January 8th: Day 13 in India

Holy City for the Sikhs!

We drove to Amritsar early morning around 6:45; also stopped at a second Haveli for some tea. For the first time, it was a little foggy, and we saw a really bad truck accident on the way.



We drove directly to Harmandir Sahib or the Golden Temple, as it is more commonly known as. We saw the largest roti making machine there. We took photos of each step of the process. We also had some langar. Then we visited the main room in the temple and had some prashad.











Then, we walked down to the Jalianwala Bagh, where in 1916, many innocent Indians, including old people, women and children were gunned down by the British Soldiers, for silently protesting some law. I couldn't even handle the sight of the bullet marks in the old buildings, so my parents didn't even take us to the well where women jumped with their children in an attempt to save themselves and later, hundreds of bodies were found.



We bought a Punjabi sword and a couple of Sikh kirpans for Jeff. Now, he has all the 5 Ks required to begin to be a Sikh. I also bought a couple of Punjabi juttiyan (shoes).



We visited my sister's hostel at the Government Medical College, Amritsar. We picked her up and drove to the Army guest house where my uncle had made arrangements for us. We had dinner at, oh hold your breath once again, Domino's, were our pizza was half and half with keema pyaaz (minced lamb and onion) and chicken kabab.

We drove to the India-Pakistan border at Wagha. We watched what they call the Retreat. They take down the flags of both sides and close off the border for the night. It was really interesting; some of the interesting points:

- On the Pakistani side, the women all sat on one side and the men on the other side
- The soldiers shake hands but have the nastiest expressions on their faces
- The Pakistani soldiers bang their heads around and stomp while Indian soldiers have been told not to do that
- At the end, everybody is waving to everybody else over the border line and they all looked like us

We drove back to Amritsar, did some more shopping and then my sister took us out to dinner to Crystal Restaurant, where we had yummy Indian.