April 24th, 2009 by Boris | Category: Articles
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Tomorrow I'll be getting up around 8, pack my things and walk the 300m to the bus station, where I'll look for a bus to take me to Wagha, the only border crossing between India and Pakistan. In the last couple weeks I've met many people who thought going that way isn't really a smart idea considering the recent developments in the area. The Kalash valley, an area up north has been taken over by the Taliban, the risk of abduction in Balochistan is unusually high, violence is rampant in Karachi, Osama...
April 23rd, 2009 by Boris | Category: Articles
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In a couple days I will start travelling back home to Germany. I decided to do that overland, rather than taking a flight. The journey will take me among others through Pakistan and Iran. These are the only countries along the way I need to get visas beforehand. It's not as straightforward getting those visas, so I decided to write up my experience to help out others. Keep in mind that the procedure and the price vary for different nationalities, so it's always best to apply well in advance (read:...
April 21st, 2009 by Boris | Category: Travel
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After Jodhpur I decided to go get myself a nice calm camel and ride around a bit in the desert. For that purpose I took another sleeper train to Jaisalmer, maybe 100 km away from the border to Pakistan. The 10 hour ride turned into 14 and we arrived around noon in the sleepy but tourist-infested desert town. On the train I had met a couple guys, Tom and Martin, from Slovakia and the Czech Republic. Together with a few other travellers we got suckered into staying at the Hotel Henna, despite my better...
April 18th, 2009 by Boris | Category: Travelogues
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When I left Mumbai I took a twenty hour train journey to Jodhpur, the capital of Rajasthan. A lot of Rajasthan is part of the Thar, a desert that stretches into Pakistan to the west. After I had dumped my bags in my room I decided to explore the city a bit on foot. Many interesting things happen while you try to get lost in a new city. This time, though, I got truly lost. From far away I had seen an impressive fort up on a hill and I walked towards it. While trying to find the entrance to it I managed...
April 15th, 2009 by Boris | Category: Travelogues
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After a few days in Mumbai the city started to grow on me. There's a lot of things to do and the food is just great. After the movie filming I heard a few people talking about the slum tours. About 55% of Mumbaikers live in some kind of slum. One of these slums, Dharavi, has just been made famous by the movie Slumdog Millionaire and it is exactly this slum that you can take a tour in.
I had heard of these tours before coming to Mumbai and really didn't think I was gonna walk around there and parade...
April 2nd, 2009 by Boris | Category: Travelogues
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I arrived in Mumbai after a 10 hour overnight train journey from Canacona in Goa. Personally I'm not a huge fan of big cities and after about 30 minutes in Mumbai I kept thinking that I had to get out of there. It's huge, claustrophobic and dirty, even for Indian standards.
There were a few travellers at the station and we decided to share a taxi to the Salvation Army Guest House, which is in the same area where the terrorist attacks happened a few months ago. I hadn't even checked in yet when...
