My Trip to India

 Over spring break I went to a faraway country, on the other side of the  called India.


 We went there to understand and learn more about India and its religious beliefs/traditions. Another reason why my family went there was because our beloved cousins live in India and we were happy to see them again. I was kind of looking forward to visiting fascinating monuments and especially the Taj Mahal.

While in India I noticed I couple of differences between America and India. 

To begin with, India had 4 times America's population.


Another difference I noticed inn India was that a  lot of food included spices. For Instance, when they served rice, next to it they put a little bowl of spices which is an uncommon thing people in America would do unless you were in an Indian restaurant
                    
                             Photo by Sporty Katie

. Also,  the steering wheel in a Indian car is on the right, and in America it is on the left.

In India, to ride in the streets and everything, you ride on three-wheeled car rickshaws. I thought it was funny because on the rickshaws they had a label saying 'Safety first' and then there were no doors on them. Since the rickshaws are pretty small, they go fast and it is really fun?

                                 All photos above by mom


 When visiting India, we had the chance to visit the fascinating palace, The Taj Mahal!

Since we didn't know much about the Taj Mahal, we payed for a guide to come and guide us around.

The guide told us the story of the Taj Mahal and I am going to repeat it to you:

An emperor named Shah Jahan met his future wife, Mumtaz Mahal... He loved her so much that when she died, he wanted to build a whole palace just for her. So he hired approximately 20,000 workers to build it. On the nineteenth year of hard work, Shah Jahan son, wanted to become emperor, so, he jailed his father and became emperor. So, on the 20th year, the year of the monument's accomplishment,  Shah Jahan, who wasn't emperor anymore only got to see his magnificent creation by the window of his jail. 
Just before his son had put him in jail, Shah Jahan had put Mumatz Mahal tomb in the palace, and, the son had only enough love to put his father's tomb next to Mumatz's.  There was a legend that said that every worker's hands were cut off. But that isn't true, however, the legend represents that they made them promise to never again make a building as beautiful as the Taj Mahal.

                                                           

                              All of the photos above by mom
                                         

           In India, we also went to an island called 'Goa'. Our cousins and my family rented a house on the beach. It was fun because evry day we got to go boogy boarding and surfing whenever we wanted. I liked this experience also because we don't get to see these cousins much and so it was fun to have plenty of time to play with them.

If you walked a little bit on the beach, there was a restaurant that had indian food and american food. My favorite Indian food was a neme. A neme is a kind of crepe with cheese on it folded in halves. It is very yummy!

After a while of exploring India, we went to Mumbai to see our cousins' house and be with them again.

In Mumbai, there are a lot of poor people. So, someone started an association for girls that were poor and they would give them lunch and make a mini school for them.

We went ahead and contributed some money for the associatiion and gave gifts to each girl. They were very happy that we came!

                                                    Their school was only a bus that was out of order. I made a connection with the green team that says that we have to reusee and I think they are doing a great job reusing !

                                            Photo by dad


                              After  we visited their classroom and stuff, they went to show us their house. I was so shocked to see that their houses were only made of  blankets, sheets, and covers. It was also impressive of the number of trash there was. You could barely see the ground because there was so much litter!


                           Have you ever been to India?

               Have you ever visited a state, country, continent that is not where you live?

               What did you do there?

                 Tell me all about your vacations or trips!