What a Difference a Day Makes

After a good nights sleep and only being woken only once, this morning at 5:00am as a group of men and women singing beautifully together in prayer as they walked past our hotel on their way to the temple. ~Om Namah Shivaya~ Luke had a great phone meeting with his partners (imagine...1 whole hour without the call dropping once! yahoo!) We had a yummy breakfast of eggs and veggies, croissants and Bhutanese orange marmalade and pots of beautiful teas. We have had breakfast at this same place the last few days; the first day they were playing Christian devotional music and today they were playing the most random mix of Ozzy Osborne: Momma I'm Coming Home, Shaggy: Caught Red Handed, Guns and Roses, Celine Dion...weird. Of course, the ubiquitous Jack Johnson is playing at the computer joint right now. JJ has nothing on Gregory Alan Isakov in my book and I am doing my part to spread the love.

We took a train ride to Ghum on the Darjeeling Toy Train and it was so awesome. We waved at everyone, which is becoming a common thread in this trip. We also got some great photos to share, but first we are going to try to catch up the earlier posts with photos. Luke is going to load a bunch after he is done with his timesheets. We walked all around town and visited a few more spots. We picked out a beautiful silver three-piece tea set and we had high tea this afternoon at the swankiest hotel in Darjeeling. It was a fun day of old British luxeries done Darjeeling style with other tourists from other parts of India and beyond.

I think we are heading to Varanasi and Bodhgaya next for my upcoming birthday (fyi, only 9 more shopping days until the biggest event of the year *wink*).

We are laying down loose plans for the rest of the trip and leaving room for the magic to swirl around us. Two of my Yoga therapy classmates, Elizabeth and Carrie, are both going to be in India too over Christmas and I am thinking that it would be so good to connect with some friends from home for the holiday.

oxo
Nichole

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I think my lovely wife summed it all up pretty nicely. Just like life, travel can be a bit of a rollercoaster. We're feeling pretty good about our plans for the rest of the trip though and are looking forward to exploring some new parts of India as well as returning to some places we enjoyed so much the last time we were here. We added a post and a ton of photos from Kailash here, and we'll catch up on the rest of Tibet soon. Sorry you've had to wait for so long.

Luke