Mamallapuram to Pondicherry, India

Mamallapuram is known for its artisans that carve marble, so we were able to get some things made from designs that we created. Through this, we became friends with the artist, Pasipatti (the one working in the picture), and all his friends.

While we were there, a classical Indian dance festival was being held. The dancers were very impressive, and, as an added bonus, we met a Tamil (South-East Indian province) guy there, named Moorti. The next day, he took us to visit a famous temple in the area which was on the top of a hill, giving an impressive view of the surrounding area.
Along with the dance festival, the Pongal festival (harvest celebration) was still in full swing. Between the two, Mama- llapuram was a busy town...but the beach was absolute craziness (note the picture!).

We are now in Auroville at Sadhana Forest. Auroville is an "experiment in international living." The town was started in the mid 1960's. It is similar to the ashrams (kind of like communes, but they have spiritual leaders) here, but this is actually a whole town based on the teachings of "the Mother" and Sri Aurobindo. It is an interesting place focused on sustainability, and cooperation. They are involved with many interesting projects including compressed bricks (similar to adobe in that they are not fired, but the compressed bricks are much stronger), organic farming, spirulina harvesting, and biological waste water treatment (using plants to clean waste water). We are staying here for 2 weeks to help out in whatever way we can. We chose Sadhana forest because it deals with reforestation and when we emailed them, they welcomed us openly.

The farm is vegan and meals can be a bit redundant, but last night we had a fantastic Mediterranean meal accompanied by accordion and Hebrew songs courtesy of our Israeli hosts. Unfortunately, Chris' stomach is tied in knots, and Dana definitely has some stomach bug but we are treating both with homeopathic Neem leaf powder that is supposed to be good for all stomach worms and bugs and comes highly recommended. The forest is not exactly what we expected, but we are utilizing our time by designing a biological waste filtration system for the farm, which currently has nothing in place in the way of a septic system. We are being helped immensely by several local experts. We are learning many things, and it is good to use our brains again. It takes almost all our free time, but we are finding it's worth it.

Auroville, India

Just under that roof is where we stayed for our 2 weeks at Sadhana Forest. Chris stands outside brushing his teeth, trying to hide the fact that being sick made us finally break down and treat ourselves to a little non-vegan contraband...Cookies! Unfortunately, cookies, or more specifically sugar is not the best thing when trying to deal with amoebas...they love sugar. We ate mostly rice porridge. After feeling better, we still couldn't kick the end of our illness, so we resorted to those good 'ol western drugs. Those drugs gave Chris a UTI (urinary tract infection), which was quickly cured, but the fight for health goes on.

The work with the biological waste treatment was slow going. Many Aurovillians were helpful in giving us what knowledge they had, we just had to piece it all together into a workable system. By the time we left, we were finally hammering out the final details of a pretty comprehensive and feasible plan. Matt, another person staying at the forest, helped with the research, and we have entrusted him with continuing the project (Go Matt!). We hope that we will get pictures someday of the completed system.

We are now in Madurai. We wanted to break up the trip across the southern tip and Madurai was smack-dab in the middle. It has a famous temple that is known for its touts. But we braved it anyway. The colorful sculptures on the gopuras (tower entrances) would take a year to fully appreciate. They are exploding with carvings of people, gods, animals and everything else. We are back to eating the normal Indian diet...thali. Most are served on banana leaves and eaten with the RIGHT hand. In India, left hands are only used as toilet paper, and it is rude to shake/ eat/ accept or give money with the left. This is proving quite a challenge for left-handed Chris.

Chennai, India

The train ride was actually really relaxing ... got a bunch of reading in and Chris got a chance to sew his man purse. Chennai isn't that exciting, but we have mastered Indian buses ... unfortunately they pretty much lead to nowhere today because of the holiday Pongal (a Hindi harvest festival). The only thing we got to see of this holiday is the sand drawings that the province is known for. Other than that, we did get to see a TV show getting filmed at a studio...not quite PBS quality, but entertaining none the less.

We have been in Mama- llapuram for the past few days. We have been relaxing at our 1st beach town in India, but are ready to head on. This place is by far has the most tourists we've seen ...and not just foreigners. For the last day of Pongal, the beach exploded with Indian tourists. I mean crazy crowds! But things have settled down a bit in the last 2 days, which has been nice.

Chai. It is sold on every corner, on the train, at every restaurant ... everywhere you can think of. It is always served hot with milk and over abundance of sugar. Not how we ever drank tea in the States, but we've adjusted ...and loving it. Lily, it rivals your beloved Thai ice tea.

Buhbaneswar to Konark, India

Heading on down the coast, we stopped in Bhubaneswar to give us a break from the train. We weren't expecting much from the town, but we found that it had beautiful temples with amazing bas relief. What a treat wandering through theses small streets and happening upon these treasures from the 8th to 11th century.
In other news...It was craziness getting our train ticket booked...the train station said that the train we wanted to take was booked for 2 weeks out (so we found out after 45 minutes in line), so we bought a ticket to somewhere closer (but still a 17 hour train ride because it wasn't express) putting us into the station at 1am. After all this madness, we talked to a travel agent in town and he was able to book us a ticket for the original train we wanted (at a 50% mark-up). Something about tourist quotas, some other rules and loopholes and possible bribes...we are utterly confused, but we got our trip!
So with the extra time, we went to a tiny town named Konark. Getting there was quite the journey...35 seat mini bus, 80 people. No joke! Sardines is an understatement. Not to mention the little boy that almost puked on me while he was trying to push his way through to a window. But the Indians made sure that us tourist got the first seats available and we were able to sit for about 1/2 the ride. They really took care of us. All was worth it. There is nothing in Konark except the exceptional Sun Temple. but this temple rivals Angkor. The relief were of amazing quality. Most of the carvings were taken from the Kama Sutra. They really had imaginations back then...some look like acrobatics.

Kolkata, India

We took our flight to India, and it was good. 24 Hours later, we have experienced so much (such is India-the opposite of Laos). For starters...Urinals are anywhere you please (for men, but a toilet is impossible for a women to find), we participated in a protest march (we don't know for what), we've seen 2 goats sacrificed to appease the blood lust of the Hindu goddess Kali (she apparently requires that 50 get beheaded everyday), got tikka's (the Hindu forehead paint), took pictures of Sadhus, or Hindu ascetics (one with an exposed pierced penis with a chain attached and slung over his shoulder), walked around barefoot in the grossest place imaginable (we had to-it was a temple), experienced bus rides and the much less daunting human-powered rickshaw, saw a kid pooping in the street, walked around the world's largest Banyan tree (it's 450 meters in circumference, and 48,800 square meters in area), saw cows in the city and played our first cricket game. This does not count the monuments, markets, and other things we actually PLANNED to see. So many more days to come; so much more to see.

Luang Prabang, Laos

For the 1st sunset of the new year, we were treated to a slow boat trip down the Mekong River by a friendly Pittsburgh couple. What a relaxing evening...such is Laos.

We were able to take a night bus, so the next day we had time to visit these amazing waterfalls about 40 minutes from Luang Prabang. We climbed to the top of the 35 meter falls and were able to stand in the falls at the very top. The river had a lot of minerals in it, creating a stone covering over everything, even the wooden planks that were used as an old walkway.

In Bangkok for the forth and last time...heading to Kolkata early tomorrow morning.