We left Delhi the morning of the 15th.  After various layovers (some more fun than others) we arrived in the Independent Republic of Mayaguez on the 18th.

I must be a really shitty friend, because every time I was asked if I missed home or was anxious to return, the answer was always a resounding no.  Luckily, I seem to have passed the travel bug onto Yano who is scheming ways to live a nomadic live as soon as she’s done with grad school.  Fortunately, I can take my work with me, and there is no shortage of people wanting to get anesthesized around the world.

Perpetual traveling is not many people’s cup of Darjeeling tea, but many people have shown interest in traveling less traditionally.  Here are a few tid bits…

• The longer you travel for, the cheaper it becomes (especially when it comes to developing countries– the US and Puerto Rico are very expensive places to live).
• It was actually cheaper for us to continue traveling, than return home.
• We averaged $48 a day for the both of us, and that included guest houses, going out to eat 3 times a day, transportation (bus, train, airfare while in India/Nepal, taxis, ferries to Estonia), massages, shaves, museums fees, internet usage, phone calls, plus all the crap we (okay, Yano) bought on the street that I’m sure will be thrown out within a year. 
• $48/day included not only inexpensive Nepal and India, but New York, Estonia, and Finland, which significantly increased our spending averages.  Even factoring out Couch Surfing, traveling somewhere outside of boring Disney World is many times cheaper than staying home (and a lot more fun).
• The most comprehensive and useful guides for traveling for just about anywhere (and for any budget) are produced by Lonely Planet.  We own a Lonely Planet for Puerto Rico; they’re that good.  They’re great for finding places to eat, sleep, activities to do, and they come for virtually every country or region of the world.  There’s a Lonely Planet for diving and snorkeling in Puerto Rico, as well as a cycle touring ones for a myraid of places around the world.
• Anywhere you go people are people, and the great majority of them are kind, hospitable, and welcoming.  (Our most distrusting experience was the New York city subway, and probably because we were just starting).

It was only logical to finish this trip with another pair of Couch Surfers.

Our return trip from Delhi had a 2 day layover in Helsinki and we’ve already surmised that there is absolutely nothing to do in Helsinki if you’ve already spent more than 2 hours downtown.  Really, nothing to do– nothing to see.  So, when we got a request to surf our couch in Puerto Rico from a girl in Estonia, we quickly responded yes, provided we could also visit her :-). We took the 1.5 hour ferry ride from Helsinki to Tallin, and voila– another border, another country.

Liis and Ronald picked us up at the dock, took us out to eat, dropped us at Liis’ place downtown, left us the key, and agreed to meet us the next day when they returned from work. Yay Couch Surfing!  The next day we went out for a night out in Tallin, and met 9 Estonians, most of which were involved with either Couch Surfing or Hospitality Club. Our night out ended far too soon, but alas, Liis and Ronald are visiting us in 3 weeks.

Anyways, we’re almost home, and will upload, organize, and label all the photos. Two more days and a New York layover from hell…

What started as a chance encounter at a bus station progressed to a deep friendship over the following weeks.  We met Antoine and Anais in Bodhgaya, India on Christmas day, and ended up traveling with them for almost 3 weeks.  We shared taxis, rickshaws, sleepless nights in the jungle, and hard bargaining over 7 cent discounts.

Yesterday we exchanged gifts (cookies, shawls, and a pair of pillows we had “borrowed” from our New York flight), and parted our separate ways, promising to visit each other in the upcoming year.

They will continue for a few more months in Nepal and then India, and we’re packing our bags for our flight to Helsinki, Finland tomorrow.

In a strange coincidence, a Couch Surfer girl from Tallin, Estonia requested to stay with us in Puerto Rico in February. It turns out Tallin is just a short ferry from Helsinki, where we have a 2 day lay-over.

Bonus! I’ve always wanted to visit Estonia, which has a rich and interesting history with occupations by both the Soviet Union and the Third Reich, both of which happened to leave Tallin, it’s capital city, untouched by bombs (or so I’ve heard).

Anyways, we’re packed and ready to go– we hear the saunas in Estonia are really good. Otherwise, it’s back to wearing every layer of clothing we’ve accumulated over the past month.  Oh yeah, we may be quiet for a few more days as we transit through uncharted territories once again.

During the past few weeks things have had a tendency to get progressively worse, the more you complained.  It all started with showers that leaked in New Delhi.  Then, we complained ourselves into cold shower with hot bucket.  Then, cold shower, but no hot bucket.  Then no shower, but cold bucket.  Then questionably hygenic cold bucket.  Then, a local boy would pump water out of a well for a refreshingly cold bucket.

Finally, we stopped complaining and things began to turn for the better.  Near our end in Chitwan, we had graduated to bucket pumped from a well, followed by furious chopping of wood, a joke of a fire, and then after about 1 hour, a luke warm bucket.  Yano gave me the biggest guilt trip while I watched through the window as the owner’s son chopped the wood to warm my water– there were comments about child exploitation, deforestation, and the obsession at having hot water every day.  I turned a deaf ear– it was bad enough I hadn’t used internet in over a week, and electricity had become a luxury seen for only 3 hours a day (usually from 2-5am when you were sleeping, so at least you could pee in the bucket in the middle of the night without missing).

Anyways… as bathing improved to the luke warm stage, we booked a flight from Kathmandu, Nepal to New Delhi, India– for only $104 (taxes included).  It sure beat a 3 day bus journey, and after a week in the jungle, we deserved it.  If you ever have a chance, the Kathmandu <-> New Delhi flight is jaw droppingly gorgeous.  The entire route is parallel to the snow covered Himalayas, and you see them from the beginning to the end of the flight.  Everyone lucky enough to have a window seat on the Himalaya side was glued to the window for the entire hour and 20 minutes.  P.S.  Don’t be an idiot and leave the camera in your checked baggage like I did.

So we’re back in Delhi, where we feel like kings: constant electricity, fast internet, great food, hot water, reliable transportation, and of course– I can pee on the street again.

Ok, enough with the blabbing, I’m uploading some pictures (though no time for all).  Here’s our favorite at one of the mosques facing the Taj Mahal (which we’ve finally seen).  Click on it for a large version.

The first thing you realize when you start following a tracker is how useless you’d be would something happen to your guide. He can smell animals before they come into view; he can see monkeys hidden in trees when all you see are leaves; he can pick partial paw prints from leaves and dirt. And of course, he can tell the difference between poop from a constipated tiger and poop from a tiger who recently ate and is therefore no threat (except for the previously explained exceptions to this rule).

A good guide can see territory scratches on trees where all you see is missing bark. He can see male rhino’s feet dragging as he’s carried around by a female in heat, as he mounts her, but she nonchalantly continues to graze. He knows what your bear had for breakfast. All in all, he can see the invisible, smell what’s yet to come, and hear things you previously thought were only audible to dogs. It comes as no surprise, that even the dumbest westerner quickly assumes his/her role: your goal is to follow your guide as a blind person a seeing-eye dog. Your survival directly depends on it, because the skills you developed in 15-20 years of schooling are completely useless in the real world.

You may be surprised to know that tracking an animal is not only serious business, but an incredibly boring affair for 99% of the time– that is until you actually sense a tiger or a rhino, breathing becomes labored, and you start replaying reruns of Animals Gone Wild.

A rhino who doesn’t want to attack you will at least warn you of his presence. It’s an unmistakable, subtle yet deliberate cough. The kind of cough you make in a public restroom when someone approaches your stall and you’re somewhat busy. It’s a “I don’t want to tell you outright, but there’s someone here. Proceed no further”. We got a few of those grunts throughout and were wise enough to do a 180.

Tigers on the other hand don’t warn. They try to scare their prey to go one way, while they move around and ambush them. We quickly found that, while we all wanted to see a tiger, we would be content with a National Geographic special. A tiger’s grunt is one scary sound– the entire forest reacts to it. Even if you didn’t hear the grunt, you’d know there was a tiger around. It’s the sound made a few seconds before the teacher shows up unannounced to a classroom. Everyone’s playing about, and as soon as someone spots her, there’s the distinct shuffle of papers and bags, followed by a sepulchral silence as everyone tries to look busy. There’s a flurry of birds followed by a sound distinguishable only by the lack of chirping. There’s the swoosh of forest as the deer run and hide. And there’s the scuffle of branches as every monkey in the entire forest climbs up the nearest tree, and then quietly peeks from atop the highest branch. In our case, there was only the sound of gastrointestinal distress, followed by a heart rate rhythm only attainable when you’re dehydrated at the end of a really long race.

We had various similar encounters with tigers throughout, and I can safely say the next time I see one (I hope) will be in a circus. a zoo with highly reinforced bars, or on TV.

We did have other memorable sights, such as crocodiles from across a watering hole, lots of deer, and a few forgiving rhinos, a baby rhino, lots of monkeys, and lots of animal shit. The most enlightening experience in 5 days happened when a wild boar ran across the brush while we were tracking a tiger. One of our guides took off running with no warning, and we quickly realized this was truly every man for himself.