Hampi-Panaji, India: 3 June 07

I met Vivien and Mathieu

i am still in a kind of paranoid feelings today. A trip like this is really draining up my energy. i wish to leave here as soon as possible. This whole place is just giving me a feeling of unsafe and uncomfortable. Every Indian if they are not in a group of family would give me a feeling that, they might be some bad guy. Every children and old people if they are not wearing shoes, would look like a beggar to me. If all these are not true, then they must be up to something to talk to me or on the same path as me.

When i had my breakfast by the restaurant at the river side, the young man working there was trying to sell me some statues saying that he needs money to go to school. i don't trust a word about him at all. He also commented that the purple and pink crystal that i were wearing were very beautiful. By then, i realised that, things that looked 'normal' and 'unvaluable' to me could be very valuable to the people here. i took off both crystal later.

i met two Shanghainese girls at a restaurant by the padi field. Both of them are 'professional' travelers. Obviously coming from a rich family in China and don't have to work for a living. So they just travel all the time around the world. They said they felt tired to deal with the people here eventhough they have two. So it must be kind of more difficult for me to deal with all these alone. They invited me to join them in their journey, but i rejected after some considerations. i think the expectation of trip might not be very same for us and they are places that i wanted to go but they have already been.

One decision leeds to another. By pure luck, when i got to the bus station in Hospect, i met a Canadian, Matt and a French, Vivien. i asked to join them in Goa and it ended up that, they both were such a great travelmate that in the end, we traveled for almost 2 weeks together.

Cost: 333 Rs



i met this Indian family when i needed helping hands. i will always remember them. They are fromAndhra Pradesh.



Tungabhadra River.

Hampi, India:2June07

The bus ride from My Sore to Hospet was terrible. Extremely bad. The Indian young guy beside of me were basically molesting me eventhough i pushed him away from time to time. He just leaned against me at my shoulder for the whole journey until i started to raise my voice at him and asked him to sleep properly!

The bus was very squeezed with 3 persons have to sit in the bench only fitted for two. It stopped from time to time to pick up more passengers and there were ashes dropped from the ceiling whenever the bus bumped onto something. The twelve hours night bus was the test of determination with the bus driver drove with the suicidal speed.

i rented a bicycle to travel around the ruins in Hampi. i like the ruins, impressive kind of workmanship. i tried to stay safe by sticked to other travellers or Indian families. Unfortunately, i still got my worst experience then.

The story goes by, two young Indian guys were following me at the temple area and i basically awared of that so i made sure that i sticked to others all the time. i thought they would give up then and at the branch road, i walked strayed from the family. To my horro then, i found these two guys just 100 meter away from me and they started to wear some kind of mask to cover their faces! So i started to scream as loud as i could. They kind of scared and walked away. Two foreigners heard me and walked with me to the main road. Then i joined an Indian family to walk back to the town.

i was really scared at that time then. i told the Indian family of what had happened and i found it both ridiculous and funny that, this was actually meant nothing to them! They were very excited to have a foreigner in their group and basically asking me to pose in their family photos! In some way, this has eased a bit of my fright and i really grateful to their kindness of walking with me

Cost: 560 Rs



Vittala Temple, a world heritage site. These outer "musical" pillars reverberate when tapped. I was followed and almost robbed on my 2km trek to this temple.



The wheels of this ornated stone chariot in the courtyard of Vittala Temple were once capable of turning.



The elephant stables of Royal Centre, where the state elephants once resided.