On Friday September 30th, I woke at 3:30am to get ready to drive to the airport with two friends Narayana and Joey. We decided to go to New York City for 6 days largely because I’d never been there and also because I had some frequent flyer miles to burn. Plus we have a good friend, Austin, who has a nice apartment we could crash in. There were no issues with the flight and I was surprised how short the journey was, only 1 hour and 40 minutes from Chicago. By the time we arrived at the West Village apartment it was definitely past lunch time so we called a friend Trevor and found a fantastic little Thai restaurant with exquisite food for $8.

Soon after the meal Joey went with Trevor to stay with him at his place in Brooklyn while Narayana and I spent the night in Manhattan. The next morning we caught a bus which was hours late to Connecticut to visit Austin and his family at their home. It was very pleasant to be amongst the amazingly fluoro green forests.

Click on any photo below to ENLARGE.

We were experimenting with motion blur and Austin decided to stand in the picture and almost be hit by an SUV.

I tried a new effect I discovered where you use a flash in low light and then twirl your camera after the flash goes off. It works quite well, eh?

This lily was in the garden.

We had a great time at Austin’s house, hanging out with Anjuli and Matt (his sister and her boyfriend). On the Sunday afternoon we went to nice little lake nearby and went swimming and boating.

Testing the waters. I was the first to jump in because it was surprisingly warm.

The boat ride was very nice except I started feeling cold – maybe the water wasn’t so warm after all.

The Connecticut sky was beautiful that day.

That night we caught a bus back to New York City. The following day we met up with Trevor, Joe, Joey, Supriya, and Jeremy. Monday night (what you see in this pic) we went to Chinatown for some real authentic Chinese food.

Here is the street view on one of the corner’s in Chinatown.

It was a nice little restaurant that only had Chinese people in it. They welcomed us warmed but barely spoke English so it was interesting.

I was playing around with reflections because there were so many mirrors in the restaurant.

The food was fantastic once again. That was really one of the highlights of New York City – the FOOD! We used the website Yelp to help us find restaurants that were affordable with good reviews and I can honestly say every meal was absolutely delicious.

Here is Joe counting the money for the bill I think it was about $100 for 8 people – cheap!

New York typical night scene.

We caught endless trains to get around Manhattan. I concluded they are like teleportation devices because you simply walk down some stairs and a few minutes later when you walk back up the stairs your in a different country or at least a completely different neighborhood with a distinctly different feeling.

We finished the night at Magnolia Bakery on Bleecker St that had the best cupcakes I had ever had. Austin got a free one because he stuck his hand out first… 🙂

Another train blurring by.

Austin’s apartment was really nice and we’re very thankful for him inviting us over.

On the Tuesday we had a touristy day where we had to check out Times Square.

There were plenty of flashing lights and huge billboards everywhere.

We came across Hotel Eric Carter.

Almost at the main strip of Times Square – it kind of reminded me of the street scenes of the movie Blade Runner.

I think this picture of Times Square encapsulates what it’s like.

A stretch limo pulls through the intersection probably transporting a celebrity. Which reminds me, I passed the pop star, Pink, in the West Village near Austin’s apartment on Monday. There were like 9 paparazzi shooting away like there was no tomorrow. And actually that was something I noticed in New York City – there are an unusually high proportion of extremely beautiful people there. I don’t know why but maybe because they are trying to make it big and New York is certainly is the place for that. Any thoughts?

Here I am at Times Square, New York City to prove I was actually there.

Narayana wanted me to take this photo of him with the NASDAQ symbol behind him. I think it suits him, don’t you?

More outrageously large flashing billboards. On these streets there were lots of dudes outside stores and clubs hustling to get us to go to some comedy show or something. We just kept walking and then their standard line was “where are you from?”. Jeremy said “have you heard of Russia?” while we kept walking. The guy then said, “is that where you’re from?” We didn’t answer and kept walking and then he said, “I’ll meet you on Jersey shore.” Quite funny.

Just north of Times Square is Central Park which is literally breath of fresh air and a God send that they’ve at least kept some nature.

As soon as I saw this hotel I thought of Home Alone 2 where he stays at this Hotel Plaza and racks up a huge bill on his dad’s credit card. It also made me think of the homeless lady who saved him from the bad guys. Quite a beautiful scene.

In that little lake were gigantic fish! We concluded that the competition is so high in New York City that even the fish are the cream of the crop.

Our next destination on this day was the David Lynch Foundation New York City Headquarters. The elevator surprised me when I noticed there was no 13th floor! Crazy. I hate to break it to them but the 14th floor is actually the 13th floor. I found out that practically all buildings in the city are like this.

The David Lynch Foundation offices were very nice and they welcomed us and gave us chocolates.

We came in when they were in the middle of a conference calls. Here is Heather Hartnett, Supriya Vidic and Austin Ayer. Austin and Heather work for the foundation and Supriya is interning there.

Another subway, another teleportation excursion.

The destination this time was ITALY or “little Italy“. We wanted to sample some authentic Italian food and had some sublime fresh homemade pasta – bellissimo!

One of the joys of living in America – you can practically buy a gun anywhere. This shop seemed quite fancy.

Joey has some Italian ancestors and in this photograph he looks rather Italian don’t you think?

Here is a NYPD cop talking to the restaurant owner. They talked for a long time, who knows what about?

We went to the fashion district SoHo and stopped by the newish brand UniQlo. I was impressed by the quality and the prices.

I bought an ultra light down jacket for $79. It only weighs 7 ounces or 200 grams and is super warm. Plus it folds into a little pouch that you can fit in your pocket! Score.

SoHo, New York City.

I was perplexed to see this Chinese man carrying two huge trash bags in the Asian style. Quite a sight and symbolic of the diversity of culture in the city. Did you know there are as many as 800 languages spoken in New York City?!

Another blurry train – I guess I got obsessed with taking a picture of every train I could.

We went to a comedy show at UCB East that was titled something like “Gene Hackman and Friends.”

It turned out that Gene Hackman had nothing to do with the show but that was a way to get us to come. Joe, Joey and Narayana were called on the stage to impersonate lines from different movies. They each got a crappy gift. It was an okay show with some really hilarious acts but mostly it was mediocre.

We stopped by a German bar where they were singing songs for Octoberfest – quite amusing.

Last but not least, we had a great a time and started wearing fancy clothes and didn’t want to leave. If you haven’t been to New York City I highly recommend it. It seems like this city is really a world city with so much influence on fashion, media, finance and education etc it can be totally mind boggling and addictive. I will go back there for sure.

I welcome your comments.

~Peace 😀

In December last year I ventured over to Europe for a meeting in Brussels and then soon after went to South India. I traveled with David Jung (my work colleague) to some very beautiful places in India during a 20 day period. After this little adventure we returned to Europe for some more meetings and business talks. We ended up changing our return ticket to Fairfield, Iowa three times and the trip turned into 10 weeks instead of 3.5 weeks.

Below is a photo blog of these winter adventures in South India, Belgium, Holland and England.

One of the first things to do once in India is to get RUPEES! I find that the best way is to either withdraw from an ATM or do an exchange with a forex company such as this one www.vkcforex.com. My other recommendation is to get a lot of 10 rupee notes because otherwise you’ll be dishing out 100 rupee notes which is more than $2 and this quickly adds up.
 

Here is a view of a typical Indian street with mainly motor bikes and auto rickshaws like the one I’m sitting in to take the picture. The streets are very noisy and usually quite polluted. So I normally use ear plugs and definitely cover my nose with cloth!
 

Another street view from a little local restaurant in Tirupati, South India.
 

This is the road up to Tirumala, the home of Venkateshwar or Balaji. The temple town of Tirumala is located on the top of beautiful hills surrounded by lush forest. It is one of the most well known temples in India with around 60,000 people a day visiting it! The other interesting fact is that approximately 100 million dollars per year is collected in Dakshina (donations).
 

The atmosphere on the top of the Tirumala hills is really quite amazing and very well kept. To give you an idea of the scope of this place there are about 12,000 employees for the temple grounds alone!
 

These foot prints are where Venkateshwar once stood. This spot had a great view of the temple in the distance to the East.
 

Here is the view of the main temple. In the center you can see the solid gold ornately decorating the roof of the temple. The darshan queues can also be seen in a circular shape surround the main temple grounds of Venkateshwar. Sometimes people wait for days to get a 10 second view of the deity. I was lucky to get 3 minutes viewing this time.
 

This is a closeup of the solid golden temple roof. It is rather impressive…
 

This the statue of Venkateshwar or Balaji who is an incarnation of Vishnu. Notice how the eyes are covered? It is said that if they didn’t put the covering the whole Earth would be scorched from intense darshan or light. The other cool thing about this temple is that any wish you have while standing in front of the statue will be granted. I made some very big wishes and they already started coming true.
 

We met a nice family with cute kids who showed as around the 7 hills of Tirumala. David is receiving a Tilak (or dot) on his forehead.
 

These hills are covered with large untouched jungles where saints have walked and meditated for millenia. The atmosphere up there was really special and much less polluted than down the hill at the bustling town of Tirupati.
 

I stumbled upon a great little outdoor shop with all kinds of different Indian art.
 

Our next destination was the small town near the Southern tip of India called Rameshwaram. This town is home to one of the 12 Jyotir Linga’s. It was the tail end of the monsoon so there was quite a lot of water everywhere. The food and accommodation was very basic here so we had to be very careful…
 

This temple was very powerful with the qualities of Shiva – silence, peace and bliss. There are 22 wells here that they dunk a bucket in and then poor it over your head. It was a very pleasant experience with each well having a different feeling or flavour.
 

The next day we took a four wheel drive out to Danushkodi which is the start of Ram’s bridge to Sri Lanka. I bathed in the confluence of two seas here and it was very nice.
 

In this NASA satellite image you can see the remnants of Ram’s bridge. It is believed that this bridge was built by Ram’s army around 1 million years ago in order to walk across to Sri Lanka to save Sita (Ram’s wife) from Ravana (a demon). It really was an amazing experience to visit this place and also to see the place where Maharishi first came to after his years of Silence in the Himalayas.
 

Our next destination was Madurai, a town about 5 hours west of Rameshwaram. This bustling city is home to one of the most ornate temples in the world known as the Meenakshi temple.
 

The temple grounds here were very beautiful. There was this great elephant at the entrance to the temple who was very good at posing for the camera! I find elephants to be really incredible animals. Some people have told me that an elephant never forgets anything and this was felt when I looked into it’s big, glossy eyes.
 

Here is another view of the amazingly ornate carvings on the temple pillars.
 

Most of our travels were done on buses. The gigantic bus stands all through India are very well organized and transport lakhs of people every day. You can literally just turn up here and find a bus that is going exactly where you want and the cost is unbelievable. For example a 7 hour journey on a luxury bus cost us $2.50.
 

On my birthday we arrived at the Southern tip of India, Kanyakumari. This place is home to a goddess and has a very special feeling. We were lucky to stay in a lodge just meters from the temple grounds.
 

The streets surrounding temples are always laden with souvenirs and handicrafts such as shell covered mirrors.
 

We drank coconut water everyday – it is sooo good and refreshing!
 

Ambitious salesmen tried to sell us plastic pearls for 200 rupees. He proved they were real by putting a flame on it. There are a lot scams like this throughout India which definitely keeps you on your toes :).
 

Thousands of pilgrims visit Kanyakumari everyday. It was very interesting to watch all the different types of people and to see the fantastic array of colours.
 

Just outside the Kanyakumari temple is the confluence of three oceans – Bay of Bengal, Indian Ocean and the Arabian Sea. The water here was so nice to bathe in, it was like warm silk.
 

South India is filled with palm trees, rice paddies, banana plantations and sugar cane fields.
 

There are never ending amazing sights to be had while traveling India. Here you can see a baby fast asleep on the back of a speeding motorbike with it’s mother balancing precariously.
 

South India, particularly Kerala, has a lot of influence from Christian missionaries. As a result there were Santa Claus’s everywhere! Some of them are really scary with skeletons and all kinds of weird things…
 

Our next stop was a beachside town in Kerala called Kovalam. The food in Kerala is incredibly fresh and delicious. I heard that most of the spices come from this state and this contributes to the exquisite tastes.
 

We found many wonderful artists here.
 

Lal the tailor made us some very cheap custom yoga pants.
 

This is Lighthouse beach at Kovalam. I was able to go surfing here a few times. It was paradise with much less pollution than other places in India.
 

Another amazing artist. I bought an wonderful artwork here for one of my brothers.
 

A nice place to have a meal! The pond was filled with fish and there were kingfisher birds all around feeding on the fish while we ate our Indian breakfast.
 

I was able to visit my friend Harshal at his university in Chennai. I hadn’t seen him for 9 years! His university is called the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) and the campus was really impressive. Recruiters come here every year to pick up the cream of the crop for companies like Google, Facebook and different investment banks. It is ranked amongst the 10 best schools in India.
 

The view from the back seat of a rickshaw in Chennai on a rainy evening. They all have metres but no one uses them. I recommend always agreeing on the price of the ride before getting in. If you’re not happy with their proposed price the best thing to do is to walk away and they’ll usually come down closer to your price.
 

This is the view from the top of our cheap hotel in Chennai. The pollution in this town is fantastically asphyxiating!
 

Brussels train station – back to civilization.
 

Sampling some local Belgian fries. They are made completely fresh including cutting the potatoes only moments before frying them.
 

Me outside the Atomium in Brussels. This structure was built for the 1958 world fair in Brussels. Everyone loved the design so much that they left it there.
 

One of the balls of the Atomium. The lights were moving around like electrons in an atom.
 

Here is the view from inside the lift that goes up to the top of the Atomium in Brussels. At one point it was the fastest lift in the world.
 

We ate dinner inside the top most ball of the Atomium structure in Brussels. It was an unusual but cool experience.
 

Belgian waffles!
 

Our bed and breakfast just outside of Brussels.
 

Working hard on some really cool, “secret” Internet projects.
 

The road up to MERU (Maharishi European Research University) in Vlodrop, Holland was very slippery so this truck had some trouble.
 

Buildings at MERU, Vlodrop.
 

This is the old, abandoned building at Vlodrop that they want to knock down. I am guilty of smashing some windows with snowballs. 😛
 

These are the elephants that welcome you to MERU and the new master plan for the campus is seen behind.
 

Maharishi Mahesh Yogi‘s magical house where he took Mahasamadhi in 2008. It still has such a sublime feeling of peace and bubbling bliss, especially upstairs. Here is a blog I wrote about my experience of Maharishi’s funeral ->
 

In one day we drove through Holland, Belgium, France and then caught a ferry across the English channel to the UK. The ferries are huge and quite luxurious inside.
 

We attended a conference at Rendlesham which is about 1.5 hours drive northeast of London. It was a fun weekend and nice to see Maharishi Vastu architecture in action. The main feature of these buildings is that they face East to receive the nourishment from the first rays of the sun every day.
 

A typical scene in London.
 

Catching the underground in London back to our car.
 

Next we caught the ferry back to France and then drove back to Holland. It was a killer day with 17 hours of travel!
 

Then we flew from Dusseldorf, Germany to Dublin, Ireland and on to Chicago, USA. Now back in snowy Fairfield, IA at Maharishi University and very happy to see all my friends again! 🙂

So that’s a quick recap of my Winter Adventures in India and Europe. I hope you enjoyed the pics and if you have any questions please leave a comment and I’ll do my best to answer.

Related Posts:

Using Mobile (Cell) Phones in India
Handling, Exchanging & Sending Money to India
Travel on Indian Trains, Planes, Buses, Cars, Auto & Bike Rickshaws
7 Tips for Eating in India as a Tourist Who Avoids Getting Sick
6 Tips for Safe Drinking Water in India
Indian Hotels – 9 Tips To Have The Best Experience As a Tourist
How to Stay Healthy in India as a Western Tourist
Shopping in India – How to Bargain Like an Indian
Indian Temples – 11 Tips to Enjoy Your Visit to an Indian Temple
Communication in India
Pictures of India & 6 Tips to Become a Better Photographer
Pollution in India
108 Faces of the Maha Kumbha Mela – Allahabad, India 2013
My Experience of Maharishi’s Funeral Cremation, Allahabad, India, 2008

Below are some of my most recent favourite photos from my travels over the past 2 years. I have now been to India every year for the past 3 years in a row with the first time being for Maharishi’s funeral. I have also spent a lot of time in Holland and now I am back in Fairfield, USA. I have only been home to Australia twice in 6 years!…

Man with his goats – Brahmasthan (Central Point) of India

Lotus – Delft, Holland. Check out the wildflowers photography by my friend Reny.

Shoreline wave – Sydney, Australia

Dhuandhar Falls – Jabalpur, India

Maharishi’s house, Vlodrop, Holland

Early morning light – Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado, USA

Beautiful scenery – Seelisberg, Switzerland

Rainbow Lorikeets – Sydney, Australia

Maharishi Vedic Pandits, Brahmasthan (Central), Madhya Pradesh, India