Now I'm in Delhi again after a long (14 hours) bus ride! We stayed outside Manali in Vashist for almost 1 week. It was very relaxing and fun and we met lot's of people. The place is a place full of hippie people. Its a bit to much sometimes but still nice in a way. The restaurants are called things like freedom cafe, rainbow cafe and world and peace cafe hehe but the food was very very  good! I have been trying to write postcards to my relatives but it's so hard writing in Icelandic for me so I gave up :( But I think about you and miss you anyway! I want to buy presents for everybody I know also but that is also hard because I can't decide who I should give presents to and who not. Theres just to many people I like!  Oh the funniest thing in Vashisht was that we went paragliding! It was really fun but not as scary as I had imagined but I definitely want to do that again!

We spent a great time in Hampi and went from there to Bengaluru. Bengaluru is "the IT-city" in India. It's supposed to be one of the cities in the world that is going to take over the world. We don't know much about these things but we could see that Bengaluru was a very nice and modern city where there are lot's of things happening. There were lot's of nice restaurants and bars and also many green parks. In Bengaluru Linnea bought a Sari! It's very beautiful and it was made specially for Linnea. After Bengaluru we went to Mysore. Mysore felt more like a traditional Indian city with plenty of culture. We stayed at a youth hostel and shared room with about 30 Indian women. It was very nice and we did actually sleep very well. We looked at a maharaja palace and went up to a holy mountain where we almost got attacked by a monkey and met some kind of a Guru who told us that we are now living in hell and that everything will change in about 28 years. After Mysore we went to Kerala. It was actually very hard getting there because it was impossible getting bus tickets! We had to spend an evening trying to get on a bus without success. We ended up taking a bus to another place the next day and taking the train from that place to Koshi. Koshi was actually very very nice! The weather was perfect and we stayed at a very nice hotel. We were going to take a boat tour on the backwaters but I had problems with my stomach and we could only spend one night in Koshi because we had a flight to Delhi. In Delhi we only spent one night before we went to Manali in Himalayas were we are staying now. We are staying in a village outside Manali called Vashisht. Vashisht is probably one of the places in the world with most Hippies! It's almost to much for me and Linnea but the nature here is amazing! I'm going to upload some pictures so you can see. Our plan is to stay in vashisht long enough to relax a bit now in the end of our journey. Now I'm going to upload some photos!

It's now almost a week since we arrived to India. The first days we spent in Bombay. My first impression was that Bombay really smelled like I imagined India, lots of spices, strange smoke and a little bit of dirt also. My second impression was how many poor people there was. Whole families where sleeping out in the streets and it was hard not to cry or give all my money away when I had to walk past the sleeping children in the evening. I knew that there where a lot of poor people in India but actually seeing it is worse than I imagined and I’ we never seen people live like this before. The best things in Bombay where all the beautiful buildings and all the nice people we met there! After Bombay we took a bus to Goa, we were at first going to Panaji but the bus driver refused to let us go to Panaji. He said that there was nothing in Panaji and that all tourists go to the beach. So after maybe 20 minutes of talking and almost arguing we had to go of the bus to go to the beach while everyone else stayed on the bus. The beach was Calangute beach and it was nice. There were lots of Indian tourists there and almost no western people because it's low season with rain and to big waves. It was nice and relaxing on Calangute beach but we wanted to see Panaji so the next day we took a taxi there. Panaji was a beautiful town with old colorful Portuguese buildings. If I would move to India I would live in Panaji for sure! Our next stop in India was Hampi where I am now. The bus ride here was horrible but also an experience. We took the local bus and it took us ten hours to get here, the bus seats where everything else but comfortable and the roads were really not straight! We stopped on the way to eat a little bit, it turned out we had to eat in a real hurry with our hand! The rice and the sauce and everything, after a while someone who saw that we had some troubles eating with our hands gave us a spoon. The views out the windows were magnificent and after a while when the bus wasn't as crowded some people started to talk to us, so the bus ride was good as well. When we arrived to Hospet we were tired and a bit moody but we were naive to think that we could get to Hampi half an hour away and find a nice hotel in peace! While we were still on the bus a rickshaw driver asked us if we wanted a ride through the window and when we were getting of the bus more rickshaw drivers came on the bus and blocked the door. Everyone wanted us to choose them. When we had gotten of the bus they were to many and all of them were talking at the same time, we couldn't choose one of them so we started walking but all of them a big group of men followed and surrounded us. We are used to people trying to sell us things but this was something new. It didn't take long before I could se the funny side of the situation and laughed at it. At last we found one driver who wasn't following us and we choose him. We almost felt like followed and harassed superstars so now we have a new sympathy for them. When we finally arrived in Hampi we got our reward for the rough journey. Hampi is really amazing! The surroundings are really stunning and everywhere there are ruins from the middle ages! This is truly an amazing place and I would recommend everyone to go here! One last thing about India this time is that it is a really colorful country. The women wear beautiful clothes in beautiful colors and most people who are not trying to sell us things or making naughty suggestions are really nice people. This is just the start in India and I look forward to tell you about the rest.

My telephone number in India is 00919930310587. I'll update you soon about India!

Finally I am finished with my history course! The course went well and was interesting but it's nice to be done with it. Now I can use the time to blog instead and of course read a lot of books while traveling. The last three weeks in Thailand were very good especially because Pontus was there! we went to koh Chang were it was raining al the time but we had lots of fun anyway and the waves were really big and fun playing in with my pink air mattress. The next island we visited was koh pang ngang to meet Emily and Alex who we had met on the train in Russia and to take part of one of the famous full moon parties. The full mun party was spectacular but i wasn't in the mood for drinking lots and dancing to rave music but I had a good time anyway! The next stop was koh Tao, a very nice place were there are a lot of divers. I had been thinking about taking a divers certificate but even if it was cheep it was over my budget and I'm quite happy just snorkeling but maybe someday in the future I will dive! the last days in Thailand we spent in Bangkok looking at the royal palace and some other places. Bangkok is really an beautiful place with lots of interesting old buildings.

I am now sitting in Bangkok, I have been doing lots of important visa stuff these past days so it's good just sitting in front of the computer and relaxing. This past week we have been to Ko samui for three days. Ko samui was a nice touristic place. The beaches were relaxing and the food was good but it was a bit more expensive than we are used to. After ko samui we sent to khao sok national park, a djungel! We did ony spend one night in khao sok which was a little bit to short but we did get a nice walk in the rainforest and we found a lake where we could swim a little bit. Se also saw a  leguan, a monkey (at the guesthouse) and lots of beautiflu butterflies! After khao sol we sent to Ranong. We took the local busses and after a little misunderstanding we almost ended up in Phuket. We got of the wrong bus with not much time getting to the other bus and we didn't know how to get to the bus stop. Luckily a woman drove us  one by one on her motorbike to the bus stop so we did manage to get there in time! We came to Ranong just to get on another motorbike-ride. It was late in the night, raining and the first two hotels we went to were full. We had no choice but to pay a man to take us do different hotels on his motorbike. This time it was me, Linnea, the driver and our backpacks on the same (not so big) motorbike. The fifth hotel we got to luckily had a room for us, it was even a really nice room! The reason we went to Ranong was to cross the border to Burma by boat and renew our Visa. The visa process went very well and in the evening we got on the bus to Bangkok. This time we had bough VIP tickets which vas very pleasant with big seats in which we could almost lie down entirely and sleep. In Bangkok we have been applying for a an Indian visa and tomorrow we are going to meet Pontus! Of course I'm very excited to meet Pontus!

I still have lots of pictures from China that I want to show you ad very soon they will be here on my blog!

Some pictures from Thaialand