 cents total. We also got a drink.
We got back to the airport five dollars later (the internet cafe was a little further into the city) and we went to the same guard to show him our boarding passes. At this point it was about 12:30pm and our flight didn’t leave until 10:00pm but we were going to try and get an earlier flight. The guard looked at me and then the tickets and said that he couldn’t let us in until 3 hours before departure. I got really frustrated and to the armed guard, I started arguing with him. I think he saw the frustration in my face and ultimately let us into the airport. So we got to use the bathroom and ate some lunch. I took a nap. We read, talked, did whatever else. The time actually passed pretty quickly. Seven o’clock came and it was time for us to go. I was ready to go.
India was a great experience. It was sad. I don’t remember what I wrote before because I have written too much probably, but it was sad. Walking around India, especially Jaipur and Delhi, there were people everywhere sleeping on the streets begging for food or money. We think that two dollars is nothing but the average monthly salary is about 20 dollars a month there. The constant nagging and the constant bartering and the constant thought that people were trying to get the most money that they possibly could from you just wore we out. It was just exhausting.
We arrived in Dubai at 12:15am and went straight to our hotel. We found a great deal online. The hotel was 8 minutes from the airport, across the street from the mall, and really close to the metro. Mike and I went to the markets and looked around. We also went to the tallest building in the world, just to see a whole bunch of desert. Dubai is very modern and it was a great way to wind down the vacation. That was much more relaxing. If you have ever heard of the “big bus tour company” they charge about 70 dollars for the a tour of the city in their double decker bus. Mike and I spent a dollar fifty riding around on the city double decker buses. We only ate at McDonalds and Pizza Hut... because we wanted to. Holy crap. I don’t ever eat at McDonalds or Pizza Hut. I prefer Wendy’s or Arby’s or Papa Johns. But biting into American Fast food that tastes the exact same as in America was just out of this world. It was great. Both nights we were in Dubai, we ordered Pizza Hut. Two days was enough in Dubai. We went to eat at “Central Perk” the same cafe that “Friends” met in. However, the one in Dubai didn’t look anything like the one on the TV. Anyway, that was it. We left at 10am on friday and got back to Yerevan around 1pm.
School starts back up tomorrow. A week of school and then I have a conference on how to write grants for a week.
Lastly I want to say how great it is to look down at my passport and see the American Emblem there. I know that the last blog was a little different, but I do think as American’s we have a very tunneled view of the world, and the American media doesn’t make matters any better. At the same time, you can really see the advantages we have. Although I probably see an American flag differently than those that served in the Armed Services, how I saw the flag as a high schooler or even as a college student is completely different. I remember looking up at the flag before lacrosse games, looking at it as a piece of cloth, but it becomes something completely different when you go abroad and you see the living conditions elsewhere. There is a reason why people try to become American Citizens and its easy to see when you’re outside the US boarders. Be thankful for being an American...
Hope everyone is doing well at home. Honestly, if you read this whole blog and the last one, thank you...
Until next time...
Mike and I got up at 3:30am on the 8th to get ready for our 4:55 flight to Dubai from Yerevan. We took the taxi to the airport, we ate breakfast there, and off we went. Since we only had 3 hours of sleep the previous night, we slept, read, and hung out during our 6 hour layover in Dubai. Dubai was incredible from what we saw. More to come on Dubai later.
We got on our next flight. It was an Emirates flight. We decided to pay the extra 50 dollars to take Emirates instead of Air India and it was worth every penny. For one thing, we would arrive in Delhi at 8:30 on the 8th instead of the 9th at 4:30am. We got to Delhi right on time regardless of the heavy fog. I couldn’t even see the end of the wing when we were flying. Many many flights were cancelled but ours was right on time. Kamran sent me an email saying “when you get out of customs, take the right exit and you will see my smiling face.” Mike and I did just as we were told. No smiling face... Finally I called Kamran using someone else’s phone and he said he would be 45 minutes late. an hour and a half later, he showed up. It was really nice to see him... and his smiling face added with many apologizes.
Then all three of us with our bags took a rik-shaw ( a motorcycle with a covered back where we sat) and drove an hour to try and meet Hector and Marissa. Marissa is Hector’s girlfriend who is in Peace Corps Turkmenistan. They were to Nepal and were flying out of Delhi so we tried to meet up with them. So here we are in this Rik-Shaw. Its funny because we looked at the highway and it had three lanes but if you looked across the line, there were 7 vehicles next to each other. There are countless times when i thought the Rik-shaw driver was going to kill us. He didn’t... Anyway, we met up with Hector (somehow) and we went to place to eat. It was really good because it was the first thing that we had to eat since we arrived in Dubai. My first taste of Indian food. SO GOOD... AND CHEAP.
After two hours, we left. I said my goodbyes to Hector and Marissa and we went to our hotel. “hotel”. Thank God I slept only three hours the previous night and we only had three hours in that hotel. It was a complete dump. Those words do it no justice. We all pretty much slept in all our clothes and covered the pillows with shirts. Mike froze because he didn’t want to use the blanket. So we went to bed at 2am and then woke up at 5am to catch our train. We went to the train station, got some breakfast which consisted on one cup of chai between the three of us and three somosas. Then we got ready for the train. It never came. In fact, it was cancelled three minutes before its scheduled departure. So, we waited an hour in a line to get our money back and we walked over to the bus station and we got a bus. I was completely out of it due to the lack of sleep. After seven hours on the bus, we got to Agra. The home of the Taj Mahal.
I have seen plenty of pictures of the Taj Mahal. Well, it was something else. Everything there is totally semetrical. They don’t show the other buildings in photos, but it was insane. The Taj Mahal was just breath-taking. Literally, I had to find my breathe. It is so beautiful. It is this huge white thing that just sits there. The inner and outer walls and decrated with inlays of rubies and emeralds and other precious stones. It was beautiful. We stayed there for maybe 90 minutes before we had to take another train, hoping this one would actually go. We went to the train station by way of a horse drawn carriage. And if you are thinking about the stereotypical horse drawn carriage... don’t. I constantly thought I was going to fall off the back.
We got to the train station, we got some dinner, more somosas, and got on the train. We sat across a couple who were from Austria just traveling around. It was a 6 hour train ride. And again don’t think Amtrak. It was Kamran, Mike and myself sitting on a hard plastic bench for 6 hours. I did a lot of writing in my journal, did some reading, and tried to sleep.
We finally got to Jaipur from Agra. Holy crap was I happy to get there. We sat down and talked to Kamran’s uncles who were more than nice. It was a really nice place right in the middle of the city. Then... I finally got some real sleep, actually laying down. I drooled all over the place. I woke up in Lake Superior the next morning. I felt like a completely different person after I woke up. Nothing opens up until about 11 so we went onto the roof which is like a patio and we washed our clothes. For the two week trip, I just took a small backpack. I wanted to have only carry-ons and not much to carry since we would be moving around a lot. Anyway, Kamran didn’t know how to hand wash clothes so I washed his clothes. It wasn’t a problem since it is just a way of life in Armenia.
We went to the market. Now. Kamran knows Hindi, and he looks Indian. Those are two very valuable assets to have, monetarily. Basically every taxi ride he negotiated. The taxi drivers would want 200 rupees (4 dollars). Mike and I would be, thats a great price. Kamran would say no. He would get the ride for 40 rupees or about 80 cents. We went to get scarves. Lets just say that we paid about a fifth of the price we would have if he wasn’t there. Kamran was great. I mean first, it was great to see one of my close friends, eight months into service, but he just knew what was going on. Anyway, that day we just hung out and took it easy. We signed up for a tour of 11 places in Jaipur. It was 250 rupees for the whole tour (about 5 dollars). It went from 9 to 6. We had to pay for all the museum fees and for camera fees but that whole day was about 30 dollars to see every sight in Jaipur. It was funny because Kamran would always pay the “Indian fee”. For example. Mike and I paid 750 rupees each to get into the Taj Mahal (about 15 dollars each). Kamran paid 40 rupees to get in... This was the way that all the entrance fees were...
We met a girl who was volunteering in a hospital in Delhi and we hung out with her. After the tour, we went to dinner together. Mike and Rebecca talked together while Kamran and I caught up on things going on back home.
The next day we just hung out. Kamran’s uncle taught me how to make Chai. It was really good. He knew how to make it taste really good and thick. A good way to cap the day. We actually ended up staying an extra day because we decided that we would spend the extra 80 dollars to take a 2 hour flight instead of a 19 hour train ride on a plastic bench seat.
We left on the 19th to go down to Mumbai. Our flight was delayed 7 hours from Jaipur to Mumbai but fortunately, the airline sent us text messages to let us know that the flights were delayed so we got to the airport about 50 minutes before take off. Mumbai was a welcome change of weather. Since I was trying to pack light, I only took my fleece which was not enough for Delhi, Agra, and Jaipur. Mumbai was tropical and I welcomed the warmth. We took a prepaid taxi to the hotel and then walked around mumbai. Kamran wanted to go to some nigh club so we went to try to find it. Instead Kamran decided to throw up all over the road, so we called it a night. The Indian apparently had an adverse reaction to Indian food. (sorry Kamran, I still think its funny). It was great though. There was a lot of power behind that yark. He probably got it to spray a good 5 feet. (ok, too much... Im finished).
So, we went back to the hotel and went to bed early.
The following day, we did some errands and hung out. We went to the movie theatre. Mike and Kamran watched an Indian film, in Hindi and I went to watch Sherlock Holmes which was just plain disappointing. I should have gone to see the other movie. Afterwards, we went to dinner and then we went to the market. I tried my hand at bartering with the people. Here is how the negotiating went.
Me: How much is this
Seller: its 1600 rupees
Me: Ill give you 50
Seller: ok, Ill sell it to you for 1000 rupees
Me: Ill give you 50
Seller: 700 rupees
Me: Ill give you 50
Seller: I am going down in price, you have to go up in price
Me: Ill give you 50
Seller: How much do you want to pay:
Me: Ill give you 50
Needless to say, I didn’t get it for 50, but I did get the price down to 350. I wasn’t really going to buy anything unless they were going to bring the price down to 100 rupees. But at least you can see how much the inflate the prices. And this was the case for about everything... including the taxi.
That night at 2am Kamran left. That was weird. I was like saying goodbye to everyone back home again. That was hard. Mike noticed that I was sad. It was now me and Mike.
The next morning, we woke up early and went to the airport to fly down to Goa Beach. No problem there. We got to Goa around 2pm and took a taxi to our hotel which was in the center of the capital of Goa, Panjim. It was an incredibly beautiful drive. It reminded me a lot of Hawaii with all the palm trees. The air had the right amount of humidity in it. It was great. Mike and I got to the hotel and then decided that we would walk around a little bit. We ate dinner at a restaurant that was recommended by lonely planet. For both our meals which consisted of three beers, two huge plates of prawn rice and kalamari, we paid a mere 9 dollars. I am over estimating. We ate there for two nights.
The next morning, Mike and I wanted to go to the beach. We went to the concierge to try and find a bus. He said there was a bus. Now this is where there was a loss in translation. We thought this was a coach bus straight to the beach. So we packed out stuff up and off we went. We got on the bus looking forward to a day at the beach. We noticed that there were only Indians on the bus, which was fine, but they didn’t look like they were going to the beach. We got the first stop. There was no beach. We talked to the bus driver who surprising knew a good amount of English. Well, apparently we signed up for a day long bus tour of Goa beach. This was one of the 8 stops. The bus driver called a taxi. The taxi driver wanted 800 rupees to go 12km. Which is outrageous, so Mike and decided we would just stay with the bus, because eventually the bus was to visit three beaches. We ate at a restaurant and then afterwards we went to the beaches. We stayed at the first beach for 35 minutes, the second for 25 minutes, and the last beach for an hour and a half. Mike and I milked every last minute out of the last beach since it took the whole day to get there. At that point we were too tired to do anything so we just took the bus back. Looking back it was a good experience. We got to see a lot of the beautiful scenery.
That night we went back to the Lonely Planet recommended retaurant and ate there. We got the same waiter who remembered us and made fun of us for ordering the exact same thing. Mike ordered a cake after dinner and that cake tasted like ashtray. Not that I have tried an ashtray but that is what I would imagine an ashtray would taste like...
The next day, we took our time walking around the city. We got some errands done. Mike sent a package to his parents. That was an ordeal because there you have to get your parcel packaged somewhere else before bringing it to the post office. Its cool too because they sew your box closed with white cloth. After that, we walked around some more and then came back to the hotel to get cleaned up for our river cruise.
The river cruise. What do you think of when you hear river cruise. Maybe a nice boat with a dinner and a tour of the river and some of the landmarks on the shore. Yeah, that’s what we thought too. Mike and I missed the boat we were supposed to be on so we got on the 8:30 boat instead of the 7:30 boat. Mike and I were the first ones to the dock. We couldn’t believe our eyes. We heard this sound coming from a boat. As it got closer we saw that it was a party boat with people dancing on the upper deck with insanely loud music. As the boat came closer we saw the name of the boat... it was our boat. Again, Mike and I somehow managed to find a “tour boat” that was a party boat and again we were the only two white people on the boat. All we could do was laugh. The funniest part was the fact that the boat we were supposed to be on was literally 80% girls, the boat we were on was 85% men. The DJ kept telling the men to come up and dance. Mike and I stayed seated. We were completely dumbfounded by all that... After the hour boat “tour” we went to another restaurant and ate dinner. We went back to the hotel, watched some tv and went to bed.
I commend you for reading this much...
We then went to the airport the following morning around 7am for our 8:30 flight. We got to Mumbai with no problems. Around 10 we landed. This is when I was really ready to get off of that sub-continent known as India. We wanted to take the free transport from the Domestic terminal to the International Terminal. There was a free bus but we didn’t have our boarding passes printed out for our Emirates flight back. It was a catch 22 because we needed to get to the other airport to get the ticket needed to get to the other airport by bus. The armed guards with their huge guns understood what our problem was but they were afraid of their supervisors getting angry with them. So, Mike and i took a pre-paid taxi to the international terminal. The airports in India are not the same as those in the States. We were greeted by more armed guards asking for our boarding passes. The guard said we couldn’t go in and he said that he didn’t have the passenger roster and wouldn’t get it until 3 hours before the flight. So Mike and I tried to call Emirates directly but there was no one there. Finally one of the guards said, if you go to a travel agent, that he would print us out boarding tickets. So, we took another rik-shaw to a travel agent. We got there and I gave him our confirmation number and our passports. Then he said that it would be 50 dollars each to print out the tickets. I looked at him like he had an arm growing out of his eye... I asked him 50 dollars or 50 rupees. a difference of 49 dollars. He said dollars. I laughed in his face. He said “ok, 25 dollars for each”. I laughed even harder. Then he said twenty dollars for both. I about punched him in the face after he tried to convince me that I couldn’t just go to the internet cafe to make print outs. After the travel agent, we went to the internet cafe where I printed out two copies of our boarding passed for about 70 cents total. We also got a drink.
We got back to the airport five dollars later (the internet cafe was a little further into the city) and we went to the same guard to show him our boarding passes. At this point it was about 12:30pm and our flight didn’t leave until 10:00pm but we were going to try and get an earlier flight. The guard looked at me and then the tickets and said that he couldn’t let us in until 3 hours before departure. I got really frustrated and to the armed guard, I started arguing with him. I think he saw the frustration in my face and ultimately let us into the airport. So we got to use the bathroom and ate some lunch. I took a nap. We read, talked, did whatever else. The time actually passed pretty quickly. Seven o’clock came and it was time for us to go. I was ready to go.
India was a great experience. It was sad. I don’t remember what I wrote before because I have written too much probably, but it was sad. Walking around India, especially Jaipur and Delhi, there were people everywhere sleeping on the streets begging for food or money. We think that two dollars is nothing but the average monthly salary is about 20 dollars a month there. The constant nagging and the constant bartering and the constant thought that people were trying to get the most money that they possibly could from you just wore we out. It was just exhausting.
We arrived in Dubai at 12:15am and went straight to our hotel. We found a great deal online. The hotel was 8 minutes from the airport, across the street from the mall, and really close to the metro. Mike and I went to the markets and looked around. We also went to the tallest building in the world, just to see a whole bunch of desert. Dubai is very modern and it was a great way to wind down the vacation. That was much more relaxing. If you have ever heard of the “big bus tour company” they charge about 70 dollars for the a tour of the city in their double decker bus. Mike and I spent a dollar fifty riding around on the city double decker buses. We only ate at McDonalds and Pizza Hut... because we wanted to. Holy crap. I don’t ever eat at McDonalds or Pizza Hut. I prefer Wendy’s or Arby’s or Papa Johns. But biting into American Fast food that tastes the exact same as in America was just out of this world. It was great. Both nights we were in Dubai, we ordered Pizza Hut. Two days was enough in Dubai. We went to eat at “Central Perk” the same cafe that “Friends” met in. However, the one in Dubai didn’t look anything like the one on the TV. Anyway, that was it. We left at 10am on friday and got back to Yerevan around 1pm.
School starts back up tomorrow. A week of school and then I have a conference on how to write grants for a week.
Lastly I want to say how great it is to look down at my passport and see the American Emblem there. I know that the last blog was a little different, but I do think as American’s we have a very tunneled view of the world, and the American media doesn’t make matters any better. At the same time, you can really see the advantages we have. Although I probably see an American flag differently than those that served in the Armed Services, how I saw the flag as a high schooler or even as a college student is completely different. I remember looking up at the flag before lacrosse games, looking at it as a piece of cloth, but it becomes something completely different when you go abroad and you see the living conditions elsewhere. There is a reason why people try to become American Citizens and its easy to see when you’re outside the US boarders. Be thankful for being an American...
Hope everyone is doing well at home. Honestly, if you read this whole blog and the last one, thank you...
Until next time...
New Friends
I will talk about my trip in the next blog. I want to go ahead and apologize if I offend anyone in this blog, but I think that what I am about to say is something that needs to be said.
During my extended break I had some time to go to Yerevan. Dave, who is an A-14, came back to visit Armenia for the first time in 18 months. I went out with him in Yerevan and he introduced me to some of his friends. His friends were Iranian. They are studying various things in Armenia. Honestly, that was one of the best nights I have ever had. As with normal occurrences, the night starts out slow. Well we had a great time. We talked about random things. Then Dave wanted to meet with some of his other friends and I was just going to go home, but my new friends asked me to go back to their house. We just went back and talked for hours. I ended up just staying there the night. We stayed up talking till 6:30 in the morning. We talked about many things. I feel like my eyes were opened. Media in the states does a great job shrouding our eyes with what it wants us to see. It was funny because one of my new friends asked me “I bet you though we lived in the desert and rode around on camels”. Well yeah. In my own ignorance, what he said was not too far from what he said. But if you will take five minutes and google Tehran or another Iranian city you will find that their cities are beautiful. Just plain beautiful. There is no better word than to explain in that way. I guess the funniest part was sitting down and talking to them for all that time and finding out how many things in common we had. They didn’t agree with everything that their government did just like we don’t either. We talked about music, we talked about films, we talked about everything.
I feel like in America we all live in our own little worlds and chose to see what we want to see. Same thing goes with Muslims. The odd thing is, as Christians we think that that is the one and only way to believe in a faith, or in God. (Mom, I know you are probably getting angry with what Im writing, but this is just the way it is). I know there are different levels of faith. There are passive people, extremists, and people who just blindly follow the light. Just like Christians try to justify the crusades, there are extremists in the Muslim world and it doesn’t mean that they are all going to be terrorists. Just recently from my travels, I went to some Muslim countries. It was just an eye opener. I know a lot of people that say that they are Christian and then that is where it stops. I will go ahead and say that Im not too far from that. I haven’t been to church in a long time. I think the last time I went regularly was when I was dating Laura Helen... two years ago. Anyway, being in Dubai and India, I would hear calls to worship and people would actually find a prayer room to pray. In airports, and other public places, there would also be prayer rooms for their faith. All of my Muslim friends don’t drink. They fast during Ramadan. I don’t remember the last time I fasted for a month, or even a day...
Im not trying to promote the Muslim religion or degrade the Christian Religion. Its just recently, I have realized that from ignorance comes fear. I was fortunate to have two of my close friends who were Muslim. It allowed me to learn something. I know you may think that my cheese has slid off my cracker, but like I said, I hope you take a moment to do a little research for yourself about Iran, the middle east, and the Muslim religion. Now onto the travels...
Until next time...
During my extended break I had some time to go to Yerevan. Dave, who is an A-14, came back to visit Armenia for the first time in 18 months. I went out with him in Yerevan and he introduced me to some of his friends. His friends were Iranian. They are studying various things in Armenia. Honestly, that was one of the best nights I have ever had. As with normal occurrences, the night starts out slow. Well we had a great time. We talked about random things. Then Dave wanted to meet with some of his other friends and I was just going to go home, but my new friends asked me to go back to their house. We just went back and talked for hours. I ended up just staying there the night. We stayed up talking till 6:30 in the morning. We talked about many things. I feel like my eyes were opened. Media in the states does a great job shrouding our eyes with what it wants us to see. It was funny because one of my new friends asked me “I bet you though we lived in the desert and rode around on camels”. Well yeah. In my own ignorance, what he said was not too far from what he said. But if you will take five minutes and google Tehran or another Iranian city you will find that their cities are beautiful. Just plain beautiful. There is no better word than to explain in that way. I guess the funniest part was sitting down and talking to them for all that time and finding out how many things in common we had. They didn’t agree with everything that their government did just like we don’t either. We talked about music, we talked about films, we talked about everything.
I feel like in America we all live in our own little worlds and chose to see what we want to see. Same thing goes with Muslims. The odd thing is, as Christians we think that that is the one and only way to believe in a faith, or in God. (Mom, I know you are probably getting angry with what Im writing, but this is just the way it is). I know there are different levels of faith. There are passive people, extremists, and people who just blindly follow the light. Just like Christians try to justify the crusades, there are extremists in the Muslim world and it doesn’t mean that they are all going to be terrorists. Just recently from my travels, I went to some Muslim countries. It was just an eye opener. I know a lot of people that say that they are Christian and then that is where it stops. I will go ahead and say that Im not too far from that. I haven’t been to church in a long time. I think the last time I went regularly was when I was dating Laura Helen... two years ago. Anyway, being in Dubai and India, I would hear calls to worship and people would actually find a prayer room to pray. In airports, and other public places, there would also be prayer rooms for their faith. All of my Muslim friends don’t drink. They fast during Ramadan. I don’t remember the last time I fasted for a month, or even a day...
Im not trying to promote the Muslim religion or degrade the Christian Religion. Its just recently, I have realized that from ignorance comes fear. I was fortunate to have two of my close friends who were Muslim. It allowed me to learn something. I know you may think that my cheese has slid off my cracker, but like I said, I hope you take a moment to do a little research for yourself about Iran, the middle east, and the Muslim religion. Now onto the travels...
Until next time...
Friday, January 1, 2010
New Years Day... Armenian style. Count it
My oh my what a time it was. New Years Eve was awesome here. Again, this year, I guess I celebrated it a bit earlier than you all did. I remember last year, Jon asked me if the future was any better...
Anyway, this is New Years, Armenian style. Honestly, I didn’t really know what to expect. So, I just went with it. I spent most of yesterday cleaning the house, and helping to make food. Basically I did nothing but watched the women make stuff. I asked to help, but they didn’t know what I could do because I didn’t know how to cook anything. I basically did some potato washing and cut up some stuff and sharpened some knifes, and cut cow hoofs again. Interesting huh...
So last night, we were preparing stuff and setting the table right up until midnight. I’m not joking; right up until 11:55 we were setting the table. Let me explain why.
To Armenians this is a huge deal. A good portion of their salary goes to preparing for this feast. That includes buying a crapload of meat, fresh imported fruits, etc. They prepare a table full of food and elaborately decorate their table with seating for about ten people. Its great. Then everyone in the house gets all dolled up. So now that you know some of the background information, I will let you in on my experience.
Like I said, I didn’t really know what to expect. I just waited. In the states, there is so much anticipation for New Years. It gets closer, you see that sparkling ball drop and then you go “what now... oh, lets just go to bed”. Actually very anti-climactic. But here, different story.
Midnight came. no big deal really. I was in charge of opening the champagne and I opened it about three minutes too early. Woops. So at the house with my host mom, grandma, and little brother, we drank some champagne and then it was on...
I ate some food at the house and before i knew it, my host brother and our neighbor’s son who is the same age as Aram took me by each arm and dragged me to another neighbor’s house. That’s right. Here, after midnight, you go to everyone else’s house to wish everyone else congratulations on the new year. So we went there. It was just us and the grandma of the other house. The boys who I was with said that we needed to go, but the grandma said no and made me sit down. So I pounded another glass of champagne and a bunch of sweets and every time I was about to get up, she would put more food on my plate. So I just shoved it all in my mouth and then went to the next house. Running...
I went to my neighbor’s house, Varton, who I normally play chess with. There were some people there and his son from the army came back so I met him. Same things happened here. I drank and ate a crapload. So as you can imagine, I was beginning to get a little tipsy, but this would be a good time to thank Hector’s family for prep-training my liver because after all those drinks, I was still good. However, this is where the problem comes about. You see, Varton has a really attractive single daughter who is a nurse. And in my buzzed state, I kept catching myself just staring at her. Awkward. And then after that, I would pretend that I was staring at something else. If you have seen “Superbad” where Michael Cera is caught staring at a girl and then he just kind of stares away, yeah,I did that.
After that I went to another house. My Armenian teachers house. That was fun. I got into a conversation with the Grandfather about something. He told me that I was speaking fluently and kept telling me congratulations. I told him when you have alcohol in your system all your inhibitions go out the window. He responded by saying, “well, we are going to have to keep you drunk all the time...” I laughed, not exactly sure if he was kidding or not.
It seemed like everywhere I went they always poured more in my glass. For example, at Varton’s house, he kept pouring me full shot glasses of cognac, he would pour himself half a cup. Same thing at my own house. My brother in law kept pouring me a regular glass full of wine and would pour himself a shot glass full. I asked him about it and he said in English “You big, me small.” uh huh. It was great though, other than the drinking thing. I was like a celebrity here. The American had to go to everyone’s house. It was pretty cool. What a great night...
So, I got back around 3 or 3:30am. There were still neighbors going around. I sat around with my family until about 4am and then went to bed.
As a disclaimer, I would like to say to the ease of my parents that I am not a drunk and I do not let myself drink too much. I know how to say no to drinks, but the fact of the matter is, drinking is a large part of the culture here. Its not binge drinking though because there is so much food and the people force feed you, so its not like what you see on the news of moronic college students just slamming down shots. I am fully fuctional.
Ok, with that said.
Now, you may think “wow that was a great time...” Well let me go ahead and say that its not over. Same deal everyday for the next five days, until their Christmas. But instead of during the middle of the night, its during the day.
The third, Pat and I are going to Hector’s house. Hector is in India right now, but his family said that we needed to come out there. Pretty excited.
Right now, Im getting ready to cook some of the pork bbq. Its so good. Definitely the tastiest meal I have had here. Its so good.
I am still amazed at how fresh the meat is here. I mean the animal is killed and then you eat it. Its great.
Alright, so that is new years here. I hope everyone at home had a good new years. You must have because none of you answered your phones when I called. Yeah, you know who you all are...
Until next time...
Anyway, this is New Years, Armenian style. Honestly, I didn’t really know what to expect. So, I just went with it. I spent most of yesterday cleaning the house, and helping to make food. Basically I did nothing but watched the women make stuff. I asked to help, but they didn’t know what I could do because I didn’t know how to cook anything. I basically did some potato washing and cut up some stuff and sharpened some knifes, and cut cow hoofs again. Interesting huh...
So last night, we were preparing stuff and setting the table right up until midnight. I’m not joking; right up until 11:55 we were setting the table. Let me explain why.
To Armenians this is a huge deal. A good portion of their salary goes to preparing for this feast. That includes buying a crapload of meat, fresh imported fruits, etc. They prepare a table full of food and elaborately decorate their table with seating for about ten people. Its great. Then everyone in the house gets all dolled up. So now that you know some of the background information, I will let you in on my experience.
Like I said, I didn’t really know what to expect. I just waited. In the states, there is so much anticipation for New Years. It gets closer, you see that sparkling ball drop and then you go “what now... oh, lets just go to bed”. Actually very anti-climactic. But here, different story.
Midnight came. no big deal really. I was in charge of opening the champagne and I opened it about three minutes too early. Woops. So at the house with my host mom, grandma, and little brother, we drank some champagne and then it was on...
I ate some food at the house and before i knew it, my host brother and our neighbor’s son who is the same age as Aram took me by each arm and dragged me to another neighbor’s house. That’s right. Here, after midnight, you go to everyone else’s house to wish everyone else congratulations on the new year. So we went there. It was just us and the grandma of the other house. The boys who I was with said that we needed to go, but the grandma said no and made me sit down. So I pounded another glass of champagne and a bunch of sweets and every time I was about to get up, she would put more food on my plate. So I just shoved it all in my mouth and then went to the next house. Running...
I went to my neighbor’s house, Varton, who I normally play chess with. There were some people there and his son from the army came back so I met him. Same things happened here. I drank and ate a crapload. So as you can imagine, I was beginning to get a little tipsy, but this would be a good time to thank Hector’s family for prep-training my liver because after all those drinks, I was still good. However, this is where the problem comes about. You see, Varton has a really attractive single daughter who is a nurse. And in my buzzed state, I kept catching myself just staring at her. Awkward. And then after that, I would pretend that I was staring at something else. If you have seen “Superbad” where Michael Cera is caught staring at a girl and then he just kind of stares away, yeah,I did that.
After that I went to another house. My Armenian teachers house. That was fun. I got into a conversation with the Grandfather about something. He told me that I was speaking fluently and kept telling me congratulations. I told him when you have alcohol in your system all your inhibitions go out the window. He responded by saying, “well, we are going to have to keep you drunk all the time...” I laughed, not exactly sure if he was kidding or not.
It seemed like everywhere I went they always poured more in my glass. For example, at Varton’s house, he kept pouring me full shot glasses of cognac, he would pour himself half a cup. Same thing at my own house. My brother in law kept pouring me a regular glass full of wine and would pour himself a shot glass full. I asked him about it and he said in English “You big, me small.” uh huh. It was great though, other than the drinking thing. I was like a celebrity here. The American had to go to everyone’s house. It was pretty cool. What a great night...
So, I got back around 3 or 3:30am. There were still neighbors going around. I sat around with my family until about 4am and then went to bed.
As a disclaimer, I would like to say to the ease of my parents that I am not a drunk and I do not let myself drink too much. I know how to say no to drinks, but the fact of the matter is, drinking is a large part of the culture here. Its not binge drinking though because there is so much food and the people force feed you, so its not like what you see on the news of moronic college students just slamming down shots. I am fully fuctional.
Ok, with that said.
Now, you may think “wow that was a great time...” Well let me go ahead and say that its not over. Same deal everyday for the next five days, until their Christmas. But instead of during the middle of the night, its during the day.
The third, Pat and I are going to Hector’s house. Hector is in India right now, but his family said that we needed to come out there. Pretty excited.
Right now, Im getting ready to cook some of the pork bbq. Its so good. Definitely the tastiest meal I have had here. Its so good.
I am still amazed at how fresh the meat is here. I mean the animal is killed and then you eat it. Its great.
Alright, so that is new years here. I hope everyone at home had a good new years. You must have because none of you answered your phones when I called. Yeah, you know who you all are...
Until next time...
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