Amritsar began with a huge boo boo. We had a train booked for the 8th March at 01:55. I should mention we booked this train around 2 weeks ago as it was such a long trip the trains get booked quite far in advance. We weren't anticipating this which is why we ended up spending so much extra time in Rajasthan. So we get to the train station around 10pm as for some reason after 10pm tuk tuks stop running in Bikaner. Annoying but what can you do. We stocked up on food and water for the long journey and found a spot to curl up on the platform for 4 hours. Tom thought he'd do a quick double check of the ticket....”So it's the 8th today, yep check, train leaves at 01:55 todaaaayyytomorroooooow SHIIIIIT!! That makes it the 9th!!!” So basically we should have got the train the night before. WHOOPS. Tom went into complete meltdown at this point rendering him incapable of forming sentences. I went off to figure out what we could do as if we didn't get this train we weren't going to Amritsar at all. It helps being female in these situations as in general if you are stuck people will come over or should I say guys will come over and try and help you. So after a number of conversations with various ticket people I discovered we could buy a cheap general ticket and sit in the unreserved carriage. We could speak to the ticket guy on the train and if people had cancelled or there were spare seats he would get us a bed yada yada yada. Yes I didn't mention we had sleeper tickets originally. So possibly we had the prospect of sitting bolt upright squeezed in with lots of other people for around 11-12 hours. Tom was not happy with this at all. He wanted to go get a hostel and we'd sort it out later, he may also have mentioned just leaving India. I however am always much more optimistic that things will turn out fine so persuaded him otherwise. It was fine, the ticket guy found us two beds together and we had to pay a bit extra. In fact we were told we could get a refund on our original ticket meaning overall we would end up paying a whole lot less to get to Amritsar, bonus. 

SO after an interrupted nights sleep we arrived at Jalandhar and then got a second train to Amritsar. Tired and weary we thought we'd check out the place where all the pilgrims go and stay at The Golden Temple. Foreigners can stay too and you're asked to just give a donation. It was pretty grim, only dorms and Tom and I couldn't stay in the same room. We left and after trying a few more places ended up staying in an over priced hotel. It was horrible, cold or should I say FREEZING in the room as it was in the centre of the hotel with no ventilation, very damp including the sheets and stank of fresh paint, overwhelmingly so. We were only staying two nights so just had to live with it.

One of the main things to do when staying here is to travel 30km west of Amritsar to Attari to the Indian-Pakistan border to watch the afternoon border closing ceremony. We did this on our first day. I think Tom was more excited about this than me. It was a strange experience. There were huge huge queues of Indian people when we arrived so much so we didn't even realise there was a foreigners queue until someone took us there which consisted of about 10 other people. So we stood in line and were stared at for around 40 mins. We were then ushered through before everyone else and went through a couple of check points and scanners. Before we reached where we needed to be they had since opened the gates for everyone else and there was just a stampede of people running to the grandstands. Hundreds of people, including the separate queue of women just running or should I say sprinting to get a seat as fast as they could. It turns out foreigners get priority seating anyway in front of the VIPs so we had a pretty good view. The ceremony started with lots of dancing which appeared to be just women who had come down from their place in the grandstands to get involved. Dancing to dance music and ending with Jaii Ho! Then a compère rallied everyone to start chanting and cheering. The same was happening on the Pakistan side so was a battle between the two countries as to who could be the loudest. Then lots of comical serious aggressive marching back and forth up to the border and back with the Indian flag with some high kicks thrown in. Then a very brief hand shake and salute between both countries, lowering of the flags and that was the end of the ceremony. This was drawn out for well over an hour. I must admit I was slightly bored by the end. Tom seemed to really enjoy it though.

Our plan for the last day was to visit The Golden Temple which was about 5 mins walk from our hotel. As is usually the case, no shoes allowed inside. At this temple everyone is also expected to wash their feet before going in. Was ever so slightly grossed out by the very small foot bath everyone has to walk through to go in as well as the accompanying pong in the air. When I say everyone I mean thousands of people. Some pilgrims would scoop up some of the water to take a sip too. Vom. The temple is beautiful, set in the middle of a sacred pool where people can bathe around the edges. The pool is surrounded by a very large marble walkway, it took us a good 45 mins to walk all the way around. Outside of the temple grounds I was fascinated by the free kitchens they have. This is a feature of all Sikh temples as a mark of unity among people of all religions and nationalities. I went into the main kitchen to take a few pics, very conscious of the fact I was the only white person in there as Tom didn't come with me. It was absolutely amazing. Large groups of people sat on the floor all chopping up onions, garlic and ginger all day long. There were groups of women making dough and chapatis. There was a gigantic cooking pot that was being stirred with what looked like an oar right next to a huge pile of firewood to keep the fire going. All of this going on under the din of metal trays being constantly tapped and bashed as they were carried along a conveyor belt of people to be cleared of leftovers, rinsed and then passed along to large troughs where they were cleaned properly. The kitchens prepare around 60,000 to 80,000 meals a day. Absolutely incredible.