Final two days in Budapest (July 23-24)

It was our third day in Budapest and we were already impressed with the city. Today, we first went for the tour of the Hungarian Parliament - which in the times when it was built had so much money spent on it that the same amount could have been sufficient to completely build a town with all the infrastructure for more than 50000 people. It has the original crown still in place and the building is symmetrical on either side of the main entrance hallway. Since the left side is used by the current parliament and the right side is used for conferences and other parties, we got to see the right side. The building was truly impressive and the money spent on it was reflected in the ornate beauty of rugs, painted walls, seats, sculptures among other things. Thereafter, we took the metro to Heroes Square and wanted to go to the museum of contemporary art but it was supposed to open late that day. So we just walked around the square. After having lunch at a cheap Thai place, we went to the best thing that I did in Budapest - the Szechenyi furd which are the traditional baths with pools having water at different temperature and with different mineral content. We had a whole range of temperature from 18 degree celsius to 38 degree celsius. I could barely get into the 18 degree water but after spending time in hot water, it was very relaxing to get into the cold water. There were also sauna rooms heated from 45 degrees to 70 degrees and rooms which were heated with different sources. We could barely see each other even after standing next to each other in the sauna room heated with steam. And the fun started when we entered the pool with jets propelling the water in circular motion. I could just lie on my back and with a little support from the side surface (since i was a bit afraid of moving too fast and sinking in water), i circled round and round in the pool. The medicinal pool with a lot of mineral content made our bodies float - if we could just leave our arms or legs free with a little support to our body, they used to float like a dead person. We spent about three and a half hours at the baths and did not feel like leaving. It was the Hungaroring festival with the planned display of flights and formula one cars that convinced us to leave. We got back to our hostel to change and moved to the castle to enjoy the festival time. As soon as we crossed the bridge the air show started, about 30 minutes before the scheduled start. We saw some amazing maneuvers of the pilot, turing the plane, falling to the effect of gravity to very close to the top of the buildings for a short while. We then hiked up to the castle and were greeted with a huge crowd gathered around the track on which they were supposed to run the F1 cars. We only got a couple of short glimpses when the car was driven by David Coulthard down the cobbled stone streets. It was more of a disappointment considering the hype that was created around the event. Afterwards, we walked around the other side of the castle with nice breeze flowing through. It was a nice relaxed time after such an eventful day. When we got back, the whole chain bridge was lit up and with the lit up castle in the background, it was giving a beautiful view.

The next day started off with a visit to the Szabor Park (the communist statue park) outside the city. It was an organized tour that included the travel to and from the park and the admission ticket. We bought a booklet that provided details on each of the statue and walked our way across the park, built in the form of two consecutive 8s, symbolizing the symbols of infinity. Outside the park, they were playing in a small theatre movies created during the communist times to train the spies. Some of the scenes with the guy holding a spy camera in his spy purse were quite hilarious if one compares them with the technology put to practice these days. After getting back to the city we took the metro back to the Heroes square to go to the contemporary art gallery with the special exhibition on things related to light and perspectives. Some of the exhibits were quite interesting - a room full of balls hanging from the ceiling at different heights with the height of each ball corresponding to the pitch of the note that will come out when you touch the ball. I moved around the room touching first all the low hanging balls creating a low pitch sound, followed by touching all the high hanging balls creating a high pitch voice. In addition to several other very interesting exhibits, there was one where a small slit in the shape of character S was cut into two discs. Three pair of such discs were on display with different amount of overlap inbetween the pair. Based on the overlap, one pair when rotated was producing a dot, another pair was producing a circle and the third one was producing a square. After this interesting exhibit, we walked around the city parks to another place with a few more statues. However, there was a concert of nine inch nails scheduled for that night for which the park was closed. We, then, got back to our hostel area, had our early dinner at a Pizza place next to Menza. However, this place was more expensive and the food was very disappointing. This early dinner was to go to a contemporary dance performance. We were told about this performance by the owners of our hostel, whose friend was choreographing the performance. We got to the performance half an hour early. It was scheduled in an open air small amphitheater in a new park on the Buda side. I was very disappointed to the see only a handful of us in this wonderful location but as the starting time inched closer, the small amphitheater of capacity about 50-70 was completely full. Thereon, followed a very energetic performance by 6 girls and 2 guys. I was very impressed with the acrobatic and energetic display of several styles of contemporary dances which continued for about an hour. With so much energy, I probably would have been dead by the end of 10 minutes with my stamina. It was a perfect finish to the wonderful stay in the beautiful city of Budapest. On my flight back to India, I also saw a Hindi movie which was mostly shot in Budapest and was quite happy to see the parliament house, castle and the chain bridge which were mainly focused as the attractions of the city.

Beautiful Budapest (July 21-22)

Since i am writing this blog towards the end of our trip, I must start off by saying that Budapest surely was one of my favorite places for all the diverse things i did there. Our hostel was conveniently located close to center and a metro station with the staff being super helpful and kept the place super clean. After getting refreshed, we first went to the information center to buy the Hungary card which would give us discounts to buy our hydrofoil tickets to Vienna. Anyone staying in Hungary for a bit long and planning to do some boat rides must buy the Hungary card. It gave us discounts for our trip to Vienna, our one hour boat ride to see tourists attractions in Budapest, on the baths we went to, one free ticket to communism statue park and on our taxi ride which saved us about 125 dollars in total. We first went to the Terror Haza or Terror House Museum which illustrated with a lot of details about the rule of communists in the country before they left in 1989. Every section had one full page of description that we could take along with us. The museum itself is housed in one of the important official buildings of those times so is small but has a tank appropriately put up in the middle of the building all surrounded by oil. Thereafter, we went to the Opera House, where we just reached in time for the English tour. This is the third best opera house in terms of acoustics, the other one which is better is in vienna and the second I could not remember. Since it is all made of wood, the acoustics are much better than that of Sydney Opera House, which was quite a bit of surprise for me. The whole building was fascinatingly beautiful with even the small rooms very appropriately decorated. Most of the material used in the building was from Hungary - something that was mandated from the beginning and which seemed to be the norm in buildings constructed around the time. On our way to the boat station for reserving the ticket to Vienna, we also saw a movie shoot going on at the street corner - a sight which was ever so common living in westwood area but still was worth a look because of being in a different country. After reserving our tickets for Vienna, we then went on to the one hour boat ride on Danube river which explained all the historical and tourists attractions around the river which is when we got the glimpse of the beautiful parliament house and decided to go there during our stay in the city. We walked through the some of the souvenir shops and at one of the shops, the lady was full of praise for the Indian food and spices - something that i was now used to after spending 5 years outside India all over the world but Diane was not. On our way back to the hostel in the night, we at dinner at an Indian place very close to our hostel where the food was not something special and i also got a big glass of mango lassi - ate a bit too much for dinner. One thing which we both liked about Budapest was that the bike lanes were next to the sidewalk followed by the parking lane and then the driving lane thus the parked cars shielding the bikes from the fast traffic and making it convenient for them. Another peculiar thing was that the 24 hour super markets were marked as "non-stop" something both of us have never seen before.

Next morning we took the metro up to the castle hill and walked the small cobbled streets around. Fisherman's bastion provided a bird's eye view of the whole Pest side (the city of Budapest is actually a combination of city of Buda and Pest located on either side of the Danube river - with pest being very flat and Buda having small hills). We could see all the bridges connecting the two sides, all of which were destroyed in the second world war. About 70% of the city of Budapest was destroyed during the war and it was amazing to see how everything was back to normal, after the war and the communist regime that ruled the country until last 18 years. We also went to the Matthias church constructed in the neo-gothic style and then for some hungarian wine tasting. The lady who gave us the tour of the wine cellars was full of praise for Indians who, in her opinion, are jolly people. It was for the second time in two days that someone was full of praise of Indian people. Since it was time for Hungarian Grand Prix over the weekend, the city decided to host a festival a few days before and overlap the last day of festival with the first day of the grand prix. The Hungaroring festival was starting from the next day at the castle and the preparations were going on. We saw a few of the racing cars and walked around the exhibition area while enjoying the views of the city. We then went to the souvenir market which was quite disappointing due to the high prices. I really liked a designer shirt that i wanted to buy for my dad but unfortunately it has a thread coming out and that was the only piece they had with them for that design. We then went to Ludwig Museum where there was an exhibit of photographs taken by Robert Capa. I did not know him but going through his photographs, I was full of awe for this courageous war photographer. The exhibit provided some amazing pictures of wars going on in the world in the middle of twentieth century. At a very young age, he was killed when he mistakenly stepped on a mine while taking photographs during one of the war times. There was another building that had a spiral going up to the roof of the building. We went up the roof of the building and watched the sun set behind the small hills on the Buda side with a wonderful view of the river, several bridges and the castle on top of the hill. We came back to the hostel area and went for dinner at Menza - a restaurant recommended by Lonely Planet and was pretty good too.

Beautiful mountains in Zakopane, Poland (July 19-20)

We woke up to the sound of rain falling on the hard surface. It was predicted to rain all through the day so we decided to just go for a stroll through the main street in the city again and do some souvenir shopping - yeah, the idea that Diane, the souvenir freak loved the most! I really liked the local market of Zakopane and inspite of the rain, we spent more than an hour there. I bought a shawl for my mom and a wooden carving of mother Mary that said "to the health of the whole family" in polish - of course Ania helped me translate that to the local shop owner who was amazingly fast in carving it nicely. Since the weather was still pretty bad, we went to a couple of museums none of which were worth even talking about. With so much time left in the day, I volunteered to cook dinner and breakfast for the next day (when we were planning to go for a hike). With Diane's craving for mexican food for the last few days, we decided to eat at one Mexican place on the main street where the food did not really turned out to be mexican - what else do one expect coming from LA, the heaven for mexican food outside Mexico. A peculiar thing about that place was that they had an offer that if you survive their big margaritas, they will hang your picture at the roof of their restaurant. Several of those pictures were hanging all over the restaurant - although none of us were interested in it. After the lunch, we bought the groceries for the two meals and went back to our place. The weather opened up a bit after we reached our place so we went for a walk in the neighborhood which was quite beautiful. We plucked some black berries - my first time when i saw berries on these very small plants and I ate a bunch of them - of course for free! This gave a good laugh to Ania as well since she used to do this activity ever since she was a kid. We also saw several wild mushrooms something we used to always have a good laugh about with Maria and Ania about them plucking maaaashrooms from wild and eating them. Almost for half of our walk we had some random dog accompanying us as if he was ours. It reminded Diane of her dog Oreo and they both started playing together as well. We then went back and I cooked some stew mixing up potatoes with the fried paste of onions and tomatoes together with small quantities of some other vegetables. With just salt, pepper and some garnishing flavor that we bought at the supermarket, it was nothing close to any india dish but was good nevertheless. I also prepared some potato and onion paste for sandwiches to take along for the hike the next day. After the wonderful home cooked dinner, we went back to sleep hoping the weather will open up the next day.

It was bright sunny in the morning. While packing our bags, we clicked several photographs from our window of the beautiful scenery outside. Ania remarked - "What a nice weather with beautiful scenery, what more do you want?" to which I replied - "More hot girls!" and everybody bursted to a good laugh. I prepared omelets for everyone and then we left for a very beautiful hike, mainly decided by Ania since she has been to several hikes in the region before. We started at Kiry which itself was about 30 minutes walk from our place. The small hills all along the hike were all covered with green trees and there were several streams of water flowing all our way. We lost our way a bit, and digressed onto the black route on the map, but it happened for good. To get back on our way (green trail), we paid to go through one of the beautiful caves that was about 30 minutes long - the only electric lit cave in Poland. It was called Jaskinia Mrozna. The temperature inside the cave was less than 10 degree celsius but we did not feel too cold because of the hike that we had done in the last couple of hours. There were several areas where we almost had to crawl through to get across. Getting out of the cave, we reached an open area and the toilets were one of the best kept toilets in all the hikes I have been to so far in my life. We then followed our way to reach a very beautiful valley (at the cross-section of green, yellow and black paths, near Ornak shelter) where we had our sandwiches. We all being very hungry and with the beautiful view of the mountains ahead, the sandwiches tasted much better that they probably were. There were also some organized run in the mountains and the place we stopped also was one of the pit stops with food and drinks. Thereafter, followed a steep hike to the top of one of the hills across to the Iwanichka valley. On our way, we also saw a small patch covered with snow - my second experience of snow in July, after I saw a lot of snow in july of 2007 in Chamonix, France. It was during the hike that I perfected my polish by wishing everyone Jin Dobre (Good Morning/Afternoon) on the hike. The small plateau at the stop was a big breather after the steep hike and then we followed our descent back again. Half way through, there was a place where we could rent bikes. We all rented and the downhill biking through the Chocholowska valley was one of the highlights of the day. Without an iota of effort, the bikes were going so fast that it was almost impossible to get one hand off and take a picture. I was also impressed with the quality of the bikes, its seats, breaks and gears. We returned our bikes and walked back first to our starting point of Kiry and then back home. We picked up our luggage and head back to the city bus station to catch the bus back to Krakow. The city bus was a small about 20 seater bus and when we boarded with all our luggage, all the seats were already occupied. We stood in the aisle but it was impressive that after us about 8 more people boarded and adjusted in whatever area they could find, 3 of them also with big backpacks. With bus being too much cramped, we got off a stop earlier and walked our way back to the bus station. On the way back to Krakow, I had to go to pee. After about 20 minutes, the bus stopped at a place but the driver didnt let me go out and Krakow was still an hour away. The last few minutes before we reached Krakow were very painful where I cursed the driver so many times. Reaching krakow was a big relief and i could smile again after a short break. We had pizza for dinner at a small place on the train station before boarding our train for Budapest. It was time to bid goodbye to Ania and thank her for taking out time and making this trip to Poland a memorable experience for a long time to come. We shared our cabin on the train with two british girls and an australian couple. Getting the upper birth, with air conditioning not working, it was hot early on but it was fine soon after we opened the windows a bit. It was our first and only international train journey on this trip and for me it was not too bad, although Diane could not sleep very well and was happy that we were not doing any other overnight train journey afterwards.

Krakow - nature's beauty and man's atrocity (July 16-18)

We stayed at a college dorm in Krakow - since it was summer time, they rent it to tourists and it was really cheap - around $12 per night and i even got my own room (which had three twin beds) while Ania and Diane shared the room. They also had ethernet in the rooms for free with a nice cafeteria downstairs with reasonable prices. When i went to take shower in the morning, I found the taps to be confusing to get hot water. After trying all three different showers for about 10 minutes, I gave up and had a cold shower - only to be told later by Ania that the bathroom at the other end of our hallway has regular different taps for hot and cold water which i used from next day onwards. After reserving our train tickets for Budapest and taking a walk through the city center, we took a bus to see the salt mines in Wieliczka. At the ticket counter, we met an old Canadian couple who were on their world tour. They had also hiked to the base camp in Himalayas, something I would love to do some day. We walked down almost 400 stairs to be approximately 70 meters below the ground level form where our guided trip through the salt mines started. Going through several mazes with salt walls supported by lots of wooden logs, we arrive at a very beautiful church at almost 100 meters below the ground level, all carved out from salt. There were wonderful paintings on the walls, including the one of the last supper, carved in salt. Even the chandelier was also made of salty rocks which were reflecting the light from the bulbs nicely. At the lowest level of around 130 meters, they had machines to send postcards to friends and relatives for free. They even had free wi-fi where i checked my email at the lowest point so far in my life...130 meters below the ground level. After the end of our guided trip through the mines, our guide told me that he also was the guide to the new president of India for the salt mines when she visited Poland just a couple of months ago. Returning from Weiliczka, we walked through the main market square to buy some souvenirs and thereafter enjoyed a coffee while watching the people go by at the central square. The sight at the square is a typical european central square sight with a church, several bars spread around the whole square and lots of open space in the middle for some artists to perform and people to just sit and relax. There was a puppet show by one person and another artist was singing wonderful low pitch song, as in an opera - Diane told me the term counter tenner used for such a voice (usually males have high pitch - close to 10, but if some male has a very low pitch voice, he is called counter tenner). In the evening, we met Ania's cousin, Maja (pronounced Maya) who was working as a psychiatrist in Krakow. Even before meeting her once, Maja knew about what happened with me at the immigration - she got to know from her mom, who got to know from her sister in law who is Ania's mom and she got to know about it from Ania. It was the complex social net at display which I had not seen elsewhere other than in India and we had a good laugh about it. After having dinner and drinks with her, we just strolled around the castle on our way back home.

The next day, was a day that I will remember for a long time to come. We went for a tour of Auschwitz, one of the very few concentration camps that survived the era to tell the story. The place is kept as it is with the electrical barbed wire around it. The different rooms have different exhibits - including 20,000 shoes, several tons of hair and other articles that tell the ghastly story of the atrocities done during the world wars. Walking through the streets, imagining the horrors of the jews who would have been brought here, who would have undergone several tortures and who would have ultimately given up their lives, tears came out of my eyes. After Auschwitz, we were taken to another concentration camp in Birkenan also called as Aushwitz-II. It was here that the nazis built the factory to kill the jews. The train line was extended to reach inside the concentration camp to save the time for deportation. The condition of the prisoners were terrible. They were barely given enough food, were given only a minute or two twice a day to go through bathrooms (which were communal as well) and none of them knew how long they will survive, once they reach the camp. Sadly, it was during the bathroom time, they used to feel safe since because of the smell, the soldiers did not use to enter the room. Since it was too slow of a process to kill them in the gas chambers and pull out their body and burn them in the chimneys, they built a couple of gas chambers with automatic floor which used to move up all the bodies and dump it into a big crematorium. About 1.4 million people were killed in total in the two concentration camps, more than 90% of them being jews. Getting up to the tower at the entrance and looking at the vast space that this camp occupied (and it was told that this was just half built and the other half could not be completed while the war ended), the whole picture of human killing factory was just terrifying. It was a bit of a rushed trip - since we took a guided tour due to the only english tour at the place being at 11 AM. I would have loved to stay a bit longer and grasp it more, but even that short period of time will probably have a lasting memory for me. Returning back to Krakow, we went to the castle, walked around a bit but most of the exhibitions were closed by then and we were not interested in them either. Ania and I were tired by now but somehow Diane had lots of energy left. A cave took us out of the castle to the riverside for which Diane offered to walk to the ticket office and bought the tickets for us. At the end of the cave was a dragon sculpture which was exhaling fire through its mouth. We walked back to the main square to have our daily share of coffee and also saw a puppet show of Michael Jackson while enjoying the expensive coffee at the square and watching a great hustle bustle of people around. Due to the late lunch at about 5 pm, Ania and I were not hungry so we skipped dinner but accompanied Diane a square in jewish quarter where Diane had her dinner snacks.

It was our last day in Krakow. We packed our stuff and kept it at a storage room in the dorms before starting off on a guided walking tour through the jewish quarter. Our guide was from Latvia and after marrying a polish girl was staying here for the last 7 years. Fortunately for us, no one else was interested in that tour at that time and we had our own personal guided tour between the three of us. He took us around the original jewish quarters (termed as ghettos in those times without the derogatory connotation the word is attached to in north america these days). We saw a couple of places where some scenes of Schindler's list were also shot. Although the area he showed in the movie is originally on the other side of the river by the schindler factory but he decided to shoot some scenes here due to the original looks the place provided at that time. After the movie, the region has supposedly gone under a lot of improvement with lots of bars and pubs opened up. We had a wonderful (and much cheaper compared to the coffee we drank at the city square) coffee at one of these cafes before moving on to the other side of the river to the area where all the krakow jews were forced to move. We also went to the famous schindler factory where 1100 jewish workers were saved for their importance to the factory - because of which schindler is the only person from nazi side buried in jerusalem. The factory which passed on hands filed for bankruptcy almost a decade ago and now they are converting it into a museum. We then went back to the square and climbed up the tower of St Mary's church for a very beautiful panoramic view of the whole city. There is a person that plays bugle every hour at the tower which was something I had never seen before. We went to have dinner at an Indian place in the jewish quarter. Although the naan and the curry was not very authentically indian the spice level (for the medium spicy that we ordered) was quite authentic - so much so that Ania had to add more of yoghurt than the curry itself to make it bearable for her. We then picked up our luggage and took the bus to the southern mountain region of Poland - Zakopane. The bus took nearly 2.5 hours and by the time we arrived it was very cloudy. We kept out luggage in the lockers and went to stroll on the main street lined with shops, cafes and restaurants all across. After dinner and some more coffee we took the city bus to our cute accommodation in mountains about 10 minutes drive from the main city.

Kyiv, Ukraine to Krakow, Poland (July 15)

We had our breakfast at McDonalds today. Surprisingly, they were very inefficient frying one potato wedge at a time as and when the order arrives. After the quick breakfast, we went to see Cheronbyl Museum, dedicated to the devastation caused by blasts at the nuclear power plant. After getting out from the metro station, we lost our way. While asking for directions, we met a Polish guy who had also just arrived in Kyiv and was going for some sight seeing. He tagged along and we finally were able to get to the place. It was good to buy the audio guide, since the small but very impressive museum had most of the things in Ukraianian. Listening to most of the things in detail, while also watching some short video clips from that time, we took almost a couple of hours to go through a very small stadium. The tragedy killed thousands of people while the after effects are probably still lingering on. We, then, went to Independence Square, a huge square with great hustle and bustle of people. Having a few hours at our disposal, we sat at the square watching people walk by and play with the water flowing down the stairs in the form of a fountain. We ate a heavy lunch at Puzata Hata again and walked back to the hostel. On our way we saw a policeman drunk and sleeping by the road. A few teenagers posed with him and took some photographs while we were enjoying standing nearby. When we just clicked the photograph, one of them shouted in the ears of the policeman to wake him up. Although, that did not disturb him much and he swiftly went back to sleep again. Reaching back the hostel, we asked the girl (who was new) at the front desk to get us a cab at 4 pm to go to the main train station for the shared ride to the airport which is situated well out of the city. The girl did not understand much english but somehow we thought that she understood and will ask for the cab. Just a few minutes before 4 pm, when i asked if she has called the cab, she responded back in signs as if saying that i was supposed to do that. Annoyed, we decided to walk to the nearest metro station to take the metro to the central station instead. It was a surprise that for the capital city, very few people spoke English and there were not too many tourists to be seen around as well - not the Asian tourists too that i get to see almost everywhere I go. We took the shared taxi to the airport. At the emigration, in the scan, they were again suspicious of my Heineken bottle opener, which was inside a bottle. When they opened the bag and looked at it, they just gave a smile as was the case when i went through emigration in Germany. We arrived in Poland at a very small airport in Katowice, an hour and a half from the main city of Krakow. At the immigration check, Diane passed through swiftly and when i answered the same thing as she did that I dont know where we will be staying in Krakow since our friend has reserved a place for us, they were suspicious. After a long 5 minute discussion, they asked if i can show them my friend. At this moment, I hoped that Ania is waiting for us outside and she was there right outside the exit and when she saw me, we both were very happy and hugged each other. For a moment, we just exchanged wishes while the officers were standing there watching us. She then showed them her identification card, told them where we are staying and after being convinced the officers let me through. It was a wonderful welcome for me to another beautiful country - Poland. It took Ania, more than 9 hours in bus ride to get from her home to Katowice. We then boarded another bus to go to the Krakow which took us another hour and a half. It was really nice of her to go through such a tiring day followed by another 5 days to show us around and travel with us in Poland - just a glimpse of Polish hospitality

Simferopol to Kyiv (July 13-14)

It was time to bid goodbye to the beautiful city of Simferopol. However, Maxim took us to a quick tour of three saints church, holy trinity church and the church of St. Peters.After getting to Kyiv, we took the bus to the central train station followed by the subway (or metro as they call it) to the stop close to our hostel. The escalators from the metro station up to the ground level were really fast and still took almost 3 minutes. It was one of the longest escalators I had taken in my life and was a commonplace during the next few days of our stay in Kyiv. We started walking towards our hostel but soon lost our way since all the road names were in ukrainian and our map had names in English. Annoyed, we took a cab which dropped us to our hostel in less than five minutes. The cab driver without any shame asked for equivalent of 10 dollars for such a ride. Even though none of us were in the mood of argument, and Diane just was willing to give him what he was asking, I gave him a 50 (equivalent of 7 dollars) and said its enough. Knowing that the trip probably was worth 10-15 (equivalent of 2 dollars), the cab driver took the money, gave us a smile and went away. Dropping our luggage and picking up a better map from the hostel, we walked back to the metro station as if we are the experts of the streets in the neighborhood. Being very hungry, we made a quick stop for food at a place called Puzata Hata (which we started calling Pizza Hut for its resemblance and our convenience). It was a nice place where you could move on while selecting different things you want and then pay at the end. When we got down at our table, listening us taking in English, the two women sitting on the table next to us initiated a conversation with us. They were both from US and were in Kyiv to adopt the children suffering from down syndrome such that they can get better environment in US. After this conversation, I really admired both women - for it is one thing to have a child born with such disease and very courageous and different to adopt one knowing that it will be a lot of hard work for them in the coming years of their lives. People like them make the future of this world full of hope. Getting off at another station, we took a boat ride on the Dnipro river that gave us a glimpse of all the major attractions of Kyiv. Getting back, we had our first visit to McDonalds to get some coffee to warm ourselves up after the chill at the deck of the boat during the ride. We then strolled through the neighborhood, making our way to a street named Andriylvsky Uzviz, famous for its souvenir shops. We again got lost in the neighborhood while being attracted to a beautiful cobblestone street (only to realize the next day when we returned that we were on the correct street). Wandering around, we reached St. Andrew's church. It had started raining a bit by this time as well. We decided to trust our intuitions, a little knowledge of mapping the english names on our map with the ukrainian names written on the streets and made our way back to hostel. At the hostel, we had our own room which was very clean and big but have to share the bathroom with another single room occupants and dorm occupants making it a single toilet and single bathroom shared between 10 people. Realizing that we might get late, taking a shower in the morning, we both took shower before getting back to bed for a nice sleep after a tiring day.


It was raining when we got up and the weather was only predicted to clear up later in the day. We, still, decided to stick to our plans and went to the cave monastery. The place had some beautiful gardens with several churches and monasteries - the monasteries, meant for preaching were in the form of caves. The walk which otherwise would have been much more beautiful was spoiled a bit by continuous rains. Walking all through the premises, we decided to have a quick lunch at a roadside place before going to the museum of second world war (also known as Museum of Great Patriotic War). While i was trying to communicate with my best effort ukrainian to the vendor that I am vegetarian, the person standing next to us knew english and translated for us. The museum itself is spread over a large area with many sculptures, warheads, tanks, aircrafts standing out in the open for which one does not need to pay any fee (unless you want to take a picture of them). The museum with all the war description is inside the base of the Rodina Mat (giant sculpture of a lady with a sword in one hand that can be seen from a long distance). The museum is an impressive recollection of events that took place through the second world war that involved Ukraine. The entrance hall has a sculpture of eagle with a nazi symbol lying on the ground with its wings broken. There are different rooms allocated to each year from 1941. The final room is a huge collection of thousands of photographs along the wall related to the war. Growing up, I was never interested in history but with all the travel in recent years, I have come to appreciate and really like history. Furthermore, due to our own rich history, only a few of our history classes were on first and second world war - that shaped modern day Europe. By the time, we came out, the weather had opened up. We made our way to the nearest metro station and took the subway back to the same neighborhood we were in yesterday, to watch St Andrew's church and St. Sophia's cathedral. It was the first time that in the cathedral, they accepted our UCLA student cards and gave us discounted entry. The views from the bell tower were quite amazing. Being tired from all the walks through the day, we decided to have a break for a nice coffee at one of the cafes in the neighborhood. It was really nice but a bit expensive coffee. Thereafter, we bought a few more souvenirs on Andrviyivsky Uzviz - this time I bought Russian dolls, which has dolls inside dolls to create a whole family. We decided to try out the Indian place called Himalaya for dinner, which was praised highly in the lonely planet as well. They also had gobi manchurian under the Indian chinese section, which we ordered and was quite good like the rest of the food. Although, a bit on the expensive side, the food at Himalaya was really good.

More in Simferopol (July 11-12)

It was the day for the resort city of Yalta the next day. According to Maxim, with expensive hotels and restaurants all over the place, it is considered quite hip to go and do a vacation here. In the soviet times, it was also considered as a sneak into how life is in the capitalist west. The drive to Yalta was a wonderful one with green hills in front of beautiful blue sky - some of them in the shape of animals as if it is drinking the water from the black sea. It was good couple of hours of drive and we took some bread from a traditional Tatar place on the roadside. I got to know that their earthen pot in which they cook bread and other dishes is called Tandyr, similar to what we call it in India - Tandoor. Another piece of trivia - pineapple in Hindi and Russian is same - Annanaas, something I got to know when Maxim ordered Pineapple juice for us. We then went to Vorontsov Palace, another one built during the Czar era for the nobleman named Vorontsov. We then drive through the view of a castle at the edge of a cliff giving a very picturesque view called swallow's nest built in its current style by a rich oil man and baron Shteingel, who liked to relax in Crimea. We decided not to visit it, heeding to the advice given by both Maxim and Lonely Planet that there is not much to the castle except for its postcard distant view. Thereafter, we went for wine tasting next to the famous Massandra vineyard, where they gave us 10 different wines to taste that included Cabernet, Herez (Sherry), Kagor (Cohors), Madeira (similar to the old time hindi name for alcohol called Madira), red and white ports and the local speciality Muskat, among others. It was for the first time that we had people sitting in a room on several tables with 10 glasses in front of everyone and one person discussing about each of the wine and asking everyone to taste once the discussion was over. Some of these wines have won several grand prix awards in international wine festivals as well and their taste was testimony to those awards. Almost all the wines were really good, with everything but one in the price range of less than 7 dollars. It was now time to visit a mountain peak. Maxim insisted a bit that he will drive up the mountain but we finally convinced him for taking the cable car (although on hindsight, it would have been better and much cheaper to just drive up). From the place where the cable car dropped us, we hiked a bit to go to the highest point and the views of the green valley followed by black sea were just mesmerizing. We then went to the seaside promenade in Yalta which was very lively with musical fountains, children area with lots of activities (including driving remote controlled cars), ice skating ring, a whole set of places where you could dress yourself in various dresses of kings, warriors etc for pictures. One of the peculiar thing was the monument of Lenin with one hand pointing towards the sea. Ironically, in the direction of his pointing, there stood a McDonalds, almost like mocking the socialist leader. It was now time for some thrill which was provided by Maxim's fast and furious drive to our beach resort by the sea. We had a wonderful dinner watching the moon rise above the black sea, changing its color from deep orange to white as it rose higher and higher in the sky. It was really an amazing sight. Now, on Maxim's insistence we all prepared for a night dip in the black sea. I was the first one to back out after stepping my feet in the water since it was too cold. Diane and me didnt go into the water inspite of too much insistence from Maxim. Anna and Maxim enjoyed their swim and we returned for a good night sleep in our cabins.

What can be a better start to a day than taking a nice breakfast followed by a swim in the black sea. By the time we went out, the sand beaches were all full of people. We went to a small rocky beach and Anna gave an air pillow to help me feel comfortable in the water. We were in the water for a couple of hours enjoying the very calm water of black sea, beautiful sun outside and holding on to the jelly fish floating in the water. It was then this thought came to my mind first that what am I really doing. Finished my PhD, returning back to India with no job lined up, traveling through east Europe for a month followed by plans for another 3 month trip through India. Is it all sane? Before i could think deeper, I took my mind off and started enjoying my present again. After a quick shower, we left the place for a visit to another natural marvel of Ukraine - the marble caves, called so because of the white calcium deposits in the caves. It was one hour guided walk through the longest caves, I have ever been to in my life with several beautiful natural formations that looked like ghosts to kings, fossils of dead animals and wonderful formations of stalactites and stalagmites. Driving back to Simferopol in the evening, it was now time for another traditional Ukrainian dinner at a traditional Tatar restaurant called Markur. Going overboard more than the last few nights, this time we could only finish the supposedly starters ordered by Maxim and rest of the main course was all packed to take away. Getting back home, we watched the infamous spoof of Star Wars - the spaceballs while enjoying the leftovers from the dinner. Lightning was striking outside as we went to bed for our last night in the city of Simferopol.

Rich culture of Simferopol (July 9-10)

The airport at the Simferopol had a long runway but a very small terminal - so small that we got out of the airport without realizing that we went past the baggage claim belt. After a short while, Maxim picked us up, dropped us at his house and went over to pick up his girl friend Anna from the train station. We were then treated with a wonderful breakfast with coffee, smoothie, bread, cheese, home made jam, etc. - a sneak preview to the hospitality of Maxim. He drove us to Bahchisaray, a place rich with history - containing very old fortress and cemetery dating back to sixth century and an ancient well which was recently discovered (in 2001) used as an emergency reservoir for the water in case the city was under attack, so the city dwellers can remain inside the city walls and reach their drinking water supply (as well as used to hide in case of an attack from some outside community) and religion - with uspensky cave monastery, one of the oldest monastery in the region with several associated legends with the image of mother Mary emerging on a stone. The hike from the parking to the fortress was a steep one with beautiful views of the green valley around us. With Diane jet lagged, and me sleeping for only a few hours last night, we both were quite sleepy. There were also several shops along the way selling souvenirs and local eateries. A peculiar thing that i never experienced before, and first saw in Ukraine, that the women even when visiting historical places or palaces like to be in their bikinis, and quite a few of them not just one or two here and there. We then went to Khans Palace, one of the palaces occupied by Tatar-mongols tribes, most notably by the Khan Girey family all the way from 13th century. Before getting into the palace, we had our first taste of Ukrainian food. We went to one of the eating joints from Soviet times and ate something like quesadillas - a fried dough filled with cheese and another one filled with meat. After a sleepy walk through the palace, we got back home. Maxim took us to a walk in the neighborhood where we also saw a war tank outside a park with children playing around - a memorial for the soldiers who died in the Afghanistan war. We then went to a ukrainian restaurant where one of his friends joined as well. I tried a traditional ukrainian soup and a dish with mushrooms. Getting back, both me and Diane slept like a baby (or as i like to call it, slept like a dog).

Waking up a bit late, it was about noon by the time we left our place for sight seeing the next day, followed by another wonderful breakfast - with some wonderful fried bread kind of thing prepared by Anna. We went to the city named Balaklava, which was opened only recently (about a couple of decades ago) for tourists since it used to be a marine base for training of Russian submarines. They built more than 1 km long tunnel inside the mountain by the black sea where these submarines used to train. The harbor is hidden behind several hills making it perfect to make a base since it will not be apparent to any ship out in the black sea. We hired a small boat for 4 of us to give us a tour in the black sea. Incidentally, the driver of the boat also a captain of one of the submarines during the Russian times. He showed us the small beaches around and told us the history of the place, which was promptly translated by Maxim. We also saw a barrel at the hill top, created by Nazis, which was called the barrel of death - those who were to be punished were put inside the barrel and the base of the barrel used to open sometime randomly, dropping the person to death. The worst part was that the person inside does not even know when his last moment will arrive. We then ate at a nearby restaurant which apparently prepares the best fish dish. The server there was impressed with my ukrainian accent when i said "spasibo bolshoe" - "Thank you very much", in ukrainian, the only phrase i learned during the whole time other than da (meaning yes) and niet (meaning no) and some numbers. We then drove to the the city called Sevastopol which had the famous St. Vladimir church where the prince was baptised, the event remembered as leading to Russia getting baptized in 10th century. There were also remains of an ancient city created by ancient Greek setters in 4th century BC. I was really impressed with the history associated with Ukrainian but disappointed with the fact that it is largely unknown to many people across the world, and not taken care off well (similar to the case in India). We then went to the main city of Sevastopol and were stuck in a huge traffic jam caused by a biker (motorbike) show organized next day where supposedly more than 10,000 bikers had registered from all across the world. We decided not to go to the city and instead took a ride on a very slow ferries wheel to get a view of the city. Maxim then took us to another traditional place in Simferopol, with a beautiful ambience. We sat outside in a small hut, tried a couple of traditional drinks, and I had something like perrogie filled with berries and another one filled with mushroom. Diane tried the sausage made with pig's blood - apparently another traditional thing, which i didnt feel like trying myself. Another tiring and wonderful day came to an end with something even more wonderful in store for the next couple of days to come.

Leaving Heidelberg for Ukraine (July 8)

It was time to leave Heidelberg today (July 8, 2009). I had my flight from a small airport in Frankfurt called Frankfurt Hahn. The information on the web for the bus service to Hahn was incorrect due to which I reached the airport 5 hours before the scheduled departure of the flight. However, with all my travel experience, it was not too difficult to kill the time. Between lunch, reading book, working on computer and playing on i-pod, time went by pretty quickly. Due to the weather in Frankfurt, our flight got delayed by 45 minutes. I had to catch the connecting flight from Poland and the layover time was 2 hours. However, with the airport at Poland being small too, I knew it would not take too long to check-in again. When the flight landed at the Krakor airport in Poland, I was surprised to see everyone clapping to acknowledge the skills of the pilot in safe landing. My sneak preview of the east europe was at the Krakow airport when after just a small conversation the lady at one of the cafe at the airport got annoyed with me not speaking their language, the dustbins were hard to find by, the toilets smelled and the girls around were beautiful. Even the flight to Keiv was delayed a bit but the immigration check at the airport was quick and easy. I went over to the hotel to meet up with Diane to sync up and then returned to the airport to spend the first night of my life at an airport. On my way to the airport, I saw a bus driver pulling over and getting out to pee in the bushes. Welcome to Ukraine, was the thought that came to my mind and I just walked past him. I laid down my sleeping bag in a corner and happily went to sleep. After about one and a half hour, two policeman woke me up. When I told them that I have my flight at 6 AM and I arrived at 1 AM only so I am just waiting for my flight, I dont know how much they understood but their response was "20 dollars, sleep". Even after his repeating a couple of times, I just refused, packed up my bag and went over to the sitting area. After about 30 minutes, the couple sitting next to me left for their flight so I got to sleep, lying down on the chairs waking up an hour and a half before the flight departure to Keiv at 6 AM. Stray dogs, although pretty calm, outside the airport was also another sight I had not experienced anywhere else outside India.

Heidelberg, Germany (July 4-7)

Immigration at Frankfort was the most haphazard immigration I have been through...no one to maintains the queue for each counter and people just cut through the lines...but it was just easy to get through and then as I expected, I saw Maria waiting for me at the airport. It was nice of her to wake up early in the morning and travel more than an hour to come and receive me. Although knowing her, I expected that she will come :)

We had to change the train in between and even with the fast train, it took us more than an hour to get back to Heidelberg (after running and barely making it to the second train). I had not slept much in the flight but since we only had a weekend when she could show me around, I decided to not sleep and instead go around the city with her. After the wonderful breakfast, we first went to her friend to take her bike, picked her bike from the train station and then went to the city center - the most happening place of Heidelberg. All through, it was like I was sleep walking. I think I even slept for a second or two here and there while walking. Maria was doing a great job keeping me awake by constantly talking with me and making me do something or the other. When i could not handle it anymore, we decided to take a coffee break and it started to rain at the same time. My first encounter with the rain which continued for the rest of my stay at the city as well. Thereafter, we took a train up to the castle and further up to the peak to get a bird's eye view of the city. We walked down the hill. On our way, we went past red berry bushes when Maria pointed them out and started plucking them. I was overjoyed with the treat of eating the wonderfully sweet berries, plucking them fresh from the bushes in the wild - something I had never done before. Thereon, we walked around the city center, bought some simple food and sat at a place with live music and beer around. The European setting was completed with the cobbled streets, people relaxing with beer and food in outdoors and enjoying the live music. Add to the scenery that the place was a riverfront and you just cant beat it. We then biked back home, got our laptop and went back to the riverfront to watch the movie out in the open. The sun here sets by 10 pm, giving us ample time to enjoy. Half way between the movie, I slept and looking at me Maria gave a wonderful suggestion of going back home and sleeping which i promptly agreed to :)

Next day, Maria planned for a bike trip to a small town called Schwetzingen, around 10 kms away. Not knowing our way, i think we biked even longer and it took us more than an hour to get there. We went to the big garden, the main attraction for the small town. It contained beautiful sculptures, wonderful green gardens and a mosque as well. Unfortunately, everything was written in German so we could not get much information about why is there a mosque at such a place. The garden also had a red mulberry tree but most of the berries were out of reach. I ate a few dropped on the ground and they were quite good. Maria tried mulberries for the first time in her life and liked it too. However, she was skeptical in the first place if she should eat it or not (being used to plucking berries from wild, she knows that not all of them are eatable and was not as excited as I was since I had never done it before other than plucking them from the tree next to our house in Delhi and some in Pittsburgh). After roaming around in the garden, we went to an Indian place for lunch. The server there was really nice to us and we got very tasty food prepared for us. It was very flavorful and I think completely cooked in Ghee, rather than oil. We took a different route on our way back. I saw another tree where the fruits looked like Jamun (dont know the English word) but it was some other berry. I tasted it and liked it as well but Maria did not want to try it since none of us knew if that was edible. I am still alive, writing this blog after a couple of days so that berry indeed was edible. By the time we got back home, it started to rain again. Maria prepared a fruit cake and I prepared some lentils for dinner.

The next day, Maria went to her lab to work, giving me enough things, including her cellphone from Poland to ensure that i can get around easily without getting into any trouble. I took the boat ride from Heidelberg to Neckarsteinach - a town of four castles. Even though it was raining heavily in the morning, the weather by now was quite wonderful and sunny. In addition to the beautiful scenery, the trip was made even more enjoyable with a group of college students who were seemingly ragged by their seniors. They were made to do stupid things like waving at passersby and passing comments, one person wearing t-shirts of everyone else, push-ups, drinking the spilled beer from the floor, applying sunscreen to each other's body, bowing to the two girls on board when they left the ship etc. Reaching Neckarsteinach, I biked to the parking lot of the third castle, hiked up to see the last two castles - which are the only public castles, rest two are privately owned. It started raining again when i reached back Heidelberg. Biking in little rain, listening to the music of New York on my i-pod along the river was the perfect end to the wonderful scenic boat ride. Maria, soon came back from the lab and after finishing the leftover Indian food from yesterday in our dinner, we watched the movie 'The Fall' as thunder and lightening strike outside. I must say that I really love the view from Maria's apartment. We can watch the sun set as we drink night tea or just chat in her balcony looking at the cloud formations and rain and thunder.

The next day, I biked to Ladenburg. This town is on the other side of Heidelberg than Neckarsteinach and is approximately 13 kms away along the Neckar river. The path was all along the river, mostly a narrow mud pathway about a feet wide with green bushes and trees on either side and the neckar river just next to the bushes. Every now and then, I would pass through the bushes and trees bearing the berries and other fruits. I also met several runners along the way - I am sure that if I would have been living in this town, this would be the place i would visit frequently as well for my running practice. Farm fields that came along the way mainly grew wheat and corn. At about 9 kms, there was also this place where the river drops about 15-20 feet. As i reached the place, they were about to open the gate on the lower side with a huge cargo ship locked inside the tank on the higher side. Although, I had seen this process from within the ship several times, it was my first time when i saw it from outside standing on a bridge up close. The whole process was pretty cool and I even took a video of it. Then I moved on and reached the beautiful town of Ladenburg - small town with beautiful old buildings some of then dated all the way back to 16th century. After putting my bike aside, I walked through the cobbled streets of town center containing shops, cafes, churches and even a farmers market selling produce, meat and eggs. After eating a bunch of berries on way biking to Ladenburg, I bought a few more different berries to further fill myself up. Roaming around the streets for almost an hour taking lots of pictures, I then sat at a cafe in the center and had a nice break with the coffee. Just before leaving, I went to a lush green garden by the riverside and sat there to have the wonderful berry cake that Maria had made. Sitting there with the view in the front containing green grass, trees, flowing river and church with clouds the background, I wondered if there could be anything better. Maria decided to get off her work early and while she was getting back, I cooked aloo gobhi at her place. After getting a dinner, we left for hiking in the hills in Heidelberg, specifically on a track called Philosophers way. As usual, the track was all surrounded by big green trees, a perfect environment to discuss the philosophies of life. After a while, it started to rain adding that extra icing on the cake. A particular comment from Maria summarizes our discussions on the beautiful hike - I now know why it is called Philosopher's way. One specific spot had a distant view of the town with its castle appearing as if wearing a green garland of leaves. Some snacks and drink at Oreilly was a perfect way to finish an almost perfect day - the last day in Heidelberg. I must also thank Celine - Maria's friend for lending her bike without which this trip to Heidelberg would not have been as much fun.

A void in the corner

I sold my bike yesterday. One of the first substantial things i bought after i moved to Los Angeles. That void in the corner of my room, from the bicycle absence, is now reminding me that the day of leaving is now coming closer. I remember my first few days in US, when it was hard to adjust to the change, when a quarter for a bus ride used to feel like very expensive, when i felt lonely and on my own, months without a phone and credit card and no one whom i knew very well who was close to me. And then..Ajnabee shahar mein zindagi mil gayee....i found life in the unknown city. I made friends, explored so many new things in life, and was well settled. Home to school and back, trips to beaches, dinners with friends, movies, travel, coffee, concerts all became part of who I am. Certainty was the name of the game after i knew what my PhD research would be and the life just flew smoothly. It really struck me hard yesterday that the time has come to get out of the comfort zone and move on to a new territory - leave behind the wonderful relationships i made, friends who were more like a family, an independent life that taught me a lot but taking along a whole new perspective of doing something meaningful in life. And when i was listening to this song on my way back after dropping Sudhir at the airport - Ajnabee Shahar hai....ajnabee shaam hai...i just could not stop but cry - the reality of moving on is sinking in, and is almost hitting hard now!

14269 @ 26.2

So finally the D-day arrived on May 25. I have been aspiring to run a marathon since March 2008, ever since i went to receive Vikrant at the finishing point. Watching the people finish, who have a combination of pain (from 26.2 miles) and happiness (from finishing it), i wanted to experience that feeling myself. Until the night before, i was not feeling anything special is coming up. The daily stuff was keeping me busy, away from the thoughts of running 26 milers. But i must say that i was in a good shape. After injuring my feet in November last year because of which i had to stop running for 2 months, i had learnt my lesson.

Waking up at 4 in the morning, we were at the Wilshire Grand Hotel by 5:20 to meet up with our group of road runners with whom i had been training for all these months. We were treated as special when we moved across and cut the line to stand right behind the elite runners to start our marathon :). Drinking one full gatorade had its effect on me and i had to go pee with no bathrooms in the sight. For the first time in my life, i took a bottle and filled it up to the brim :). Light stomach with festive atmosphere to enjoy around was the perfect start for the run. :)
The first few miles were very crowded but after around 4-5 miles we had known faces around who were running together. We had a total of around 25-30 people in our group (of which i think only 4 finished together at the right pace :)) who were planning to run 11 min/mile pace. Akshay was not feeling well so i decided to stay with him and push him to the finish line. Taking a bathroom break at around mile 8 meant that it took us around 4 miles to catch up with our group again. When we used to train, we used to walk around the water stations and it used to give us all enough time to catch up. This time, no one waited or walked around the water station and catching up was always difficult. Add to that the pain that Akshay was feeling, we decided to leave our group and run slower.

I saw 4 old sikhs (more than 60) running the marathons. I talked to one of them and it was his second LA marathon. I even saw a person running barefoot for some cause. These people around form tremendous inspiration and push you to put in that extra bit of effort. And then there were small children high fiving along the route, giving water, oranges (oh i really ate a lot of oranges during the run and i feel thats what kept me going!). Cheer back at the people cheering along the route and you will always hear a huge roar in return! :). The whole atmosphere was electrifying.

There were two water stations organized by the sikh community as well and it was nice to get some cheers from them! :) By mile 12 I started feeling that my body is heating up a lot. But it never really became a huge concern until a few hours after the finish when my body just could not keep down its temperature. I was almost shivering all through the evening and a brufen and good night's sleep made all the difference :). I started my mp3 player around mile 14 to keep me a bit away from the pain. I even ran into Khanh (my old friend from UCLA) around mile 16 and chatted for a bit along the run before leaving him behind :)

At mile 18, Akshay almost gave up and decided to walk the rest of the route. I did not want to walk 8 miles since i thought that it might be more painful and i can finish it running. I asked him if he will surely finish the marathon. Getting a confident yes from him, we decided to separate out and thereon i ran the last 8 miles by myself. Walking for a minute inbetween, running slowly I was making my distance towards the finish line. Music from the mp3 player kept me moving. I did not have courage to cheer back at the crowd anymore so just gave a passing smile to people cheering for the runners. The whole route was full of small ups and downs but with no one steep hill. And the weather was perfect - cloudy all through until i reach around mile 24. When the sun began to show up, i was motivated more to finish it soon before the sun hits. I had realized at mile 23 that with this pace and pain, i can finish in less than 5 hours if i really push myself but that motivation to make up the time was not good enough! I decide to run whatever my body feels comfortable with and not push too much. At mile 25, i started feeling the cramp in my right leg and every step for a few minutes was quite painful. I was almost about to give up running and start walking when Vikrant came from behind (aka a movie style) yelling "Amar Bhaag (Run)". That was good enough to push me more until we were a little away from 26 miler. My pain from cramps returned! It was showing on my face. People across the streets were watching me. Vikrant pushed me further showing me the banner for 26 miles. "Ab finish line ke baad hee rukio (Now stop after the finishing line)". It was in sight and i also wanted to not stop now. We crossed 26 miler. The pain was almost gone. Vikrant and I held each others hands and crossed the finishing line together. The total time was 5 hours 4 minutes 58 seconds. It was good to see Gaurav, Sridhar, Swetha and Suman at the finishing line. Sridhar and Swetha drove a long way from orange county to be there so i really appreciate that.

But after i finished, it was like where is that feeling for which I was running. I felt a great sense of achievement but it was still away from that very special moment. It is however sinking in now and i am getting that special feeling since last evening. It was 8 months of dedicated effort (Thanks to the road runners group) and today i am fine, able to walk around and am sure that i have not caused any injury to myself. Together with Vikrant, Akshay, Siya and Charlie, we raised more than $2000 to support grassroots projects in India. Thanks to all the people who donated for this good cause.

Anything is possible! I could not even run 1.5 miles until last May when i decided to run a marathon. The journey started with 14 km City2Surf in Sydney, City of Angels half marathon in December and LA marathon in May. They say, once a runner, always a runner. I do feel I am addicted to running now and sincerely hope i can continue running even after i return to India. Do you want to join and run together in Delhi?

Listening for a change

In preparation for our India travel, i just read a very wonderful book titled "Listening for a change" by Hugo Slim, recommended by Eve. I think anyone who is planning to have discussions with communities for social change should definitely read this book. Below I am listing a few of the points (with my own interpretation) which i think can serve as a summary notes for people going out in the communities (Some numbering is incorrect since i could not figure out how to continue numbering in blogspot!):

1. Make sure that an action is taken based on collected information - those that have given their time to participate know that their efforts have been taken seriously.
2. Have patience, humility, willingness to learn from others and respect views and values that you may not share.
3. Make sure to involve everyone - particularly those who are not usually involved such as elderly, women, ethnic minorities, the disabled and children. Bringing in these "hidden" community members allows a much more subtle appreciation of the divisions and alliances within societies.
4. Try to bring out hidden spheres: experiece of family and work relationships, of friendship, love, parenting, leisure, culture, history, religion. People are more likely to take part in something they value and believe in and are more willing to invest their time and resources in what is feasible within their current social obligations.
5. Try to bring out the hidden connections - Involving communities bridge together different developmental sectors such as health, agriculture, economics, nutrition, law, psychology, religion etc through their individual accounts and perception.
6. Involving community and making them have a say in deciding the welfare practices can have several positive influences - raising confidence, encouraging community action and cohesion, closing the gap between the programs that get implemented and programs that are needed, providing the basis for other programs such as literacy (making it more interesting by having illiterate learn to write what they speak or what they have pictured); and revitalizing those marginalized by age, gender or any other "disadvantage".
7. For participatory community involvement, you have to learn skills such as listening, asking, telling, using ritual expressions, memorizing and handing on information by word of mouth alone
8. Try to understand the historical dimension - make the process of inquiry and description as first step by letting communities recount and identify the nature of their poverty.
9. First hand involvement of community people can provide information about:

• Indigenous Technical Knowledge (IDK) - including skills and practices in agriculture, health, botany, nutrition, arts, crafts, business and trading to develop an understanding of past experiments and innovations.
• Disaster relief: Collect stories and legends that not only provide important technical information about precedent and strategy in disaster relief but are also of equivalent spiritual value to a community in crisis
• Cultural preservation and consciousness raising: Cultural roots include their history, values and social and political structures. Reviving cultural traditions in turn serves to define cultural identity more clearly and boost confidence. Stories, songs histories and technical knowledge gathered in this regard can be put to creative use in school curricula, adult literacy projects or in health education programs.
• Artistry: Theater, song and storytelling can be used to convey health education messages. Arts of theater and storytelling provide a ritual and artistic space in which it becomes relatively safe to say things which may not be safe to say directly.
• Human rights: include land rights, labor rights, trading rights, women's rights, children's rights, rights of disabled and rights to free association.

1. Involving first hand account constitutes range of methodologies that make up Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA). Several methods in PRA include individual and group interviews; mapping; transects, modeling and diagramming; and ranking and scoring exercises.
2. PRA is particularly useful at two stages:

• Project identification stage: research is undertaken and appraisal made of the existing situation and of priorities for the future. The collection of individual life stories or community histories can prove a powerful entry point into discussion and understanding of current conditions.
• Monitoring and evaluation: inclusion of PRA in retrospective analysis and evaluation process can introduce a wider dimension and correct an almost inevitable bias towards quantitative goals and objectives. Comparing conditions before and after development interventions, in terms of people's subjective accounts, and not simply in terms of project's data and reports, includes the experience of "beneficiaries" and can play a valuable part in evaluation or review.

1. Several projects which are hailed as succesful because they have met their chosen targets may well have negative side effects in areas which remain unacknowledged, unrecorded, and even undetected - because it is usually the poorest who have most to lose form big projects and the least chance to voice or document their objections and experiences.
2. Types of collection - individual life story, single issue interview, focus group discussion, community interviews.
3. Topics for a life story:

• Warm up questions - name, date of birth, occupation, parents, their occupation
• Issues of family and early life:

1. Family background, grandparents, elderly relations, extended family
2. Parents: where they come from, their occupation, their role in the family, their personalities
3. Brothers, sisters and childhood friends, children's responsibilities, games and leisure activities, childhood journeys, what happened to siblings and friends later on in their lives
4. Everyday life, household environment, food and meal times
5. Special occasions - weddings, funerals, festivals
6. Local geography - community, village, communal areas, land rights and ownership, markets, meeting areas, neighbors, important people, interesting characters
7. Social and cultural life - religion and politics, education and instruction at home/school, important friendships, influences and ambitions.

• Working life:

1. Occupation inside and outside the home - domestic, agricultural, vocational, professional, formal, informal, paid or unpaid
2. How the skills were learnt, work environment, what the work involves and with whom, any formal or informal training?
3. Any changes of occupation and why - successes and failures in working life
4. Other income generating opportunities - crafts, trading
5. Typical working day, seasonal variations
6. Work related organizations - cooperatives, informal groups, professional organizations, unions, any social life connected with work
7. Wider changes affecting work - environmental, industrial, political etc.

• Adult family and social life:

1. Central relationships: single/married, background of partners, expectations and ideals of marriage, family home, children, child birth, family planning, child care, hopes and ambitions for children
2. Leisure activities: hobbies, religious and cultural festivals, means of entertainment
3. Old age: responsibilities, privileges or difficulties which come with age

1. Recounting life story is a positive, if emotional, from which they can gain much satisfaction and a renewed sense of pespective. The listener should ensure that the narrator is comfortable at the end of interview and is surrounded by the support they need, whether from friend or family.
2. Single issue interviews are the main method for learning about a particular event, such as a drought, or for an investigation into a particular area of knowledge or experience.
3. Group interviews can bring out the best and the worst in the people. By taking the focus off individuals, they can be less inhibitive but the opposite can occur just as easily due to pressure from others in the group. The voices of less confident, poorer and powerless are less likely to be heard.
4. Focus group interviews - between 5 to 12 people, homogeneous - same sex and largely equal in social status, 1-2 hours of discussion with participants sitting comfortably and facing each other. The main emphasis should be on discussion between participants themselves.
5. Do preparation for each interview - familiarize yourself with contextual information so as to be more relevant in questions and establish mutual respect by passing on the message to the interviewee that you are not ignorant of basic things.
6. Do not box people with a rigid set of questions - but be flexible within an overall plan. open question (how did you feel about that?) should form the basis of the interview, closed questions (did you do it?) are appropriate for clarifications only, leading questions (was that good?) should be avoided.
7. 4.9 Prompt and probe throughout the interview with short questions to encourage the narrator to expand further in one direction.