India Part 2

After an amazing month and a half in the south of India, it was time to make the journey up to the notorious Delhi, India. Bree and I took a flight from Chennai with a stop in Hyderabad. We get to Delhi and sure enough, they’ve lost my bag. Welcome to Delhi. They are telling me that my bag is in Hyderabad but I have an air tag and it’s telling me that it is at the New Delhi airport. Tip: buy the two pack of air tags, they will help you so much in any situation like this. 

After 3 hours of waiting and going back and forth with them, I finally got my bag back. We head to our hostel, smoke a joint, eat some food, and go to bed. 

I spent a few days in Delhi. Some with Bree and then a couple of days by myself. It is hectic there for sure, but worth the experience. I was honestly expecting it to be way worse. My theory is that people land in Delhi so it’s their first experience in India so it seems full power. Don't get me wrong it is full power, but when you've been traveling around India for over a month already you have your wits about you more. I knew what price I should be paying for everything, what was a scam, what wasn't a scam, and I even tried some street food. New Delhi and Old Delhi are different. Old Delhi is a bit more intense with the beggars, a lot of them with body mutations. I had a great time in both places truly. I enjoyed Delhi way more than I thought I would. 

The next part of my journey was solo traveling around India. Something I never knew I would say but it’s awesome to say it. It was awesome to experience it as well. I left Delhi on an overnight train to Varanasi. A very well-known, intensely spiritual, and eye-opening place. Suppose you haven’t heard about Varanasi I’m happy to tell you. This city is located on the Ganga River, a very very VERY holy water. At the river people bring their loved ones once they pass, they have a ceremony and bathe the body in the river, then bring it up to a fire for the body to be burned (cremation). It is a very common ceremony and a very intense thing to watch. My body was feeling all of the intense energy while I was there. Watching the bodies burn, loved ones standing there, a dead cow in the river right next to it (which isn’t supposed to happen). Wow, intense place. I remember one morning I was walking to breakfast when a family passed me, carrying their loved one down to the Ganga. I will never forget Varanasi and how many bugs there were. While I was here I also tried my first bhang lassi. This is a plant similar to weed but gets you very high. Depending on how much you drink it can also cause hallucinations. Please proceed with caution if you are not used to such things. 

I continued my solo travels with an overnight bus to Agra to see the Taj Mahal. This bus then dropped me off in the middle of a highway with 1 tuk-tuk driver standing there saying I had to pay him 1000 rupees to get to my hostel. Thank god I knew better and called an Uber, and it was so worth it. There will never be any words or pictures that can explain the beauty of the Taj Mahal. To this day I can’t fathom the true beauty of its creation. The fact that they built it without any modern technology is mind-blowing. The Taj Mahal, the Baby Taj Mahal, and the Agra Fort are all must-sees. To be honest there is not much else in Agra. I had a wonderful time there. I stayed at House of Travelers, it is such a good location. You can walk to the Taj Mahal and they can set up a ride to drive you to any other places you want to see. 

My next destination was one of my favorites on my whole trip. Udaipur, the city of lakes. This place did not disappoint, it even exceeded my expectations. I met up with a friend I had met in Varanasi. He then invited me to do a walking tour around Udaipur with him and his friend. It was with a local and he brought us to many different spots to try different snacks. The guide walked us through the old town and new town, a farmers market, and some temples. I hadn’t done something like that outside of Europe, nor did I plan on it. But once he told me about it I decided why the hell not.  One morning, very early for sunrise, we went to this lookout point. This picture is showing just how magnificent it was.

Udaipur was seriously so so so breathtaking. This was the place where I ended my solo travels and made my way to Pushkar for the Holi Festival. 

I arrived at a town outside of Pushkar by train. This was one of the most intense experiences ever at the train station. I luckily used Uber so I didn’t have to deal with all of the tuk-tuk drivers yelling at me. My Uber driver had to come and escort me to his tuk-tuk as all the other men were yelling and screaming at us. Wow, that is a memory right there. I got to Pushkar and met up with Madi and Sam at our lovely hotel. The hotel was a little outside of the main Pushkar so we had to get tuk-tuks there and back every time. I was unfortunately very sick once I got to Pushkar. I’m not sure what caused it but it wasn’t good. So many of my days were wasted on the toilet or in bed in Pushkar. I seriously think I slept for almost 24 hours straight besides getting up to use the bathroom. Rough time but we made it through. The reason I was there, and the same for everyone else, was for Holi.

Holi festival is their celebration of the coming Spring. Known as the festival of colors since everyone is going around throwing colored powder everywhere. My personal experience was not good. It was very intense and full of people (mostly men) touching you with color. My friends and I only lasted 45 minutes out on the streets. We then went back to our hotels to get ready for the party we had bought tickets for. Well, we took our sweet time and ended up missing the party. No one had told us that it ended earlier in the night because it started so early in the morning. We paid for a ticket to an insanely cool party, then missed the whole thing. Devastating. If I were to do Holi again I would go to a party like that and not walk the streets.

Honestly, I don’t plan on doing it again. 

Continuing on our travels, Sam and I headed to Jaipur to see Baba at his home. We took a car because it was only a 3-hour drive, rather than getting back to the other little town and figuring out a bus or train. Jaipur, the pink city was so beautiful. Thank you Baba for having us at your home, and thank you to your mother for cooking the best food I’ve ever had. While I was in Jaipur I slept a lot. I think I was still recovering from my illness in Pushkar. Traveling is also fucking exhausting sometimes. You need to make sure you’re resting enough otherwise you’ll burn out. Which is basically what happened to me at Baba’s house. They provided a safe space for me to fully relax. We also had a full day of exploring the city with our amazing tuk-tuk driver, Ikram. This city is a must-see, must-explore place. 

The next part of India is my last stop, also the most transforming part. I was headed to Rishikesh for 1 month of Yoga Teacher Training School.  I got to Rishikesh one night before Sam and it was the best night of my solo travels ever. I went to explore Rishikesh on my own. Rishikesh is split by the Ganga so there were two sides for me to explore. I had walked around on the side my hostel was on then decided to take the boat to the other side since the walking bridge was closed. I then asked a lovely guy named Mike if this was where we buy our tickets. He said yes and we continued to make conversation on the boat across the river. We then decided to get coffee together and walk around shopping. Then he invited me to the beach where he and other amazing people would be spinning fire, playing instruments, and singing songs. It was the most beautiful experience ever. I met some wonderful souls that day that I will forever cherish in my heart. 

The next day was check-in day for Yoga School. I did my 200 hours and Sam was doing her 300 hours. We were lucky enough to get into the same school for the same month, not only that, we were roommates (cue "and they were roommates" vine). Thank all the Gods for that, because truly the experience was perfect with us together. We carried each other when needed, studied together, and had our biggest laughs every night before bed. There wasn’t a night we didn’t laugh our heads off at whatever the hell we were talking about. Sam I love you thank you for that experience, I will cherish it in every life. The entire experience at YTT completely reshaped me as a human, physically, mentally, spiritually, and emotionally. Every aspect of my life has been different since that month at Yoga school. There will be a blog dedicated to my month at the school. 

After all of those stories, cities, adventures, and people India will always be a country I go back to. There is so much to see and do and learn, it’s never-ending.

If you have made it this far, thank you for reading. I hope this inspires you to go to one of the most unique countries in the world. Full of culture, religion, love, spirituality, and light. If you have any questions about the details of traveling to India, such as hostels, transportation, bargaining, and places to go, I will be writing another blog on How To India. 

Please remember to keep discovering, especially outside of your comfort zone,

Darby