Monday, December 18, 2006,11:25 AMI went to Outward Bound School in India from 4th december to 14th december. Hahah. thinking back it was actually rather fun but while i was there suffering, i couldnt wait to come home! haha. hm. i shall now blog about my escapade before I forget about it!
On 4th dec at around 4pm, i boarded the SIA plane heading towards Delhi. Watched the movie 'Stepped up' on the plane. A rather nice movie, interesting dance moves. The food on the plane was delicious! there was even tiramisu icecream! hee. Ate the meal heartily as i knew that this would be the last good meal i would enjoy for a loong time.
xD
the mini television in front of me x)
As soon as i touched down from the plane 4++hours later, i noticed the drastic difference between Singapore and India. Just getting through the customs was a problem. We had to queue a super long time to wait for our passports to be cleared. The airport was not as nice as Changi airport. the facilities arent as good.
About an hour(? maybe less) later, we stepped outside the airport. It was super dusty! My vision was blocked by the fog..and i thought only Singapore has haze. Got into a vehicle that was waiting to send us to our first stopover. We would be travelling on two separate days as the journey to reach our beach campsite was 12 hours long. We stopped by the deluxe tents for the night.
We were greeted by very hospitable people whom served us tea aka chai and snacks. We couldnt believe our luck when we were introduced to our deluxe tent. It came with an attached bathroom!! hahahh.
inside the tent
The next day, we continued our long bus ride. haha. the sights we saw were interesting..indian drivers are pro drivers! they swerve left and right everytime and kept honking..what a busy road! haha..oh. behind their vehicles..there is a sign..'PLEASE HORN" Zzz.
their taxi..
animals ( cows, bulls, horses, donkeys, ponies, camels) were used as a basic means of transport
just an interesting sign i saw..><
this is a view of the beach camp
ahh..see how messy my bed is..packing for our trekking expedition
this is the view from our beach camp
toilets we use..inside its just a hole dug. after doing your business, you are supposed to use a pan, scoop some sand and dump it on top of your whatever to cover it and prevent it from becoming stinky.
this is the cliff we jumped off from for the cliff jump. the cliff is about 15metres high. it was quite scary!! esp when you are standing at the edge of the cliff and all you see below is flowing waters. as i stood at the edge of the cliff, i was shivering with both fear and cold. the water was icy cold..abt 9 degrees..wth!!
as i stood there shivering i knew i had to jump as everyone was looking at me expectantly. i looked straight ahead and jumped. i was so scared tt my arms were waving about wildly. i landed in an awkward position and realised tt my butt and arms were stinging with pain. Zz. some ppl felt it was fun and wanted to go a second time! ZZZzZZ!!! hahaha. due to peer pressure, all of us went again. the whole procedure was repeated and my relief was replaced with fear once again..
we also had some rope obstacle courses on the first and second day. the third day was the first day of our trekking expedition. the night before, we had packed our 65litres backpack for the journey. my back was super heavy!! about half my weight! in it was my sleeping bag, tent, food rations, clothes and sleeping mat.
the first day of our trekking expedition involved trekking 18km on sandy/rocky roads with our ultra heavy backpack. as i had been slacking at home for too long, i already wanted to give up after the first 1.4km. the trek was tough!! at first, i kept having negative thoughts in my mind and anticipating our arrival to our new campsite. i ended up feeling more exhausted than ever and even wept. Zz. couldnt believe i actually cried. i thought i was strong! AHhh. =( there was no turning back..no vehicles in sight. i had no choice but to carry on.
anw..after some encouragement from my teammates and the instructor, i started to become more optimistic about the whole trek.
after 7 hours of trekking, we finally reached our new campsite and pitched our tents. glad i survived it!!
this is our makeshift kitchen..
the second day of the trek , we had to trek 8km uphill to an altitude of 1600m. it was tougher and more challenging than the first day.
one of the challenging thing we encountered was the COLD. hahaa. so cold. didnt bathe for many days. for my trip i only bathed 2 times. haaha. the water was soo cold tt washing plates and cups can make my hands numb! =((
climbing up was a great accomplishment! and we got to see the himalayan range!
our lunch..
some potato and puri
hehehh. the poor ponies. they were made to carry out gas cylinders used for cooking..and the makeshift kitchen tent..heard tt the load was so heavy tt one of the ponies wept and threw the load off its back! poor poniess! =(((
villagers we met during our trek
the third day, we trekked down 8km and sat a local bus. the local bus was really squeezy but it was an experience! the locals are really friendly ppl! they would return our greetings ..'namastae' which means hello in hindi with a warm smile and namastae. ><
we also had a rafting expedition which lasted for three days. it was my first time rafting and i must say the experience was great! haha..the scenery was breathtaking and water was crystal clear..:))
on the last day of our rafting expedition, we met up with a grade 3++ rapid. our raft was drawn into a hole and then went up a super huge wave. it became vertical and the next thing i knew was tt i was under the raft. quite scary . i drank gulps of the holy water until i couldnt breathe. just as i thought i was going to die, i escaped from beneath the raft. there was a rescue kayak and soon i was back on the raft, dazed but safe and sound. haha. the picture is not the one on the major rapid..juz another small rapid. hee. quite exciting!
abseiling down a bridge.
we were also given time to reflect on everything during solo night where we were given an empty space to sit and think. i received a letter from my father. i started missing everyone back home and also the comforts of home. i started crying uncontrollably and it was quite bad. hahaa. suddenly i heard some noises and looked up. realised tt one of our instructors mr suri was looking at me! zZZzz. so embarrassing !
we also did CIP in a village school for a few hours. the children were cute and shy. hahaa. =)
TAJ MAHAL!
hahaha. we travelled 6 hours to taj mahal just to spend 1hour there! now i really appreciate spore being a small country!! taj mahal was a symbol of love from the king to his third wife taj mahal. it took 22 years to be built. made of marble and precious stones..all transported by animals..magnificent architecture.
WE ARE THE PIONEER BATCH TT GRADUATED FROM HIMALAYAN OUTWARD BOUND!
whaha.. xD
HANNAH HOBS FOREVER! muahaha.
anyway, the experience i had is hard to be expressed here so this is just a brief recap of what i went through!
lalala.
OH MAN. BACK TO REALITY!
HOLIDAY HOMEWORK!! AHHHH. :((((
