Updates coming...

I'm alive! I;m working on updates from:
INDIA - where I barely made it out of the country alive!!
ICELAND - where the volcano errupted AFTER I left!!
BERLIN - which is as charming of a city as ever!!
WROCLAW - where I'm actively working on increasing the population.... ;-) !!

Victory treats?

This is very last minute and fresh kind of news (well, wasn't that fresh), but at breakfast they had what I think were post-Osama victory doughnuts! Or am I seeing more here than I should be?

Anyway, enjoy! ;-)

I'm off to do some work in 45 degree heat and after that to the next destination - Ludhiana. See you all there.

Punjab region - where it's at! Where it's HOT!!

I may gain in my mysterious credentials here since I'm often found where things are happening...

Today I'm in Jalandhar, about 50km from Pakistan's border, but for those who want to thank/blame me for recent events - it wasn't me - cross my heart (not that I have one!)
So when things heat up - I go there - and things are hot here! Today for example 44 degrees and expected to rise! I leave the city tomorrow but only to another Punjabi location - Ludhiana. Where I'm sure things will happen and it will be hot!

So this is the first time in real 'Outback' India. I arrived yesterday evening and immediately noticed this isn't Delhi.

• 10x more staring at the Westerner - you should have seen the shock on my driver's face when Mr Anna turned out to be me! There is also a lot more expectation that I couldn't be travelling here alone. In the hotel yesterday it took a while before anyone served me, they assumed I was with the 3 (separate) men who were also checking in. I did get my own room in the end and didn't have to stay with any of them, for those concerned...




• Most signs are no longer in English but in whatever they speak here - I am not being dismissive, I just don't know. I thought most people would still speak English as a left over from British colonisation but that doesn't happen so much - India is a strongly independent nation. They also seem to identify with the region more than with national level and speak different languages - understandable for a country this size. But even though Hindi is the official language, not all speak it. So for, example in Kolkata most people are Bengali and that is the language they speak but many, though not all, also speak Hindi (I went to have my mandatory manicure/pedicure and tried to guess what language the staff were speaking to each other (I got it wrong). In Delhi, the official language is Hindi and that's what most people speak. My Indian sister (yeah I got one - from my mother's side) is an example of a person who is Bengali but lives in Delhi and speaks both. She says her main language is Bengali but that she had to learn Hindi, she also speaks perfect English...). Bon (='sister' in Bengali, I am learning) also said the two languages are not related at all. So I don't know whether similarly here most people speak Punjabi, if there is such a thing...?
  



• There are more men wearing turbans (it is a majority Sikh area) and almost all women wear traditional Indian dress - sarees or kurtas. In Delhi for example only few men wear anything but Western wear (most of them effortlessly rock this 1970s look - I always wish I had my camera when I see especially cool examples) and less then half of the women wear traditional dress. Funnily enough about 90% of Western tourist women dress Indian. No, not me. I couldn't do is since my daily dressing to a theme wouldn't work if everyday was "Out of place in India". Today for example I'm trying this new dress and the theme is: "She couldn't have posed as a courier wearing that!!" ;-)

Oh by the way, I will not be sharing my experience of Delhi much, lets just say that my stomach got the most intense experience!

But I will tell you about my lesson in bargaining India style - next post! Later today - seems my questionable wit is back!