Saturday, October 21 Diwali, Train, Fatehpur-Sikri, Agra

Today is Diwali, the festival of lights, and the largest Hindu festival of the year. Everyone puts lights on their houses, flowers on their doors, and decorates their homes inside. The stores stay open until the afternoon, selling god figurines, posters, sweets, fireworks, and flowers. It’s considered good luck to sell a lot today. Every Hindu is expected to go to temple to worship today. In the evening, a big vegetarian meal is eaten, followed by sweets. Everyone turns on all the lights inside and outside their houses and opens all the doors and windows. Then, large celebrations include massive dangerous fireworks displays in the streets. The Jain’s spent $200 on fireworks, trying to outdo everyone in the neighborhood, who spent comparable amounts, as well. The Jains had numerous bombs, a carpet of fire crackers that exploded for five minutes straight down their whole driveway, and tons of other assorted fireworks. The fireworks are so dangerous that all the rich people make their servants light them. It sounds like a lot of fun. Unfortunately, I was still sick all day today, but luckily my fever was mostly gone. I had to catch a different train than my parents at 4:30am to Bharatpur, which wasn’t fun. The train was delayed 30 minutes, and I had a confirmed seat, but since it was such a high-traffic day for Diwali, no one paid attention to tickets. Some guy and his luggage was in my seat because two other guys were sleeping in his seat, but I really didn’t care; I made him move and I slept the whole time. There were easily three people to a seat, and sleeping people covered the floor. It was not fun. I got out at the station, and because the stop didn’t want to invest in an overpass, everyone had to walk across the tracks, which are covered in petroleum, trash, sewage, spit, and rats. I waited a couple minutes for my parents, and we got into the car to Fatehpur-Sikri, the ghost town of Akbar. I’ve already been here, and again saw the palace, where the Mughal king and his three wives lived in extreme luxury. We couldn’t go to the mosque because it’s Ramadan, so people would be harassing us a lot. We drove two hours through rural Uttar Pradesh to Agra, and checked into the huge hotel, the Jaypee Palace. It took forever to check in because I didn’t have my passport. I have never needed my passport for a hotel as long as I know the information. We spent the afternoon lounging by the pool, which was nice. Then we had some dinner. It was not really that good for such a nice hotel. Neither was the business centre (it didn’t have a phone, calendar, or stamps). Then they tried to make us sit in the worse restaurant, and they lied and made us pay even though they said it was included. Horrible service! There’s only one American channel, so we were obligated to watch The Simple Life (those girls are worse than five-year-olds), The Ghost Whisperer (who actually believes in that stuff?), and Criminal Minds (one of about 50 shows about crime scene investigations on American TV). Being sick and tired, I didn’t really feel like searching for a Diwali festival (or getting blown up by a stray firework).