I was looking forward to Amritsar just about as much as a root canal. While in McLeod, we witnessed the Punjabi men, most of whom are Sikhs, flock into town on vacation and proceed to scare every woman to death with their packs of stares and cat-calls. This ungentlemanly behavior coming from guy's wearing hard-hats I can understand, but turbans...? I guess too much Sex-and-the-City and not enough actual contact with real live women make a volatile combination which, when seen through western female eyes must be as threatening as a pack of drunken lonely junkyard dogs. But at home they are as gentlemanly as can be. But we haven't even arrived yet...

Helen and I splurged on a taxi instead of a bus which cost us the equivalent of US $70, but at $10 per treacherous hour it was probably the best travel investment we could have made. Even though the trip coming down from McLeod was beautifully lush and green the heavy monsoon rains over a such long period of time had washed away many of the roads to the point that our little micro-minivan could barely pass between washed out drops of up to 40 feet. Also, on many too many occasions there were huge boulders from very recent rock slides to complete the obstacle course. Even our driver got a bit nervous at times, which is saying a lot for an Indian driver.

We went from the cool mountains to the hot muggy plains of Northern India. It was a 4,500 foot drop from the veritable wonderland of Himalayan peaks to flat land and dust which continues through Pakistan all the way to where Osama is drinking Pina Coladas in the mountains of Afghanistan. We hit the outskirts of Amritsar and it was like one of those towns that had been pumped to be the next technological powerhouse (maybe in the 60's) and then someone changed their mind and the entire town was forgotten about. And this little memory blip ended up being a really beautiful thing for us because when we got to the center of town (or "Old Town"...go figure...) it was like an architectural wonderland of beautifully run down old buildings, gorgeous covered balconies, extremely detailed mosaic work, and a network of shop lined little alleys that meander in no particular direction but all seem to end up at The Golden Temple.

Our driver finally found our hotel after an hour of navigating through the throngs of walking pilgrims, biking pilgrims, pilgrims in tuk-tuk's, rickshaws, motorcycles, and pilgrim's in taxi's and SUV's with blacked out windows. We pulled up and low-and-behold, our hotel was100 feet from the entrance of the Golden Temple. We dumped our stuff, ate lunch, and hit the temple. The procedure to enter the temple is as follows: 1. Stand in line to check your shoes at one of the many designated places outside the building. 2. Cover the top of your head with a scarf, turban or use a makeshift piece of cloth that they provide in several huge barrels out in front (which you must stand in line for). 3. Stand in line to rinse hands, face, and arms in the massive troughs out in front. 4. At each temple entrance there is another shallow trough that you walk through to clean your feet (but you must stand in line first). I actually think Indians use lines as a chance to socialize, much like we use Starbucks. Anyway, so now you've finally made it through the front door and now you're clean and wrapped, and mentally prepared, which is good because as soon as you get to the top of the stairs going down into the temple you should be ready for what you see next. Huge domed and ornately sparkling white marble buildings surround a massive pool of water in the middle of which lies the Golden Temple. This is, by far, the most impressive religious structure I've ever seen. Actually, I'll go on record as saying, as of now, it's the most beautiful and impressive structure I've ever seen, period. I also have to say that the fish that live in the moat would make any angler salivate buckets.

The next afternoon we meandered through the higgledy-piggledy alleys looking at buildings, meeting many vendors, and being followed by groups of wide-eyed giggling children. Along the way we got scooped off the street to tour a factory that makes all the confectionaries for the Shiva temples (we saw loads of this stuff in Haridwar). Helen and I ended our little tour by eating fresh lotus seeds out of the pod.

30,000 pilgrims are fed daily at the Temple complex. Helen and I decided to increase the total sum by two. The temple at night is even more spectacular. Light bathes the white and gold building so magnificently that it looks like a Cartier window. (NOTE: I bet you can tell I'm running out of words for "beautiful," right?) We arrived at the Dining Hall around 8:30. After fighting through the crowd to get a cafeteria-style sectioned metal plate, a bowl, and a spoon we weren't quite sure what to do next (but we were pretty sure it involved standing in a line). A very old ridge-faced toothless man with the most eerie pale blue eyes tugged my sleeve motioning for us to follow him. The huge group of eaters were made to sit outside as the previous shift of diners was herded out of the colossal dining hall. As soon as they opened the doors there was a forward surge that reminded me of all the sports news footage of crowds compressing three or four poor souls through the grid of the fences like Play-Dough. Luckily, my new friend had a secret path that circumvented all the insanity. Once inside the dining room we took our places in one of the 18 rows, each of which had more than 70 people sitting cross-legged on the floor. Buckets of goo were distributed among the "waiters" who just ran up and down the aisles slopping it onto peoples' plate. Helen, upholding her proper English manor, whispered to me that it was a lovely gesture to give all of us finger bowls. As it turned out the bowls were for holy water which was explicitly for consumption, not for rinsing the goo off one's fingers. Unbelievably enough, the meal was amazing! Upon our completion of the meal, I insistently carried our guides dishes into the plate receiving line, but he wrestled them from me and motioned me to the side. Respecting my much elders, I did as I was told. Looking over the little balcony as I approached the edge of the walkway I was stunned by what I figured out was the dishwashing section. Hundreds of people from the previous eating shift were hunched, elbow-to-elbow over mammoth troughs and the suds were flying. Evidently most Gringo's just eat and run because when I approached the trough all the washing stopped for a split second while over a thousand pair of eyes locked on mine. I was reminded of one of those frightening dreams of showing up to a business meeting naked. Anyway, not to escape my chance for some good clean fun I found a little nook and elbowed my way into more space. At first they were a little suspicious, but I just started slogging away and in a very short time I was the person who, once the mountains of plates were dumped into the trough, made sure they were evenly distributed for all. At one point a bunch of plates got dumped into the soapy water and I was left with a beard of suds. I turned to the guy next to me and said, "see, me Sikh too". That pretty much broke all barriers and the smile flew freely. Upon completion of our duties we were hailed as we left the operation. The ever-so-charming Helen, not wanting to take on any Sikh women (who scare me more than the unusually tall Sikh men) took on the very delicate job off digitally logging the sometimes camera shy pilgrims.

Well, once again my bar for "strangeness" has taken a giant leap towards the heavens. Near Amritsar is the Indo-Pakistan border where every night they do a closing ceremony. It's a cross between a military operation and a disco with a sprinkle of Wrestle-Mania on top. It starts out with a bum-rush to get your seat. Then both Pakistan and India crank up the tunes. Each side begin inching their music louder until the bass in the speakers is blown out. Naturally, this incites the Indians to dance (as does pretty much anything). After about 15 minutes of intense booty-shaking the real fun begins. Men line up and two at a time they're allowed to sprint to the border gate with an Indian flag, wave it furiously while hurling insults to the other side, then spin on their heels and race back to hand off the flag to the next in the queue. Next, the actual border gates are open and thus marks the beginning of the official ceremony that is gilded with high-kicking, foot stomping, order screeching fun. When ever one side gets a particularly good insult across the border the soldiers from the other side shake their heads madly making their rather large fan-tiped beret's hit a seismic reading. Then the flags in the buffer zone are quickly brought down, the gates snapped shut, the ceremony comes to a close, and you spend the next hour and a half on a bone rattling, teeth chipping tuk-tuk ride back to Amritsar. Fun for the whole family, huh?

We'll see ya'll in Bangkok....

PMB 24/8/06