shim shim shi-shimla

Once on the mountain, it feels like a different country. The British Raj built their summer home hear to escape the heat of Delhi. They chose well. To help them feel at home a beautiful, super expensive palace/castle was built for everyone to relax. It was also the first Indian president's home. Pakistan/Kashmere peace talks went down in one of the rooms. And Ghandi stopped by! Now it is an institute for learnin'

Christ's Church was the 2nd church built in India and sits in the city center Scandal point.

The real highlight was another monkey temple. We quested up a mountainside to the land of irate apes. All along the way a person is cautioned: don't look them in the eye, don't smile, carry a stick to beat down monkeys that try to attack. I wasn't particularly concerned, but as soon as we sat down an older monkey snatched Gary's specs. The monkeys were scary smart. It did not relinquish his spectacular prize until an entire bag of 'monkey food' was thrown into its hands. The monkey caught it like a football, saluted and ran away. We headed back last night via overnight bus. At last I returned to the ICGEB for a day of science.

The train that took forever - BRIDGES!

In the morning we were hounded by shoe shine men and Gary relinquished his beaten down boots to see what would happen. The results couldn't have been better. They reglued the toe of his shoe sole, sewed the holes together and smeared on a cleaner that looked like snot. For $1, that's a good deal!

The trip between Chandighar and Shimla was a historic trek into the mountains on a train built in 1903. The British put the train there so that they could access their summer home in Shimla. The trip was a feat in civil engineering with 800 bridges and 100 tunnels in 96 km. The train was supposed to arrive at 5 pm, but instead took until 7:30 due to long stops waiting for other trains to pass by. The views and company made the toy train well worth the journey.

We arrived at Shimla in the evening in time to catch a pic of all the lights. Hurray electricity!

Chandigar - Paddles and Rocks

So, the story of Chandighar is that American designers laid out the city. Sidewalks, houses set back on the property, space between buildings! it hardly felt like India.

Chandighar did however have a lake. I jumped on a paddle boat right away to get a better view of this rare chunk of water. I learned something on that lake: Gary hates paddle boats. For 26 minutes I heard non-stop complaining about the whole experience. He was convinced that we were slowing down - that our paddle boat was defective. It turns out he was right. As soon as we returned to the dock we saw a 30 ft net dragging behind us. It was quite a bit of exercise.

A pic of Gary complaining and doing nothing while I paddled.
I mention this instance so thouroughly because this is the only time the whole 7 day trip that Gary complained. Believe me, 7 days with me and he has earned the right.

Next we went to the Chandighar rock gardens. They were huge and sprawling and full of waterfalls. The rock gardens also contained hundreds of statues made of recylced anything you can think of. These ladies are made of bangles I think.

Jaipur Dos

Our second day in Jaipur was even more scenic. For a small bus fare Gary and I rode out north of Jaipur and checked out the super defensible Amber Fort and Jaindighar. We looked around for elephants, but it appeared that the midday summer kept them in hiding.

After walking all over Jaipur, Gary and I ended the day with a tricked out ice cream sunday - we have ice cream at least once a day. Just as we were heading to the rail station for our last overnight train trip I caught sight of this guy.

Jaipur day UNO

This morning we arrived in Jaipur, the capitol of Rajasthan in India. It reminds me of Atlanta.


We are never without people following us, asking where we are from (the overwhelming guess is Holland), if we will buy something, if we will give something, and if we will take a "poto." When they say photo correctly we usually agree to a pic. Usually Indians are more interested in me, but these guys only had eyes for Gary.After a 1 km hike up a mountain we came to the Tiger Fort Palace. It was built in the past 200 years, so the building is in great condition. I used my internet because it was there.
On top of the Sun God Golden Temple. It is not golden and most easily goes by the name Monkey Temple. There are monkeys all over, but they pale in comparison to cobra lady.Coming soon: elephants.

India + Gary + Rupees = Adventure!

So Gary and I started our whirlwind India adventure on the 23rd. We first went to Agra to see the Taj Mahal. It is much bigger than I had imagined. This picture taken by a local is the only thing I got for free.

After an overnight train ride, we arrived in Udaipur - the Venice of India! It is supposed to be a lake city. Unfortunately, like everywhere else in northern India, drought wins and the lake is nearly dry. That actually made getting around easier since we did not need to hire a boat. (in the photo) We walked across the grassy lake from the right above my pierced ear all the way out of the left side of the picture. We then found a gondola type ride up to the top of the ridge we are standing on. Today we are in Jaipur, the pink city.

Swine Flu

So, for some reason I thought this whole swine flu problem had blown over a month ago. Turns out, not true.
87 people have died in the U.S. and 180 worldwide. There are 1,000 new cases in the U.S. every day.

Yesterday, the PI I work for asked me to look up the new cases and deaths caused by swine flu in the U.S. and Mexico on the W.H.O. website. He was hoping to see a rise and then decline in numbers - showing that the worst is over. That scenario seemed to be true for Mexico - but not the U.S. Also, because the U.S. has so many cases and so many people travel through it, that there are about 88 countries with swine flu cases.
This graph shows a trend that Mexican flu deaths are leveling off, but U.S. deaths are starting to pick up speed.

Today there was a relatively uninformative panel discussion at the ICGEB. Dr. Jameel called up all of his governmental big-shot friends and scientists, social workers and journalists answered questions from the scientific community. Though they did not say anything I was not already aware of, the concept that I got to be a part of that discussion was pretty neat. Dr. Jameel gave an intro/background for the Influenza (2009) H1N1 virus, a.k.a. swine flu. Guess what showed up? My graphs! I have broken into the science world of crunching numbers and retelling known data.
If you would like to look at the current case numbers, they are reported daily here:
http://www.who.int/csr/disease/swineflu/updates/en/index.html

Since there have been 44 cases in New Delhi in the past week, I'm starting to think a bit more about this - which is safer India or U.S.? I know the answer that some of you will give.

Anyway, my thinly veiled point is that everyone should wear facemasks. Go on. Do it.