Day 2 - Flash Mobs
We woke up this morning to find that out of the 15 or so rickshaws that were at our apartment, we were the last to leave! We have some major catching up to do. We got on the road and made our way to Lumbini, the birthplace of Buddha and one of the four major Buddhist pilgrimage sites we hope to visit. Halfway through our rickshaw stalled on a hill in the middle of a forest. We had to push our rickshaw up an incline for about half a kilometer (yea, we've adopted SI units). Nothing says "move your ass!" like the burning noon sun and unsettling wildlife noises from the trees.
We ate lunch at a shady restaurant which would eventually get two of us sick. We did however strike up a conversation with a local there. We talked about hip hop music and he was kind enough to burn us some Nepalese rap! Too bad our stereo doesn't work.
It's amazing how quickly we can draw a crowd here. We stopped in a rural area to take pictures of a statue when before we knew it, children were coming out of all corners of the village. Being an agricultural area, one kid approached us with a giant sickle, creating mixed feelings of "awww" and "AAHHH!" We talked with them for awhile and let them autograph and draw on our rickshaw. Some punk went around tracing his middle finger, much to the delight of the other children. They're names are so difficult. I feel terrible when they have to repeat it twenty times, each repitition causing a more butchered response from us.
By the afternoon we made it to Lumbini, which was a very humble town. I'm glad they didn't glam it up and construct tons of garish monuments and stuff. It looked like the place hadn't changed much since Buddha was born. We stopped by a Japanese giant buddha statue and prayed barefoot on blistering granite. Suffering's the path to enlightenment, right? One site down, three more to go, still no epiphanies. Let's hope they come soon.
We hit the Nepal-India border town of Sanauli where we were again bombarded by locals. We had them sign our rickshaw too. A lot of them are writing stuff in Hindi now. Something tells me theyr'e swear words.As we past into India we noticed a significant change in culture. We met our first scam artist who tried to pass himself off as an immigration officer and told us we didn't have the right paperwork. The solution? A "fine" of course. It would be the first time we had to make a getaway, and with something as reliable as the death trap we're driving, we hope we don't have to make many more of these.
Last night we promised ourselves no more night driving. Well we don't learn too quick apparently. At least we saw an awesome sunset. As the sun left we found out first hand that India has the worst roads in the world. The best way to describe what it's like when you drive on these roads is it's like being the ball in the Price of Right's Plinko game. Couple this with a broken headlight and cargo truck drivers who apparently don't fear death, it;s quite the dangerous game.
Here's the highlight of the day. We made it to Bridjmanganj in hopes there would be a hotel there. We failed to find one and toyed with the option of spending the night there in our rickshaw or going to a town an hour away that may or may not have a hotel. We were going to go with option 1. Sonny left to get us water, and like everytime Sonny leaves us alone in the rickshaw, we created a scene. We experienced our first flash mob. It always begins with one or two curious bystanders. Three minutes later, we had (no exaggeration) 30 people surrounding our rickshaw, old men trying to give us directions, children checking out the strange Americans. Sonny came back with his "I leave you guys alone for thirty seconds and this is what happens" look and tries to speak to some of the adults in Hindi. The three of us in our rickshaw, dozens of hands grabbing inwards, it was like an Indian zombie movie. We needed to get the
f*** out of here. I literally mowed through people with children making a game out of running in front of me trying not to get hit. We'd make a getaway, maybe 100 meters, when we'd stall. The mob returns. We're out of gas. Allen performs crowd control, showing them how Americans (or at least Allen) dance, as the two of us fill up. As Allen tries to get the car started again, Sonny and I took over, teaching Cal chants. There's nothing like yelling "Go!" with the hesitant Hindi-English return of "Bears?" Be proud Berkeley, we've brought you to Bridjmanganj. This actually turned out to be a bad idea because now the crowd was as excited and frenzied as ever, and they didn't want their singing and dancing American monkeys to leave. With that, we made our second getaway of the day, hauling ass towards Nagaurh.
We arrived safely in Nagaurh and lodged in by far the crappiest hotel I've seen. The room had all the amenities of a prison cell. Cot beds, a door that only locks on the outside with a huge padlock, a hole in the floor that wouldn't flush, bugs, bugs, bugs, and more bugs. We met some interesting characters there however. It was a family owned hotel and one of the older guys came out of the shower and held a conversation with us outside wearing only a bath towel. The worst was when he'd cross his legs. We took a shower, refreshing after being covered in a thick film of grime all day and hoped to stay clean for at least the night. Wishful thinking of course. The power went out, and our pitch black prison cell became a sauna...with bugs.
