Harry, first class all the way baby

 Tiger Blog

Hello! Welcome to the Blog! Today I will be telling you about how many tigers we saw (5) and where we saw them.  I will measure the next paragraphs in days.

Spotted deer - also known as lunch

Day One: 

Got up in Delhi at approximately 0430 hours. Spent the rest of the day travelling by plane and by car. We arrived in Bandhavgarh and as soon as we arrived we departed on a jeep safari but only saw spotted deer, samba deer, wild boar and a snake.

 Day Two: (Friday 13^thL) got up at 0500 hours. We saw 3 Tigers that day. (FINALLY!!!!) The tiger we saw we followed for 0040 hours. At one time it almost crossed the road but other jeeps following it blockaded at the spot where it was going to cross. (Fortunately, it did eventually cross the road.) One of the tigers we saw was the alpha male of the park. We saw it for 0001 hour(s).  The next one was asleep and we saw it for twenty minutes because the other jeeps were piling so we couldn’t get past. Rating: ∞ I thought Friday 13^th was supposed to be unlucky!

Can you spot the tiger...?

Day Three: Got up at???? Hours and we saw 2 tigers that day.  One was about 2 meters away and the other was 20 meters. The one that was 2m away was asleep although I’m surprised it didn’t wake up because the elephant we were on was getting thwacked by an ugly man babbling “doo doo DOO DDDDDOOOOOOO!!!” and “bad bad bad bad bad BAD HAATI**!!!” not to mention “MACHILLEIT!!!!”

First class A/C. Lovely. 

After that we left to go back to Delhi in a first class train carriage. I think Indians get confused between first and worst class because it is one of the most uncomfortable things in history. The train station was covered in --------. They don’t have tanks where they hold the ---- so the rails are also covered in --------. The cabin we were stuffed in was a 3X3m room with four bunks. At one point an Indian lady barged into our room and asked if she could sleep with us. (Thank heavens mum said no! - note from ma - not no! so much as, ooh maybe, but do you want to check along the train for somewhere else first...?!)  Rating: 5\10

Day Four: Arrived back in Delhi at 7am and went to the Imperial Hotel for breakfast. 

Well, it seems I have w… (Normal ending)….Goodbye! Click!

                                                                                                                                                                                

*Try to laugh at this blog (if you play the music that goes on when Darth Vader is around on Star Wars, it might make you laugh more.) 

**Haati is elephant in Hindi. Although I don’t know what the DOO!s and the MACHILLEIT!!! was about.

Edward sees a tiger (finally!)

SAFARI AGAIN!

Hi everyone! We went on Safari again and saw a ….. T T T TIGER! Here is the whole adventure! (Most of it anyway!)

Day 1                                    

We got up at 4:30, got dressed and then went downstairs to check out.We were on our way! Unfortunately it took 20 minutes to check out and by the time we got to the airport our flight had already closed its check-in L. We spent the rest of the day being taught by Charlotte (our tutor). Not going well. Days rating:L

Day 2

not a tiger...

Yet again we get up at 4:30, got dressed and checked out (quickly this time!). We left to the airport and caught our flight to Bandhavgarh. We arrived at a military airport and went on a 4 hour drive (Not niceL) to the safari park. At 3pm we went on safari and saw lots of spotted deer, a couple of wild boar, some rare birds, tiger poo but no TIGER! Days rating:L

not a tiger....

not a tiger....

not a tiger...

Day 3

4:30 (I’m getting frustrated from these early morning daysL) we went on an early morning (gimme a break!) safari and saw 2 TIGERS! (Now that’s more like it!J) The first one was a female and we followed it for 40 minutes! The second one was the alpha male tiger* and only passed us but these were our first TIGERS in the wild! Praise the Lord YEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSS! J

3pm we went on safari and saw another TIGER! It was miles away but another Tiger! 3 in one day HOOOORRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYY!!!!! Days rating:J

That's a tiger!

Day 4

4:30 (AAAGGGAAAIIINNN!!!!) we went on another Safari and saw two more Tigers. One was miles away but another was 2 meters away and we were on an elephant!!! What happened was it was nearly the end of our trip so we decided to go on an elephant and that was a brilliant idea because we saw the Tiger right up close.

Thank you, God! J

Sleepy tiger, really quite close

That afternoon it was time to leave but the worst was still to come. We were going back on an over-night train! Noooooooooooooooooooo!!!!! When we arrived, the train station stank! The reason for this was simple. You know that rule in England that in a train you can’t go to the loo until the train is moving? Well, India doesn’t have that rule so the track was covered in …. (Need I say more?) SEWAGE!! (note from mum – they do have that rule but nobody follows it!) Anyway, our room was tiny and only had room for sleeping and not much else. Anyway, once we were on we read for a bit and then had a rest. Days rating:JOrL?

Day 5

5:45 (Come on I need to sleep. Why me? Noooooooooo!) We got dressed and made our beds. When we finally arrived (14 hours after getting on) we got off the train and our journey ended! J

Well that’s all folks. So long guys and girls who are reading this beeeeeeeeeeep click POW!

*Male Tigers are more muscular than male tigers but females are more elegant. Weirdly I preferred the female one!

Alpha Male Tiger

PS. If you have never seen a tiger they are an amazing mixture of graceful, beautiful and terrifying!

Harry and Susan visit the Gurkha Welfare Scheme

Nepal

Hello! And welcome to the blog! Today I will be saying why I have stencillised all of my writing.

Well, the reason I stencillised my 1^st and 2^nd sentences is because I went to a GWSAWC (Ghurkha Welfare Scheme, Area Welfare Centre). The army uses the Stencil font a lot. The Gurkhas are a special military unit in the British and Indian Armies. The Gurkha regiments are made up of British (or Indian) and Nepalese soldiers.

The Gurkhas carry fearsome knives called kukris. Every time they get out their swords they have to draw blood, so if there is no enemy then they have to cut their own finger!  

A kukri - ouch

While Mum and I were at the GWSAWC in Syangja in Nepal I learnt all of the military ranks.*(In all militaries they have the same ranks apart from militias which have no official ranks.) It turns out that the Gurkha Welfare Scheme (see above) is actually to decrease poverty. They do that by providing pensions for people who fought in the second world war for Britain and by making schools for pensioner’s grandchildren. They also make water pumps for EVERYBODY! (Ask your current teacher what a “pensioner” is.)

"Please tell me they are not all here just for us," says Harry
"Afraid so," says Mum

A water pipe installed in someone's home
(well in someone's garden actually) 

Before we learnt about the water pumps and schools we met up with Lieutenant Colonel Johnny Fenn and he gave us a briefing on the GWS and Nepal. In the end, we learnt that the military isn’t all about blowing people to smithereens, it’s actually more about keeping peace and providing pensions (unless you’re a Taliban fighter…)                                                                      

*Ranks in military: (worst to best) (first 4 ranks are non-commissioned. Basically their orders are blow the enemy to smithereens.) Rifleman, Private, Corporal, Sergeant, (now entering commissioned ranks. Basically they`re told to do special orders.) Warrant officer, 2^nd Lieutenant, Lieutenant, Captain, Major, Lieutenant Colonel, Colonel, Brigadier, Brigadier General, Major General, Lieutenant General, General and finally, Field Marshall.  There are lots of “minor ranks” in between the non-commissioned ranks (E.G private 3^rd class, 2^nd class, 1^st class. there is also master sergeant, staff sergeant, pre-sergeant). We do not have a Field Marshall now as none are appointed in peace time.

Well it seems I have written all I can write. It looks like I’ll just have to say… Goodbye! Click.

No Harry didn't cut himself with a kukri - it's a very red bindi 

Our visit to the Gurkha Welfare Scheme, outside Pokhara, Nepal

Nepal collage

Edward in Nepal

Himalayas, Nepal

Edward experiments with new hat
to find the very best look

Hi it's Edward and today loading bzzt pop! download complete... I will release a special Nepalese Blog. We left 8 days ago (25^th April) and I'm going to tell you everything that was vaguely interesting! Loading please wait .... Beep beep beep.....

Well, first of all we caught a plane to Kathmandu (pronounced catmandoo) went to our hotel and then lounged around playing a game called "tigers walk" beeeeeeeep zzzzzzz loading... and I lost every single time. Tiger’s Walk is a traditional Nepalese game where the tigers try to eat the goats and the goats try to trap the tigers.

Garuda on a very tall pillar, Patan, Kathmandu

The next day we went sight-seeing and saw a poor girl who the people thought was a living goddess *. We then bought a tiger’s walk board game with the pieces – but not instructions. After that we had lunch and entered a bzzzzzzt caution boring place ahead... Museum and looked ( that was a joke I don't hate museums J) there were nice artefacts including a glass case containing the many stages of making a metal face (hand made!) called repoussé and many other interesting artefacts that I can't remember ( something about chacras in your body?) . 

Children scaring away evil monsters from Buddhist monastery

Kitty gives baby elephant a bath

The next day we flew from Kathmandu to Tiger Tops safari jungle lodge on an airline ( prepare to laugh) Buddha air (I don't remember Buddha having the power of flight?!) ! We went on a looooooooooooooooooong drive to get there. That afternoon we went on an elephant safari (We rode on the elephants and gave them a bath*!).

We saw Rhinos, wild boar, spotted deer, crocodiles, wild elephants and tons more but guess what? No tigers! (tips, never expect to see a tiger because 99% of the time you won’t). Anyway, next day we went on safari in a jeep and then in a boat. We saw nearly exactly the same things except a few more kingfishers. We spent the rest of the day reading and stuff (I finished "Skellig" in half a day!) The next day we changed lodge to the Tharu lodge and one of our modes of transport was a bull ox cart! (it's slower than walking!)


We played in the swimming pool (marco-polo), we played table tennis and while I was working I saw a paradise flycatcher bird! That night there was a HUGE storm at first we thought we were being bombed. That would certainly explain why it sounded like the sky was blowing up! The next morning we played chess and just hung around doing nearly exactly the same as the day before, but at supper a venomous spider started crawling up Harry's arm (that was different!) and we shoved it off and when we went back to our room there was a MASSIVE spider on the bathroom sink. I went and got someone to take it away but when I came back it had disappeared.

The next day we drove for 5 hours to our current lodge way up in the mountains (no we can't see Everest but did see Annapurna) And so far today we have had a nice fishing trip, we caught lots of small fish using bread and used some as live bait to catch an eel but didn’t catch one. So that's all folks so I will just say bu bye! (sounding like Mario J)

* the living goddess is chosen on stuff like the date she is born but she also has to pass tests such as being locked in a room with a bunch of dead animals and not being allowed to cry?! (the girl picked is always aged 5-11) The girl who is chosen is then apparently possessed by a goddess (the current one is possessed by Kali the goddess of death) and is not allowed to do the following things: leave her palace, smile, laugh, look sad or show any emotion what so ever and tons more! I mean, poor girl!

Edward in Sri Lanka with George, April

Sri Lanka in the sun

Hi bzzzzzzz (sorry that was passing mosquito and a bug is crawling up the screen) I am sitting in a jungle camp in a place called yala in Sri Lanka. The lights are powered by oil (they are lamps) and my face itches. This is what has happened since we left Delhi...

Boys at tea plantation 

One morning we got up, had breakfast with granny (for the last time) and then left with Dad to the Airport (We had to wait an hour for the plane to arrive). (note from ma - that's quite normal for some people!) It was a 3 hour flight to Sri Lanka and we met up with Dads friend Nick and when we landed we had a horribly uncomfortable drive to Nicks HotelL and went straight to bed as soon as we got there (it was around 9’Oclock by then). The next day we had a nice breakfast and then went on a lllloooooooooooonnnnnngggggg walk around the tea plantations (these were similar to the ones in Darjeeling).

Edward enjoys another nice breakfast with Nick

We then went to the swimming pool and after that we hung around had a nice dinner and went to bed. The next day we got up early and drove to a helicopter and had a llllooooooooooooonnnnnnnngggggggg flight (some Indian kids watched with awe as we took off) to Yala National parks (We saw 2 waterfalls and tons of tea and when we arrived met up with our Delightful cousin Rosie and her mum). We then came to this jungle camp (I have been here for 2 days and so far seen spotted deer, an albino wild boar, baby wild boar, water buffalo, A black necked stalk –there are only 6 in Sri Lanka!- , Elephants –adults and babies and an elephant called Windy who passes wind ALOT-, and a lot of rare birds).

Wildlife in Sri Lanka

Well here I am typing away at 10’Oclock at night and nothing much else OK, Goodbye people fzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzt BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!

PS. Rebooting loading fzzzzt hi just to tell u we r sharing the camp with some land monitor lizards that are around 3 to 4 foot long Bye fzzzzzzzzzzt wqbcubdcuwbewchefiviebv BOOOOOOOM!

Harry in Sri Lanka with George

Harry’s blog from Galle

Hello and welcome to the blog! Today I will be saying what has happened in the past ten days. Well, first of all we left Delhi and flew into the vicinity of Sri Lanka. We then went on a 4 hour car journey up into the mountains and arrived at our dad’s friend’s residence near Hatton. We stayed there for a day and went on a long walk round some tea plantations not to mention we saw some bird chicks.

Kitty with creature...

We then FZZZT FZZZT BEEP... sorry technical faults.  Be quiet, computer. I`m trying to do a blog here, y`know. SORRY. My bad. 

Well, continuing...We then voyaged in a helicopter (with the window OPEN and I stuck my hand out and nearly got it sliced into human sashimi) to a place called Yala National Park. We went on four long safari trips and got bitten by mosquitoes and we also swam in the river next to our camp.  One night we had a campfire and toasted marshmallows (we kept on stepping on burnt marshmallows and getting big blobs stuck on our feet).

When not in a helicopter....

The next day we left (THANK GOODNESS) on the most comfortable minibus I had ever been in.  

We then travelled to a villa in a town called Galle. (The place in Sri Lanka, not France.) While we were there we checked out a shipwreck museum with nothing that actually came from shipwrecks. (It all got swept away by a tsunami.) Galle has been visited by many people over time. It has been invaded by Dutch, Roman, English™ and Portuguese. Even now, we saw ships travelling past.

 VCHhhhhhvCHhhhhHhhvCHhhhhhhhhFZTFZT!!....SORRY. Well, we stayed there for a while and our cousin’s friends came along. They were very young though. (One of the children was showing us the games on his mum’s IPAD and they were all on the first update! And he was showing off about it!)

Well, after staying at Galle we soon voyaged in the wonderful bus to a villa in a place called Idon`tknow\forgottenit`sname. When we were at forgottenit`sname we went surfing. The surfboard had not been looked after by the villa and gave me friction burns due to its rough surface. We didn`t do much interesting in forgottenit`sname apart from what I just wrote.

Sri Lanka from helicopter (view from the open window...)

Well here’s what I did in the rest of my time in Sri Lanka:

·        We were supposed to go on a train to Colombo (capital of SL) but we had to go by bus and frankly, it was actually faster than the train.

·        We flew from Colombo to Delhi and arrived there.

Well, it seems I have written all I can write. All I can say now is this: goodbye! Click!  

Harry visits Akshardham but no cameras allowed

INDIA UNHYGIENIC INDIA MARCH 31^st 2011 with Harry!

Hello! And welcome to the blog. Today I will be telling you what happened yesterday. Beep possessing processing… sorry! Technical faults. Well anyway, yesterday I went to a place called… processing… Akshardham. It is a colossal temple with the volume of 15895684.8 (15 million 895 thousand and 684 point 8) cubic feet (I didn`t make that number up) and it was made 10 yrs ago. It was made because there was once an Indian boy called... err… can`t remember. Nethertheless, it was something like MayyjtnmhialckKofghy (let’s just call him Joe) or some weird name like that. There were many stories about him like… a fake boat ride through caverns decorated with historical plastic figures, (the boat was a kind of giant mine cart on tracks) a big IMax cinema which showed a film about Joe, (it was all in Hindi, and even though we had headphones speaking in English, the voices of Hindi still made louder noises than the EnglishL) Then at one point he befriended a man-eating lion and also when some explosives were thrown at him they fell to the ground and turned into seeds (then they instantly grew into vines and wrapped around the man who threw the explosives). We also saw a robotics theatre. We watched them do different scenes of Joe`s life. Once Joe(in other words, a robot) brought some fish back to life without doing mouth to mouth. Now it’s time for… WHAT I`VE ACHIEVED SINCE I LEFT ENGLAND! Well, one of the things I did before I went to Akshardham was translate some Greek on a Weetabix packet. It turns out that “oat bar” in ancient Greek is pronounced “spareesbromees”. I`m also pretty sure I have enough knowledge to win any argument. Well, it seems I have written all I can write ^yawn^ well, goodnight. Click! Snore snoresnore burgers snore French fries…….. J

Darjeeling!

Hi everyone it’s me Edward and I am about to tell you um … stuff! Um that um no-one has um ever um heard before! So um I guess I will just get on with it! (I will um try not to say um ok!J)

Ok well I will start where the unicorns invaded no that’s not right. Um (sorry!J) ok I will start when granny arrived! Well about a week after we last came to the Imperial we came back from school and granny was there. She had come from her home in Scotland to do stuff with us, and she brought brilliant news our cat violet (who is the cutest cat ever and is staying with our granny and granddad while we r in India.) has had KITTENS! I miss violet tons but I can’t even visit her for a day because of some stupid visa! Anyway she (violet) had 5 kittens and they r adorable! 

Kittens - not cute at all!

So after another week we went on another adventure! One morning we got up as usual and had breakfast also normal, but then we went to the airport and got a plane to the Himalayas. We landed at the bottom, (Bagdogra) so we then had to go on a 3 hour car journey to a hotel in Darjeeling. That night mum and I went out to the mall (a ton of shops in one street). We went down the wrong street and then had to go all the back up the hill and go down the other road which turned out to be the right one we then bought a couple of hoodies (one for me and one for Harry because we left all our sweaters in Delhi) and then found a bakers and bought 2 doughnuts, 2 chocolate tarts and 2 brownies! We then went back and nuked everyone! Just kidding we had supper and went to bed. Beep beep breaking up sorry this blog has just fzzt fuzz fzzz BANG! Sorry I guess the bang made it work again lets continue (there are no guarantees this will not happen again). In the morning we …… sorry Thiz website has gjsdagvjhfghvj. All right sorry about that beep booop beep booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooop rebooting sorry … 

Typical Darjeeling street scene

By the war memorial on train trip

In the morning we had breakfast (Harry left the table because there were Bananas and apple on the table and went to play his beep processing printing beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep DSI and when mum told me to take that away he played on mum’s I-pad so he lost 10 minutes DS time. We went to a zoo and saw lots of amazing animals such as barking deer, 4 kinds of leopard, a leopard cat (cute), red pandas (cute) and other poor caged creatures. We then went on a train that was mega slow. 

slow, blue steam train being fired up

We stopped once at a memorial dedicated to the Gurkhas  who fought in many different wars. We read a quote saying “if you ask a man if he is afraid of dying and he says “no”, he is either lying or a Gurkha”.  

When we got to the bottom we went on a 3 hour long car journey (note from ma - it really was no longer than 90 mins) to a hotel in a place called Glenburn Tea Estate  (It had a brilliant view of the 3^rd highest mountain in the world!J). Kanchendzonga.  For beeeep the rest of the beeeeeep day we just hung around but when we were having supper it started raining and there was lightning and then a bolt of lightning knocked out the electricity beep printing POW! Sorry every computer in the world has just crashed. Sorry continuing …… then the staff came out with torches and about a minute later the lights rebooted and everyone blew up for absolutely no reason, r u laughing yet? Continuing …. The lights rebooted and we continued dinner. The next morning we had breakfast and then me mum and Harry (not Kitty or granny) went on a long walk (2 miles to be preciseJ) to a river. It took ages and eventually we got in a jeep and did the last 10 minutes in it. When we arrived at the river we got on our trunks and I waded around (it was freezing!). We also found some tadpoles and then someone brought us some barbecued chicken and sprite and I had some. We then played cards and had lunch and then got in the jeep and drove back up.

Edward by a tea plantation

The next day we went to a tea factory (I will list some facts at the bottom!). The next day after that we had breakfast, went on a long windy road to the airport and returned to Delhi, tada the end. . …. ……. ………………………………………… beep POOOOOOOOW!

Tea facts: I don’t know how these survived the explosion but here they are…

-There are 4 types of Darjeeling tea 1^st flush, 2^nd flush, monsoon and autumn. (They use different names such as oolong, white tea, green tea and something else.)

-It used to take 40 mins to dry the leaves but know they have machine that can do it in 5 mins.

PS – in the car journey on the way to the airport Kitty threw up all over mum

Wait… the devil is here! No! Must      do     last    symbol!      LBye.

Harry tea-tasting in Darjeeling April

Harry’s Darjeeling Blog

Hello! And welcome to the blog fzzzzt fzzzt beep…! Today I will be giving a special issue! Since you`re all on Easter holiday I am going to do some videos!

Darjeeling - reminded Harry of Scotland

So anyway, last week (written 4th April) we ventured to Darjeeling. We had a 4 hour car journey up the Himalayas and arrived at a cold, Scotlandy hotel. (It was extremely like an island off the Scottish coast called Arran, and the hotel had the features of Arran... e.g. cold climate, wooden floors, Scottish architecture and misty Scottish mornings.)

Next morning, I woke up and did some DSI and Mum banned it for the rest of the day. We walked to town and went on the famous toy train. (A very small steam train which goes around the Himalayan foothills.) My brother forgot his camera and our tour guide had to follow the train in his car and pass the camera through the window while the train was moving! It was a very slow train.

We really DID go to the mountaineering institute....

We then stayed there and did nothing (note from ma – we went to the zoo and saw three types of leopard, a red panda, a bear, a tiger and some monkeys, we went to the Himalayan Mountain Institute and museum and saw lots of artefacts from expeditions to Everest, we went to the Tibetan Refugee Centre and took a trip on a small steam engine – but apart from that, as Harry says, we did NOTHING) until we went on yet another 3 hour car journey to a place called Glenburn. (it was actually a one and a half hour car journey, says ma)  (A very Scottish name, says Harry.)

TEA!

When we went to dinner a storm started brewing and a colossal fork of lightning struck a power station and the power went out. Luckily, the hotel had its own generators and the power was soon back on although the rest of the valley was still dark and we could see torchlights flashing everywhere.

The next day we went on a walk which was 10 times longer than Marriage Hill. (Warning! This next sentence is completely true. I am not joking. It would have been 20 times longer than Marriage Hill if I had walked the whole way.) Half way there I got so tired that I fell on the ground and almost fainted. The jeep had to pick us up and then it took us where we were going. We turned up next to a river and then got changed to go swimming. I found some mud next to the river and started slidingJ. I soon fell into the river and started swimming. It was FREEZING!

Tea in packing cases. First flush in wooden
cases and second flush cardboard boxes

The day after that we went to a tea factory and there should be some videos here. (I really liked the tasting part J and the filtering process where they put dried bits of tea leaves on a shaky ramp and shook it to get the bad bits out.)

We soon went to the airport and left for Delhi. And what do you know, here we are! Well, it seems I have written all I can write! 

And now for some recommended YouTube titles to entertain you! There is Klay World: Pancake Mines and there`s also The Annoying Orange. These are both non-violent and they don`t have swearing! (note from ma...the pancake mines video blows up all the klay people and annoying orange contains scenes of graphic violence against fruit - using knives...apart from that, as Harry says, totally non-violent)

Well, goodbye! Click!FZZZT FZZZT BANG POW! Ouch.