My second leg of the trip to India wasn’t as smooth as the first. Lufthansa decided that my luggage should stay in Frankfurt for an extra two days. I expressed my position on the matter to the customs agent wandering around the tiny Pune airport trying to find the owner of the passport I had just handed her. Hint: it was mine. She didn’t call over the guards holding machine guns, which leads me to believe she doesn’t know what the ‘f’ word means… I really am a dumb American.
The human body is an incredible piece of hardware. Despite the fact that in 52 hours I had only had six hours of sleep; my first day in the country was full of tourist activities:
1. Zoo
2. Jain Temples
3. Laxmi Road
We grabbed a driver and headed to Katraj Snake Park & Zoo, which is located in the south part of Pune. If you’re like Dr. Jones, I recommend that you skip this attraction. The snakes are held in open pits which put you at arm’s length from these not slimy creatures. Very Cool. The highlight of the excursion for me was the white tiger. We were lucky enough to witness this massive cat scratch at a tree and then dash across its enclosure. I felt like Ryan Reynolds when our group of four was asked to take a picture with some locals. I’m finally getting the attention I deserve…
Jainism is one of the oldest religions in the world. They believe in peace between all living beings and self-control. From what I saw, they also believe in spending an unfathomable amount of time building their beautiful temples in which they worship a myriad of gods. You could spend a year exploring one these temples and continue to find new details in the carvings that cover every inch of stone.
Laxmi Road was my final destination for day one. Think Sunday at Pike Place Market multiplied by 1000. The streets are lined by storefronts big and small with just about anything you could imagine. A bargain shopper’s utopia. I took this opportunity to buy a work appropriate shirt since my luggage was vacationing without me and soak up the busyness that is Pune. The unstructured chaos is what makes everything here flow in harmony. As well as car horns.
Stay tuned America…
