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Charlie and Rebes: Brit's Abroad
Hey all have so much to tell been internet and phone deprived for over a week since have been travelling in the middle of nowhere! But here is the low-down on what i've been doing.
I arrived on the 26th in Guwahati (capital of the state of Assam) and met Hil and Alison, thank God cause I have been needing to speak to an English person for so long and being stared at in a group of 3 is so much easier then alone! They introduced me to Ali's friends Digunto and Mirza who as locals had organised a massive trip for us. The first night we went to a bar with a load of scary (you'll see in the pictures) guys which was hidden in this big building cause nobody here drinks and I have been constantly told that drinking is the biggest sin. We had a pretty good night and then returned to our hotel being told at the last minute that we had to be up at 6 the next morning.
We then travelled the 3 hour journey to Shallong staying in a pretty decent hotel but being scared like you wouldn't believe when we were told we had a 7o'clock curfew. When questioning the reasons for the curfew we were told that people often were kidnapped and there was loads of terrorist activity so we were made to be in before dark. So for the two days there most of our experiences classify as watching Friends, dying Hils hair and trying to escape from the hotel and getting caught and b******ed. We did however manage to find a pretty park and a Baskin Robbins so the blow was slightly softened.
The next day we hired a car thing and went to all the sights. The 'rainiest place on earth' which Hil and I thought was hilarious due to the lack of any rain, possibly being the sunniest place visited so far and the fact that we bought umbrellas to go, Elephant Falls (so named because of the massive elephant shaped stone which no longer exists!) and Shillong peak which claims you can see the whole of Shillong from. The best part of this tour was when we seemingly randomly picked up a guy from the street and was told he would be our tour guide. When he started driving the car we were told in broken English that he was in fact 15 and had lied about his age to get the driving license so we promtly made the other 17/18 year old drive. Safety first!
On day three we took the what was supposed to be 3 hour drive to Bhalukpong which ended up taking 12 hours since the car broke down not once but 5 times and in the end we waited 2 hours for to be fixed. Not to mention the punctured tire that Alison noticed and when she pointed it out they ignored her until she showed them it was in fact a huge bloody slash and we weren't going to go anywhere. This was the place we actually started getting really scared since there is a huge military presence and the place is so unstable. When going past a school and saying how cute the kids were I was told like 3 months before terrorists had blown up half of it, but it was fine cause only teachers were hurt!! The icing on the cake though was that when we were driving we actually saw a dead man on the road and when Hil suggested we should stop and check if he was alive we were told we couldnt because if anyone saw us we would be suspected and basically screwed. About a mile on we saw several camoflage soldiers hiding in the bushes (we actually saw there guns).
The place we ended up did I have to say look like a safe house with huge bars on the windows but did have the most beautiful river behind it which we went swimming in (well Ali went swimming in) and the mountains you can see in the background are the Himalayas which I was so happy about cause I didnt realise we were anywhere near them. It was very spiritual and we did a 45 min meditation and then a half day meditative walk (in silence) which I totally managed! The place was alright except for the cockroaches and the scary huge flying clicking thing. The worst bit was that Hil got really sick and the local doctor was constantly talking Hindi and the only word we understood was malaria so we were freaking out but in the end she was fine!
Me and Al were really pleased cause we had this massive India vs England Trumps game thing for three days and England absolutly kicked ass and they were such sore losers!!
The last place we visted we were looking forward to most cause we were supposed to go for a 2 hour elephant riding safari. This however was cancelled due to....wait for it....MAD ELEPHANT DISEASE!! Yeh I thought they were kidding too but apparently its somehting to do with the heat so it turned into a rubbish 30 min jeep safari where we saw about 3 Rhinos that were so far away they could have been card board cut-outs we'll never know. Not to mention the other people in the other jeeps appear to have come for a white people safari and looked far more interested in us then the animals so we were dragged into at least 15 photos. When we thought it would be hilarious to do the same back we where told we were rude!! But the best thing was that when we were eating lunch the other day I did in fact get asked for my autograph and I was more than happy to oblige!
I left Hil and Alison earlier and took a 4 hour bus back to Guwahati this morning and am staying alone in a skanky hotel tonight and flying to Delhi tomorrow which I am excited about cause there should be lots of white people and I want to see the Taj Mahal.
I hope thats a good update, all my love Charlie xx
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