Skip to main content

Why plan?

What a Sunday.

I stayed up super late (5am) catching up on my life (blogging, emailing, reforming the to do list in my head) on Saturday night, so I could have a nice, carefree Sunday.

My first plan was to take the bus to Neemrana to meet Durand. I got up at 8:30am, but hadn't received a text back. Waited to 9am to call. Phone not working. Called the front desk again. They'd delivered a note. Called Dev, the driver. 'Sure come on down.' Still wanted to talk to D before heading down. Had breakfast. He called - missed call. Called back. Phone didn't work. Argh! He called. Chatted. He was coming back too late for me to make it to North Delhi for interviews on Monday. Plan #1 - no more.

Gym. Yeah, good idea. Then go to Delhi. Texted a few people to see what they were up to. Ed was first to reply. He was ready to go, so Plan #2 of gym - no more.

Met Ed in GK II. We were going to go to CR Park to see some of the Durga Puja festival. Got there and found it was all finished. Plan #3 - no more.

A shop called 'The Shop' which D really likes was having a sale. We decided to head there. Driver thought shop would be closed. Read in Time Out that shop was closed. Went to Dilli Hat instead. Plan #4 - no more.

Jalebee Cartel was recommended by a friend in dance class. Wanted to go watch them at the Park Hotel Sunday Pool party. Went to Park hotel. No pool party. No Jalebee. Plan #5 - no more.

Brunch. Sure. Yum. Japanses at Hotel Nikko. Got there only 20 mins to go. Plan #6 - no more.

OK, Q BA in CP? Sure let's go there. On way decided for United Coffee House. New place cool! It is an old restaurant in CP. Quite the atmosphere.


Sameer, who I'd met in Leh, found a place to watch some of the Dusshera festivities in Saket. The burning of Ravin would happen around sunset, so we had to rush. Raced down there and stood for about 1.5 hours. Then they burned. What a riot. Large paper mache statues full of firecrackers.

Was with Ed (who I met in Leh) and Renee (a colleague of Richard, who I also met along with wife, Michelle and 3 kids in Leh.) The burning was to start at 6:15pm, but it wasn't until 7:30pm that it actually started.

After Sameer and I had a drink in PVR Saket. Good chats. Then took ages to find the driver. Went home. So tired after no sleep the night before.






Below is a video I found posted to YouTube. It isn't the place that I was, but the experience was similar.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Dear Traveller,
i see that your blog is about travel and also has some videos.
Citymedia foundation has launched www.city.vi,a network of 68,000 city specific video sites, where you can share videos about cities and regions across the world. like for gurgaon videos you can visit http://gurgaon.vi. You can also find out about other cities that you are interested . hope to see you there

Popular posts from this blog

Vizag: clean city by the sea

Visakhapatnam (or Vizag) wasn't on the radar. It is one of the cleanest places we'd been India. I had no idea it was a city in South East India or how to pronounce it. Only learned it existed because when we tried to get our boarding passes in the airport in Sri Lanka to come to India we needed to show an outbound flight. Walking across the boarder to Myanmar wasn't accepted. Next time will remember to book on a site that allows cancellation after 24 hours, but in the early morning panic that didn't happen. Then it turned out to be overly complicated and expensive to cross overland from India to Myanmar, so we decided to use the flights to Kuala Lumpur and come in from the South. Vizag was now in the itinerary. Get there We took a train from Puri to Khurda junction. And then transfered to a sleeper to Vizag. There is a waiting room in Khurda upstairs to charge phones and sit. Eat, drink, sleep - Sree residency was a great spot to sleep. It was cheaper online. G...

Konark and Puri: see the Sun temple

A site noted that the sun temple at Konark is in the top 10 architecturally. It was on the way to Vizag, so seemed like a good place to stop and boy was the temple impressive. Get in It's a 8 hour train ride from Kolkata to Puri. Arriving at 12am wasn't ideal as tuk tuk drivers were limited and many guest houses full or closed. Eat, drink, sleep - The Pink House is a relic from the 70s. I'm guessing the cockroach in the bathroom has been there that long as well based on its size. Rooms are very basic, somewhat clean, and ours along the walkway was loud. However for Rs. 600-800, you can't complain too much. We also had decent food there. What we did - Puri beach is sadly a mess. Children playing on the beach and using it as a toilet (you had to watch your step). There is trash all over, the only upside of which is the boys use the styrofoam to make boats. Dude asking for photo on the Puri beach.  Children playing with self-made styrofoam boats ...

Bodhgaya: follow the Buddha's path to enlightenment

It was a pleasant surprise to discover that Bodhgaya, where the Buddha attained enlightenment was just a 5 hour train ride from Varanasi. How pleasant to go walk in the footsteps of this seemingly kind and thoughtful man. Having not done much research, I wasn't sure what to expect. What we found was a religious center for Buddhists and Hindus around the world and a struggling town, working to make ends meet. Get in We took a train from Varanasi which was 2.5 hours late and got us in at 1 am. After spending 2.5 hours at the train station in Varanasi with a sore throat and stomach bug, we decided to use the various train tracking websites. Then you can get auto (Rs. 120-150 is what we bargained) to Bodhgaya. It seems possible to jump in a shared auto for maybe Rs. 10. Eat, drink, and sleep Buttshinji temple is associated with the Japanese temple and has rooms for a Rs. 800 donation for two. Supposedly they charge for wi-fi, but we weren't charged. The wi-fi is ridi...