Back to Delhi (groan)

I've been really lazy with the blog-updatery lately, and we're now a week into our first South East Asia stop, but don't have much time today so I'll leave everything after India for my next entry.

We ended up spending a ridiculously long time in Pondy, longer than we'd spent anywhere else in fact, but it's such a relacxing place and we felt quite at home there after a couple of days. We saw a lot of the town and rented bikes to get around for a bargain 40 pence a day, and had some nice French-style meals.

Our train back to Delhi was booked from Chennai, a 3 hour bus ride away, so we had a day there wandering along the beach right on the edge of the city. Like everywhere seemed to be in India, it wasn't as relaxing as you'd imagine walking along a beach should be, but crowded with people, touts, food and drink vendors, dogs and the sounds of the city nearby. We took a walk through the streets for a while afterwards but really were glad to get on the train and get ready to leave.

We were in a sleeper cabin with 4 berths, and had some really interesting travel companions. We were on the train for about 35 hours in total, so in that time we got to know a little bit about their lives and religion. One of them was a young guy in training to become an army officer, and he told us a lot about young Indians, their careers, family obligations and the rituals that they live by. The other was a middle aged man who turned out to be a psychologist, and who asked me lots of questions about my career plans and was very encouraging. In addition to this he told us that he practised palm reading and astrology as part of his therapies, so there was obviously an Eastern edge on the type of therapies that he provided. All in all it was a very pleasant journey, although by the third day the loos were to be avoided at all costs.

Our return trip to Delhi was altogether more pleasant than we anticipated, and although we were taking things pretty easy we managed to see Humayun's Tomb, a huge complex of ancient temples, mosques and mausoleums from the Shah period, which was really fascinating. Pictures to be seen on Peet's Flickr page, as he's altogether more organised about these things than I am.

It's www.flickr.com/people/windymiller if you fancy a look.

We're now just about to leave Chiang Mai after heading up to go trekking, and in some ways the contrast between Thailand now and three years ago when I first visited is surprising.

But I'll have to wait 'til next time to get into that.

Cheerio for now.