Day of Nauseous Driving

Today we drove from Kishangarh to Balaji Temples, near the border of States of Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh.  I started the day off feeling sick to my stomach, hot, tired, run down, and head achy.  My mom felt my head and thought I maybe had a fever.  In the US, fevers come and go with little consequence, but in India, a fever is one of the main symptoms of the horrid disease, malaria.  This causes one to be extremely sick and, in some parts of the world, even die.  We decided that the chances of me having malaria were slim, but I should get a blood test just to make sure I did not have the disease.  We walked into the hospital and up the stairs to a room where I was pricked by a needle on my finger.  It really hurt!  While I was eating breakfast the lab checked my blood sample and it was negative.  Whew!  That was a big relief! 

We departed in the morning with Mom, Ivan, and me in the support SUV.  My mom and Ivan are still feeling rib pain and the rickshaws are much more bumpy, and therefore uncomfortable.  My dad was riding in a rickshaw with Dax, one of the organizers of the Rickshaw Rally for Heath, and Will, another photographer.  I laid down on the seat in the SUV and listened to my music for most of the ride.  Today, we were not going directly to our destination.  We planned to stop at a Hindu temple which was supposedly next to a salt lake.  I was feeling worse when we arrived at the Hindu temple and realized that the lake was actually five kilometers away.  We would address that fact later.  Instead, we were interested in exploring the Hindu Temple.  Another dilemma was the fact that Rob’s and Dad’s rickshaws, and the second support vehicle, took a wrong turn somewhere along the road, and never made it to the temple.

Well, I was actually more interested in sitting on the steps of the temple, due to my belly.   I was sitting holding my belly and my mom came down and said that the temple was interesting and was cooler than on the steps in the hot sun.  I walked upstairs and was suddenly glad I did.  First of all, there was a long clean platform in the shade where I could lay down.  The temple was also very interesting.  Before entering, one had to take shoes off, though inside the floor was covered in pigeon poop.  The top of the temple was open with a screen to keep out the birds.  This was not affective due to the open stairway, and three or four birds flew throughout the temple.  The pillars inside were made out of mostly mirrors, and hanging from the walls were huge chains.  The temple was by far interesting, but I was ready to be back on the road.




Outside of the temple is where the cluster began.  Some of the doctors wanted to rent a jeep to drive down to the lake, the shores of which were said to be inhabited by cranes from Siberia.  The people in the jeep would have one rickshaw left at the temple in which they would ride towards our destination for the night when they were done looking at cranes.  We ultimately found Dad’s rickshaw stuck in the dried up salt bed that used to be the bottom of the lake.  Dad, Dax, and Will had been messing around in the salt flats when the rickshaw axel broke.  We had to rescue them, after which we decided to meet up at a town close to our destination to eat lunch.  We all made our way easily and had a yummy Indian lunch before driving to our night’s stay.  We are staying next to a temple in a large complex of large rooms.  It was perfect light when we arrived, so I took some pictures from the roof of the complex.  We are ready to sleep well and possibly not have to get so early!!!  My belly and head are feeling much better!

Thank you for reading Rohan Geographic!