July 8, 2012 - New New Delhi

Whew! Today was a busy day!

We stepped off the airplane into the Delhi airport at approximately 1 am. Our shoes were immediately caressed by the seemingly endless soft carpet. Burnt orange, cream, and brown patterns swirled and twirled underneath our steps. I would love to find a large wall mural of the carpet design.

We meandered, stopping on occasion, to observe various art structures like elephants, a woman demonstrating yoga poses, and larger than life hands praying over us.

There was even a prayer room for devout Muslims to take a moment between flights.

We thought the designation for women and men’s bathrooms was cool:

Crisp, white walls followed us down long hallways and flat escalators. I think all four of us were amazed and a bit awed by it. Several signs boasted the airport’s award of 2^nd best airport in the world. Wow! I’m not sure if this was just according to one survey, nor do I know the validity of this survey, but all the same, the airport was amazing. Apparently part of the Dehli airport is new; before domestic and international flights were in separate buildings and you had to take a bus to arrive at either. However, the remodel combined the two into one beautifully massive airport. It was so nice; Vinay exclaimed he would always fly to Delhi first before transferring to a Nagpur flight.

We waited in the airport for 4 hours before boarding the transfer flight to Nagpur. Some of us fell asleep waiting to board:

So here is a map of India for those of you interested to know exactly which part of India we were in, here is a map of India.

We landed in New Delhi (northern part of India, were the red circle is and red plane is) took another flight to Nagpur. It was roughly a 1 hour flight from Mumbai to Nagpur. Shagi Chaton, a close and dear friend of Vinay’s family, met us at the airport with a car. We gathered our luggage, exhausted, and climbed into the rented car.

 

(note – I borrowed this map from http://www.wordtravels.com/Travelguide/Countries/India/Map)

Chandrapur, the town Vinay spent most of his life growing up and where his mother current lives, is too small to show on this map. Click on this link below to get a sense of the location of Chandrapur – it is a 2 ½ hour drive from Nagpur – almost due south.

Chandrapur, Maharashta

 

The drive was exciting – full of things to see – especially for Jessica and Jackie since this was their first time in India. It’s a strange feeling sitting in a car with the steering wheel on the left side – and driving on the left side of the road:

Here we are in the car while on the way to Chandrapur:

And the clothes we were wearing:

Here are some pictures of things seen outside the window on the drive to Chandrapur:

I have been in India before, so I am not surprised by the near death experience of being in a car on the streets of India. However, my cohorts are not so familar (see picture below for Jessica's face):

Our first stop was Vinay’s father’s grave to pay our respects. Vinay and I both lit a slender white candle, poured some melted wax from the candle on the edge of the grave stone, and attempted to “glue” the candle upright. Unfortunately, the wind was blowing strongly and the small flames didn’t have a chance of surviving. Out of respect for those who have passed away, we did not take any pictures of the cemetery. I wish I could have met Vinay’s father.

We finally arrived at Mom’s house around 11am on the 8^th. We were all relieved.

First we stopped by Mom’s house to greet her and introduce my friends. It’s always an emotional moment when Vinay greets his mother for the first time in one year. She hugged all of us fiercely.

Vinay’s mom and the maid had prepared us some food, and we all wolfed it down. There was sorgum roti (gluten free for me!), stir-fried potatoes and cauliflower, several curries and chutneys. We drank chai and savored these sweet, milk balls for dessert.  After several hours of eating and conversing, we all piled back into the car and dropped off Jessica and Jackie at the hotel - located about 5 minutes away.  We all decided to nap for a few hours before dinner. Jet lag and the long trip were really getting to us. The hotel in Chandrapur, where Jessica and Jackie stayed, was surprisingly very nice - nicer than expected.

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This was the view from outside their hotel (I think we decided that even though one can occassionally see a recylcing bin - all the bottles are being thrown on the roof of the hotel/adjancent building). Seriously. This picture below could be seen from Jess & Jackie's room.

 

  

Vinay and I, after ensuring that Jackie and Jessica were comfortable and set for a few hours, headed back to Mom’s house to take a nap ourselves. In fact, we all ended up sleeping the rest of the afternoon/night. We woke up for a quick dinner and shower, but we basically all slept. Jess and Jackie remained at the hotel.