"Whoa!" I yelled at the cow that had thrown me off balance in attempts to get cuddly and nuzzle my leg. I gave in and pet the soft coat between her big black eyes. No, I'm not on a farm- I'm in Udaipur, India- a city of a million people, where cows wander the streets and cars swerve to miss hitting them.

Cows in India are sort of like dogs in the States; they wander in the streets and get fed by people. The main difference, however, is that cows get fed a lot more and don't bite. You'll also never see a stray cow as they are probably owned by someone. If for some strange reason a cow is left homeless, then it is quickly snatched up, for having a cow, it is believed in India, brings one closer to God.

Cows are sacred in India. They are seen as an all-giving mother, providing milk which is a staple in the Indian diet. Hindus would never dream of eating one; to do so would be sacrilege.

So the cows leave their homes in the morning, and wander around their neighborhoods getting fed. A cow is a unique form of social welfare. To feed a cow is to be blessed by God. So you see Hindus holding out chapatis and fruits that the cows eat with their big fat cow lips, the Hindus touch their ears and eyes afterwards, like how Christians cross themselves to pay homage to God. To feed a cow is to be blessed. And because everyone wants to be in the gods’ favor, the cows are happy and fat and give their owners lots of milk when they finally shuffle home in the evening.

I haven't gotten tired of studying the cows here in the state of Rajasthan where I've just spent an amazing six weeks. A rainbow of saris, bejeweled camels, and ice-cream scoop roofs of Mogul architecture, Rajashtan is a whirlwind of candy for the eye. Here in Udaipur-a city of palaces and temples and shiny lakes- I am nearing the completion of my travels around Rajastan and will depart from this lovely kaleidoscope country in a few days to make my way further down south to Bombay.

I say country, because leaving Rajasthan for Bombay is like leaving one country for another, instead of travelling to another state. And this is one of the things that make India so fascinating. Presently, the Subcontinent is divided into six countries: India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan, and Bangladesh. I say presently, for with so many rebel movements in these countries, and considering that the borders of these countries are less than a hundred years old and still in a state of motion, it will be anyone's guess what new borders will be carved and shaped out of which wars.

And so for now, India is the biggest of these new countries. When we think of a country we think of a culture that dominates that country. Of course there are regional differences, but normally a country shares the same language, race, and style of dressing. In India, you have every color of skin imaginable. Black in the south, white in the north, yellow in the East, and red and brown everywhere else. In India, you have fourteen languages, twelve scripts, and hundreds of dialects. In India, you have Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, Christians, and Jews just to name a few of the many faiths there. With every religion, race, and dress represented you sometimes get the impression that the whole world has been compressed into this corner of the world. And it does sometimes feel like that when walking down a crowded Indian street; the whole world is bustling right along with you, elbowing and vying for a bit of space.

Though the dialect changes every hundred kilometers here in Rajasthan, the main language spoken is Hindi, which is written in the Devanagari Script. I've purchased a Hindi phrasebook and have learned a bit of the language during my stay here. I can now count to a hundred, ask about someone's family, and request that my food not be too spicy. I felt that I was making some headway with the language, but I'll pretty much have to scrap the phrasebook when I head down south. For though some people can speak Hindi, many people are learning it, just like me. Marathi is the language spoken in Bombay, so not everyone is going to understand me when I try to communicate. It'll be like starting from square one again; ground zero in illiteracy. I was beginning to make some sense of the world around me, but it's back to the funhouse again.

Going from Rajasthan to Bombay isn't like going from, say, Ohio to Florida. Sure, both are roughly the same distance from each other. But I will dare to say that going from Rajasthan to Bombay is like going from Finland to Morocco: worlds away in language, and worlds away in culture.

I don't really know what to expect from Bombay. I do know that it's more crowded, cosmopolitan, and has a different language reverberating down its streets. The only thing I know about Bombay is that it will be different.

Until the whitewash of globalization sweeps over the world and makes it into one homogenous place where humanity will more or less be the same, India will continue to be a smorgasbord of all that is available in the Subcontinent; a magical and maddening travel destination. Sometimes it’s not that bad being in the funhouse, especially when cute cows come around the corner and nuzzle against your leg.