mother cow.

aIt's 7:30pm and je suis tres fattigue. I'd forgotten how far you walk everyday traveling, we must have walked 10km today alone.

The train ride was an adventure, let me tell you about it....later. I'm way too tired to tell that story right now, so Instead I'll tell you about today.

We spent the day walking through Old Jaipur, the walled pink city, well more of an orange city actually. The city is split into four very neatly seperated quarters. We wandered around and stumbled up some stairs and found ourselves in a Hindu Temple of Lord Krishna. A preist greated us, and after showing us around the little temple he invited us in for tea with his wife. His wife spoke amazing english and we had loads of questions to ask the both of them. We ended up talking for a couple of hours and they filled us in on Indian culture. So here's some of What we learned today, and what we've gathered in the last few days:

1. The only people that wear nose rings in India are married women, aka NOT ME. Everyone here finds it very puzzling at first, then they find it hilarious. The number of times today alone I had to explain that in Canada, it's normal for men to have nose piercings are inumerable.

2. Everything else about my appearance is also hilarious.

3. The checked scarves we've been wearing are muslim, and different colours tell people where you're from, but everyone seems to be confused by the purple one Amelia wears.

4. Cows. Cows are holy for three reasons:

• Cows symbolize the mother. They give and give all their lives. Even in death their bodies are used for various purposes (medicines(their poo mainly), clothing, etc.). Oh, and they give milk. That's a big one.
• Krishna grew up among cows and said that they are beautiful, peaceful creatures and should be revered above others.
• Cows are simple animals. They are vegetarian, non-violent, and ask nothing of others.

Also, it should be noted that the cows have homes. Not too long ago, every family had a cow living with them in their house. Now you are still expected to feed the cows, but they are allowed to roam the streets during the day. Apparently they return to their homes at night.

5. Most women don't smoke. Seeing a girl smoke, especially a western girl, is reason to stare and whisper amongst your friends. Although, being a foreigner is enough for people to stare, and they do. All the time.

6. Bindis are traditionally red. All the colourful, sparkly things you see the women wearing are merely for fashion. The men don't wear red bindis. Small children sometimes have a black spot painted on one side of their forhead. This is to ward off bad energy and jealous thoughts of others'. This idea extends to buildings as well. People will sometimes put something black around their home for the same reason. This object could be anything, the preists wife mentioned black shoes being popular.

7. Tibetan tea is salty. And gross.

8. If someone is too enthusiastic about giving you a good deal, it's a sham.

9. It is incredibly easy to be a vergetarian here. The simplest dish packs a ton of flavour.

10. Don't try to understand how you got somewhere, just be happy you did. We somehow made it through a train ride without being able to read any Hindi, which seems to be mandatory since they don't announce the stops or the train numbers.

That's all we've got right now, we need to pass out. We love and miss you.

Goodnight.

-Ben and Milly.