Thursday, August 21, 2008

I'm Married!!!!


Yep - you read it right. . .I am now married. Those of you who really know me well, then this shouldn't really come as a surprise now should it?! I always said that it would be quick and fast and come right out of left field and boy does this ever! Seriously though, I figured about 4 days ago that I would be better off married while I am here - so 4 days ago, I found myself a husband, he doesn't have a name, he is a businessman and he is coming over to join me at the beginning of September. In other words - he is fictious - sorry for the heart attack mom. I have been routinely asked, mainly by my taxi drivers, if I am married and have realized it is much easier to answer "yes" than "no". Funny thing is, none of them seem to notice that I don't wear a wedding band (but I do have an explanation for that - my fingers swell in the heat, had to take it off). I have found that by having a "boss", as one driver called him, makes my life much easier and I don't have to answer so many questions.

Well I am about a week into my experience/holiday and I can finally say that I am starting to enjoy myself. I flew down to Goa from Delhi on Tuesday and let me tell you what a great change in scenery it was and it immediately put me in a better frame of mine (let's put it this way - I was looking for the first plane back to Canada by Tuesday!). Goa reminds me a lot of the Carribean - it is very lush and green, the roads are narrow and the people are friendly. I have booked myself into a resort in South Goa called the Royal Orchid - I found it on Expedia when I was in Delhi and it looked pretty good. I can tell you that it ain't no Four Seasons but it sure in the hell a lot better than some of the sh*t holes I stayed in in Rajasthan for double the price! All it all, it is a 3 star resort - rooms are clean, bed is comfortable, they have a nice pool. Given that it is still monsoon season down here, the resort is anything but busy! Speaking of monsoons, the only rain that I have experienced was this morning when I woke up - it was pouring out but it only lasted about 20 minutes and then it was blue skies and sunny all day! I even burnt the marshmellow. . .dumb me! I decided to take a walk down the beach and ended up going about 8km down to a little town called Colva. There I found a restaurant that is owned by a British guy and managed to finally eat some comfort food - mashed potatoes and chicken pot pie. The chicken in the chicken pot pie had a little too much chicken flavour to it, but the mashed potatoes were real and made me feel a whole lot better. I then spent the next hour teaching my waiter how to do Su Doku - we did 3 puzzles together and he didn't want me to leave. . .maybe I should have mentioned my husband! LOL! Given that I was pretty toasted by then (and had no sunscreen in my bag) I opted to take an auto-rickshaw back to my hotel - which was a good thing when I realized just how far it was. . . I am sure that I would still be walking!

So my thoughts on India (I know that you are all wondering and given that I haven't blogged much about my first week, I figure I should share with you a bit now) - well let's just say that the none of my pre-trip nerves were worth it. I have mentally prepared for the worst, but experienced something a lot different. Delhi was a lot less crowded than I expected, it didn't smell as bad as I was expecting and the proverty wasn't as extreme - don't get me wrong, it was bad (will blog about that later) but then again, maybe I was too sensitized before I left. Delhi was also a lot less cosmopolitan than I was expecting. I was expecting it to be much more of a commercial/business hub with some large office buidlings/downtown core or something but it had none of that. Rather, it was a dump. Yep, a dump - or at least I thought so. The only redeeming feature of Delhi in my opinion was the Domestic Airport - which was very nice to fly out of! After about a day in Rajasthan (which is the state that Delhi is in) I wanted to leave! I will fill you in on my Rajasthan experience in my next blog.

In the mean time, I have come to these conclusions. . . I am much more of a Four Seasons/Westin type of holiday person. I thought that I liked to do the "cultural" thing - but I want to do it by nice little day trips from a really nice resort! I have really learned a lot about myself and my travel preferences on this holiday and I am sure that I will keep on learning considering I still have almost 3 more weeks! Until tomorrow. . . .keep smiling!


3 comments:

Vacation Girl said...

Heather - you really should have let me hook you up with my friend in Mumbai to help with your travel.. he planned my entire trip to Rajasthan and mine was fantastic - great hotels, awesome driver - I didn't want to leave... if you want me to connect you to help with anything, let me know, he's awesome - and loves CAnadians.. and is very well connected... email me if you want his contact info - I've been talking to him this week already anyway, so could connect you two.
nfullerton@dow.com
Nancy

Vacation Girl said...

Here's his info just in case... he would love to help out or just meet you (and if you want to do some shopping, he's the guy)
Vishnu Bhimrajka - email him and I'll let him know you might be contacting him...

vishnu@bhimrajka.com

Hot Momma said...

I am so happy you're sticking it out. I don't know if I would but I'd like to think I could. I'm going furniture shopping today...the bank upped the line o' credit...lucky me. keep blogging. I love to hear about your adventure. K