Feed on POSTS
Like I said before, Bodhgaya was a definite highlight of the India trip. Not only did we stumble onto a lost carnival, but this was also the spot where Buddha stumbled onto nirvana. Let us take a moment and connect those two events, shall we?
More: India photo set.
This monk is peering through a thick wall which protects the Bodhi tree, the spot where Buddha first attained enlightenment. Here’s the tree in all it’s glory!
Before the Buddha was the Buddha, he was Prince Gautama Siddhartha. He decided that he wanted to seek something more than what he saw around him as his life and he meditated in this Mahakala/Dungeswari Cave for years. It was meditating in these caves that made him realize that fasting and depriving one’s body of nutrition is not the correct path to wisdom. (He’s saying: eat a sandwich and the truth will come!)
One of the highlights of our India trip was Bodhgaya, where Buddha found enlightenment. It was probably no coincidence that this was also the same place where we found a lost carnival amidst the dry, arid land.
More about enlightenment later, but for now enjoy the photos of the incredible carnie rides that we braved!
More: India photo set.
This attraction is commonly known as “Wall of Death,” with motorcyclists slowly ascending on a slightly slanted wall as they spin round and round and round.
It’s all smiles for the Wall-of-Death defy-er!
Marah and her new friends! She treated all these little boys to a hand-cranked carousel ride!
In the middle of January, Katherine and I traveled to India during a term break. It wasn’t just any ol’ holiday, this was the vacation where my super friends, Gus y Marah, joined us too! Here are pics from the first part of the trip, when we were in Kolkata.
More: India photo set.
At Mother Teresa’s former home. This is her tomb, the only place we were allowed to photograph. On top of her tomb, formed by marigolds, it says “You Did It To Me.” Really? Me? I did it?
Holy cow! Gus is in India!
More: India photo set.
During one of our last nights in India, I strolled up and down Main Bazar Road and peeked into shops searching for a bag of peanuts. I found a street vendor selling freshly-fried biscuits and perused his cart for a nutty snack, but there was nothing. As I looked, he asked, “What do you want?”
I shook my head and he repeated his question.
“Nah,” I reiterated.
Then he asked, his voice heavy with genuine concern and desperation, “Please tell me what you want.”
No one’s ever asked so directly before. Too bad he didn’t have what I wanted though.
E-mail to friend:
I’m at an internet cafe in Varanasi, India. This is where the Ganges is, its the river where you can bathe to wash away all of your bad ju-ju and begin anew with fresh karma. I haven’t touched the water yet. We’ll see how that goes.
Response from friend:
Hope you guys are having fun. If anyone needs their ju-ju bathed, it’s probably you.
Immediate follow-up message from friend soon thereafter:
Wait. That totally came out wrong.
Ah, shit.
Highlight of the trip thus far has got to be the small carnival we stumbled upon in Bodh Gaya, the epicenter for Buddhism as it was where Buddha became enlightened after 40-some odd days of mediation beneath a bodhi tree.
The air was dry in Bodh Gaya, and auto-rickshaws kicked up dust on the roads. The carnival was about a 15-minute walk from the center of town, sitting on a landscape that looked like a desert. It was the most amazing thing to see a rickety ferris wheel sprung upon the dusty earth of India. Obviously, we rode it. We saw a couple men circle a dome-room on motorbikes and spun around on a hand-cranked carousel. All at the birthplace of Buddhism.
I hadn’t laughed so hard in a long time.
Gus and Marah are here in Kolkata with meez! It’s like we were just hanging out last week when in fact we haven’t seen each other in almost a year.
Gus took a back-lit photograph of my by the Queen Victoria memorial and all you can see is the outline of my head and a shiny spot on my forehead. We laughed about how greasy my head is and he said that it looked like a cartoon apple. I laughed so hard, I cried.
Maybe you had to be there for it.
