Carvings and Culture

Continuing with our catch up from the South. Here are a few shots from Mamallapuram. This town has crazy stone carvings. There are whole temples carved out of one rock. It's also where Dan got scratched by the monkey (a tiny scratch that is totally healed I might add).

This is a "Shiva Lingum" (a representation of the god Shiva's penis).

Some carvings:

A full-scale carving of an elephant (carved out of one rock):


This is me pushing "Krishna's Butter Ball" up the hill. I've been working out a lot on this trip. Also, please note my tres cool lime green pants.


I also want to add a few interesting Indian cultural phenomenon that we've noticed.

1) Hangin' out with whitey

For some odd reason, Indian tourists like to take our picture. Most of the time they want to be in the photo with us. Now these are not people that we have gotten to know in some way....just random tourists who come up and say "photo please." One theory is that they get to go home and say to their friends "look how cool it was where we were! there were even white people." But we've also been told that Indians like to talk to foreigners to prove that they're able to speak English well.

That doesn't mean, however, that it's not really weird for us. This girl was so excited about having her picture taken with me that, immediately before Dan snapped the photo, she kissed me on the cheek (that's why I'm laughing so hard).

This dude ... shit if I know.


2) Man Love

Here in India, it is completely taboo for men and women to touch in public. No holding hands and definitely no PDA. And I have to admit, I'm clearly used to the American male culture of homophobia -- the empty seat between men at the movies, confusing urinal ettiquette and clearly, CLEARLY, no touching aside from a hearty handshake or perhaps a slap on the back.

Indian men....they are all over one another! Walking hand in hand, with arms draped around one another, frolicking in the sea, laying and sitting in each other's laps -- it's some serious man-on-man action.

Homosexuality, however, is illegal.

3) Spitting, urinating, and snot rockets.

It's considered very rude here to blow your nose into a handkerchief. Launching all manner of mucus out your nose onto the ground, however, is perfectly appropriate, as is any kind of hacking, spitting, and ground-shaking throat cleansing needed to loosen up your phlegm.

Public urination (for men only) is also totally appropriate. Anywhere. At any time.

Here in Varanasi, male public defecation is also totally legit.