No one in India can pronounce my name so I've taken to introducing myself as Allie. Unfortunately, I learned that in Tamil (the language of the state we're in), an Allie is a eunuch, so I've found it preferable to allow the locals to struggle with my given name.

We're in the town of Madurai, home of the Sri Meenakshi Temple, a huge, unspeakably beautiful and atmospheric complex that sees upwards of 10,000 pilgrims and tourists each day. It's the first Hindu temple we've visited and provided Chris and me with hours of photo-taking opportunities.

On the train ride here, we sat across from a very warm and friendly family from Virginia Beach; an Indian man named Sekur, his Malaysian wife and their daughter. Chris and I loved them. Sekur was well-spoken and having lived in America for over a decade, he abandoned the bewildering circular logic used by so many Indians we've met and was able to frame stories and explanations in a way that made sense to us. This was refreshing. We spent the entire 6-hour journey plying him with questions in an attempt to uncover some of the more mysterious aspects of Hinduism, Indian society and culture.

Based on what I've learned so far, I've formed the opinion that India is by far the most backward, repressed society on earth led by the most oppressive, corrupt government on earth. Indians, however, are the most beautiful and generous people I've ever met. Funny how these things work.

Here's what we learned from Sekur about the dowry system. This is seriously messed up, I am still trying to get my head around it. So, the vast majority of Hindus in India are still married through arranged marriages. Once a match is made, (using astrology, caste, salary, so on) the boy's parents present a list of dowry demands to the girl's parents. The demands can be stiff, often bankrupting the girl's family. Scheduled payments are sometimes allowed, but then the couple is to refrain from having sex until the dowry has been finalized, sometimes a year or two after they are married. If the girl gets pregnant before then, it's not uncommon for the groom's family to plot (often with the help of their son) to kill the daughter, thus making it possible to arrange another marriage and another dowry. Sekur told us a common way this is done is to turn on the gas stove in the couple's home while the girl is away. Then when she lights the stove to prepare a meal, there is an explosion and her death is ruled by the authorities as "accidental." Worst case, she doesn't die and finds herself horribly disfigured, pregnant and unmarriable.

As a result, many couples want to avoid the burden of having daughters and every day, female babies are killed all over the country. Sekur's wife Judy told us that when she was first pregnant, they were still living in India. She had an ultrasound and noticed signs plastered all over the room stating, "We will not reveal the sex of your baby." They implemented this policy because upon finding they were pregnant with girls, many women would abort the fetuses and try again for a boy.

And now, here's a very small example of how the Indian government comports itself on a regular basis. At the temple today, a man instructed me to take my shoes off before entering the complex and pointed me to a shoe check stand where they would charge me 50 paise (1/2 rupee) to hold them. I said thanks but no thanks, stuffed my shoes into my bag and started to walk in. A uniformed policeman brandishing a large bamboo nightstick stopped me at the door and redirected me to the shoe stand. Quickly realizing that the officer was working in cahoots with the shoe stand in exchange for a kickback for each pair of checked shoes, I said, "I know I am allowed to bring them in. I'm not falling for this routine." He glanced at me furtively and waved me in. It makes my blood boil and that is hardly the worst of it. More government corruption stories another time.

As soon as I entered the temple, two old men in orange robes with long white beards approached me to take their photo. They were excellent subjects but afterward they insisted on a payment of 10 rupees each for the privelege. I begrudgingly gave them 5 each and chalked it up to another lesson learned. It's often difficult and tiresome trying to distinguish between people who are genuinely friendly and interested in human interaction and those who just want my money; the latter are more aggressive and the former take some seeking out.

At 4 AM tomorrow morning, we bid a fond farewell to the state of Tamil Nadu and head for Kollam in the state of Kerala.

It's been a slow week for the blog. Chris and I spent another couple of days in Pondicherry and discovered the truly French part of town. At a little outdoor cafe, we enjoyed the best meal either of us had had since we began traveling: soupe de poissons, a cheese and mushroom crepe and chocolate mousse for dessert.

The next night, we went in search of Pondy's nightlife and found the most diviest dive bar on earth (in case you've wonderered where it was). From the street, the bar looked like a run down liquor store. Hidden in the back was "the bar," a cramped dingy room with a row of old beer and dirt-covered tables with stools perched precariously on an uneven, filthy cement floor. There was no music, no pool table, no toilet- no ambience niceties whatsoever to woo us into a drinking mood. A lone group of Indian men sat near the door and fell silent when we entered the room. They watched us intently as we sat and listened closely as we talked for a few moments before fading back into their own conversation. While downing our Kingfisher Beers, a rat the size of a cat (I know, you've heard this before, but *seriously*) scurried up from the floorboard and disappeared into the decaying wall. Cheers!

With two more of his tabla-selling friends, Raja cornered me on the street hours before leaving for Auroville and suckered me into buying a drum. He was such a sweet kid and I felt bad for his bum drum-selling luck, what can I say. Oh, Chris and I decided we are getting old now that we call people in their early 20s "kids."

Some of you may have heard of Auroville, an intentional community a few kilometers north of Pondicherry that is home to 1500 people from all over the world. The city was inaugurated in 1968 as "the first realisation of human unity based on the teachings of Sri Aurobindo, where men of all countries would be at home..." Then, the land was a barren field with a view straight to the Bay of Bengal. Now, thousands of trees have been planted around the community, which consists of settlements that have built an infrastructure of roads, water, electricity and telecommunications. It's all organized around Matrimandir, a giant Epcot-type dome covered in gold foil tiles, which houses the central meditation chamber. On a tour, we filed past the door of the chamber itself and caught a glimpse of the gorgeous white marble walls and the world's largest crystal sphere in the center of the room.

We checked into a guesthouse that turned out to be Auroville's geriatric ward (at least it felt like it). Despite the fact that the bill of fare consisted of food bland enough to befit the majority of the guests' ancient western palates, our first night here, Chris got bacterial dysentery. He spent the next two days confined to our room. I spent my time helping a slightly nutty German woman preparing fliers for some self-help workshop she's leading and reading "The Life of Pi;" the main character is supposedly from Pondicherry.

It seems to me that the only real way to "get" this place is to spend a lot of time here getting involved in some way. I think it could offer a lot to to someone who has the time and interest to do so. But it's not a tourist attraction, and it certainly doesn't feel like India, so Chris and I are ready to move on. I miss the clamor, excitement and insanity outside these quiet tree-lined lanes.

Mamallapuram was cute. There are charming shops and restaurants, the fish is fresh enough to eat without worry, the main drag doesn't have a constant rush of honking traffic, and despite the ever-present piles of litter strewn about, the water is clean enough to swim in. This does not mean I recommend it, particularly if you're a white chick like me in a sea of Indians.

The holiday we'd celebrated a bit in Chennai turned out to be Pongal, a holiday to celebrate the harvest and observed only here in the state of Tamil Nadu. As such, the best place to see the festival was outside the city and scores of Indian tourists from Chennai and other towns descended upon Mamallapuram for the festival's climactic events on Saturday.

Chris and I went to the beach to see what this Pongal was all about and were not disappointed. About 10,000 people mobbed the beach. Men and boys in their underwear dove into the waves while women and girls in saris made of silks that shone in the sun waded only to their ankles. Totally into what was going on, Chris and I went home to change into swimsuits (a button-up shirt and shorts for me), headed back to the beach and joined the locals for some frolicking and revelry. I had about 30 seconds of fun before I had my boobs and butt grabbed by horny little Indian boys who thought they could get away with it underwater but were sadly mistaken when I yelled at them and smacked them on the tops of their heads.

Taking pictures in India fun. There are so many people everywhere, all the time, doing such interesting things and leading such interesting lives that they are really the only subject worth spending time on. What takes some getting used to is the baffling number of people wanting to take pictures of us.

We spent our last night in Mamallapuram sitting in a jewelry store with Riyaz, a charismatic Kashmiri man who was able to shed some light on a few things for us. He gave a little history lesson on the instability in Kashmir (the northernmost state in India, between Pakistan and China), some tips for being running a successful business, a bit about the corrupt Indian government (more on that another time), and most importantly, an attempt to help us read into the characteristic Indian head wobble.

Chris and I first encountered the head wobble in Chennai at a local restaurant when I asked if I may have the dosai masala and was met with a utterably indecipherable head shake that made it inconclusive as to whether or not what I ordered would actually ever appear.

The technique for the wobble is to move the head from side to side, pivoting from the nose so the head is moving roughly in a figure-8 pattern. Unfortunately the actual meaning of the wobble is unclear. Is it "yes?" Is it "no?" It usually seems to mean something like "what you ask is possible, but only if a) you have the money, b) I can be bothered c) the stars are aligned." It has led to a most frustrating series of encounters with people resolutely wobbling their heads and us trying in vain to get a definitive answer, but it's led to some hilarious moments of Chris and me stifling laughter.

We had Ayurvedic massages this morning, which involved the gratuitous slathering of three different salves and ointments onto nearly every available skin surface, including caked into my hair. Three shampooings in cold water and my hair is still a grease pit. I think I'll pass on the next one.

We're now in Pondicherry, aka Pondy, a former French-colonized town where many locals speak French, Police wear red kepi (hats), coffee is easier to find than tea, many of the street names are in French and the main drag has a mini Arc de Triomphe-type monument. Tonight, we met Raja, a 20-year old tabla vendor from Varanasi who quickly dropped the sales pitch and befriended us, keeping us riveted with stories of traveling around India selling his drums. On the way to dinner together, a tongueless beggar jumped up and began following us, crying "ahhhhh! ahhhhh!" as he came near. It freaked me out. India's like that though; wonderful one minute, terrible the next and always in your face.

Everyone says you either love India or you hate it. I may only be one day in, sleep-deprived and delirious, but I am pretty sure it's a little of both. This place makes Thailand feel like Disneyland.

From the airport, we took a 7 rupee (about 12 cents) train ride to downtown Chennai. It never quite came to a complete stop and I jumped on as it rolled by. Chris had a harder time and several Indian men hoisted him in, I gave his backpack a final tug, and off we sped.

There were no seats left and so we rode standing up next to the wide-open door overlooking the waste-filled chasm below. Several beggars shook coin cups at us, including one man who entered the train and travelled down the aisle seated with his useless legs crossed, propelling himself forward with palms on the floor.

Exhausted and thrilled from our journey, we checked into a guesthouse. This proved to be a preposterously bureaucratic process involving filling out four separate forms (three more than usual) and having each and every character repeated back to us to ensure accuracy. With a deeply significant look, the clerk asked Chris if we were married. He answered yes and he called me "honey" to ensure I played along. Perhaps we'll shop for some cheap matching rings to ease future check-in processes.

Having been told that the best way to stay healthy in India is to maintain a vegetarian diet, we headed to a nearby "A/C Veg Hygienic" restaurant and ordered four different things on the menu that neither of us recognized. We ate them under the watchful eye of the restaurant manager. We nodded and smiled while we ate, but he continued to stare at us until finally I said with a subtle tone of dismissiveness, "everything is very good." These were apparently the magic words and off he went.

After lunch, we went to explore our neighborhood. People are absolutely *everywhere*, walking, cycling, motorbiking, in tuk-tuks (little motorized 3-wheeled vehicles), busses, cars, giant trucks, farm equipment, you name it. One guy was walking two large unidentified horned farm animals down the center of the road while vehicles whizzed past. To cross the street, we followed the lead of locals and ran like hell whenever an opening allowed.

With mouths agape, we walked through a maze of small streets on broken or non-existent sidewalks, over stinky polluted waterways, past men peeing in gutters, women balancing loads of bricks on their heads, children singing, "hello! hello!", beggars pointing to their stomachs and reaching with outstretched hands, and lepers waving their disfigured body parts at us.

Chennai is on the Bay of Bengal, and today we headed to the beach. It's a national holiday, so there were vendors set up, even some amusement park rides and of course, throngs of people.

We saw a crowd drawn around something going on and decided to take a look. Laying on the ground was a dead man. Next to him, his three children sat motionless, staring at his body through tears. My eyes welled up and I dragged Chris away because I desperately needed a hug. He said it was the first dead body he'd seen.

As we walked away, several people stopped us to pose with us for photos. I was still dumbstruck and did my best to smile for them. I asked two young men in airforce uniforms if they knew what had happened to the man. They said he had drowned and his body was spotted floating by onlookers. I still can't quite comprehend what we saw and haven't processed how I feel about it, but I wonder how I'll sleep tonight.

As if the day weren't surreal enough, we spent our evening at the circus. It was absolutely the silliest thing I've ever seen, sort of like amateur hour combined with stupid pet tricks, but entertaining nonetheless.

Though Chennai is not as poor, run-down or frenetically in-your-face as I've heard it is in the north, that's not saying much. In its own right, this place is intense, insane, hilarious and wonderful. Tomorrow we will go to Mamallapuram, a town about two hours south of here that is supposed to be on the chill side. I think I can already use it.

After a terrible night of sleep in my hot, stuffy guesthouse room shared with an insatiable mosquito, I got up at 5 AM and came to the internet cafe to IM with my dear friend Stacy who got engaged to her boyfriend Gian over the holidays. I am half asleep, eating Dunkin' Donuts and drinking coffee from 7-11. Chris and I leave for India this morning and I am so excited/nervous and unsure of what to expect. This is going to be an insane day.

We intended to spend our last day in Bangkok at an amusement park, but the weather didn't cooperate and we opted to go to a Thai boxing (Muay Thai) match. If you're not familiar, Thai boxing is the national sport of Thailand and is more like kickboxing than American boxing. The fighters are usually rediculously young, like 15 or 16, and the matches are cheered on by mostly middle-aged Thai men who watch the matches standing up, cheering, grunting, and gyrating in response to every blow.

The event begins with everyone standing in honor of the King (as does everything in Thailand, even movies). Then, the fighters emerge in their corners wearing big colorful silk shorts and giant yellow flower garlands around their necks. Then, accompanied by a live band, they crouch and slide around each other in something resembling a courtship dance before removing their ceremonial garlands, and then proceed to kick the shit out of each other. We watched three matches from the nosebleed section, and immediately saw the first defeated fighter rolled away in a wheelchair after the third round. Good times!

I am off. Next update from India!

Back in Bangkok yet again after a wonderfully relaxing 6 days in Koh Chang. I feel lucky to have spent the time there that I did as the impending closing of the beach's best bungalow, the opening of a nearby airport and the ever-increasing numbers and quality of accomodation and garishness of nightlife spots is an indication that the place will be a different (and worse) place in a matter of months.

Upon arriving back in Bangkok, mattmatt immediately caught an overnight train to Chiang Mai. After 15 days of traveling together, saying goodbye to him was a bit difficult. He's a remarkable person and has become a good friend whom I hope to reconnect with whenever I return home. Jill leaves day after tomorrow and then Chris and I will be immersed in pre-India preparation. (You should see my shopping list: anti-malarials, anti-diarrheals, water filter, sleep sack to avoid bedbugs... wait, someone please remind me why I chose India as a destination?)

It's Saturday night and I got myself psyched for a night out in high season but found myself roaming Khao San Road feeling a bit disillusioned by the experience. I went to Gulliver's Traveller's Bar, the hot spot on the road where the young'ens gather to drink and watch sports, and ordered a drink at the bar. I surveyed the room and found the demographic to be primarily under-25 frat types and young Thai girls trying to lure them and their wallets into bed. I seem to be finding more joy in reading emails from friends and family these days than in hanging out in bars trying to meet new people. Is that pathetic?

I've been thinking a lot lately about my plans and find myself overwhelmed by the possibilities. After India and Nepal, the logical move would be to return to Bangkok enroute to Vietnam, Cambodia, Southern Laos and Burma. There are some catches though. First, starting in April, it's hotter than Hades anywhere in Southeast Asia and I have a hunch I will want to be elsewhere. Second, around the time I am ready to leave Nepal, I anticipate being close enough to running out of money that I will need to consider options for making some, either to be able to continue traveling or to be able to come home and support myself while I find work. One option for making money is to teach English somewhere that pays well (Korea, China or back to Plan A, Japan) for a few months and then resume traveling. However, I'd really like to come home for Burning Man at the end of August, and on October 1, my dear friend Jen is getting married in Colorado and she's asked me to be the maid of honor. So, I could teach from April - August, come home for 6 weeks and then come back to continue traveling? I don't need to decide anything now but it certainly occupies my mind a bit.

It's almost 11 and I am off to make a last-ditch effort to find some good music to dance to. Sawatdee ka!

Hello from Koh Chang! It's such a trip to be back here and in some way feels like a homecoming. I've seen so many familiar faces and whiled away my time in familiar surroundings for the first time since I left home. Since I was here last, the water has become cooler and the bioluminescent plankton have headed off for warmer climes. Jah Bar was closed down in a big drug bust last month but the owners have simply opened up an exact replica with a new name just down the road. There's a new internet cafe, more people around, and prices have doubled for high season, but it still feels perfect. Being here with Chris, mattmatt and Jill has made the time here wonderful in a completely different way than those first 10 days here alone. Now I always have someone to dance, laugh and share my rum/Coke/Red Bull buckets with. Oh, and Chris has some fantastic music and mattmatt has a computer, so I've been adding to my staling music collection.

Chris and I each bought a visa and plane ticket for India, about $320. We leave on January 14 after a couple of days of preparation in Bangkok. We will fly into Madras (Chennai) in the south and will work our way across to Goa and then up and finally into Nepal probably sometime around April. We may not travel together the entire time, but starting together feels right to me and I couldn't ask for a better travel companion. Of all the places I wanted to go,I anticipate India being the biggest challenge of them all and am so excited and scared shitless to go someplace so completely different. I am hopeful however that a little amoebic dysentery will help make up for months of excess noodle and alcohol consumption here in Thailand.

A final note. Here are a few things I miss from home and wonder how long I will be able to live without. My bed and pillow. Sunday brunches. Dancing at really good parties. Getting dressed and having more than 5 outfit options. Driving. Reality TV. Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. 92.7 Party. Fast internet access.

Happy New Year everyone! I thought of home yesterday when it was 2004 here and still 2003 there, wondering what sorts of insanity you were all getting up to. Oh, I've put up some new photos including ones of Tyler eating grasshoppers in Bangkok. Don't miss them! Act now and check out the Bangkok album (page 2) and 'The North' for photos of N. Laos and I'll throw in some extras of Ayuthaya and Kanchanaburi specially for you.

Chris arrived in Pai on Dec. 27 with his friends Jill and Matt Matt (say it twice), both also from San Francisco and connected to other friends of mine, but neither of whom I'd ever met. I waited for them at the bus station and when they arrived, I knew right away that New Year's would be a lot more fun than Christmas. I packed up my things and moved with them to Spa Exotic Home, an awesome guesthouse a little way out of town that Jill had read about. The place had about 12 tubs fed by the nearby hot springs that we could fill and adjust to any temperature and we spent the evening skinnydipping in our cold, hot and warm tubs. It all felt so damn California I could hardly stand it, and conversations about things that felt so familiar to me made me feel the most homesick I've felt since I arrived.

After two days there, the owner of the place announced that our room was booked for that day and we had to check out (!), so we spent the next two days moving around and hastling with annoying logistics (high season makes things so much more complicated), which put a slight damper on our jovial spirits but landed us in a very comfortable mountain lodge where we spent the last three nights. There were some parties going on in town, but we opted to avoid the crowds and the long, cold motorbike drive home and spent New Year's Eve in. After some ambience modifications (good music, incense, candles, comfy seating arrangements, sugary snack foods and beer go a long way), we spent New Year's Eve huddled around a roaring fire.

Jill and I came to Chiang Mai yesterday and left the boys in Pai so we could check out the famous night bazaar, but they will meet us here tonight and we'll get on a night bus back to Bangkok. Then it's back to Koh Chang, the island where I started in Thailand almost three months ago, to spend a few days with the gang. This is an unexpected detour but I've been craving going back there and this seems like the time. My Thai visa expires on January 10, which happens to be right around the time Chris is going to India. I planned to go there, it was just a matter of when and with whom (going there alone wasn't so appealing), so we'll spend the day together in Bangkok tomorrow looking into flights and visas. If all goes as planned, I will be on a plane to India in a few short days.