Okay, Rishikesh was not the place to rely on e-mail but other than that it was a nice refuge from Delhi. It is where the Ganges River is running clean before it hits Varanasi. My Brit pal and I pre-booked our bus tickets with seat numbers 19 and 20 but when we got on the bus our driver thought differently. Being the only foreigners on the bus we were seated in the front cab with the driver and his little shrine. They made us change buses not twice but thrice, each time to have that lucky seat in the front. Oh, how lucky we were. While everyone slept, I was wedged between my pal and the 'doorman' (who coudn't have possibly been more than 17 years of age). The driver played loud ear-splitting music throughout the night and the doorman... he was not in the mood to work as he crashed as soon as the roar of the engine was hear... he crashed on me. First my shoulder than my lap... his sleepy head left him a dead weight on my lap... no matter how hard I tried to wake him up he was not going to budge. So for the next 7 hours into the sweaty night, there laid the 'doorman' on my lap.

We managed to arrive in Rishikesh at 5am and welcomed with a cool breeze. It had the feeling of paridise after leaving the hot and grimey Delhi. I embrassed the cool air with full force and off we went to find an Ashram to stay at the for next couple of nights (though a couple turned to three). As we were given our room, exhaustion hit us to the floor and there we slept for the next 5 hours completely ignoring the hard wooden yet welcoming beds that stood before us. The floor was just so much more attainable in our eyes. We awoke refreshed and ready to begin our day so we set off for a morning lassi, pranthas, and thanda panni (cold water). We stumbled upon the ashram where the BEATLES once spent their days and so for hours we simply explored the old abandoned buildings. It was fascinating to see the beehived shaped homes equipped with their very own meditation areas and the solitary meditation spaces. We came accross a room filled with sacks of paperwork and a mess of letters and postcards and forms just scattered all about so we set to work, knee-deep in paper (and whatever else) to find some proof that the BEATLES had been truly there. Somewhat dissapointed as there was no BEATLES paraphanalia we armed ourselves with old letters and postcards to take back with us!

The next day we trekked the opposite direction to find a secluded riverside. We spent the day emersing ourselves in the holy water of the Ganges. We bathed and swam and even drank the water... but truth be told, I brought along my little MEC water bottle equipped with filter and chlorine solutions so we purified the already 'pure' water of the Ganges! I like to take calculated risks! We planned to test out our rafting skills the next day and then head back to Delhi but when Monday came around it was Election Day and thus everything was closed... we couldn't even hitched a bus back to Delhi. We didn't know what to do so we just meandered about and came accross one little magazine shop and Shah Rukh Khan was smiling at us from the cover of 'FilmFare'. You guessed it! We bought and sat by the river and read all day!

We did manage to go rafting yesterday. It was an exhilirating 12km down the Ganges. A mere 500Rps (about 10 dollars US). My rafting pal was a little girl who clung to me and called me Didi (I think that means sisters?!). We left shortly after the rafting and grabbed a bus back to Delhi... somehow we managed to sit right up front again with the driver. but the ride was hotter and stuffier so I clung to the window and managed to have my arm pinched between the windows. I wander about with my green kerchief around my arm as a bandage to help keep the Delhi dirt away (yes, I tried the chemist but they don't have any larger bandages). Now I will rest a day or two and decide what's next...

Note: Only one person allowed in each dish.
- quoted from menu at Lucky Restaurant, Rishikesh