India Week 2: Dan in Chittorgarh and Udaipur

January 28, 2018
by Dan

I really loved my time in Bundi. Probably I should have stayed for longer, but I wanted to more places in India. There were some weird things happening on my last day and a half in Bundi. There was some religious dispute brewing or expected and the government shut down internet access. Happy new year! And while I was leaving all of the shops and restaurants were closed and police were everywhere in town. No one seemed very concerned, maybe it was all precautionary. But it seemed like a good time to make my exit.

On my way to catch my bus out of town, a shop owner stopped me to chat in typical Rajistani fashion. I told him I was going to Udaipur and he suggested that I should stop by Chittorgarh since it’s midway point between Bundi and Udaipur. With no fixed plans, or even internet access to make them, I decided to go for it. Off to the bus stop I went repeating Chittorgarh in my head so I could ask for the right bus.

I had to ask around for the bus stop and everyone would ask “government or private.” I responded, “whichever is cheaper… is there a difference?” It didn’t matter in this instance because, possibly due to the dispute mentioned above, because there were no private buses running. I ended up at the government bus terminal and I found my bus. The government buses are cheaper with fixed rates so that there is no haggling for a fair price.  But they are in worse condition than the private buses. A 6 hour ride to Udaipur in a government bus, bouncing along dirt roads with no suspension would have been too much. But a three hour ride to Chittorgarh was tolerable.

I arrived in Chittorgarh (the fort of Chittor) around 4 pm. Luckily I had internet connection again, and so I was able to locate several hotels near the bus stop. I made a loop asking prices. I found out that none of the cheap/reasonable hotels had WiFi. The hotels with WiFi cost three times what I was hoping.

I ended up choosing Natraj Tourist Hotel because it was the cheapest and went with out the WiFi. It was just about the same quality as the other hotels and it was the closest to the bus stop. I later made a search for hostels and found a few options on Google maps, but not on any of the hostel booking websites. I went to check them out in case I wanted to extend my stay and found out that none of the ones on Google exist. This is a strange tourist town.

My one day in Chittorgarh was spent full on touristing. I walked 17 km that day; it was a lot of sightseeing and well worth it. I went to visit the fort, which is apparently the largest one in Asia. Entry to the fort is free, but there is a tourist ticket you need to buy to access a few sites within the fort. Mostly the fort is full of temples. They are everywhere. All of them are absolutely beautiful are all free to visit. Most of the things in the tourist ticket weren’t so interesting to me, such as ruins of palaces.

The most notable thing to me about all the the temples, towers, and palaces was the amazing stone carvings everywhere. That was truly a delight. And I played Tomb Raider in the abandoned Baori (step well, pictured in the panoramic photo), jumping between all of those pedestals to reach the other side.

 

One of my favorite places on the tourist ticket was the Padmini Mahal. This is the water palace of Padmini, who was a beautiful princess with lots of stories about her, and apparently this palace was the inspiration for the construction of similar water palaces like the Taj Mahal. A cool place in it’s own right but wait, beautiful princess Padm___ that lives in a palace surrounded by water. Water being unlike sand, which is coarse and rough and irritating, and it gets everywhere. Sound familiar George Lucas?

Next up Udaipur, the city of lakes. After so many days without proper internet, that was my top priority for a place in Udaipur. I booked Backpacker Panda Hostel on Lake Fateh Sagar. They have two locations, and of the two, this was cheaper and quite far from city center. But that was perfect for me. I was exhausted from touristing so many days in a row and I extremely pleased that the neighborhood was quite and peaceful and very close to the lake. Even the main part of the town was relatively quiet for how big of a town it is.

I did practically nothing for two days and it was great. My biggest excitement during that time was going for a run around the lake. I also made it a habit of eating along the lake where there were some fast food restaurants that served great coffee and chai. (Also pictured: sweets, the Indian take on a sandwich, daal bhati which was recommended to me over and over again here, and raw sugar cane juice)

 

Also interesting note on the hostel; this was absolutely the cleanest place that I stayed so far. They were really strict about no shoes in the hostel and the bathrooms were pristine. The bathrooms were also finished, in the sense that they were tiled instead of just raw concrete like most bathrooms I’ve experienced here. The one thing they were missing was the big bucket, which I was puzzled by in an earlier post. I was not affected by this because I don’t know what the big bucket is for, but I still felt a sense of longing for the big bucket.

On my last day I was sitting around with a few of the Indian guests and they were complaining that the hot water was scalding hot (it was and difficult to modulate with the cold water). And then they said “and where’s the bucket! You guys need to have a bucket.” I was so excited to learn its use. The front desk guy told them that there is no need for a bucket because the shower has hot and cold water. They said that they needed the bucket in order to get perfect temperature for bathing. I tried to inquire further, but was just told that a bucket is the best way to bath and nothing else compares. No further details were forthcoming, but evidently water temperature has something to do with it. I’ll keep inquiring.

The folks at Backpacker Panda were really great. One night I went out to dinner with my buddy Chetan and his friend. We sat across the lake from the City Palace which was gorgeous when lit up, then we went to a romantic lake side restaurant Hari Garh and shared a mutton dish and beer. It was great to navigate the city with a native speaker. It was far less stressful to find transit and ask for things at the restaurant.

 

After this I decided to move into town so that it was easier to see some of the sites. I wound up at Moustache Hostel because of the price (not because of the name, the mustache craze drives me nuts). It is a pretty decent hostel, but not as nice as Backpacker Panda. I spent my first day trying to hunt down a train ticket for my departure, which left me empty handed. The process required knowing the exact departure times, queuing up at multiple counters, begging a nearby hotel to make a printed copy of my passport, and ultimately the only available tickets were too costly. I ended up with a bus ticket, but a sleeper seat this time so I was excited for that. Mostly I just walked around looking for chai and food.

I also went to a really cool dance and puppet show at Bagore Ki Haveli, but I have no pictures because it was an extra fee. It sounded cheesy to me, but I heard so many great things that I gave it a try and far exceeded my expectations. The best way I can describe it is if the fiendish Dr. Wu were to decide to host a kung fu tournament in Rajasthan with all of the greatest fighters in the world, this would be the entertainment the night before the tournament.

There were several rounds of dances from various parts of Rajasthan, a pretty great puppeteer, and traditional music on the harmonium accompanied by percussion instruments. The dancing started off with three women coming out with big flaming pots of oil balanced on their heads. My favorite dance was done seated with these nun-chuck bells that the women would swing around and bounce off of various metal plates on their bodies. I would have sat through a full hour of just that. The evening ended with the most senior dancer performing balances with a huge pot balanced on her head, then two, then three, the six, then nine. It was insane. She was older with a rather feeble looking walk, but she was so smooth when balancing pots on her head. Just like a ancient kung-fu master. She won the tournament despite the fiendish Dr. Wu’s elaborate plans.

On my final day in Udaipur I went to the main tourist attraction, the City Palace, even though I was feeling a bit burnt out on tourist attractions. I had heard that this palace was mostly closed off to the public and you only got to see a portion of it. It’s true, but even so I’m really glad I went. It has beautiful architecture and some really cool paintings of royal people doing royal things. There were some fun paintings full of figures with slightly enlarged heads all doing things like smoking hookah, dancing, hunting, lounging royally, stuff like that.

 

After the palace I all I had to do was wait for my overnight bus back to Delhi en route to Amritsar.

Bonus thoughts:

I’ve been walking a lot, and navigating through the streets of India means occasionally shifting your shoulder to avoid a passing car. This sort of behavior from motorists would enrage me in the US, but not so much in India. When someone passes you that close in the US, it’s because they are inattentive or trying to scare you for the offense of encroaching on their sacred pavement to which only they are entitled. In India, it seems like the drivers doing this fully aware of you and where the side of their vehicle is. It’s not any safer, but the intent seems entirely different. It’s much more crowded on the streets, and they’re just trying to squeeze past.

I also noticed that a lot of people walk in the direction of traffic, the opposite of what we are told to do in the US. I was walking with a local to dinner one night and he explicitly had us cross the road to walk with traffic. I asked about this and he said it’s what they’re taught to do in school. He also said that it makes no sense to him, but that’s the way it is. Huh. I’m still opting to have a modicum of control over the situation and walking facing traffic when I remember which direction that is.

Dan’s first week alone in India – Jaipur and Bundi

January 14, 2018
by Dan

With Christina gone to Rishikesh, I decided to stay put in Delhi one more day. Despite the smog I found a park, but the one I found was just barren and brown and dusty except for the trash littered everywhere. The smog made my eyes sting. And people were out enjoying the park like it was normal. I don’t have a good photo to portray this, but the level of environment apocalypse happening made me think of Mad Max, for real.

After that I went to the tailor for a custom shirt. Christina had gone to this shop, D. Vaish & Sons, to get some tailor-made suits for herself. When Christina went to get measured I wasn’t thinking of getting anything for myself because I don’t like dressing up. But since I do have trouble finding shirts that don’t choke me or billow out around the waist I decided to head back and get fitted. So now I got a guy in Delhi.

After that I decided to check out Jaipur which is part of the “Golden Triangle”: Delhi, Jaipur, and Agra (Taj Mahal). Christina and I are going to go see the Taj Mahal together after her training, so I thought Jaipur was the most obvious place to go. I was hoping that it would be a bit better in terms of the pollution and commotion since it’s a smaller town.

Next, how to get there? Originally I thought, ‘oh India, I’ll take the train and it will be a delight.’ No, you need to know where you’re going and book trains in advance (apparently you can get lucky last minute but it’s far from certain). After Latin America I was way too accustomed to winging it with travel planning. Just show up and figure it out. The only way to do that in India is buses.

Everyone says the buses suck and the more posh locals say that it’s not a good way to travel, but I love the buses here. They go everywhere for good prices. On some of them the suspension is gone so it’s bumpy and a bit uncomfortable, but I can sleep through just about anything so doesn’t matter to me.

The confusing thing about getting a bus ticket was that everyone was shouting things like “Volvo” “A/C” “seater” “sleeper” “1+2!!”… What? Ok, Volvo I guess is the fancy nice buses. A/C is obvious, but doesn’t matter because it’s winter. Seater means a seat … where you sit … like a normal bus. Sleeper means that above the seat are areas that you can lie down in. Definitely I wanted to take advantage of this on some overnight bus in the future just because it seems so cool to climb up into your little bunk for a bus ride. 1+2 or 2+2 means the number of seats on each side of the bus. 1+2 is nice if you are a single traveler and get to sit on the 1 side.

With location and transit settled, I took off from Delhi and arrived on Christmas night at Sindhi Camp which is the main bus hub in Jaipur. I was delighted by the long line of steaming colorful food carts and, relatively less traffic than Delhi, but it was still pretty crazy.

Then I took the wonderfully cheap metro to AmigosIndia Hostel. Oh man, what a great find. It’s a huge mansion of a place with excellent people. Not a literal mansion, but a big house. First thing I did was go on a beer run with a manager on the back of a moped. It was quite an adventure to get to live the Indian traffic experience from the inside. Then we had a bonfire, beer, tandoori chicken, and cake. It was a lot of fun.

Jaipur had a lot to offer tourists, but it all came at pretty steep prices. I had plans to see a lot more, but I found that I didn’t have enough time. Transit consistently took a lot longer than expected and the constant stopping to chat with people really slows you down. But I would never just brush people off here because I met some really friendly people by taking the time to engage everyone in conversation. I think it makes the journey more worthwhile overall even if I miss out of seeing the house of some rich dead dude.

First on the list of attractions was Amer (Amber Fort), which is the main tourist destination in Jaipur. There wasn’t much info on public transport options to get there but I found red public buses to Amer that left just east of Ajmeri gate. But I wasn’t able to make it all the way there because of a protest blocking the road. I couldn’t find an English speaker, but the protest had something to do with water.

I scored a ride on the back of a moped the rest of the way. It was an odd journey that consisted of a stop at the guy’s house to offer me water, picking up a make believe relative, and then riding in circles for a bit before leading me to a guy selling parasols and turbans outside of the fort.

The fort itself was amazing and huge. There wasn’t any signage so I first wandered through the narrow halls on the outer edge without other tourists. I got a bit lost in the process and so then headed back through to see the courtyards. The courtyards and main paths were jammed full of people. It was lots of fun imagining how grand it must have been in its heyday. And also because I’m ignorant, I make-believed different scenes in my head from Aladdin the whole time.

From there I just ran down to Jal Mahal because the traffic was backed up. It was only 4 km away and I didn’t feel like adding to the mess of motor vehicles at the moment. The Jal Mahal is a duck hunting lodge built in the middle of a lake. I still can’t wrap my head around what the city must have been like when these places were in use. The lake is pretty polluted and gross but it’s quite a cool building. Unfortunately you can’t actually visit inside of it. Over the next few days I had a lot of tuk-tuk drivers try to tell me that they could take me there for a good rate, and that it’s free, and there is a festival happening today. It was a strange scam and I probably would have fallen for it if I hadn’t visited already.b

On the next day I decided to hit up the rest of the tourist attractions in the city center. This ended up being just Jantar Mantar for time and money reasons. Jantar Mantar is a collection of astronomical devices, like huge sun dials and tools for measuring the locations of celestial bodies. It was like a big astronomy playground.

Also, fun story, as I was about to leave I saw a long queue forming. I had no clue what it was for and it was all Indians so I joined and tried to ask what was happening. No one knew what the line was for. It turned out to be a short movie about the history and geometry of the devices in Jantar Mantar. I couldn’t understand anything, but it looked like it was probably pretty interesting if you understood Hindi.

After my sightseeing of Jaipur I felt ready to move along. It’s a city of 3 million, so not exactly small. It was still too much traffic, smog, and tourist hustling. I wanted something calmer. There was more to see and do in Jaipur, but I was ready to go.

The next major tourist city is Udaipur, but since the new year was approaching and Indians love to travel in their country, all the accommodations were booked solid. After some internet research I came across the town of Bundi. There isn’t much written about it, there were rooms available that I could book online for a good price, and it only has 100,000 people in it. It sounded perfect. Turns out that it’s a pretty popular tourist destination and I saw way more foreign tourists here than in any other city. I don’t mind that, it’s just a curious observation given that the few blog entries I found say that Bundi is off the beaten path and authentic and hope that it stays that way. It’s tourist city for sure, just smaller.

I really enjoyed Bundi. I think it’s a top notch place to visit. The city is covered in beautiful wall paintings and there is a lively market area but it’s not too crowded. There are even moments walking on the street where you aren’t being passed by motorbikes. There is far less hustling going on and most of the time I was offered chai, it was just to chat and not to purchase things in tourist shops. I need to find more places like this.

In Bundi, I was able to hit pretty much all of the tourist sites, but mostly I just liked walking around the city. For tourist sites, there are two main packages. There is the Raniji Ki Baori, Sukh Mahal, 84 Pillared Cenotaph package and then the Garh Palace, Taragarh Fort package.

I opted for the former thinking that overall it was more sites and cheaper at 350 rupees (versus 500). But only Raniji Ki Baori was really worth it. It’s a super ornate step well, which is a water storage system for the city in past times. Step wells are all over the city, but usually abandoned and littered with trash. This one was well-kept and super cool. I would definitely pay the single entry fee to see it.

The 84 Pillar Cenotaph was cool but probably just fine to see from outside or buy the single entry fee. But I only counted 80 pillars. The internet confirms that this is a common first counting and maybe there is some trick to seeing the last four, but it was light on the details of the trick.

Finally, the Sukh Mahal was a huge let down. I wouldn’t recommend it even if it was free. It’s famous because Richard Kipling spend two days here and wrote Kim. It is not a palace, it’s not even that big of a house. The cost of this was quite high and accounted for most of the composite ticket price. There is a museum associated with it, but it would have cost an additional 100 rupees. I was not interested.

On my last day I decided to go to the palace and fort before I caught a bus out of Bundi. I was the first one there when it opened at 8 am. I was encouraged to head up to the fort first. “In the morning it is good for the health,” I was told. I think they just needed time to open up the palace. Off I went. I was diverted by a poorly marked trail that led me into a fight through some brambles. This resulted in some unfortunate tears in one of my favorite shirts that, just days before, I was thinking how great it was that it had lasted almost ten years. 😦

After realizing that I had truly lost the trail, I headed back and found my way up to the fort. It was the only person there during my entire visit. The place was overgrown and swarming with monkeys. It felt very Disney Jungle book in King Louie’s Palace. I was struck by how quiet and calm it was after all of the commotion I had been experiencing in the cities so far in India. All I could hear was the morning prayer echoing in the town below. Never before have I been so amused at hearing my own footsteps crunching through the rubble of this old fort. It was really well worth the visit getting to crawl through these ruins and climb up to the top of every tower I could find.

Eventually I thought I should get down to the palace, and I found a few other tourists starting their journey into the palace as well. It’s beautiful, but really not as big as it looks on the outside and much of the palace is closed off. The rooms and temples that are open are very ornate and the stone carvings and paintings are lovely. But I didn’t spend too much time there, maybe only half an hour. I’m glad I decided to go and I was really lucky to go up and tour the fort without anyone else around. That really made the experience for me.

FOOOOOOOOD!!!!!!

The food in India has been fantastic. I feel completely comfortable just picking random things off the menu, with no idea what they are, and it’s always amazing. Consequently though, I have a lot of trouble remembering the names of things and I don’t really have a lot of details on what I’ve been eating. But the food is absolutely one of the highlights of this trip.

I’ve finally gotten to the point of eating some street food which is delicious, cheap, and plentiful. At first I was being very selective on restaurants and getting recommendations for good places. But that was only sustainable for so long, I think I held out for two days.

Finally I couldn’t resist this snack that I saw all over Jaipur called thonga jhal muri. It is a colorful mix of dried veggies and nuts and fresh onions and parsley and then topped with salt, lemon, and spicy powder served in a cone of newspaper. It was a wonderful mix of crunchy, salty, spicy, and tart. I paid way way too much for it and that was after bartering down, but it was totally worth it. The other street food that I have a name for is jalebi. It’s a sweet oily fried dough ring. Delicious, but super sweet and just oozing with oil.

There are also some lovely drinks in India. Typically yogurt or milk based. The most distinct one was purchased on a cool night waiting for the bus at Sindhi Camp in Jaipur. There are these huge cauldron/wok type things full of milk being heated with spices. It’s served in a ceramic mug and topped with the spongy milk film that’s created when you boil milk. The crazy thing to me was that you throw away the mug. It’s biodegradable sure, but it just seemed so fancy for a single serving container.

And of course the most prevalent drink in India is the chai. It’s delightful, super hot, and thick and oily. So much better than I’ve tasted elsewhere. You find it everywhere served in these tiny Nescafe cups. I find the serving size way too small but it’s fine for the price which is typically about 10 rupees or about $0.16 USD.

In Bundi I also found Krishna Tea House where the owner hand makes every single cup of chai, made to order. He sits there and uses a stone to crush the various spices while he boils the tea again and again. It’s a lovely process to watch and with a very tasty end product. Plus you get it in a proper sized glass (which is cleaned by rinsing with water and then wiped off on his pants…. but remember I’m still not sick). He’s super friendly too and his shop is covered in paintings and drawings from travelers from all over the world. He has notebooks with notes from visitors that he loves to show off. I went there every day in Bundhi.

Note, a lot of tea stalls make the tea from scratch, but sometimes is will just sit around for a long time and get reheated, sometimes you get a fresh batch, but Krishna Chai still is one of the best that I have tried so far.

In restaurants I typically go for the paneer dishes because I love cheese but I need to start branching out. I have also had a few thali meals. They are more expensive but are basically sampler plates so you get a lot more opportunity for delicious.

Finally I would like to discuss a mystery product that I’ve been intrigued with and it took awhile to figure out. There are these little packages at all the food stalls, and subsequently littered all over the ground. At first I thought they were mints or drink sweeteners. A demo by a very helpful shop keeper helped me to understand that these are chewing tobacco like products.

The main one is paan masala, and it can be mixed with tobacco or taken plain. It’s held between your lip and gum like chewing tobacco but it’s all dry product. I’ve heard alternate explanations that it’s a stimulant or that it’s good for digestion after a heavy or non-veg meal. The paan masala has a distinctive red color and causes really terrible stains of the teeth that I’ve started to notice on a lot of people.

Basically… it’s the juice of Sapho from Dune by which “thoughts acquire speed, the lips acquire stains, the stains become a warning. It is by will alone I set my mind in motion.” Terribly hazardous stuff from what I’ve read, but I had to try some. It’s got an herbal minty flavor and it’s quite refreshing, but not something I would buy again.

Bonus Curiosity: Toilets!

India has an interesting toilet situation that I don’t full understand. It’s all just one space with no separation between shower and toilet. The exact opposite of Japan. So the floors and toilet seat are always wet. And then sometimes there is this hose for cleaning your behind, but there are also always two other buckets and a faucet at about knee level. The smaller bucket is there to clean yourself with your hand in the traditional way (I’m getting accustomed to that because it’s the only option in Bundi and it’s pretty easy and effective).

But I have no clue why there is the larger bucket. What is that for and why is it usually half full in the hostels? Why are there so many options? What am I doing wrong? Which things are shit covered? How can I optimize my use of the large bucket? I’ve read some things about using Indian toilets online, but don’t actually understand the mechanics very well and have not gotten answers to all of my questions. Maybe it’s all just extra stuff and different options to do the same thing, like how there are like 8 light switches in every Indian room, even though only two of them do anything. I’ve never before been so curious to watch someone else use the bathroom.

And on that note, while you and I ponder these deep questions, I’ll be heading off to Udaipur next, the city of lakes. And maybe when I go back to Delhi and visit the toilet museum I’ll get some solid answers.

My initial impressions of travel in India

January 7, 2018
by Dan

India so far has been a mild roller coaster of sentiments for me in this first week. What I have read about travel in India is that it’s an “assault on the senses” and “mix of extremes” and things of that nature. I don’t quite care for many of these descriptions because they seem rather too vague and copy-and-paste. But now I get what these writers are getting at. The fact is, India is incredibly beautiful, like nothing I’ve ever seen or smelled or tasted. But I have also experienced plenty of downers with India, both in general, and specifically as a tourist.

For starters, along with the exciting bustle, commotion and things to see and experience, there is also deadly serious smog and treacherous traffic. This is absolutely the most depressing aspect of my travels so far. The smog is just overwhelming. Especially in Delhi where you just want to stay inside. The traffic itself is interesting to a degree. It all functions very organically, but it’s quite a mess to navigate. Not only do I have to remember that traffic is headed in the opposite direction from what I expect (left side of the road), often there are also wrong way drivers. I’ve gotten used to brushing shoulders with motorbikes as they weave around potholes and slower traffic.

I say this about everywhere, but it’s never more true than in India: ride more bicycles! Really most of the distances that people travel are not far. And it’s not that folks are prissy about sweat, rough roads, and mixing with traffic which are the usual excuses for motor vehicles. Traffic is so slow that I’ll often be walking faster in some parts. Bikes people! And that’s not going to solve all of the smog issues because there are a lot of things contributing to the problem, but it would help for sure.

Anyway, besides these two things, India is incredibly safe and welcoming. I have a handful of anecdotes that don’t amount to much in the way of proof, but it does feel very safe here in terms of crime at least for a male traveler.

The ups and downs of India seems to be most evident in the person to person interactions. Never before have I encountered such a friendly society. It’s absolutely overwhelming how friendly people are. Everyone is just thrilled to lean out of a tuk tuk and shout hello to you. Or they will call you over to shake your hand and ask where you are from. Or just randomly come up and ask to take a photo with me. It’s truly the friendliest place I could imagine and often this will turn into earnest delightful conversation on any topic that is within the person’s English vocab range.

But a lot of the time this is followed with you being led into a person’s or brother’s or uncle’s or whatever other make-believe relative’s shop where they can score a commission. But all of the shops have really beautiful things that are generally very reasonably priced. It becomes frustrating after awhile, even the genuinely delightful conversations will wear on you eventually. But at the same time I still love it and don’t want it to stop. Overall, even when you are being pushed to buy something you don’t want, you get to sit down out of the commotion of the street and are offered the most delicious chai you have ever tasted. It’s always back and forth and back again like that with everything. I’ve never been fleeced so pleasantly before.

The food is the one thing that transcends this good/bad mixing. It’s always absolutely amazing. I have full confidence that I can walk into a restaurant with a Sanskrit menu and point my finger at a random dish and receive something I love. Of course, the bad will come if (when) I get food poisoning here. The hygiene standards are not very good, but so far I’ve been lucky even with the street food that I have started eating.

In general I try to push myself to try weird and scary food, but there is never anything particularly scary to eat here because it’s almost all vegetarian. You have to specifically search for a place with a non-veg menu. This doesn’t apply to everyone of course because the food is super spicy (spice spicy as well as picante spicy). So I imagine it would be tough to find things to eat if that’s not your bag but I love crying during my meals.

These are just my general thoughts over my first week solo adventuring, so I’m sure these ideas will change. Overall I really love it despite the annoyances that exist. This is truly a brilliant adventure and I’m happy to experience it all.