Panaji, Goa, India: 4June07

Welcome to Little Lisbon!

We arrived with the disasterious bus trip from Hospect to Margao (not Panaji) that we wanted to go, at the ungodly hour of 4.30am. The bus ride was extremely unpleasant. Bumpy and very hot and again, i was molested by some Indian guy when Matt went to the seat behind to lie down.

When we got settled down at the guest house in Panaji, it was already 1pm. When we got the ticket to Bombay done, it was already late afternoon. We then took the 4.5km walking tour. It was just one hour and the walk was a pleasant one.

Goa has a very different feel from other India cities. At least, they serve beef here. People also tend to not bother you and there was hardly anyone asked us "which country?", "What is your name?" - For some reasons, these questions are 'important' to some very curious Indian. This place reminded me of Macau, the almost same Portuguese influence, with the Portuguese style of buildings and churches. Even the Hindu temples don't look like an Hindu temple at all.

Cost: 692 Rs



Church of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception, standing above the square in the town centre of Panaji, Goa. Built by the Portuguese.



The sunset by Mandovi River, Panaji.



This interesting looking building is not a house owned by some rich people and it is not a wonderland for kids too. :) (It looks like some kind of castle to me.) This is Maruti Temple dedicated to the monkey god, Hanuman. The temple's veranda provides fine views towards the Mandovi River.



One of the city view from Maruti Temple.

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.

My Sore-Hospet, India: 1June07

Shopping, Thali ...

i generally find it difficult to find coffee or tea without milk in India. A lot of time, even if i asked for without milk, what was served will still be something with milk.

i would just do shopping for the day. i went into a shop and the shop keeper insisted that i am the first customer and i MUST buy something from her, or else there would be bad luck for the day to her. In the end, i bought a blouse which i didn't really want.

There are not many female shopkeepers (almost none) selling clothes over here. i found it a bit uncomfortable to buy female cloth from the male and i doubt they know anything about female fashion. But somehow i managed to buy an Indian kalwar salmeez then. The shopkeepers kept wanted to sell me the sparking bright yellow or orange color garments and i had to repeat and repeat to him that, i am not used to this kind of thing! i was glad that, in the end, i settled at something less bright in color.

Cost: 655 Rs



Sayyaji Rao Road, the main shopping street.



The 'usual' India street sight. The vehicle and animal carriage both on running on the same road.



The Thali. India is a heaven for vegetarian.