Hampi 1

Finally, time for the next update.

We left Goa Jan 5, after Christmas and New Years celebrations. Mostly hanging out with our new friends from our guest house. 2 of them in fact we're hoping to meet up again with later! New Years wasn't too exciting as Ben was sick pre New Year and I was sick after. But none the less we're looking forward to the next year of continuing travels.

We took a 12 hr bus ride to Hampi, this went much better than the train adventure, but not so good for the story telling. This was a overnight bus so we could sleep, actually that mattress was the most comfortable we've had since we got to India. Hampi is just east of Goa, centrally located closer to the southern area. It's beautiful! Lots of large boulders, popular with climbers, as well as palm trees and rice fields. The people are great! We hadn't realized how grouchy we had gotten after Goa, having people shout at you repeatedly to buy things all day. It's great to actually like the locals! It's less touristy here, but stilll lots of tourists. We're in a small village here with our own little hut overlooking rice paddies... the down side is I seem to be populating all the mosquitos off my blood. See, one good thing with cold weather, no itchy sores! There's also lots of ruins and temples here in Hampi, most of which we are still to explore. Our most exciting news is our picking up of yoga. We finished our first week and it's really helped Ben and his poor very well used body. So we're planning on sticking with this, maybe even for our whole time in India, why not while we're here right. So we now have something we must do every day. It's a very weird process slowing down from life in Calgary. Now our only "chore" is our laundry. No house cleaning, no cooking, maybe emailing... We play lots of cards though, and read, and now the yoga. We're being taught yoga by this Isreali couple who are passionate about their work and are very enthusiastic. It's a class with just us and them so there's lots of attention and teaching which has been great. The four of us certainly wouldn't be accepted for any lululemon brochure though for sure!! The teachers are here for a couple more weeks before moving on so our plan is also to stay, then we're not sure we're looking into going further east.
this might sound a bit boring yet now that we're used to it it's quite nice. All our time is our own. I did see women sitting around peeling garlic while watching Bollywood the other day though and I found myself a bit envious, that feeling of I'm doing something useful and productive that you can measure. "finding ourselves" and all that we are doing isn't so tangible.

Thanks for all the birthday greetings. I loved all the emails. It was of course a fabulous day, not much different than all the rest of the fabulous days except for a nice massage, a birthday in India, with the one I love, doesn't get much better than that.

So I guess that brings you up to speed hence the lack of blogs, not too much exciting to relay. We're having a great time, living life, learning so much and very thankful for this opportunity.