Mumbai to Jodhpur

January 17th
Mumbai
Today we went to Elephanta Island. The main cave was pretty cool but the other ones were kind of plain. For the main cave we had a guide. It was very cool to hear the stories he told. One of them was:
There was once an evil demon who worshipped Lord Brahma and Lord Brahma granted him a boon. The boon was that all should fear him and that he would be invincible. Then the demon went to Parvati and demanded she come away with him. At that moment Shiva returned and shot an arrow at the demon but every drop of blood that fell onto the ground turned into a new demon! Shiva created a new god who drank all the blood.

January 20th
Udaipur

The sites in Udaipur weren't all that great but there were two things that made it the best: the people and the FOOD! Raju and family were great as hosts/hostesses. As for food, Lotus Cafe!!! LOTUS CAFE! Lotus Cafe (editor's note: Matthew goes on at great length at this point with all sorts of versions of 'Lotus Cafe' written in stylized lettering. If you are interested in seeing it, ask to see his journal upon his return). Lotus Cafe food....hungry....lotus cafe.


January 26th
Jodhpur
The Jodhpur fort was very cool.




There were lots of pigeons but...there was one building that had so many pigeons we gave the pigeons a name. The RPF (Royal Pigeon Force).

More pictures

My dad put some new pictures up in my photo album, just click on the side where it says 'My pictures'. There are also a bunch more on my dad's blog.

Matthew

Ellora Caves

January 14th
Today we saw the Ellora caves. They were cool. There were Buddhist, Hindu and Jain caves. The carvings could be really intricate, but some were a bit plain. There was a really big one that had three floors and is one and a half times the size of the Parthenon in Athens! Papa and I climbed to the top of the but Mama and Jonas were too tired.

New Year

January 2nd, 2008!
Today we walked all the way to Om Beach. I like Kudle better because the waves weren't as big at Om.

January 7th
We got to Hampi at 7:30 PM and had supper. Ohh-ohh mmm. After 10 hours of crackers, vegetable soup and cheese wrapped in chapathi is pretty good.

January 8th and 9th
Temples ahoy!
There are lots of temples in Hampi. My favourite one was Hanuman Temple. We didn't go inside the temple itself but the view was amazing . On the way back down, we saw the guy who wanted "just 50 rupees" to protect us from the monkeys. I don't think we would have needed it because when we got down there was a guy who said we could feed the monkeys peanuts! We went and bought some peanuts and then fed the monkeys. They held my hand while they were eating the peanuts. I think it was because they didn't want any other monkeys to come along and take their peanuts. There were other people there who fed them bananas and the monkeys took the bananas and ran right up into the trees.

January 10th
We got to Hospet train station and chatted with some Indians. When the train came, we realized that our car was way on the other side of the platform. A bit of running was involved that time, but we got on safely.

Matthew

Into India

December 12th
Today we went to the Coptic Christian area of Cairo. We went onthe subway and it was packed tighter than a football match. At the museum, the stuff there was kinda same old same old but the architecture on the building was very cool. After that, we went to some other church. In the church there were lots of pictures of St. George.

December 17 to 23rd Alleppey
In Alleppey, at our hotel, Jonas and I met a boy named Mathews (only you didn't pronounce the 's'). I felt right at home because his dad and grandpa were also named Matthew. I couldn't believe it. And he spoke good english. We played lots of games together like hide and seek, cricket, soccer, races and jumping contests. I made something up. There's a big circle and you try to jump the farthest in. Mathews and I tried, and Mathews' friend tried but Mathews' and mine were the farthest. It was nice there. I really liked the houseboat ride - all the scenery, beautiful, and all the palm trees. The kids we saw were all asking for pens.


The Beach
The waves on this beach [Gokarna] are huge. My favourite part of the beach is the waves. If you hit them right you can go "100" feet, says papa. It's also kinda fun to wait until the water is white and then kind of body slam it and it twists you all up. It's really fun, though. I wish there were big waves like that at Grand Beach.

Christmas Day and Boxing Day
For Christmas we got lots of the few kinds of things we got.
We got: lots of chocolate and lots of books.
My favourite is one by Roald Dahl.
And now for Boxing Day. The best part is now I can tell everybody that I went in water on Boxing Day and it was WARM (and no, I did not wear a PHD (Personal Heating Device)).

December 30th
Today we went to the town beach. The waves were pretty powerful, they could send you flying. One sent me flying, only a little bit too hard. I got flung face first into the sand. OOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWW. Right now, I can feel it swelling up.

December 31st
Speaking of swelling up, most of the waves today didn't look very big in the distance, but when they got up close they were HUGE. Lots of them knocked the wind right out of me.
Today there was also an odd current that carried us away from where our stuff was.
For supper, we had three masala dosas, one veg noodles, two onion dosas, samosas and fries.
For the movie part, we watched KING KONG. In some parts it was kind of scary but most of the time I didn't have to cover my eyes.

Egypt stuff

December 6th
Rudolph the red nosed reindeer, had a very shiny nose.....
Today we saw...the Pyramids. At first we were fine, but after we saw the sphinx we couldn't find our way to the pyramids entrance.
We finally got to the pyramids and inside it was very small, crammed passageway that went down and then up.
I don't see the point of having this, or at least Papa doesn't. He had to walk bent over and he didn't like having to do that any longer than he had to.

December 7th
We awoke to the hearty breakfast of a dry bun, cold egg and luke warm tea!!! There's a hint for all you Luxor goers: do not got to the Shady Hotel
After that, we went on a wonderful felucca ride. It was very peaceful except for the part where the kids on Banana Island asked for baksheesh (money). One of the guys that asked for money gave us sugar cane. Sugar cane would give you a big sugar rush (aka. lots of hyper activity). We watched the sun go down. After that we switched our bags to the Happyland Hotel and called it a day.
The next day we woke up and had an 'unhearty' breakfast of lemon juice, some fruit cocktail thing, bread, pita bread, jam and pancakes! That's another hint for you Luxor goers - Happyland Hotel!

Valley of the Kings, and temples
The Valley of the Kings was pretty cool. Of course, we didn't go to Tutankhamun's tomb because it was way too expensive, but we did go to Ramses III and II's tombs. In Ramses III's tomb...well, I drew a plan of it in my journal.
We also went to Tutmosis I's tomb. His tomb is the deepest discovered tomb in the Valley of the Kings. The hieroglyphics on the walls were really cool.
The first temple we went to was very touristy and most of the statues were ruined because it was Hatshepsut's temple and Hatshepsut didn't let Tutmosis III be pharaoh. Finally he became pharaoh and he smashed all here statues.
Next, we went to Habu Temple. Ramses III had built it, and sometimes pharaohs carved their name over another pharaoh's name so it would be theirs, so Ramses carved his name so deep, I could stick a full page into it. Nobody's going to take that temple over.
The next day we went to Luxor and Karnak temples. Luxor temple seemed more tourisy than Karnak but Karnak was a lot bigger. At Karnak, I copied part of an obelisk. Papa wouldn't let me copy it all down so we took a picture.

December 11th
Jingle bells....
Today we went to the Islamic quarter of Cairo. We went to some mosques. The guys there asked for money. They wanted 50 pounds. Mama said we'd give him 20 but he said no. We didn't know why he didn't want it.
After that we went to a souq. I bought a scarab beetle that's really cool. While we were there, we saw the.....New Zealander's!!
We made plans to go for supper with them. They showed us a really neat place in a mall across from the hotel. There was a KFC! But we went to a pizza joint. It was good. After that they took us to an amazing juice stand. They had lots of flavours. I had strawberry/banana, it was awesome! It's like a smoothie without the ice cream or yogurt.
When we went to the hotel, Jonas, Isaac and I played a game that Jonas made up. It was fun, but finally they had to go to Paris.

Matthew