You may have been wondering about signage in India. Not as amusing as China, but funny non-the-less.

These signs are at the entrance of the Taj Mahal.

Everywhere we go we must line up in separate lines.  It is not okay to touch the other gender in public.  Long story here, but I’ll save it for later.

This is the reason everyone comes to Agra if not India.

 

This famous monument to love is as timeless as it is beautiful. So, here’s the story.  Shah Jahan was a Hindu prince who took over from his father at a time when there was great unrest between Hindus and Muslims.  In order to forge a truce he married a Muslim princess who became the love of his life.  They were never apart and she bore him 14 children, only 6 of whom made it to adulthood.  Anyway, during the birth of the 14th child the princess died and this sent Shah Jahan into a deep depression.  His minions finally took him from the spot where she died but he really was never the same again. On her deathbed he promised to build her a garden to last for all eternity and thus began the 22 year build of the “Taj.”  During this time the third son killed his two brothers and usurped the crown from his father exiling him to Agra Fort where the Shah was con fined to a small set of rooms.  He could only watch out the windows as the Taj was built.  At last it was done and he buried his wife there and shortly died himself at age 72 and was interred next to her.

These are the eternally fresh and beautiful flowers the Shah gathered for his beloved.  The two that are inlaid use a forgotten art which came from Italy.  Semi-precious jewels are used and shine in the sun.

This is the courtyard outside the Shah’s rooms where he was confined for the 8 years before he died.

This is his set of rooms.  They are beautiful although I guess Jahan was pining for his wife.

This is the view he had from his window.  So this sad story ended and the monument to everlasting love still draws admirers from around the globe.

 

This is Agra Fort, where Shah Jahan spent his final years and where he lived with his princess.

This is the entrance in the inner courtyard.  This fort was never breached and in this level they kept lions and tigers.

 

This is the palace the Shah had built for his new bride. It is in the Muslim style, to help her feel at home.

The Hindu temple where the Shah worshiped his gods.

The grand presentation hall.  It would be imposing if you came to call!

We all commented that in a country with arranged marriages it seems there are a lot of stories about true love.  This is the ultimate tribute to that.

 

Going through one of the million toll booths on the “freeway” we passed this van.  Who knew?

 

At the Amber Fort these guys sat and watched us.  You can just tell they’re thinking ‘crazy tourists!’

 

The garden inside the Amber Fort.  These were in the part where the harem was.  My finger on the top of the picture is over the harem.

 

The pool at Naharaja Fort, but it was way too cold to go swimming.

 

 Camels shared the freeway with us as did ox carts, tractors, tuk-tuks,  scooters, bicycles, people walking, motorcycles, rickshaws, trucks  large and small, cars, buses, and the occasional cow, dog, goat, donkey, and elephant.  Traffic rules are merely suggestions.  We have driven down the side against oncoming traffic, ignored red lights, passed on hills and curves, gone the wrong way on one way streets, anything you can imagine.  So far we’re safe and have only slightly grazed an old guy on a bike pulling a trailer.

 

 Mark likes to take pictures of street scenes. Here is one of them.

 

 Anyone who knows me knows that I am petrified of snakes.  Rounding a corner one day I stepped into this scene.  I busted through a line of tourists 3 people deep to get away before the snake charmer let one of these Cobras loose.

 

 

 We went to a shop where they made carpets and other textiles.  This is a man block printing a piece of cotton.  He’s on his third pass with about four more to go.

 

This man is shaving the knots off the wrong side of a rug.  This co-op sends woven pieces to the main building for finishing.  After this step he uses a flame thrower on it to burn off any remaining knots and to make sure no polyester was used in the carpet.  Yes we bought one.  Well, three.

This is Mr. Smarmy who gave us the talk on types of wool and carpet quality.  He plied us with rum, chai, and soda beforehand.  Smooth!

 

 We stopped at a small school somewhere in the dust to give these children notebooks and pencils and scare the bejezeesus out of them.  The little girl in front with the blue scarf just started crying uncontrollably.  We big, loud, ungainly white people were just too much for them.

 

 

Finally,  we stopped at this largest step well in India.  Built centuries ago, it is still occasionally in use.  The water rises and falls with the rainy season.  They used to let tourists go down to the bottom which is 90 feet deep until some woman fell and sued.  Bet she was American!  Anyway, it was a really amazing sight.

 

I can’t figure out how India seems to be stuck in the Middle Ages but has electricity.  Roads are mostly dirt over cracked cement, plumbing is really sketchy, toilets are pretty much a gamble, there are animals roaming all over the streets, most people are thin, there is garbage everywhere, and yet this is a really beautiful and mesmerizing country.  You judge from the pictures.  Next stop, Agra and the Taj Mahal.

 

 

Years ago when we were at Emerald Isle and we were on the way to the pool I saw a real scene that did not compute in my brain.  I thought I saw a tiger and an eagle but what it really was was a dead Great Dane and a buzzard.  I have been redeemed on this trip, however!

 

Here is our hotel, Najarha Fort.  It was pretty special.  This guy below started playing his instrument at 5 in the morning.  There was another little boy who would dance for us, too.

The first night we had a bbq outside.  It was cold!

The next day we rode into the National Park which surrounds this fort, called Ranthambhore Fort.  It is where the maharajah staged his tiger hunts.

 

We saw deer.

We saw monkeys.

We saw wild boar.

And at last we saw this absolutely beautiful female tiger!

Toward the end of the trip we sat by a lake to watch the wildlife and there was an eagle, so tigers and eagles!

This was our transport.  One in front of us had a flat tire and we watched them roll the van up on a pile of rocks to change the tire.  It was scary!  At the end we all agreed that this was a high point of our trip.  Tigers, tigers, Royal Bengal Tigers.  Only 2500 left in the world and we saw one!

This is the Amber Fort which was begun in 1592 by Maharaja Man Singh.  It has walls that ramble all over the hills which surround it and is very formidable.  We got to ride elephants up the hill to get to it.  One of our number, Stephanie, was a little scared to get on the elephant because she is afraid of heights.  The reason we all had a good laugh over this is because she is a flight instructor!  She’s the one on the left below.  Ashley is another of our traveling companions.

 

The interiors of the fort are as incredible as the outside.  And for Betsy, the ceilings are just exceptional!

Jai Singh, a descendant of the guy who built the fort was very interested in time and astrology.  In 1728  he built this, the largest sun dial in the world.  It is accurate to 2 seconds.  The grounds of the site also house many other astrological features that he used to study the skies.  Below is device by which he could track the signs of the zodiac.

We went to a co-op which makes all sorts of handicrafts.  We watched a rug being made and we all had fun shopping for carpets, clothing, and other trinkets.

 

This is the Jaipur City Palace Museum.  It is full of textiles, weapons, the reception rooms of the Maharaja and other things detailing life in the long ago.

 

Here is the famous Palace of the Winds, which is just a facade used by Indian woman to watch the street scenes below.  They would hide behind the screen-like Windows to watch parades of departing or returning warriors and other pageants.

From Jaipur we travel to Ranthambhore National Park to see tigers, hopefully!

 Leaving 5:30 am January 19th.

 

. LAX

Our plane left at 1:10 January 19th and arrived in New Delhi January 21st at 3:00am.LONG flight.

 

 Day 1  tuk-tuk ride through an open air market.  Our driver kept telling us how much work it was.  Time to lose weight!

 

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The power grid in Delhi.  A little scary!

 

 This is the oldest mosque in India.

The Red Fort as seen from the mosque.  We couldn’t go in because of a national holiday on the 26th.  Lots of police, guns, barricades.  Glad we’ll be getting out of town!

 

 

 

The tomb of Humayan

 

 

 

Beautiful Windows

 

 The outside of the tomb

 

 In the footsteps of Gandhi.Where Gandhi was shot.

 

 

The great man

 

 His bedroom All his worldly possessions

 

 The Parlement building

 

 India Arch

 

 The Indian flag, duh.

 

 A Sikh mosque.  Money collected goes to feed the homeless and hungry.  They make food for 100,000 people a week.

 The naan factory.

 

 Stirring up rice.

 

 Making naan.

 

This whole experience was very humbling.  So far India is not what I imagined.  It is loud, colorful, active, bustling, dirty, exciting, and beautiful.  More to come!

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 Back at good old Mandan High School with many old friends.  Of the 213 class members, 37 had died and all but about 30 came to the 50 year reunion!  These guys are known as the “Mandan Mafia.”   We have left to right, Al, George, Mark, and Butch. This is the decked out bus the Class of ’65 rode in the Fourth of July parade.  As an outsider I can tell you we had a great time.  Mark’s classmates were very accepting and inclusive.  Mark reconnected with so many old pals and I finally was able to connect names and faces to stories I’d heard over the years.  We found out that quite a few fellow classmates have also migrated to Arizona.  No one can stand those ND winters!

And the next event was Amber’s annual Fourth of July Bash.  Our niece surely knows how to put on one fine party!  She and her friend, Tara prepared the games, prizes, and food for about 50 people.  The kids were entertained with a movie on the lawn at night, the adults with adult beverages, and all with a scrumptious buffet presided over by Amber’s mom, Karen.  She made Indian fry bread for tacos and made salads, beans, deserts, and so much more.  The residents of Marina Bay had a fireworks display thar went on long after midnight.  Best of all, our girls, Kallie and Ariel were there to share it with us!

We took Lilly to the zoo.  She took us on the tour, because, as she said, she’d been there about 500 times with her school.

Mark and his mom, Ann visiting Mark’s Uncle Johnny, brother to Mark’s dad, Don.  It was a great visit with Uncle Johnny conversant and happy to see some of his extended family.

On the same day, June 30th, both Doug and Susie retired!  Here is their whole family at a party given by the Bis-Man Chamber of Commerce for Susie.  Left to right are Bryan, Jennifer, Susie, Doug, and Matt.  Congrats to both Doug and Susie and we’ll see you in AZ soon!!

One afternoon the skies clouded up and a torrential rain fell accompanied by 80 mph winds.  After it was over we were treated to this wonderful double rainbow that made a perfect arch across the sky.  We were also treated to all the shingles of a motel behind which we were camped being blown off causing dents and scrapes to the motorhome.  Mark was quite calm over the whole thing, just glad it wasn’t really that bad.  Amazing!

Overall, our ND adventure was stellar.  It really is a beautiful state in the summer.  We’ll be back!

 Geez, here’s a surprise.  It was raining when we got to North Dakota!  In case anyone in the universe doesn’t know, this year is Mark’s 50th high school reunion so we are revisiting sites of his education.  First up is NDSU in Fargo.

This is Ma Henski’s house where Mark lived with Larry Hagan, Zeke Gustin, Al Gustin, tand Tom Keating.  Not pictured is the place which is now a crack house where Mark, Tom, and George Gress lived.  This is Stockbridge Hall where Mark and and Butch Ressler shared room 226.    This used to be The Quadrangle but is now a huge construction project, which is pretty much the norm for most of the school. Go Bison!!And this is the ATO house where Mark and his buddies crashed for a couple of years.  Alums, contribute to the housing fund because this place is falling apart!

Off to Mandan now to see family and get ready for the big reunion.  Mark is excited to see all his pals from the olden days.  Me, too!

 I had to download this picture off the internet because I missed the one going across the bridge into Minnesota.  Our next stop was Duluth which is a pretty amazing town, really.  We went on another old train ride up the shore of Lake Superior and then visited the museum in the train depot.  Once again Mark is living out his boyhood fantasies!  This is the operating system for the engine pictured above.  Can you even make sense of it? This is an old mail car when mail was sorted along the way and then delivered to towns along the train route.  In Duluth along the waterfront is a ship canal which leads from Lake Superior into the harbor area.  This light house is at the mouth of the canal.  Ships containing or loading iron ore, grain, wood products, etc. make their way into and out of the canal.  We watched as the Paul Tregurtha, the largest boat on the Great Lakes made it’s way through the Canal. It is 1013’6″ long with a beam of 107′.  It carries over 78,000 tons of ore in a load.  The infamous Edmund Fitzgerald was one of these boats and was only 800′ long.   eThis is the old flagship of US Steel.  We toured it and learned a bunch about this form of transport in the Great Lakes.  The Irwin became too small at 600′ and load capacity of 17,000 tons and was retired in 1975.

next up-North Dakota!!