Rishikesh, Haridwar, and the Ganges (our first trip out of Dehli... sorta by ourselves)

How to begin to explain this trip to anyone but Christine? I have no idea... but will try...

So, After a few days in Dehli, sight-seeing, eating home food, and getting over "Dehli-belly", Christine, Puneet (a man who worked for the company that mahima's family owns and w

ho was paid to accompany us) and I, set off on a little adventure away from home

. We took the Dehli train (a sleeper train, packed full of people and odd smells, but oth

erwise pretty cool) to Haridwar. After waking up after 3 in the morning, being on a 6 hour b

us ride, and learning that the animal outside our window is not a "cow" but a buffalo, we were ready to eat some American food and head out to see some sights. So after finding a "Holiday inn" or something to that nature and scarfing down some pasta, a veggie hamburger, and India's version of fries, we set out for Rishikesh. A place full of temples, ashrams, and people trying to find themselves/God.

This is the Ganges River... it is a sacred river in India where people release their dead and bathe in the water to be cleansed from their sins. Its gorgeous :)

I thought this outfit was awesome!


Gotta love that cows are treated so well here... They are everywhere!

So excited to feed monkeys!

These are the sacrifices that people will buy to make on behalf of their loved ones... They set it on fire and send it down the river with the person's ashes

Christine and I bathing in the water... after this I remembered all of the water parasites that we learned from first year of medical school.

The temples had slides throughout them... It was more like an amusement park than a temple, but its a different religion than we understand.

I had to show off my temple mark.