Back to the Mountains

In Amritsar, after our morning engagement at the Golden Temple, we took a nap before my bus back to Mcleod Ganj. We had suffered a really poor breakfast from the hotel, and needed to sleep it off. Though, when we woke up and went to the bus station, we suffered another not great “tiffin” (aka snack) at another hotel. I am not sure why we keep going to hotel restaurants, but they seem to almost always be at least somewhat disappointing and not pleasurable.
We had to navigate our way again through another bus station, this time in the Punjabi afternoon heat. The Amritsar bus station is loud and noisy, and reminded me of the Stock Exchange with the men yelling and shouting out numbers and names of buses for people to clamber onto before departure. The bus for Dharamsala was tucked away in the corner of the station, and full of foreigners.
This is where Maulin, Tara and I parted ways. It was not initially going to happen this way…Maulin and I were going to trip around a bit more together. However, his grandmother in Gujurat had fallen and broke her hip, and he was to go see how she was fairing for the family. Because we had found such a safe area of India in Mcleod Ganj with yoga and ashrams and people with whom I had become friendly, we agreed that I would go back there until we would meet up in Delhi before going back to the US. And so, after 5 weeks of seeing Maulin every single day of my life, we promised to call each other daily to double check and said goodbye.
The busride took 8 hours. We were stopped by a lot of railroads in Punjab, which means I dripped a lot.
For a few hours, a pleasant Indian guy named Manjit befriended me and talked to me in extremely broken English about India, the US, almonds, and relationships. Being exhausted and a bit baked from the hot bus, I found it extremely difficult to hold a smooth and comprehensible conversation with him, but it seemed to all work out. And after he asked me if I was married, I told him that I make only friends and he agreed to be friends with me. He was a bit upset when he realized I was getting off of the bus earlier than he thought, and I gave him a quick handshake as I ran out of the bus to catch the transfer before it left without me.
There was also a group of British college guys on the bus, and I ended out helping them find a place to stay on their stay here, near my hotel. One of them is particularly cute, but anyways… There is another American girl who joined up with them in Amritsar, and we ended up having a good night as I showed them around the town and went to dinner at one of my favorite little spots for momos. I slowly realized that I was paying forward to this group of 5 the help that Josh gave us 5 before coming to Dharamsala. Only this time, they know where I am staying and my phone number, so maybe I will be seeing those kids more often while I finish my stay in India.
I got back into the Pink House and Javid welcomed me back while we talked about the trip. It was nice to see a friendly face that I know after 8 hours in a bus.
It is really good to be back in Mcleod Ganj.