On the Rails

ADP: While it’s theoretically possible to snag a cheap fare from Delhi to Chennai on one of India’s new low cost carriers, getting from A to B in the subcontinent (especially on a backpacker budget) usually means traveling by train. And when cities and attractions are as spread out as they are in India, going the distance can mean you’ll be spending anywhere from four hours to four days pitching and rolling along with your fellow passengers.

Depending on how much you’re willing to spend on a ticket, doing the locomotion can be relatively comfortable affair—shell out for the 2 AC class and you’ll get a full flat “bed,” clean sheets, air conditioning, full board and an electric outlet perfect for recharging your camera battery while in transit. A slightly less expensive seat in 3AC class earns you similar perks, but you’ll be bunking up with eight people instead of six. And, the third overnight category, is the “sleeper” class, located in a car that doesn’t have air-conditioning but does come complete with a full militia of cockroaches that can actually be heard laughing at your feeble attempts to squash them dead.

Of course, Jen, Holly and I were blissfully unaware of the distinctions when we booked our seats for the 14 hour overnight ride from Bangalore to Trivandrum. After inquiring about the cost of 3 AC, we were promptly told that all upper classes were sold out and that sleeper was our only option. No sweat, we said, figuring if we’d mastered the matatus in Kenya we could handle economy class aboard an Indian train.

No sooner had we slid into our assigned spots when a steady stream of six-legged critters starting pouring down the walls and over the seats like a scene straight from the short lived Jerry O’Connell show “Joe’s Apartment.” But these little guys didn’t sing and dance like they did on Comedy Central. Our new insect bunkmates were hell bent on showing us who’d invaded whose territory—and swooping in to claim any crumbs we might drop between shrieks of pure terror.

As we ran around the compartment swinging wildly at the walls with our shoes, rolled up magazines and even our Lonely Planet South India book, the rest of the passengers started filing on and seemed astonished—then incredibly amused—to find three white girls engaged in a full scale freak out over a few tiny little bugs. With a mix of sign language, Hindu and English, one kind woman tried to explain that there was nothing to be afraid of, that unlike mosquitoes, cockroaches didn’t bite.

Of course we knew this—the girls at Pathfinder Academy didn’t mind roaches and said “there is no reason to fear them.” Blame it on our American socialization or one too many Raid-Kills-Bugs-Dead commercials, but we definitely did fear them…at least, for the first few hours of the train ride.

But as the hours rolled and the city lights grew dimmer behind us, something interesting started to happen. Or rather, stopped happening. While the bugs continued to commute down the walls behind our heads, their presence ceased to evoke such a strong reaction. Eventually, there was barely a reaction at all. We’d spot a bug crawling in the direction of each other’s hair and without a word, we’d lean over to squash it and move back to our seats in one fluid motion.

Skin no longer crawling (well, not as much), we were finally free to observe the action all around us.

Each sleeper car housed about a dozen compartments and each one was packed to rafters and with extended families large enough to comprise both sides of a regulation soccer game. We saw groups of glossy haired women—moms, aunts, grandmas—swathed in electric hued saris, bouncing babies sporting kohl smudged eyes and more jingly gold jewelry than your average hip hop mogul. Hunched over tin foil packets filled with steaming mutton biryiani or chicken tikka masala, dads ate dinner, pressing the food into a sticky ball between their fingers and scooping it directly into their mouths, throwing the containers out the window once the contents had been spent.

In the absence of something more interesting to occupy their hands, groups of middle aged men with 70s disco-style mustaches stood in the train car vestibule, untying and retying the thin plaid and flowered fabric that encircled their waists (called a mundu or lungi), sometimes so short that I had to look away for fear of getting an unwanted glimpse of the goods.

And then like clockwork, at 10:00pm, the sleeper beds were pulled down and everyone snuggled in together, sometimes three to a bed, to start the process of drifting off to sleep. Within minutes, snores, wheezes, sneezes, coughs, farts and other exotic sounds filled the air, a cacophony set to constant rhythm of train wheels clattering over the tracks below.

I wriggled into my sleep sack and pulled it up tight around my head, praying that insects who shared our car would be bunking down as well—just not with me.

Okay, I knew better, but tried not to think about it.

Morning came way too early (Who gets up at six when they don’t have to?!) and the howls of drinks sellers hawking “CHAI COFFEE CHAI COFFEECOFFEE CHAI CHAI CHAAAAI” pierced my sleep like a smoke alarm. By 7:00am, most families had already snapped their beds back into place and one group in particular was trying to share its breakfast with a too-kind-to-refuse Holly.

Having wisely chosen the top bunks, which didn’t have to be folded back up, Jen and I hung out and watched and a.m. chaos from scalp level, finally jumping into the fray when became too hot and steamy to remain perched at the top of the car.

No sooner had we hopped down when this adorable brother and sister duo approached us to say hello and see if we were having more fun on our side of the car. Jen, trying to be friendly, placed one of her Ipod earbuds next to the little girl’s head.

At first, the girl shied away, totally unnerved by the sound emitting from the tiny speaker. But just as we all did five years ago, she quickly caught onto the joys of the Mp3 player and as she listened to the music, a huge grin spread across her face.

Her brother, noting that his sister had a toy that he didn’t, grabbed the other earbud and together they rocked out to some classic Bon Jovi until their tug-of-war war nearly split Jen’s headphones in two. After Jen took back the headphones to prevent them from being damaged, the little girl decided to move on to something more interesting—slapping, scratching pinching and hitting the two of us until we were black and blue.

Across the aisle, the girl’s mother looked on lovingly, laughing in delight as her oldest child pummeled the two nice ladies currently babysitting her.

Shocked by her strength and determination, I was torn between the instinct to control the little four year old hellion in front of me and the desire to abide by the rules of Indian etiquette I’d yet to learn. Was it rude to discipline someone else’s kid, to tell her that physical violence isn’t cool and to try to calm her down—especially in a language she might not understand?

In the end, I didn’t have to do anything. Attention Deficit Disorder won out once again and she started a new game of unbuckling her sandal, throwing it across the train car and bringing the shoe over to Holly to help her put it on again. The two of them were well into their third round when the girl’s mother finally came over to intervene: they’d reached their destination.

Our stop came about twenty minutes later and the three of us all disembarked, not so much rested, but at least in one piece. We’d officially made it through another Indian rite of passage, one of totally idiosyncratic, hair-raising experiences that make this country seem challenging—but one of the least boring places one earth.

Happy Holidays from Somewhere Warm!

In order to preserve the chronology of our blog (we're a smee behind on posting), we can't tell you exactly where we are right now. But we can say that our pal and New York roomie Beth Frey flew out to join us in this tropical paradise for a little diving, a little sunbathing and lots of Christmas cocktails. Here's a few shots from our winter wonderland...

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, everyone!

'Om' My God!

“You can check out any time you’d like, but you can never leave!” echoed through my head as the gangly, Indian security guard stood between me, Amanda and the exit gate. Now, of course, that’s not really what he said to us, but I could feel an eerie, Hotel California-twisted haze settle over us as we realized this man was actually not going to let us out of the ashram. Our brief stay at Southern India’s famous Sivananda Academy was beginning to feel more like a prison sentence than the relaxing yoga vacation we’d expected. “You can’t stop us from leaving,” Amanda sputtered in disbelief. “We’re just going to walk out!” “No, no, you must need a pass to go,” the guard replied in broken English. “Yes, but everyone is in meditation right now, so no one is at the desk to give us one,” Amanda rebutted. Oh Jesus, it’s only 6am and I already need a cocktail, I thought. Unfortunately, alcohol was one of the many things strictly forbidden at the ashram. Smoking, bringing in outside food, reading books of an ‘impure’ nature (content unrelated to yoga or Hinduism), wearing sleeveless shirts or tight clothing and basically anything fun, were major no-nos listed in the rules we’d been forced to sign upon arrival. Under normal circumstances, no self-respecting Lost Girl would willingly subject herself to such torture, but we really had no idea how insane Sivananda would be until we got here.

Before we began planning our India leg of the trip, I had no clue what an ashram was. For you readers who are as much in the dark as I was, let me enlighten you. Actually, I’ll let Wikipedia enlighten you since that’s where I found this basic definition: “An ashram in ancient India was a Hindu hermitage where sages lived in peace and tranquility amidst nature. Spiritual and physical exercises, such as various forms of yoga, were regularly performed. Today, the term ashram is used to refer to an intentional community formed primarily for spiritual upliftment of its members, often headed by a religious leader or mystic.”

Amanda and I actually first learned about ashrams from Holly, whose one main goal for the trip was to get her yoga teaching certificate while we were in India. She wasn’t the only visitor to the subcontinent to have this idea. We quickly discovered that many people, especially those in the backpacker circuit, come to India specifically for the teacher training courses or have blocked off a couple weeks on their itineraries to experience ashram life. Lured by the uber cheap price tag ($11 per day covers lodging, food and all classes), the huge community of fellow travelers (almost 200 people stay at Sivananda each day) and the incredible fat burning factor (4 hours of yoga a day x approx 300 calories/hour = smaller love handles) Amanda and I happily committed to a week long yoga vacation. That way, we’d at least get to spend some time with Holly while she was there for her 1 month program. Plus, it’d be good to get in some exercise and healthy eating before we headed to the famous beaches in Goa to pursue more hedonistic pleasures. But after only a day at Sivananda, Amanda and I began to wonder if we could hack this holy lifestyle for an entire week.

Not only were we expected to subsist off of only two tasteless, vegetarian meals a day (a form of cruel and unusual punishment in our eyes), we were required to attend all activities and classes on the daily schedule - - one that started at 5am and didn’t end until 10pm. In case you’re wondering what hell is like, I’ll tell you. It’s 2 hours of meditation and chanting in the morning, followed by a ‘hearty’ snack of 4-5 grapes or peanuts, 4 hours of yoga classes, 1 hour of karma yoga (aka scrubbing toilets or sweeping the dorms), 2 hours of lecture hall, sitting cross legged on cement floors to eat rice and vegetables with your hands, topped off with a second round of meditation and chanting from 8pm-10pm and a mandatory light’s out at 10:30pm. ‘Om’ My God! What have we gotten ourselves into here? No amount of enlightenment is worth this suffering!

Amanda and I decided the only way we could survive was to do things on our own terms. Fortunately the yoga vacationers slipped under the radar when it came to attendance checks, so we decided to simply disregard the wakeup bell, skip most of the meditation, chanting and lectures and actually use a spoon and fork at mealtimes (we did still do our karma yoga/chores every day, though). Now I’m sure some of the hard-core ashram-ites out there will regard us as spiritually challenged students who didn’t open ourselves up to the whole experience, but just because we like to sleep in, hit happy hour once a week (OK, a few times a week) and pig out on chocolate bars when we have the craving, doesn’t mean we couldn’t achieve zen. In fact, during our time at Sivananda, we accomplished exactly what we’d set out to do - - improve our yoga skills. We may have skimped a bit on the fluffy stuff, but when it came to the physical, we pushed ourselves from day one, opting to jump right into the advanced class rather than beginners. After only a few sessions, we saw a visible improvement in our strength, flexibility and ability to hold difficult asanas (poses). I was even able to balance in a headstand for a full two minutes, a feat I hadn’t even achieved in childhood. Holy, Hare Krishna! I’m awesome!

In the end, Amanda and I made a ton of fun new friends, shed a few pounds, gained a newfound appreciation for vegetarian cuisine (well, almost) and overall had a positive yoga school experience. Of course, after 7 days of forced detox, we were more than ready to re-tox ourselves in Goa. The only down side to our departure was that we had to leave poor Holly there to finish out three more weeks of the program. Arming her with words of encouragement, a huge stash of contraband fashion mags and enough Kit Kats to fill a 7-11, Amanda and I hugged Holly goodbye and headed out of Sivananda’s gates back into the real world (stay tuned for the seriously juicy details from Holly once she’s fully recovered).

Oh, and in case you’re wondering what happened with us and the security guard…

After arguing for several minutes in vain with him about the fact that we just wanted to take a walk outside and that he couldn’t stop us from leaving, Amanda and I finally backed down and returned to our dorm room. After all, even a couple of Sivananda slackers like us don’t want to get kicked out of yoga school. Cause that would be some seriously bad karma!

---Jen

Bargain Basement Dubai

ADP: In the last decade, Dubai has become a red-hot destination for ex-pats eager to make an overnight fortune and spend it just as quickly. Boasting the world’s only seven-star resort, the world’s largest indoor ski slope, the world’s highest number of shopping malls per capita and soon-to-be the world’s tallest building, Dubai doesn’t do anything half-assed—and it definitely doesn’t do anything cheap.

Of course, this was a critical piece of information that we learned only after Jen, Holly and I had accepted Dubai as a “free” stopover on the open-jaw airline ticket we just purchased. Until now, we’d prided ourselves on choosing destinations where our money would stretch the farthest, places where we could eat, sleep and entertain ourselves for about $20 to $30 per day. Seduced by the idea that we could get something for nothing (and the fact that we could add “Middle East” to our itinerary) we opted to spend a week in the United Arab Emirates. Little did we know, things were about to get expensive, and fast.

Better still was the fact that the flight was half empty, so the girls and I had plenty of room to stretch out, curl up our feet and watch the movies everyone else at home has already seen (and for the record, with the exception of Adrianne Grainer, I thought the casting of Devil Wears Prada was perfect).

After spending the entire overnight flight staring at our personal entertainment centers, Jen, Holly and I arrived in the Dubai Airport a little bleary eyed, but feeling particularly cool that we’d managed to finagle an extra city into our traveling itinerary.
But as we entered gleaming white marble customs hall filled with passengers sporting more Prada, Escada, Gucci and Valentino than the characters in the movie I’d just finished (not to mention in Vogue itself), I got the distinct impression that this “free” stopover might be a bit pricier than we’d bargained for.

That reality hit home once we tried to find an affordable place to stay. After checking dozens of hotel websites, emailing friends-of-friends who lived in town and inquiring about hostels only to find out they don’t exist in Dubai, one upscale hotel manager took pity on us and negotiated a deal with his pal across town. For the rock-bottom, bargain basement price of $133 per night, the girls and I could unpack our bags at the Empire Suites, a slightly seedy, down-n-dirty establishment that looked ripe for a Vegas style demolition. After spending between $6 and $15 apiece to shack up in South America and Africa, we could hardly fathom spending that kind of money just to catch some Zzzs. But rather than head back to the airport to switch our flights and admit defeat, we humbly accepted the “deeply discounted” room. It could have been worse: in Jumairah neighborhood some big spenders were shelling out $10,000 per night to stay at the oft-photographed and neon splashed Burj al Arab (the hotel that looks like a sailboat set adrift in the Persian Gulf).

It certainly sucked knowing that we’d be hemorrhaging almost an entire month’s lodging budget on six nights of sleep in Dubai, but our financial situation got vastly better from there. By talking to other travelers, getting advice from the aforementioned friends of friends and stealing a “Don’t Remove” copy of Time Out Dubai from some hotel lobby, we figured out all sorts of nifty ways to save cash and have fun in one of the world’s most expensive cities. Here’s our advice for Doing Dubai on the Cheap:

Eating Out: Much like Vegas, this place has no shortage of super swank restaurants designed to satisfy an international jet set with champagne wishes and caviar tastes. Unfortunately, as you know by know, we’re on a diet coke and tuna fish kind of budget. We found our food salvation by hitting up several of the ubiquitous schwarma, hummus and falafel stands across town. Not only did these delicious street eats fill us up for less than a buck, we never had to worry about reservations or a dress code.

Transport: The price of gas back at home may be stratospheric, but here in the Middle East, cab drivers pay about 50 percent less to fill up their tanks. Sure it’s unfair—we won’t even begin to go into the politics here—but cheaper petrol means cheaper cab rides. We rarely paid more than a few bucks each to get ourselves across town. And until Dubai gets a subway, cabs are really the only way to roll.

Drinks and Dancing: Expensive hotel rooms are big strike against Dubai but the city wins back mega points for its fantastic Ladies Nights held at lounges, clubs and bars across the city. Every single night of the week, the fairer sex can enjoy their choice of beer, top shelf cocktails and even champagne with strawberries. Now that’s what we’re talking about---free drinks without the burden of chatting up some random dudes (c’mon, you know you’ve done it or someone who has!)

Entertainment: Grab a copy of Time Out Dubai and you’ll find an incredible number of free events in the city, such as movie screenings under the stars and concerts featuring bands you’ve actually heard of. Most events happen around sunset, leaving you plenty of time to head out on the town (see Ladies Nights above).

Beauty: Forget Paris or Manhattan—if there was ever a town with a higher concentration of makeup counters and beauty bars, this is it. Locals explain that because Arab women often reveal just their face (and sometimes just their eyes), they are fanatic about having gorgeous skin and great cosmetics. Chanel, Estee Lauder and Dior may not come cheap, but you can have a field day sampling the goods at one of the 10 zillion department stores and makeup shops in town. Sure some of you may get sucked into purchasing $200 worth of anti-wrinkle cream like I did (hey, the desert is dry and I am 28 now), but if you can show restraint like Holly and Jen, you can sample expensive and buy cheap. You’ll find amazing deals on yummy smelling hair, nail and skin products at Boot Pharmacy, a London-based brand that has a few branches in Dubai. The girls took advantage of the buy two, get one free deal….making their bags heavier but their wallets only slightly lighter.

Health: Really want to make up for lost funds? Hit the very back of Boots (or any local pharmacy) and stock up on all the medications that you ordinarily need prescriptions and tons of cash to get. Retina A, a great Rx skin smoothing cream, normally costs about $60 with insurance but we snagged tubes for $8. Jen picked up some antibiotics to knock out a sinus infection for a few bucks. Antibacterial eye drops, Yazmin, Difflucan (if you’re a chick, you know what those last two are), nasal spray and malarial meds were all available over the counter—and at a serious discount, making Dubai a great stop for stocking up.

Lodging: Sure, the nightclub downstairs was a little too loud and the location a bit out of the way, but the Empire Suites really wasn’t all that bad. Book now—before it’s cleared to make room for yet another five-star hotel.

How We: Booked Our Flights

ADP: Back in New York, when the girls and I were strategizing the cheapest ways to convey ourselves and three very heavy packs around the planet, we ruled out the infamous RTW or round the world ticket. Not only do Americans have to shell out hundreds or even thousands more than our British or Australian backpacker buddies for virtually the same itineraries, but locking in every destination before we’d even left NYC seemed a little rigid. Wouldn’t it be more spontaneous, go-with-the-flow and well, significantly cooler to arrive in a country and book our onward travel just a few days ahead?

Well, if we’d been slightly less ambitious in our destination planning (“Five continents in the same year? Sure…no sweat!”), flying solo instead of in a three-woman party or cashing in those trust funds everyone seems to think we have, traveling ticket-to-ticket might have worked out well. But after many frustrated attempts to make reservations through airline websites that don’t accept foreign credits cards, don’t have customer services numbers, advertise bogus fares or simply don’t have three seats available 48 hours in advance, we knew we had to find a happy middle ground between an insanely expensive RTW ticket and failing to fly by the seat of our pants.

Fellow world traveler and a pal of mine John Buckley (hey Buck!) recommend that we check out AirTreks, a San Francisco based company that specializes in tracking down the cheapest possible flights between any three or more destinations. After logging onto their website, we used an interactive program to estimate what the total for our trip would cost, then submitted it electronically to a travel agent. In about a day, someone from company wrote us to learn more about our plans, asked us a few questions and came up with a price tag for our dream trip.

After dealing with so many testy websites in South America and India (“what do you mean you can’t process my order without a local cell phone number?!”) it was a tremendous relief to deal with a real person. Our agent, Sarah, asked us innumerable questions and offered advice that ultimately saved us from having to backtrack overland just to fly out of the same city. And after viewing the route we wanted—Nairobi to Bangalore to Bangkok to Auckland to Sydney—she let us know that we could stop over in both Dubai and Bali without paying a single dollar, peso, baht or kip extra. Score!

So, while it might have made us cooler travelers to roll with the punches and to see where the wind takes us (both terrible clichés, wouldn’t you say?), we made the decidedly unglamorous move of plunking down the old credit card for an open-jaw ticket. How much did we spend, you ask? A little over $2000 apiece to travel between seven intercontinental cities, or approximately $300 a flight.

As for getting back to the states after the trip’s all finished? Well, we haven’t thought of everything yet. Stay tuned for updates.

Just Say Ohm

HCC: The Lost Girls found a secret hideaway in Diani Beach on the coast of Kenya: Shaanti Holistic Health Resort and Retreat. Set on a white sand beach overlooking the Indian Ocean, it’s an oasis of calm.








Yoga and meditation classes are offered daily on an outdoor platform, Ayurvedic facials and massages are given in thatched-roofed huts, and a nutritionist on staff can cater the vegetarian meals to your personal needs. It’s the perfect spot to go to detox, take a break from a fast-paced schedule or for a romantic retreat (you’ll have the beach almost all to yourself).


No shirt? No shoes? No problem! The vibe is so laidback that you can dine in the tree house-like restaurant in just your bathrobe and slippers. Plus, there’s no specific check out time. Though the staff doesn’t rush you, we stayed until almost 7 p.m. on our last day and I think they started to wonder if we were moving in. We didn’t want to leave!

Check it out for yourself at www.shaantihhr.com; doubles start at $250 and include all meals, yoga and meditation classes.

A Monkey Stole My Mango!

ADP: We seem to have a little problem with the animals of the world stealing our stuff. Well, more accurately, Holly's stuff. First there was the kinkachu in the Amazon that bit holes through her wallet and nearly made off with her shiny new camera. Then, in the Diani Beachalets, a pretty balsy monkey ran through our front door, made a break for the kitchen, unrolled a brown paper bag and grabbed a mango before Irene screamed, threw a water bottle and scared him off.

Considering that we'd left the door open in an area where swinging primates outnumbered people by 14 to 1, it stode to reason that Holly's fruit could get stolen. But after we'd upgraded to a slightly more "luxurious" hotel with air-con, a back patio and deadbolts, we figured out days of thieving animals were behind us.

Apparently not.

We returned from a day at the beach to find everything in its place---except for a gnarled, mangled piece of fruit sitting right next to Holly's pillow.

"You guys," moaned Hol. "Somebody came in here and ate my last mango! Who left the door open?!"

We looked around...no one had left the door open. The sliding glass in the back of our room was shut tight and we'd opened the front door with a key. We played Nancy Drew for a few minutes, quickly ruling out the possibility that the intruder was still inside the room.

Despite our best detective work, we never did figure out how the mango thief got inside, then back out of our room. Or why the sneaky little bugger would leave his leftovers sitting right next to Holly's side of the bed. The best we could figure: we'd left the back door open when hanging our laundry to dry, our uneaten fruit a siren call for any hungry monkeys roaming by. When the staff came to clean (yes, we were living large that week) they must have closed the back door for us.

We didn't expect to get the chance to confront the thief face-to-face, but the very next day, the hungry little guy decided to come back for a second helping of fruit.

As you can see below, Holly was ready--with ammo.




Holly decided to have a little fun with the mango thief before finally giving in and letting him have the banana you see pictured. Sure, we all know that feeding the monkeys makes them come back for more, but he was so persistant (and clever) that we figured he'd probably find a way inside no matter what we did. Beside, could you resist that face?

Beds, Baths and Beyond

When Holly, Amanda and I decided to take an entire year off from the ‘real world’ to globetrot together, we realized it was a huge commitment. We knew from experience that we were excellent travel buddies, but jetting off for a week’s vacation to escape our daily grind wasn’t exactly the same thing as spending 365 days in a row together with no jobs, boyfriends or apartments to come home to? What if we started getting on each other’s nerves after only a few months? What if we got into a huge fight? What if one person always felt left out of the three? While these were valid concerns to consider before taking off, we were too focused on the positives to worry about the potential pitfalls. After all, it’s not everyday that two of your girlfriends are willing to put their lives on hold to take a trip around the world. We knew how lucky we were to have found each other and were confident that the trip would not only change our lives forever, but also make us closer friends in the process. Little did we know just how close!

Traveling on a tight budget, through mainly third world countries, has made privacy a luxury we can rarely afford. During the first few months of the trip alone, we’ve crammed three into a two person tent on the Inca Trail, slept head to toe in twin beds for an entire month in Kenya, packed ourselves, our luggage and a local family into a tiny, roach infested train car in India and snuggled under countless mosquito nets the world over. Despite the occasional case of claustrophobia, we’ve learned to accept our too-close conditions as part of the ‘true’ travel experience and jokingly rationalize our lack of personal space as an essential element of Lost Girls’ bonding (I mean, spending 24-7 together just isn’t enough!). But it wasn’t until a strange twist of events in Diani Beach that we realized just how comfortable we’d gotten with one another.

During our three week visit to Kenya’s East Coast, we were lucky enough to be invited as guests for one night to the Shaanti Holistic Health Resort - a luxurious spa and yoga center nestled in a tranquil garden above the Indian Ocean. (Jen’s tip to readers: Befriend journalists; the perks are fabulous! :)). Having spent the past month in tiny huts with no showers or toilets, we were overjoyed to be in such swank surroundings; even if it was just for one day. So of course, when the owner encouraged us to try their signature ‘star baths’ – an indulgent dip in exotic, oil infused water – we jumped at the rare opportunity to be pampered. Donning our complimentary terry cloth robes and slippers, we happily skipped down the path towards the ocean, eager to experience Shaanti’s signature soak. We got even more excited when we saw the elegant sunken bathtubs, overflowing with bubbles and blanketed in rose petals, that had been set up for us. But wait a second. There were only two baths and three girls. Huh! How was this going to work? Now, boys! I know what you’re thinking. These numbers sound perfect to you. But Holly, Amanda and I kind of thought that this type of intimate situation would be more appropriate to experience with our boyfriends, not with two of our girlfriends who probably hadn’t shaved their legs in a few days (we’re in freakin’ Africa; give us a break).

Maybe it was the knowledge that in less than 12 hours we’d be back in a dumpy $6/night beach shack or the fact that none of us wanted to be left out of the fun, but without giving it a second thought, we all leaped into the tubs together like little kids. At this point in the trip, we’d shared practically everything with each other. Why not a bubble bath? (Again, you male readers can keep your comments to yourself!) Sure, we may have looked a bit funny to the Shaanti staff, but we didn’t care. We’d had enough crazy things happen to us so far on the road that practically nothing could faze us. Although that may have had more to do with the contraband rum we snuck into the alcohol-free resort and brought with us to enhance the star bath – but still! At this point in the trip, Amanda, Holly and I have resigned ourselves to the fact that we’re likely to have more honeymoon-worthy moments with each other during our year abroad than we will ever have with our future grooms. On the positive side, at least this trip will give us a firsthand knowledge of the world’s most romantic locales. Add star baths in Diani Beach to our list of places to re-visit with our husbands – or at the least, really hot guys! In the meantime, we’ll continue to share our beds, baths and beyond with each other!

---Jen

Check out our ‘Girls Gone Mild’ video of our rub-a-dub in the tubs - - if you dare!

Love for Sale

ADP: As someone who managed to learn depressively little about international geography during my formative years, I barely knew that Kenya had a coastline, let alone a gleaming ribbon of icing white sand and its own rhinestone speckled stretch of Indian Ocean.

We hadn’t planned to follow up our recent safari by hitting a beach resort area favored by European package tourists, but after several weeks spent unencumbered by travel “extras” such as showers, clean laundry, mirrors, pillows and electricity, we were drawn to Diani Beach like media girls to a sample sale. Located in the far southeastern part of the country, D-beach promised all the creature comforts of a Caribbean holiday—without the pesky quadruple digit price tag.

After checking into the optimistically named “Beachalets” and whipping out the lip gloss for the first time in what felt like decades, Holly, Jen, Irene and I made a beeline for Forty Thieves, the Lonely Planet’s recommendation for a guaranteed good time.

Once properly settled in with a cocktail (ahhhhh…finally!), the girls and I leaned back and eyeballed the scene unfolding at the low-slung booths, saltwater-worn couches and around the enormous center bar. Behind us, a few backpackers were shooting pool and ignoring the signs warning them not to perch their beer on the table. The DJ who was mixing up a weird combo of 70s disco, Foreigner and Nora Jones was unsuccessfully trying to get the party started on the dance floor. And at the next table, two balding, paunchy Germans were thoroughly enjoying the company of their dates, two very young Kenyan girls wearing the type barely-there outfits not usually seen outside a Wet Seal or Rave. Judging by the draping of limbs and stroking of body parts, I might have guessed that these ladies were really hot for their companions—except their deadly bored stares told a different story.

A quick glance down at a pair of clunky white pumps that had no business being manufactured (let alone traipsing across a soft sand floor) got me thinking. What was going on here? How did these old white guys end up on a double date with two local girls half their age?

“Dude, those chicks are totally prostitutes,” whispered Irene in a low hiss.

Jen, Holly and I laughed until we realized that she was being completely serious. Were they really? Nooo. We were all hesitant to make a snap judgment about a situation that could be very well be innocuous. Sure, several basic fashion edicts had been violated and the ladies probably would have been more amused hand-washing laundry than making conversation with their dates, but could we all leap to the very unsavory notion that they had to be hookers?

As the night wore on, there was no doubt left in our minds.

Judging by the transactions going down all around us—several women were now openly soliciting whiskey-toting dudes with bottle cap-sized moles, yellowing teeth and hairy backs—Forty Thieves clearly doubled as a brothel. The only thing that stood in the way of it becoming the Best Little Whorehouse in Diani was the lack of rooms for rent. Drinks, cigarettes and entrees such as the aptly-named Bang-Bang Chicken were the only goods on the official menu.

We watched the foursome next to us slowly slink towards the door. Just over an hour later, Ms. White High Heels and her pal were back—sans German escorts. The girls made their way over to the fully packed bar and found two new friends looking for entertainment.

Slightly scandalized, we headed back to the Beachalets to discuss how gross men could be without even trying. But it wasn’t until the next day, when we witnessed scads of European women soliciting and enjoying the services of Diani’s famed “Beach Boys” that our jaws truly dropped.

On the beach, blue-haired old ladies with flesh bursting out of their skirted bathing suits were walking arm-in-arm with sinewy locals sporting baby dreads and flip flops. By the pool, 20-something blonde girls with cornrows and sunburned scalps enjoyed sunscreen applications from bare-chested Kenyans with toothy smiles a way with words (in six different languages). We even ran into the famed octogenarian sex kitten who accepted sexual favors from several different beach boys, then tried to pay them with English toffees instead of cash. While the sun never stopped shining overhead, it appeared that our idyllic beach paradise had a something of a dark side

Curiosity overcoming my mild repulsion, I longed to sidle up to the nearest European on a sex holiday and ask her, How much are you paying per night? Are you looking for companionship or did you fly down to Africa just to get it on?”

And, most importantly,

Why the hell would you pay for sex in a country where 1.2 million people have HIV??

After chatting with security guards, waitresses, beach bums and even a few forthcoming members of the British Army, we came to understand that alluring Diani Beach leads a not-so-secret double life. If there were a Zagat Guide for sex tourism, this place would appear on its top 10 list.

Visitors say that the aquamarine waters provide “the ideal backdrop for enhancing the mood” while the prices are “some of the lowest on the coast.”

As the scene unfolded around my beach lounger, a part of me felt sickened that girls not much older than the boarders at Pathfinder were trying earn cash by selling their bodies as many times a night as possible. Another part of me was shocked that in some twisted version of gender equality, the boys doing it, too. And the third part was just confused as to why educated men and women would fly so far and put their lives seriously at risk just to have sex with a stranger.

Apparently, folks at the United Nations were just as baffled. Anne, a 25-year old Kenyan we met a dinner one night, told us that she’d volunteered for the UN when they were conducting a study on sex tourism in the area. Her job was to infiltrate clubs and bars along the coast and learn in the “ins-and-outs” of the business….what the going rates were, how the sellers got started and the ways that they protected themselves from disease.

Through Anne’s covert opps, she learned that the majority of the prostitutes, both men and women, were well aware of HIV and were much more diligent about using condoms than the average Kenyan. They got paid precious little for their services (“the Germans say that for the price of touching a boob back at home they can get the whole body here in Diani”) and conducted their business out in the open rather than in some sleazy back room. But while the women required volume sales to stay afloat, men often got rented for the entire week to give the “relationship” time to develop.

Anne told us the prostitutes didn’t always have sex…sometimes they’d keep men company at the bar in order to get drinks and a taxi ride home. I almost smiled as she said this—how different was that from any given night at any given bar in Manhattan?

I still had mixed feelings about the whole pina colada-and-prostitution culture, but the longer I stayed in Diani, the more desensitized I became. After all, who was I, the ignorant American tourist who barely knew Kenya had a coastline, to judge?

Becoming Maasai

While we thought the safari would be the highlight of our brief visit to the land of the Maasai, we soon discovered that our most exciting adventure had yet to come. Since we only had one more day to spend with Emmanuel before heading back to Nairobi, he told us he’d arranged for a few friends and nearby villagers to come to his house to perform a special ceremony - - one which Holly, Amanda and I were enthusiastically requested to be a part of. We happily accepted the invitation, excited at the chance to part of an authentic Maasai ritual. Little did we know just how big of a role we’d been cast to play.



We awoke the next morning to a cacophony of clanging pots, squealing kids and distant drum beats sprinkled throughout a steady hum of voices coming from outside. Emmanuel and his wife Lily, both donned from head to toe in traditional tribal garb, cheerfully bid us good morning and outfitted us in our very own Maasai-ware -- chunky oval necklaces packed tightly with patterns of aqua, sky and royal blue beads - - to help us look the part for the day’s activities. We were ushered into the front yard where we quickly learned that the term ‘a few friends’ must translate differently in the Maasai language. Row upon row of local men, women and school children blanketed the lawn as more people continued to pour down from the hills and enter Emmanuel’s gate. While we had met a couple of Maasai the day before at the game reserve, witnessing an entire tribe come together in full face paint, distinctive red robes and ornate jewelry was a site worthy of a National Geographic spread. With distinctively tall and willowy frames and striking facial features, the Maasai are easily the most beautiful people we’ve seen in the world. We were instantly captured by their friendly dispositions, open manner and natural elegance.



After making the proper introductions, the girls and I snagged a spot on the grass at the front, eager to watch the Maasai in action. But before we knew it, the three of us were upgraded from spectators to star performers. Pulled from our seats by a large group of Maasai women, we were ushered straight to the middle of their inner circle and encouraged to dance along side them. At first we stumbled along unsure of what to do, but with their expert guidance, we soon fell in step beside them, swaying our hips and swinging our arms to the rhythm of their spiritual song. And while our moves might not have qualified us for Soul Train, our best efforts to fake the funk had the women in stitches. They laughed out loud, grabbing us by the hands and pulling us into a group hug. One after the other, the Maasai women pressed their faces up to ours, leaving streaks of red ochre paint across our skin. “You are Maasai now,” one woman cried as the crowd cheered.

Our scarlet stained cheeks baking in the sun, Holly, Amanda and I continued to dance across the lawn with our new sisters until it was time to exit for the next performance. Sweaty and exhilarated, we happily plopped down on the ground to watch the Maasai men show off their vertical prowess. Until we saw it in person, we wouldn’t have believed it, but with each leap, they got at least 3 feet of air under them. How do these men jump to Jordan-worthy heights, you wonder? Well, all we can say is: it’s a Maasai thing; you wouldn’t understand!



---Jen



Check out more photos of our favorite “NBA All-Stars” and of our extraordinary journey into Maasai-hood:



(There are a ton of pics -seriously, like 25- so please be patient! :))