Last night we ended up seeing the sunset from the Monsoon Palace. Much like my takeaway from the movie props of the City Palace, I was perhaps most impressed with the place as a filming location for the final showdown in 1983’s Octopussy. But I suppose, the sunset was pretty impressive too. Plus, ya know, […]
At 6:15 AM we met Milo. He’s a beagle. He lives at the hotel and his human runs it. He runs the human. By 6:30, we had mounted out bikes and set off on a sunrise trek through Udaipur and around a nearby lake. It was dark and the streets were uneven, and although early […]
Having flown from Mumbai to Udaipur, our tour guide/driver for the next week or so met us at the airport. Budhi Man gave us the traditional Indian ceremonial garland reserved for honored guests. I actually recognized it from a scene in Gandhi when Ben Kinglsey as Mahatma Gandhi returns to India from South Africa on […]
Swotty was our culinary guide for the Reality Tours Food Tour of Mumbai. She said she had just finished her masters in Clinical Psychology. She was looking for a job and this was her breadwinner gig… which she had been doing for three years now. As a local expert, Swotty took us on a local […]
Billed as the largest running event in Asia, the Mumbai Marathon boasts 45,000 participants across its various events – a senior citizens/fun run, a 10K, a half marathon, and the full marathon. So while there may be bigger marathons held throughout Asia, this apparently is the largest running event… even though in the finisher slaughter […]
The Reality Tours group offering an all-day guided tour of Mumbai is dedicated to giving back. Eighty percent of their revenues, after expenses and taxes, gets plowed back into the community through an NGO. They work to provide rudimentary education and life skills and strive to better the job opportunities for those who live on […]
I don’t know what time it is. I’m wearing my Garmin and its clock is tied to my phone which is currently in airplane mode. I don’t know where we are. Every seat back entertainment system in sight isb’t working. I don’t know who is around me because this flight left Delhi at 3 AM […]
After several glasses of whiskeys between us, Budhiman tried to arrange a marriage for me with his sister-in-law in Nepal over FaceTime. I politely declined as I’m opposed to marriage in all forms, but I like to think this means I wasn’t a completely ugly American tourist.
It’s not like the one in Atlantic City. It seems … classier.
Just outside the stepwell used to film the pit prison in The Dark Knight Rises (more on that when I have a better internet connection), we came across the small temple that our driver recommended. The temple docent put a Tikka mark on me and wished me good luck – which is probably a good […]