On with the journey!

Just when you thought that this blog was well and truly dead...we're back again! The photos and stories from our trip to India stalled at Mysore...the final leg took in a couple of hours in Bangalore (that was enough!), then to the ruins of Hampi and onwards to the Lobo family home in Goa, before flying to and then out of New Delhi towards Istanbul. We'll come back to the Hampi photos in the next blog and cut straight to Goa and our final days in Delhi...so, on with the story...

After another long train journey from Hampi to Margao, we finally got off at the Vasco train station and quickly found a pre-paid taxi to the village of Parra, where my great-grandfather's home still remains. I was so eager about showing Andrew around Goa and the family home, that I could hardly contain my growing excitement. The trip from Vasco to Parra should have taken approximately an hour and I was counting on arriving during daylight. However, just to ensure that our plans were not in my hands at all, we soon discovered that our elderly taxi driver was not only half-blind but that he insisted in driving in fourth gear at an average speed of 30 kilometres an hour. Never has my patience been so sorely tested! However, it was when he decided to enter a roundabout in the opposite direction just so he could get to a fuel station, that we all had merciless thoughts of ditching the poor chap and jumping into the driver's seat ourselves! Nevertheless, we grit our teeth, resigned ourselves to our fate and continued to wind through unknown roads in the hands of a man who really should not have been in charge of a vehicle. As the twilight turned to night, I began to worry that I wouldn't be able to navigate our way to the house, but suddenly, the road I was looking for appeared, and all the familiar landmarks from many childhood holidays to Goa came flooding back. We arrived well after dark and my sister and parents came out to greet us. It was such a delight to be back, five years after my last visit with Astrid. After a light supper, we all fell thankfully into bed and woke to a beautiful morning. The next day, never tiring of the sights and smells of Indian markets, we made our way to Mapusa, the main market area about 10 kilometres from Parra.

Spices for sale at the Mapusa markets

A woman selling her wares at the markets

We only remained in Goa for four days before flying to New Delhi and in that time we managed a couple of trips to Mapusa, a visit to Calangute (a very touristy beachside spot) where my aunt from Geneva was staying for a few weeks and generally just lazed about and relaxed in anticipation of the next stage of our journey.

The view from the front balcony of the Parra house

Relaxing on the balcony at the front of the house

Afternoons were often spent with a book and some snacks gazing out on the view and rocking away slowly!

When we were little, my Dad always used to show us this vision of hell painted on a wall at the local Catholic church in Parra, in the hope that it would inspire good behaviour forevermore!

A plaque at the church in memory of my great-grandparents on my father's side

The back of the house (but also the main entrance)

Andrew testing out the old scooter that my Grandad used to ride well into his 100th year! He took Viv for a spin down the road to drop her off at a bus stand!

Testing his skills at cleaving a coconut!

And enjoying the fruits of his labours!

The dining room

The large central hall with 20 foot high ceilings and four main bedrooms coming off from here

Calangute beach, which suprisingly continues to attract many overseas tourists (they obviously haven't seen Australian beaches) and locals alike

The breaking of the fellowship on 31st December...we won't be all together again until after August when Astrid returns at last!

In New Delhi, we managed to meet up with my Uncle Bernard from Geneva and his sister, Muriel, who were on their way to Goa too. It was lovely to meet Muriel, who is also a Baha'i and works for the Baha'i International Community in Geneva.

Accomodation in the centre of New Delhi is very expensive even for 'hotels' such as this one that we managed to find...complete with a tree growing through the bathroom!

Our hotel was somewhere in here!

On our way back from Haifa and Istanbul, we had one more day in Delhi for some last minute shopping. We passed this sign, shook our heads in wonderment and hurried on! Farewell strange and crazy land!

The earth from above

Well, it's been a while, but we're back again. This time, some photos with a difference...all taken from altitude. Who won the battle for the window seats? In the end, we settled the matter fairly reasonably and mostly just took turns (though I still think Andrew got more turns than me)! Enjoy the view!

Leaving Perth on the 7th December headed for Singapore. You can see the city skyline in the distance and the South Perth foreshore in the foreground

Flying from New Delhi to Istanbul on the 2nd January. Andrew estimates that this photo was taken while we were flying over Pakistan.

You can't really make out very much in this photo, but the colours of dusk were nice! Taken as we flew above Iran on our way to Istanbul.

Leaving Istanbul for Tel Aviv on 7th January, we had a chance to view the very busy port area on the eastern side of Istanbul, the Sea of Marmara.

Crossing over Turkey we passed some mountainous terrain with a dusting of snow...

...but it got colder than that! A large part of southern Turkey was covered in snow...we were glad that we had only visited the north!

A lake amidst the snowy scenery

And then we had left the shores of Turkey and flew over the Mediterranean...

All the time just waiting for our first glimpse of Israel and hoping to see Haifa from the plane. Alas, it was too cloudy for that. As we flew over Tel Aviv preparing to land, the ground glistened with pools of water and black clouds rolled away in the distance. That was the first and last we ever saw of ominous weather, much to our relief!

Bazaars, buses and baklava

OK...I'm afraid I just can't hold on any longer...I'm not trying to overshadow Andrew's impending narrative, I'm just trying to put off doing some school-work! More photos and stories from Turkey...

Wandering the cobbled streets of Sultanahmet at night-time was always a lovely experience...well, apart from being harangued by a multitude of carpet-shop owners and waiters doing their utmost to get passer-bys to come into their respective establishments!

We arrived in Istanbul late in the evening on Tuesday 2nd January. We went straight from the airport to our hotel and once we had dumped our bags in our room we took off again straight into the cold night air to find ourselves some dinner. We managed to locate a place fairly close by - a tiny little cafe with about three tables and a huge gas heater taking up most of the room inside! Here we tasted the first of what was to become our staple diet in Istanbul - chicken and vegetable kebabs. Istanbul was much, much colder than New Delhi. After the first night, we hurriedly dug out our gloves, scarves and beanies before we ventured outdoors again. The next day we decided to just explore the part of the city we were staying in...a thoroughly beautiful area called Sultanahmet, which is home to the major tourist attractions of Istanbul as well as most of the tourist accommodation. This part of Istanbul really felt like an old, exotic city: the cobbled streets, mosques and churches, dazzling shopfronts and the sounds of traditional music wafting into the night air late in the evenings really set the scene for what was a most enjoyable, though all-too-brief visit.

Crossing a large courtyard on the way from Sultanahmet to Fatih

On the third day, we decided to spend the morning walking to another part of the city called Fatih, where Baha'u'llah had spent four months in 1863, after being forced to leave Baghdad. We found some of the places that He had visited and spent some time just wandering around and taking in the sights. We came back to Fatih the next day, when we had an opportunity to visit one of the houses that Baha'u'llah actually stayed in during His time in this city. There we happened to meet a Baha'i family from Queensland who had just returned from their pilgrimage in Haifa and were stopping in Turkey en route to Australia - doing much the same as we were. We discovered from them that the weather had been terrible during their time in Haifa - apart from the first day of blue sky and sunshine, it poured down torrentially for the following nine days! This got us a little bit worried about the conditions awaiting us in Israel, but we ended up having all the luck with ten days of perfect weather!

Sitting outside a mosque in Fatih, we posed for a photo (I think we only took about three photos of ourselves together during our entire trip!).

On the way back from Fatih we stopped to look in the window of yet another sweet shop, but suprisingly we didn't go in (maybe because we hadn't actually finished the box of sweets that we had purchased earlier that morning!).

Yum...dozens of varieties of melt-in-your-mouth pastries and baklava! We resisted for once, but made up for it in Haifa where we bought a half-kilo box which we promptly polished off in about 2 days!

It was also on the way back from Fatih that we decided to venture into the Grand Bazaar to escape the biting cold of the elements outside. The place was huge and very different from our experience of market-shopping in India. We went in pursuit of cushion covers of a particular size and shape, but would you believe, couldn't find any - though we had many offers from shop owners who said they could whip some up to our particular specifications in a matter of hours!

Beautiful mosaic glass lamps at the Grand Bazaar

The next day, Saturday, we decided to go to Edirne and back - a one-way journey by bus would be about two and a half hours. We caught a taxi to the bus station and our eyes boggled at the sight of literally hundreds and hundreds of individual bus companies all offering trips to various parts of Turkey. Luckily, we knew which bus companies we had to find and we managed to buy our tickets fairly quickly and board our bus about half an hour later. The buses were a huge surprise. Brand new, sleek and comfortable and staffed with two attendants who handed out beverages and food throughout the journey - it was more like a plane trip than a bus ride, but far more comfortable! It was here that I got my first taste of 'simit' - a bagel-like bread that is sold on every street corner and tastes every bit as good as it looks! The highway from Istanbul to Edirne was as good as the vehicles that traversed it. We sped onwards at over 100km an hour and were at our destination in no time at all...what a remarkable change from travelling in India!

Some of the residential areas of Istanbul that really made us appreciate what we have at home

One of the saddest things that we observed as we travelled, were scenes such as the one above. As soon as we had left the heart of the city, for kilometres into the distance all we could see were masses and masses of tall apartment buildings, squashed in so tightly together that there was no room for trees, parks or even a blade of grass. Istanbul is home to over 20 million people and the only affordable housing for the majority of people are such multi-storey apartments. It made us think of how very lucky we are in Australia. Even with the cost of housing going through the roof, homes still have gardens and trees and even those who live in small apartments still have tree-lined streets and parks around the corner. These people had nothing natural at all left in their environment. We asked the owner of the carpet shop where we purchased our rug about this: where do children play and run? The young lad who was also working in the shop told us that when he was growing up, he used to play soccer in the streets with his friends, but now, there was too much traffic even for this.

The Salim Mosque in Edirne

We reached Edirne and walked to the Salim Mosque shown above. Near this mosque was another house that Baha'u'llah had stayed in during His five year stay in this city. The caretaker of the house met us at the mosque and we walked to the house which was a few minutes away. Here we were shown around the house, which had been beautifully restored, and we were also shown the site of another house that Baha'u'llah had stayed in. All that remained were the foundations - but work is starting this year to rebuild the house in its original form. We then wandered around Edirne for a couple of hours before returning on the bus to Istanbul once again.

Shanks purchasing some carob in Edirne

We arrived back in Istanbul at around 8:00pm. We came back to the hotel briefly and were just about to head out the door to find some dinner when the family who ran the hotel we were staying at persuaded us to join them for dinner instead. We had already spent a few hours talking to Bulent and his wife and their gorgeous, cheeky daughter Yasmin. We ate a simple meal of fried fish, salad and bread and then talked away long and late into the night about so many things, including food, schooling, Islam and carpets! We kept them amused by teaching them various Aussie phrases ("G'day mate" being the standard one), but we also had a chance to try to understand more about life in Istanbul from their perspective. There, like here, it has become almost impossible to afford a house and, again, like Australia, many people are leaving the rural areas to come to the cities for work - no-one wants to work on the land anymore. We also asked them about their impressions of the many Australians who come to Istanbul en route to Gallipoli (known as Gelibolu in Turkey). Luckily the reputation of Aussies here appears to be pretty good, which may explain the warm reception we received! Once again, spending time with this family was one of the highlights of our time in Istanbul...connecting with people from a different culture and religion, discovering so many commonalities in the lives that we lead and being treated with so much hospitality and warmth - this for us is really what travel is all about and where its influence has the most positive effect.

The very special family who ran the hotel we stayed at in Istanbul

We were very sad to be leaving Istanbul just five days after having arrived, but also tremendously excited about the last leg of our journey. In the end, we were so busy at the airport trying to change our tickets for the return leg that we ended up having to run to our gate just before they shut the doors, and slightly embarassed about being the last passengers on to the plane, we plonked ourselves in our seats and spent the rest of the flight looking out the window at scenes such as the one below, thankful for our time in Istanbul and awaiting the next leg of our adventure with mounting anticipation.

Snow covered mountains in southern Turkey as we flew towards our final destination

To market, to market...

The hardest thing about being home again, apart from failing miserably to adjust our sleep cycle back to Perth time, is the thought that we may have to start shopping in ordinary shopping centres again....aaaaagggghhhhh. After weeks of haggling and wandering in markets and bazaars all over India and in Turkey, and having laid eyes on the mind-boggling array of olives, cheeses and assorted delicacies (marinated eggplants, capsicums, tomatoes) in small supermarkets in Haifa, not to mention the luscious treats on display in sweet shops everywhere we went...how can we ever face going back to Coles again???

The truth is, supplies have run low in our fridge and pantry but neither of us are game enough to venture out of doors...I opened a can of tuna for dinner last night and Shanks went without! The area we live in isn't exactly renowned for the fresh produce on offer. There are no fruit and veg markets nearby...the only hope we have is our little Italian grocer about 10km down the road and a cheese shop across the railway line (where we buy our supplies of parmesan, mozzarella and ricotta). The other difference is that shops and markets in India are open till late at night...often 10pm (in Perth everything shuts at 6pm) and wandering the streets of Istanbul and Haifa it was easy to find small delis open even later (no such luck in Armadale)!

Also, being in India, and witnessing the daily lives of hardship and suffering lived by so many thousands has also made us reflect on the life of excess it is so easy to lead here. Maybe changing spending habits on an individual level doesn't affect the quality of life for others the world over, but we will certainly start looking at our purchases more carefully from now on.

Anyway, here are some more marketplace photos (just from India) to tide you over until we have a chance to fill in the gaps from Israel and Turkey. Check out our friends' blog, http://allanmuna.blogspot.com/, for pictures of the markets that we never quite made it to in Haifa and also of their recent trip, like us, to Turkey (some of you will remember Allan - he was the celebrant at our wedding and has recently moved to Haifa with his wife, Muna).

Fruit stall in Ernakulam, Kochi

Another vegetable stall owner keen to pose with the towering Aussie in Ernakulam!

Quality control

Sweets, sweets and more sweets...

...makes it a very hard choice for Christian!

Chillies anyone?

Lentils, pulses, garlic and pasta-type things on display in Ernakulam

Shopping for sarees in New Delhi

Christmas decorations, Indian style!

Almost there...

After almost 45 days of adventuring across 3 different countries, we are just 9 hours away from returning home again. The return leg of our journey back to Perth has been challenging - we left Haifa at 5pm on Wednesday afternoon, spent that night at Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv before our early morning flight to Turkey. We arrived in Istanbul at about 9am on Thursday morning, where Shanks and I, despite being severely sleep-deprived at that stage, went in search of the famed Bosphorus cymbals (more about that adventure in another blog!). Then we snatched a few hours of sleep at the hotel we stayed in previously, before setting out to make some last minute purchases (well, you didn't really expect us to leave Turkey without a carpet did you?). At midnight we hopped in a taxi to the airport for our 2:15am flight to New Delhi, arrived there at midday on Friday and once again, without having slept very much at all, had one final Indian market experience (not to mention one final masala dosa!) before heading back to the Baha'i House of Worship for some much needed peace and tranquility. This achieved, we experienced one last crazy rickshaw ride to the airport...there is nothing like a 1 hour rickshaw ride through the streets of Delhi to make you so glad to leave India! Despite our trepidation upon arriving once again at the Indira Gandhi International Airport, our fears were allayed as soon as we saw that there were no unimaginably horrendous queue awaiting us - we even ended up having an hour to spare before boarding!

We landed at Changi Airport at about 4:30am this morning, our third night without uninterrupted sleep! However, being in Changi has a tendency to relax and refresh you straight away - the airport is so clean and visually beautiful, full of little comforts like the famed foot massagers, exotic gardens and of course, the free internet (great for killing time!). We now have about 3 hours left before our flight to Perth...we both have mixed feelings upon our imminent return home. Our travels have provided such wonderful experiences that partly we both feel like just keeping on going. On the other hand, there is never anything quite like home. Shanks is looking forward to returning to his evening musings in the garden and meeting the latest duck/chicken arrivals that hatched while we were away! And we're both looking forward to a looong sleep!

Well, the next post will no doubt be from the comforts of our own home, where we will be able to post lots more photos and magical moments to share with you all.

Counting down again...

We have almost come full circle. We are once again sitting here at Ben Gurion Airport, trying to keep steadily ordering small things from the cafe here which offers free internet to its customers. We have a very long wait ahead of us...our plane leaves at 6:45am, but we have been warned countless of times that it takes over 3 hours to clear all the security checks and that the Israeli airport officials turn your suitcase inside out! So...we're in for the long haul.

We fly from here to Istanbul, stay there for half a day (where Shanks will go in search of the magical Bosphorous cymbals), then to New Delhi where we have an 8 hour stop (enough time to scoff down a few masala dosas), before the flight to Singapore and then, finally, home.

There are so many stories to tell and photos to share...even though we will soon be home, we will keep the posts going so that all you who have been following our journey can follow it right to the end...there are many, many gaps to fill in. We hope that you have enoyed the story so far.

Trying to leave India...

Leaving India ended up being rather more difficult than we had imagined (and we had already imagined it to be pretty difficult)! Our flight was scheduled to depart at 1:15pm. We managed to check ourselves in on-line the night before, so we weren't in a huge hurry to get to the airport. In fact, before arriving at the airport, we managed an all too brief visit to the Baha'i House of Worship in New Delhi, named the Lotus Temple, and attracting well over 3 1/2 million visitors each year (some photos are below). We spent a quiet hour in prayer and reflection and had a brief look at the impressive information centre, which wasn't there 5 years ago when I first visited. We hope to come back for a few more hours during our stopover on the return leg of our journey back to Perth.

Anyway, we arrived at the airport at around 11:45am. There are no signs telling you what to do or where to go, and it was only previous experience that told us that the first thing we had to do was get our bags scanned. We did this fairly promptly and then proceeded to find our check-in counter. Again, no problem, though the queue here took about half an hour. As we were lining up to check-in, we noticed an alarmingly long line of people waiting to go through the security checks. Hoping the queue would be somewhat diminished by the time we had to line up, we completed the rest of the check-in procedures swiftly. By this time however, the rather long queue had multiplied phenomenally and was now coursing through the entire departures terminal like a gigantic human snake! A little bit startled, but nevertheless good-humoured (after all, we thought, we are in India), we proceeded to try to find the end of the line. This in itself took a good few minutes, as the human snake had doubled and re-doubled on itself in an attempt to create some semblance of order in a fairly chaotic situation. Taking our place at the end of the queue, it was now our turn to observe the looks of sheer bewilderment and horror as fellow travellers also realised the full extent of the queuing scenario that was about to greet them.

The queue was moving fairly slowly and we had just made our way around one coil, when two parts of the line decided to merge into one. Not ones to get too worried by this we kept in line and went with the flow. However, with the finishing line just in sight - the inevitable happened - queue jumpers appeared and decided that instead of lining up at the end they would try to sneak in at the start! Understandably, this incensed a few fellow-queuers - one American lady started yelling at the little sneaks to "Go away", and suitably-chastened, a large party of shame-faced Finnish passengers took their rightful place at the end of the huge line. However, this didn't stop others from trying it on, and finally, with the camel's back well and truly broken, an Englishman decided that he had a cause to champion on behalf of his fellow sufferers who had, like us, patiently stood in line for an hour and a half already. He took his cause up with one family - mum, dad and son, and things, inevitably got quite fiery, with the Englishman refusing to give up, and the man and son raising their voices and getting very upset. The beleaguered Indian airport officials, when called upon to intervene, did nothing - you could see in their eyes that this was a situation that happened frequently and they felt powerless to deal with it. The stoush continued for a good fifteen minutes, until finally the queue-jumping crew were removed to the back of the line. Small victory indeed, as many of the on-lookers themselves had pushed in and were probably hoping that no-one would point the finger at them too.

Anyway, by this time, our plane should have taken off an hour ago, yet we were still in the line. Obviously no procedures to speed up the processing of those passengers whose planes are first to depart. A few times, a lady came around calling for Turkish Airlines passengers. We eagerly identified ourselves to her, but it was no more than a head-counting game and we resigned ourselves to the fact that we may never end up leaving New Delhi after all. By this time, we realised that "foggy conditions" are really just a convenient cover-story for the Indian Airport Authority - delayed flights have got nothing to do with the weather at all - it's all just the complete lack of proper procedures and systems to deal with passenger arrivals and departures!

Finally, when we had been waiting for over three hours, together with another couple travelling on the same flight as us, we were bumped up to the front of the line (much to the annoyance of others!). We cleared the security checks in a flash and raced towards the boarding gates. Two hours after our scheduled departure time we were in the skies, quite happy to be leaving the chaos and confusion of India behind us...and no doubt to happily return again many times in the future!

Photos of the Baha'i House of Worhsip in New Delhi

http://info.bahai.org/article-1-6-0-7.html

One of the paths leading to the Baha'i House of Worship in New Delhi

Thousands of people from all faiths visit the House of Worship every day

A view of the interior of the House of Worhsip

Aerial view of the House of Worhsip, about 1/2 hour from the centre of the city

The House of Worship at night