The bit of my Friday that I left out yesterday was my visit to a Hindu temple here in Delhi. I had commented to someone that I wanted to see some Hindu architecture here because I haven't really seen much. They said I should go to Akshardham, a temple here in Delhi. Well, it wasn't listed in any of my guide books which made me a bit skeptical but it turns out that is only because it is actually fairly new.
It is a HUGE temple complex and the architecture is amazing. Sadly you can't bring a camera in so I have no pictures, sorry.
However, that is not the end of the story. First, you have to go through a security check where I got two very thorough pat-downs (a bit too thorough if you ask me even if they were women doing the pat downs) and they had a very long list of things that were not admitted: cameras, cell phones, knifes, guns, bullets (listed separately), and, my favorite - drunkards. That is right, drunkards are not allowed at Akshardham. Strangely enough there was a woman right behind us who was acting kind of drunk.
School children, however, are allowed. There were about 5 busses of school children there. One rather odd thing that has happened to me a few times is people being interested in me because I'm white. They want to talk to me, take pictures of/with me, etc. It had happened once in Jaipur that I was practically cornered by a class of school kids who wanted to talk to me; they could speak English pretty well so I talked to them for a minute. The kids on Friday though really couldn't speak much English beyond "hello" and they trailed my friend and I for a few minutes staring at us like some sort of zoo animals. I didn't like it, it makes me kind of uncomfortable, but I try to remember that these kids were probably bussed in from outside of Delhi and quite possibly we were the first non-Indians they have ever seen.
And lots of kids in India have one goal when they grow up: to live in America, so I can almost understand their interest in me, but I still reserve the right to not like it.
Gotta wonder if when the kids got home that night if they told their parents about the temple or about seeing us. I hope they talked about the temple.
And as an almost final aside: one hold over from the British era is that kids here wear school uniforms and while school uniforms are rarely very flattering, they have some of the most unfortunate and unflattering ones here I have ever seen; luckily they all look bad together.
And as a final note: Happy almost belated birthday to Juliana (almost belated because it is still your b-day where you live for about 3 hours!).
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