The End

So I have reached the end of my gap year.

I feel like I´m dragging the part of me that has grown in India to its death.

During my last few hours in Delhi I couldn´t really believe this place and the fact that I was not going to be a part of it any more. But the world is a big place and you can´t live everywhere.

To remind myself of this year...

It started off with monks, in a monastery, in rural paradise Puruwala,

got to know the Tibetans, taught their kids, really miss their kids now.

went to Nepal, had a mental time in the hills.

had a Christmas and new year away from home, in Daramsala and Goa.

Headed off to the desert to teach at BRCM public school. Got my teacher skills stretched to the limit.

Had a bit of fun with horses and Hindi songs. 

Hopped over to Sri Lanka. Did a bit of lonely travel. Saw some of the stuff I´d never thought I would.

Back to the Indian kids and their shananagins.

A little jaunt in Rajasthan and a cricket match.

Went off on a big U shape route of the country.

Goa, Kerala, Madras, Varanasi, Nainital, Rihikesh. Lots and lots of stuff went along with it.

So it´s complete now and I´m coming back home.

I have been away a long time.

 

 

Being a Long Term Resident in a Delhi Guest House

I´m a few stays short of being a familiar face at the Tibetan settlement but it wasn´t the first time I´ve been hanging around there. What better way to round things off than to spend the best part of a week hanging around Delhi.

Delhi is confusing. And tiring. A bit like India.

So I am fully aware I will be off soon and it is making me quite nervous. Not that I don´t want to go home but right now there are about a billion cars all horning away in unison, six beggars mumbling to me, the streets are packed, women are walking around in Saaris, the rickshaw driver doesn´t understand me, people are bumping into men carrying sacks of rice on their heads, the rickshaw is weaving about between trucks- strafing three lanes of traffic, and in Britain its... not like that, which will be funny.  

The Taj Mahal

It was really beautiful.

The light caught it in amazing ways.

I'm really sorry I can't think of anything more to say about it that you haven't heard already.
It's the worlds most amazing building, everyone knows about it.

It was incredible though. Imagine building that for your wife.