Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Random Ramblings

OK, I looked back over my notes which look very interesting because trying to write on a very bumpy bus is NOT easy. I only hope I can interpret all that when I get home! Anyway, I jotted down several things in no particular order and they will be all jammed up together. So here goes. I am now on notebook #3. In the streets we see pigs, cows and water buffalo. They just wander around everywhere. I think I mentioned the dung is collected and used for fuel. Actually though I have not seen any "minefields" in the streets, which is rather surprising. We passed a man or woman walking down the side of the road with a load of hay on their head at least 10' by 10'. It was enormous!! Oh, we went to a castle that people can ride elephants to (I may have mentioned this also) and I had my picture taken with an elephant! Too cool! We saw a man who makes pottery. He had a big round spinning wheel. It sat on a little point of wood in the middle as the balance and spinner. He had a stick that he put on the wheel and spun the wheel around and around and around. Then he put a blob of clay on the wheel. He proceeded then to make SIX different pieces of pottery from that one blob of clay and never had to spin the wheel again. I bet it spun for 10 minutes or more! I was amazed. We have ridden in many different types of transportation. The other day it was a Jugad - kinda like a pick up - Of course there were only 13 of us in it rather than 35! :-) The Taj Mahal was built by Shah Jahan in memory of his wife who died after 19 years of marriage. During that time she bore him 14 children and had 3 miscarriages. Story goes that a woman asked her husband if he would built her a Taj Mahal (Crown Palace) and he said "Sure. If you will bear me 14 children in 19 years!" LOL Ok, so much for my random ramblings.

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