The Wandering Two: 2012

Thursday, October 25, 2012

Not-So-Much-Wandering-Anymore-Two

Hi from Seattle,

We have been here now for over two months and are settling in nicely. It has been sunny and beyond beautiful (until this week) and we enjoyed the chance to really get to explore our new city without it’s trademark rain and gloomy grey before school and work began. Long story short: we are sharing a nice two bedroom apartment with friends Kelly & Riyaz who also just moved here, in Magnolia just northwest of downtown. School is REALLY busy but REALLY good. I’m enjoying the program, the professors and my classmates a lot, but it has been a lot of work! Naveed got a job at the Nordstrom flagship store downtown conning people (I mean helping people) into buying $1000 Prada shoes, it is something for now and in the meantime he is on the hunt for a more permanent job. We are doing well, busy and happy and enjoying the community here a lot. Here are a few pictures of some of our adventures in and around Seattle.

Love,

The Wandering Two

Seattle Sounders game

Assembling too much IKEA furniture

Kelly & I unpacking and setting up the kitchen

With dear Nelli and Nura in Pikes Place Market

On the ferry to Victoria

Dallas Point, Victoria

WHALE!!!!

Tour of Theo's Chocolate Factory---unlimited free samples!!

The "gum wall" in downtown Seattle

Hike to beautiful Snow Lake

Snow Lake

Naveed took a 5 second dip in the freezing glacial waters

Salmon fishing with Aunt Jan, Uncle John and Ian

Monday, August 13, 2012

Change of Plans

So it turns out (3 months ago) that we will not be moving to Atlanta anymore. We changed our minds and decided to move to Seattle so that I can attend the University of Washington. I will still be doing my Master's in Global Public Health but both Naveed and I felt that the program at UW was more in line with my interests and with my experience and hopefully it will be the right fit. We've had a great summer living in good old Bath, Michigan, both of us working and enjoying spending time with the family. Now our car is packed up and ready to go; we're setting off tomorrow morning!

Below are a few pictures of a recent wandering to Prince Edward Island with the family for our dear friend, Zarrin's wedding.

Love,
The Wandering Two

Beautiful fields of flowers on beautiful Prince Edward Island

A failed jump by Point Prim Lighthouse, the oldest one on the island

With the beautiful bride and groom, congratulations Zarrin and Josh!

A tourist at Green Gables!


At PEI National Park enjoying the beach and the Atlantic Ocean

Fish and chips yum!

Sunday, April 22, 2012

Back to the Real World

Hi folks,

Sorry for not updating the blog recently, we've been in the midst of lots of changes. For one, we left India. Had a wonderful last couple weeks in Pune, working at Deep Griha and spending time with all of our friends in the city. We flew back home to Michigan after spending Naw-Ruz in London with Taraneh joon. Now we are staying with my parents, we both have gotten jobs and will be working and living here for the summer. We made a trip down to Atlanta to visit Emory University as it was one of the top contenders for where we will move in the fall and the city and campus won us over. We are planning to move down in August; we have already found an apartment close to campus and I will start my Master's in Global Public Health while Naveed works and explores business opportunities. We are eager to show you all some “Southern Hospitality” so please come visit us in Atlanta!

We are so grateful to have had the last (almost) two years together on this Wandering Two Adventure and so blessed to have had all the incredibly amazing experiences and opportunities that have changed our lives and taught us so many things about ourselves, each other and the beautiful world we live in. We especially want to thank our loving and supportive families, without whom this all could not have been possible and also those friends and family members that crossed oceans to come and visit us. We will continue to update the blog from time to time so don’t forget about us!

Love,

The Wandering Two

Saturday, March 10, 2012

One Last Trip

After finishing up our first week back at Deep Griha, seeing old friends and going to all of our favorite spots in Pune we set out on probably our final journey within India. We went with our friend Kelly to Bombay to pick up my cousin Armand and Telia who had come to visit us. If you recall, Telia was our first visitor and original Wandering Three member in Zonkizizwe long ago. We spent a hectic day in Bombay, visited the UNESCO Heritage caves temples on Elephanta Island. It was an hour ferry from the Gateway of India and the cave temples were built in the 5^th centrury and were very impressive. The pictures speak for themselves. After that, we indulged in our favorite afternoon tea at the Taj Hotel. I had hyped it up quite a bit, of course, but everyone told me that it exceeded their expectations.

The next day we said goodbye to Kelly and headed to Goa with Armand and Telia. We stayed in beautiful Palolem Beach once again. One day Armand led us on an adventure to find the hidden and beautiful Turtle Beach. The journey was definitely better than the destination and included a ride in a stolen boat with two little boys and walking for what felt like hours trying to find our way back to Palolem only to be told by everyone we passed that it would take us hours. Thankfully we made a friend, Sonya, whose mom got us a taxi. That night Armand decided he wanted us to have a seafood feast. All the restaurants in town had fresh seafood out for you to select so we bargained with one and ended up with the biggest lobster Ive ever seen, a crab, a red snapper, 2 kingfish and a sable and 24 prawns, plus rice, chips and salad! It was amazing!

The following day we rented scooters and rode all around Goa, seeing beaches and riding through fields and enjoying the beautiful views. I may want a scooter of my own after that! By the end of the day we still pretty much had a full tank of gas and had to return it empty as we woldn’t be reimbursed for the extra fuel. We stopped at a few places offering to sell our fuel at half price to anyone who wanted to siphon it and take it. We met a nice lady who ran a shop who bought it from us at market cost and had a hilarious experience siphoning the gas out of the scooters into water bottles for her to sell to people. Only in India!

The next day was Holi, the festival in India where everyone throws coloured paint at each other. We had been hearing mixed responses when we asked about the Holi celebrations so when we saw two people covered in paint we quickly asked them where they had been, bought some cheap white outfits and some colored powder and ran to join the festivities. What we found was a large congregation of locals dancing and singing and playing drums and throwing colored powder and paint at each other. They moved through the streets and from house to house and welcomed us into the mix by smearing our faces and clothes with color and encouraging us to dance along with them. There were few foreigners in the crowd and it was definitely a unique and very special experience. Afterwards, Armand tried to shower and clean all the paint off to find he was left with a green back and paint speckled head so we decided to go for a midnight swim under the full moon. The water was so warm and with the help of rubbing sand all over ourselves, most of the Holi colors came off.

We were sad to say goodbye as Armand and Telia left to do some traveling in the north and we returned to Pune. We only have a week and a half left here as we’ve decided to return to Michigan earlier than planned to get jobs for the summer and save money for our new life. More news coming soon.

Love,

The Wandering Two

Entrance to one of the cave temples on Elephanta Island

Inside the caves

With Kelly, Telia and Armand

View of the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel, the Gateway of India and the Bombay skyline from the harbour

Gateway of India

Cousins on an adventure!

Two boys, a stolen boat, and a dodgy river full of sewage

Fun in Goa with a waterproof camera!

Our sweet rides, colourful Armand

One of the most hilarious experiences

Pre-Holi, ready with our colours!

I got paint in my eyes, which made them water, which made it look like I had blood all over my face

What an awesome festival!

Kids drumming and singing

Palolem Beach

Monday, February 27, 2012

Further Adventures of the Wandering Four in Indai

The spelling of India in the title of this post is a typo made on purpose. While in Jaipur, the Pink City, mom wanted to buy a magnet. We found one she liked with a beautiful painted elephant on it and bought it for Rs40. It wasn’t until later that we noticed the “India” painted on the top of the magnet was actually spelled “Indai”. Typical. Mom just laughed and said it was so Indian and she didn’t mind the misspelling.

After Agra we wandered to Rajasthan, first stopping in the ‘Pink City’ of Jaipur. I had been there in 2008 and really enjoyed the shopping there so wanted to bring mom, Nura and Naveed there. We stayed in a great guesthouse that had a huge family suite for us all to be together and the Peacock Rooftop Restaurant with views of an old fort and the city and neat peacock decorations all over. One day we went to visit the Amber Fort/Palace. It is situated high in the hills surrounding Jaipur, was built in 1592 and was once the capital of Rajasthan. It is really beautiful and we had fun wandering around, climbing up and down stairs and wandering through passageways and the view was amazing. Naveed said it was his ‘most favoritest place’ ever because there was a snake charmer and he got to watch a cobra dance and giggled like a 5 year old. That evening we ventured to Chokhi Dhani, a reconstructed traditional Rajasthani Village. It was sort of like a theme park, Indian styles. We got to sit on cushions on the floor and eat a traditional Rajasthani thali for dinner which was delicious! Then there were elephant rides (which of course we avoided), a ferris-wheel-type contraction, dancers, singers, magicians etc. It was quite the interesting experience and definitely one of the best meals I’ve had in India!

Our next day in Jaipur consisted mainly of shopping. We did visit the City Palace and the Hawa Mahal then spent the rest of the day bargaining and head wobbling and lugging home bags filled with pashminas, skirts and dresses, a table cloth, some keychains, jewelry and other goodies, including a box of yummy Indian sweets.

The following day we had a flight to Udaipur which kept getting delayed and delayed and delayed (thanks Kingfisher Airlines…) but we finally made it to our final stop, Panorama Guest House in beautiful Udaipur. Udaipur is located near Lake Pichola, the Taj Lake Palace is on an island in the middle of the lake and the buildings are all gleaming white and really beautiful unique architecture. It was Shiva’s birthday the day we arrived and we heard the celebrations long into the night. The next day we decided to take a boat ride on the lake. It took us a long time to find the place where the boats went out from but we made it and went on a dodgy little speedboat with 8 other Indians in a 20 minute circle around the lake.

We did a lot more shopping in our couple days in Udaipur and also took an Indian cooking class from the wife of the owner of our guesthouse. She was lovely and we had so much fun learning how to make the food and then eating it all for a delicious lunch! We learned how to make chai, potato pakoras, dhal, aubergine potato curry, potato pulao, onion tomato raita, chapattis and halva. It was one of my favorite experiences of the trip and hopefully when we all go home we might actually try to make the foods and invite you over for a traditional Rajasthani feast!

Our last day with mom and Nura in India was spent visiting the City Palace in Udaipur, and yes, doing some last minute shopping. They flew back to Delhi and then home meanwhile Naveed and I’s flight to Mumbai was canceled with no prior notice from Kingfisher and no other arrangements made for us. We ended up buying the last two seats on another airline to get us home 5 hours later than planned and $450 poorer! Boo!

Anyways, we’re back in Pune now. Looking forward to seeing everyone back at Deep Griha and our friends here in the city. There’s a lot of new volunteers here so the house is full. We’re not sure exactly how long we’ll be here, still waiting to hear from some universities but for now just enjoying being back in India! We are looking forward to having more visitors (aren’t we lucky to have such wonderful friends and family who come halfway around the world to visit us!?) in Armand and Telia who arrive next weekend in Mumbai!!!

Love,

The Wandering Four/Two