Today I got my first major culture shock. Although Mumbai is an amazing city filled with wonderful things, it is hard to rap my head around a city that has a population of more than 18 million people. To add, their culture and way of life is a lot different than what I have ever seen. An example of this is that it isn't uncommon to eat with your hands. As well, the streets are full of vendors trying to sell you millions of different things. Markos and I ended up giving-in as he wanted to buy some very large balloons for his 15th birthday and I wanted a new pair of sunglasses.
We woke up this morning in a hotel not too far from the airport. That seemed like a good option because our flight arrived just after mid-night. Then this morning, to get into Mumbai, we ended up taking two different taxis with the bikes strapped on top all the way through the city to where we are staying tonight. Our bed and breakfast is about a kilometer away from the Gateway to India and we are right by the ocean. It was super interesting to walk around today and get a better idea on how it will be to bike through India. I have been wanting to get a haircut for a while and we finally found a barber today. Dad got his beard trimmed up a little bit and Tarn got a haircut. My hair is a lot shorter now and I like my haircut quite a bit. We had some local street food for lunch and dinner and it was delicious. We tried some different chicken dishes with rice. My favorite was the chipati bread. We are being very careful with where we eat and what we drink as we know that it isn't too hard to get sick. Restaurants that are busy and look good are generally the ones we are looking for. We are also trying to buy things that are already packaged to ensure that they are "sanitary". Overall, our first 24 hours have been great and we are excited to be here for two months. The heat is definetly appreciated and it is super nice to walk around in shorts, t-shirt and flipflops. I'm sure we will have many stories to tell from our experience in India as we have already had some very memorable times within the last day. We don't know how often we will have wifi but my dad and I bought SIM cards for our phones so I might be posting through my phone instead of my computer. Make sure to check out the food page to see some of the amazing and delicious food we have had in Budapest and Mumbai. As well, I have posted a bunch of photos on the photography page and have started a photo page for the ones I take in India. Enjoy!
