A day as a cat!: Incredible India

I hopped onto the plane to India for an incredible short trip on 11th Apr... the flight there was alright.. although checking in was disastrous thanks to a minor blunder... I reached New Delhi International Airport at 2am, india timing... it felt like I had gone back into time upon reaching the airport... remember Changi Airport's old arrival termina? The ones with people waiting to pick you up at both sides? that's how it felt at delhi...

Nitin arranged for a driver to pick us up at the airport and the moment we stepped out, we met with a sandstorm... and for me, other than the sandstorm, it is the fact that I was surrounded by numerous Indians... freaked me out a fair bit...cos all the time, in singapore, we're surrounded by people of different races, not just one...

As soon as I got onto the car, I heard a lot of car horns sounding... it's freaking hell 2am! It took not long to realise horning is a way of life in India.. driving there is suicidal..there are no road markings, no traffic lights, no street lamps... drivers are reckless and cutting into each other's lane is common, high beaming other cars are acceptable... it made all reckless drivers found in singapore polite drivers...

so after a 45 mins ride, we reach nitin's place... a 3 storey block standing on its own... he's staying with his cousin, who's doing his MBA at the moment.. or rather, the cousin is staying with him... he was kind enough to give up the master bedroom and squeeze with his cousin... hehe... while alone in the room, I spotted something familiar

HP tag.... a good sense of familiarity...

by the time i slept, it was close to 5.00am... didn't sleep much.. woke up at 6.30am... and found the guys still sleeping so i got up for a nice little shower and some tv time... guess what i saw on tv?

xiaodingdang.... in hindi.. *faint*

on and off, i fell asleep... by the time, we really got moving it was close to 11am... we had a long journey to jaipur...to visit an ancient fort, taj mahal as well as some female shopping.. hehe...

on the way there, we saw lots of cows, elephants, camels, dogs etc on the road... being a city girl, wild animals were a rare sight for me... so i went, "wow! moo moo!!!" this sentence apparently, was later told to every single person that we met on this trip... courtesy of Mr Sharma... *embarrassed*

so here's the ancient fort...

it is now a hotel/resort.. a beautiful place...

the land that used to be owned by the king who built the fort...

me on their day bed... can i have one of these at my own place?

guess what is this? it's a lantern holder... cool huh?

then we saw these on our descent down to the car...

peacocks and my fav porky pig, the wild boar...

after that, we checked into the local hotel for our one night stay there.. trident by hilton... here's the room and the view

original plan was to just get the garden view.. but the hotel ran out of the rooms and gave us a free upgrade to lake view and at a cheaper rate... good bargain... eh, but our lake view got blocked by the trees... darn!

after resting and watching some tv... we headed down to chockidani... *did i spell i correctly??* it's a hotel cum resort.. like our downtown east... over there, we saw a lot of cultural performances... here's some of them..

we also took elephant rides that scared the shit out of the both of us.. and i tried their version of teh tarik...

and shamelessly took their terra cotta cups and leaf bowls back to singapore...

this is us, after the elephant rides...posing with the moo-moos..

me and my henna painting...

that night, nitin shared with me his childhood photos, photos that he had with his counterparts in HP...AND i had a sleepless night again thanks to *ahem* the room mate... so i dragged him out of bed at 6.00am to catch the sunrise with me...heheh

had a hearty breakfast before moving off to taj mahal...

and one last photo with the doorman before we left...

headed down to the market in jaipur and got some shawls and other stuff...

the windows in this building are all not covered by glass panels... fake one... hehe

here's the pic of a huge truck that is blocking our way on the highway.. i suspect the horning culture started bcos of these guys...

after a long long car ride, we finally reach the taj mahal....

the self proclaimed great cameraman took this... hehe

us at the taj mahal

view from the taj mahal

the first impression is truly a "wow"... however, subsequently, it was the case of an "ouch, ouch, ouch" why?
it is an indeed a beautiful piece of work, given the time it was built and the lack of equipment, the great love story behind it.. but to enter the taj, you need to remove your shoes and the floor was freaking hot!!!! imagine walking on orchard road at 4 plus 5 barefooted... yeah.. that's how we felt... and plus, while we were in there to view the coffin, ppl were shouting away and disturbing the peace and quiet that associated with the place... so my feet were screaming due to the burning heat and my ears were aching from the shouting...

at taj, we also took a horsey ride... as vehicles were to be parked at a distance from the entrance so such modes of transports were available..

beautiful horsey huh??

so we left for delhi after that... as travelling on the road requires good headlights, we stopped at one mechanic to get them checked before travelling... so i took pics of the sunset...

stopped at mac for a small bite... at india mac, they have this box to collect all the unused chilli, ketchup which I thought was rather cool... at least they dun throw it away like the way we do...

the veggie and non veggie burgers.. no prize for guessing whose is who's...

had a good rest on sunday.. finally!! nitin had to work on monday so he work up at close to 800am... well, i woke him up... his colleague who stays 15 mins away dropped by at abt 830am to pick him up for work... and that fella kept ppl waiting for 30 mins while he was in the shower.. and i had to chat with the colleague to make sure he wasnt bored...

at 1130am, islam, the driver came to pick me up for HP office.. i was supposed to meet mayank.. the manager i worked with in HP.. we contacted only via email and msn and have never met...
here's he...

and the colleague who came by in the morning... i felt bad cos i was parked in his room and disturbing him while waiting for nitin for lunch...

other than them, i met nitin's team of guys... a real cool bunch of ppl... now i know why nitin is constantly at work... who wants to be away from these bunch of nice guys? i also met priyansh... he's the india country manager when i was working in hp... forgot to take photo.. doh!! a cheerful and warm guy...

we did lunch with gunjan, a female friend of ours... check out the restaurant...

nitin told me it used to be an army barracks... it served good indian food... and well, we had a good time there...

after that, i went shopping with twinkle, nitin's cousin... got more shawls and earrings!!!!

it was a long day and we met nitin's two colleagues for drinks and one drink turned into two drinks and it went on....

the whole gang... we had a truly happy time there...

me and nitin... dun tell me he's cute.. i know that myself.. and he's taken... dun try anything funny... i warn u...his gf is very fierce...

me and shalini... she adores me so much that nitin gets jealous...
so we were drinking for close to 5 hrs... and by then i had developed a slight gastric and i was truly tired...

we didn;t do much on tuesday... nitin was working from home and i was just lazing around.. we did go out to get some dvds and had a good dinner at nitin's favourite restaurant.. flavours.. i took this pic with the doggies at his place.. they're not his, but strays.. i wish i could keep them!!