Delhi, Day 2

We were able to visit four places before our handy-dandy Jet Lag Timer started to screw us.

We got in about fifteen minutes of Indian tv, which was enough. There was an astounding commercial where an incredibly obese man kept on dropping and catching various things until he was defeated by a mosquito. Then his unrealistically attractive wife sprayed "OFF" on him.

This was during "India's Got Talent."

We had a breakfast of Aloo Paratha, chicken sausages, and a potato curry. (I'm getting Mom to remember the names of the foods we eat for William's sake.)

After breakfast, we went to get our money transfered at a kind of seedy money changing station. Small businesses in India are kind of like apartment complexes. Ross picked up a piece of litter and looked for a trash can, and I was horrified.

"YOU NEVER PICK THINGS UP OFF THE GROUND," I shouted.

"But it was dirty. I wanted to throw it away." (Ross must have missed all of the other pieces of trash around. Thankfully.)

"Yes, it was very dirty. So don't touch it."

Ross looked sheepish. "It wasn't THAT dirty..."

"Ross," I said, mostly serious, "there are places where you can get a disease by squatting near the ground."

Ross looked at me for a second, then began to slowly lower himself defiantly. I told him it was his funeral. My nine-year-old cousin heard every word of this conversation but understood very little of it.

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The first place we went was called Qutab Minar. It's basically a giant minaret constructed by some Muslim ruler. Or so the MAN wants you to think.

Our government appointed tourguide had an agenda. A hilarious one. He basically tried to convince us that all of the (ostensibly) Muslim architecture around us had actually been constructed by Hindhus. The main piece of evidence for this was the lotus imagery, which apparently doesn't occur in Muslim architecture. He told us the Muslim-capitulating governmetn was trying to sweep all of this under the rug, and that "Delhi" was a Sanskrit word for "attacked by Muslims." I looked at my grandfather after this, who had turned off his hearing aid and was staring off into space.

The Qutab Minar complex looked very Arbiter's Grounds. I was delighted.

Next, it was off to a Baha'i temple that was in the shape of a lotus. Ross told me that the Hindhus clearly constructed this as well.

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One of the coolest things we saw was Humayan's Tomb. Humayan was some rajah who died after his daily prayer by falling down some stairs. Hilariously, his tomb contains incredibly steep inclines in it. Two pigeons flew into the tomb, and Ross was delighted.

In addition to the various ruins, I took a picture of every white person I saw there. Some people took pictures of Ross as well.

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After Qutab Minar, it was time to go to the President's House. This house was built to entertain heads of state and is blah blah blah some boring stuff you can find out on Wikipedia. The best part of the tour was when my grandfather got belligerent and commented during the middle of the lecture on the state dining room, "Yes, indeed, one gets hungry. When the hell are they going to let us go?"

At this point, Ross, Dad, and I were all jet-lagged so we fell asleep on the way to the restaurant. We awoke to hands down the best food I have ever had in my entire life. And I HATE Indian food.

Today, we're going to see the Taj Mahal!