COMING HOME

Breakfast this morning consisted of French toast, cereal, juice, omelets, French fries, eggs, porridge, and noodles. It was a really good buffet! Afterwards we walked around and got some henna on our hands. We got it today, so then we could have designs on us for when we get home. The guy doing it was really talented at it! I got a simple flowery design on my left hand. Mom got a design on her right. And Tara got it on both. We tried to convince dad that a design for his bald head would have looked cool, but sadly it didn’t seem to work.

Next we spent like an hour drying our hands with blow dryers. That was a struggle! It was weird being back in Delhi. I know that I’ve already been here, and walked down the same streets that I am now. It just feels like a different place than it was a month ago. For one thing, I have have gotten really used to the traffic now. I don’t freak out as much when I almost get run over now! 

Next we walked around town, with this really weird guy who just started randomly guiding us around. He took us to a tea shop, down some wedding decoration aisles, and to a jewelry place. We got really badly ripped off on some tea we bought. I guess we weren’t really paying attention to what he said the price was. In the end, we ended up paying 26 dollars for three small boxes of tea! It was terrible. The “guide” finally left us, and we were able to head back to the hotel.

After thirty minutes of avoiding having to do blogging, we left the hotel again for dinner. This would be our last dinner in India (not counting airports and plane rides). Being the last dinner, I had a celebration with a “very cultural” meal of chicken nuggets and Sprite. Everyone else seemed to do a better job on getting something actually Indian. Dad had some spicy soup thing. Tara has some kind of curry. And mom, do I even have to say it anymore? We all know what mom had for dinner. 

A few ours later, we found ourselves off the the airport. Home, here we come!

Sadly this is my last blog! Our trip has come to an end, and all we have grown fond of India’s culture. I think we are all ready for home though. Colorado’s the best place I’ve ever traveled to! Overall I really enjoyed this trip and learned a lot of things. One, being that we are blessed. Most of the time I take running water and a roof over my head for granted. A lot of people here are are struggling to find food, when I just grab it out of the fridge! I realized that we are really really blessed to have what we have. I am even blessed to be here, traveling India. Another, being the fact that no matter what people talk like or look like, they are still children of God. I’ve also got to explore a lot about their beautiful culture. India’s a truly amazing country, and I am excited that I had the ability to explore it. Goodbye India, hello Colorado!

DAY TWO ALLEPPEY

Once again, the morning started out early. Again. It started at 5:30 when our alarm clock went off. We got up and got ready for canoeing! We took a tuk tuk there, and got life jackets on. The other person coming took another half an hour to finally show up. So much for getting up early! I needed it today too. Last night was a horrible nights sleep, with a train track right next to us. The music was just as bad too. It was blasting all night! It was even worse right next to where we were waiting for canoeing. It was SO SO SO loud! Like a concert or something. I think we were right next to the temple playing it.

When she finally showed up, we headed on our way. The first hour or so, it was peaceful we relaxing. We got to see the sun set on the water, and watched as Alleppey woke up. After the hour though, is when it started to get hot and a bit boring. My arms hurt a lot, and I couldn’t fathom another three hours of doing this! It wasn’t any better with Tara throwing a tantrum in her boat either. She was mad because mom wasn’t doing a great job steering, so they were going in circles. I think dad and I did pretty good! I kept us going in front, and dad steered in the back. We had a break for lunch and for tea, before hopping on a support boat for the way back. We needed it! Overall, I think it was really fun. I enjoyed watching Tara throw a tantrum the most though. Definitely.

Next we got ready with showers and packing up. We had to check out of our room by 11:30, and we had to get ready for the airport later too. Once all of that was done, we headed to dinner. Dinner was, again, Italian. Once again, I feel as if I am doing a great job branching out! Tara and I had pasta and bruschetta, dad had some veggie curry thing, and mom had rice. Dinner was awesome! I did find a hair in my noodles, but, oh well...

After a long drive to the airport, we checked in and shopped around for a bit. Tara, dad, and I shared a smash burger meal. With three of our hands in it, we DEFINITELY DESTROYED the burger. It was a wreck! But good, nonetheless. I also bought some chocolate covered blueberries. Those were gone in a matter of minutes.

All that’s left of the night is to board the plane and get into our hotel room. Those are pretty much self explanatory, so I’m gonna sign off now! Goodnight, and STAY TUNED.

THEKKADY DAY ONE (this never posted)

Half of the day was spent driving to Thekkady. It was a terrible drive! Our driver kept violently braking on the turns, it left everyone feeling nasty. After a long torturous ride, we finally made it.

Our home stay is pretty nice. Tara and I share a room again, which is both good and bad. Good, because that means that we have more space having two rooms. Bad, because Tara’s a blanket hog. I’m pretty sure I am gonna have zero sleep tonight. It’s freezing in our room!

Then we walked around for a little bit, to look at the shops and stuff. Tara bought some tea and soaps for her friends. 

Dinner came around and I had noodles (again). Tara had noodles too though, so I don’t feel as bad. Dad had some soup thing. And mom, you know. Mom had rice. 

The last thing we did today was see a fighting show. At first I was wondering why we bought the tickets. All they were doing was stretching and hitting their arms. It was really weird. But a couple minutes into it, they started to do more cool things. Cool things as in jumping through fire hoops, having sword fights, and swinging metal stings around really fast. It was awesome! At one point, they jumped over eight people in total! And when they sword fought, they weren’t playing around. They were hitting so hard that sparks were flying off! It was awesome.

Afterwards we headed home and got in bed. So yup! That pretty much concludes our short day. STAY TUNNED.

ALLEPPEY DAY ONE

I am gonna give you another basic summery about what our first part of the day consisted of. Driving. Again. To Alleppey. It was terrible! Even worse than last time. He would once again slam on the brakes on turns. And then he would accelerate super fast, and then brake hard again. Over and over and over. The people that normally don’t get carsick in the car, were feeling not so hot. The person who usually does get carsick, (aka me), literally died today. Thankfully I didn’t actually get sick, but was too close. Anyway, moving on from that torture.

We arrived at our hotel place and put our luggage in our rooms. Our rooms aren’t very great. I mean there do able though, of course. Tara and I share a room with one bed, and a small bathroom.

Shortly after we head over to the beach! Unlike the last one, this one held little to non trash or dirt. The top part of it was kinda dirty, but not to bad. At first, I thought I was just gonna dip my feet in. But soon, me and dad decided we wanted to go all the way in! I wore a bathing suit under my cloths there, but no woman were in the water. Not one! We decided it would go against their culture to go in there with a swim suit on, so I just went in with my clothes. It was awesome! 

The water was the perfect temperature, and the waves were just huge. When I say huge, I mean HUGE. Like monstrous waves. One moment I’d be laughing and having a good time, and the next I’d be on the ground being scraped up against the sand. It was uncontrollable! Even dad couldn’t stand so well against the waves. Despite the gallon of salt water I’m sure I’ve swallowed, it was still fun. We stayed in there for a long time! Long enough to avoid getting popularity photos like Tara and mom. Almost. They came in the ocean after us.

Our popularity increased on the beach ten fold! Especially for Tara. Wherever she walked boys would unbutton their shirts and strike what they thought was a “cute” pose. It was disgusting though. Bleh. Tara even got like ten selfies so the boys could tell their friends that they have an American girlfriend. Luckily, looking like I’m ten comes in handy for me sometimes.

After rinsing off the sticky sand from the beach, we headed back out for dinner. Well, we didn’t rinse all of the sand off. Even now, when I itch my head, a feel a bunch of grains all stuck in there. It’s even in my ears! And under my fingernails. The most of it was in my pocket though. When I turned it out, a good handful of sand was just sitting in there. I guess that’s what you get, when you are dives into the sand.

For dinner I got chicken curry and bread. The bread was good, but the curry was really spicy! My lips were literally on fire. So I got French fries to go with it. Those were delicious! Dad got curry, and Tara got masala. Mom got an omelet and fries. In case you guys haven’t caught on to her diet, I’ll lay it out for you. What she eats most is rice. Second is eggs. And third is french fries. That is the basic diet of Patricia Lin.

Next we headed home for blogging and bed. Goodnight and STAY TUNED. Also really sry, but I just found out that tuned is spelled T-U-N-E-D. Apparently not T-U-N-N-E-D. Oops. Sorry to all the people who had to deal with that for all my blogs. It’s unfortunate that I found that out the day before we fly on our way back home. Oh well! STAY TUNED.

THEKKADY DAY TWO

Today sadly started at 6 AM in the morning. We got up and got ready to go on a bamboo raft. Unfortunately that entailed hiking for an hour and a half to get there. I found though, that when i thought about lunch the time went quicker. Finally we arrived and pulled out the lunch box they packed for us. They are so gave us a water to in a camo bag. The lunch was... interesting. I mean, it was ok. It smelled exactly like an air plane meal though. Yuck! We had this weird potato bread, and some spicy garbanzo beans. I drank four juice boxes! That was pretty much the extent of my lunch.

After lunch we hopped on a bamboo raft and went around a little bit of this lake. The lake was cool! There was varying sizes of dead tree trunks sticking out of the water. I think a flood hit there or something. We floated around there for a while before heading back. 

When we got back we chilled for a little before heading into town. We got dinner and then shopped around for and headed back. After showers and a gross love movie, we got in bed. That’s all for today. Night! STAY TUNED.

MUNAR DAY THREE

This morning we got up and prepared to take a hike through the tea plantations, and up across several peaks. The hike took four hours! Seeing the views was way worth it though. There was a great view of the town down below, and the peaks mountains further away hidden slightly by fog. Near the top we took a break and ate some of the fruit our guide brought for us. I ate three passion fruits, and one orange. Well, almost one orange. Tara threw one of my slices off the cliff. The passion fruits made up for that slice though. THEY WERE SO GOOD! The taste was pretty good, but their crunchiness was awesome. They also had weird slippery texture, kinda like tapioca! We decided to get some later. They were an easy fruit to eat, because you could just break it open with your hands, without a knife. 

Oh yeah! Mom also wanted me to put some of the things I learned down. Hmmm well. Leeches drink you blood while harvesting tea leaves in the monsoon season. The vast system plays a big role in their culture (especially in marriages). Black tea helps you stay energized, white tea helps with your bodily functions, and green helps with high blood pressure. Oh, and chocolate can help with wrinkles. There’s some random facts you wanted mom!

After that hike, I came down drenched and craving air conditioning. Our air conditioning was cut short, because our drive to lunch was a short one. I got noodles (again! So much for branching out). Tara got chicken masala. Dad got some plate full of dips and rice. And mom got, the second most popular food item she eats. Beside from rice, eggs. So yup! That was lunch.

Next was just a short walk through a food market nearby our lunch place. I find markets in foreign country’s cool! Just picture a small table overflowing with bunches of cilantro, garlic, onions, white carrots, eggs, ect. It’s so... pretty? I don’t know how to describe it. Sadly there wasn’t any passion fruit, so we picked some up of the way to the chocolate factory.

Oh yes. You heard me right! THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY. They showed us a mini demonstration on how they make it and stuff, then, lead us over to shop part of the room. Luckily, mom was feeling really generous today, and let Tara and I each get our own box! And dad too, of course. He doesn’t really count though because he just got disgusting dark chocolate. It wasn’t all bad there, but, still. Tara picked out a mix of fruity chocolates, white chocolates, and nut chocolates. I just kept it simple with white and milk chocolate. IT WAS SO GOOD. I’ve been trying to refrain myself from eating any since I got back. I’ve only ate one! One plus six that is...

Now I am back at our place. I just finished rinsing the the dust off of my disgusting feet, from the hike. All that’s left of the day is dinner! I think it’s time to sign off for now. STAY TUNNED.

MUNAR DAY TWO

Ok, so today’s started out with the tea factory! We went and got to see the history of tea + how they made it there. I mean that part was kinda boring, but I was just holding on until the last part of it, when we got to drink tea! I got black tea, and Tara and dad shared two white teas. It was really good! I like black tea better than those teas because it’s more sugary. YUM. 

Afterwards, we went to Echo Point. Sadly we couldn’t go see the view cause it was closed. It wasn’t all bad though! On the way back down we got four containers of chocolate. Unfortunately, three of them were for Tara’s friends, so we gobbled one container up. Later today we found a staple in the bottom of one of the box’s. IT WAS NASTY. It kinda makes me question the quality of this chocolate. Hopefully I didn’t eat a staple!

Next was lunch! I got veggie noodles. It was good! I’ve been trying to avoid vegetables her though, convincing mom that I just want to play it safe with the water and stuff. Secretly, I’m just avoiding green grossness. What I perfect excuse! Am I right?

Ok. Now. The bad part of our day, massages. Most of you are probably like, “Why is that bad? Wouldn’t that be the best part of your day?” Hang on to those questions. I’ll answer them soon enough. Story time!

THE MASSAGE STORY:

We got to the place and they took Tara and I to get massages first. I was already a tiny bit nervous when they separated Tara and I. But that was only the beginning. In my defense, I wasn’t prepared! Mom never told us what kinda massages we were getting. When we went in the room she told me to take off my clothes. It was really weird. And when she said my clothes, she meant all of my clothes. Yuck. After an eternity of awkward messaging, I finally escaped. So yup! That was the horrible, most awkward thing ever.

THE END

Okay sleep time! STAY TUNNED.