I headed to Punjab yesterday. Harneet's parents packed me up and took me to Amritsar. Another road trip sounded exhausting but the roads were a lot smoother and not as mountainous as Uttarakhand. Amritsar is home to the Golden Temple - the most famous Gurudwara. It was a marvel to see. It's made completely of gold and refreshed every couple of years. The crowd was enormous and the queues long - filled with both devotees and tourists. On getting there, I met two Nani Buas (Harneet's mom's paternal aunts). They enthusiastically took us around. Here are some pictures of the Golden Temple (Darbar Sahib). The pictures are only of the outside as I don't normally click pictures inside religious places.

After exploring the temple, the nani buas told us that another Gurudwara where Guru Tej Bahadur was born and five gurus had stayed was celebrating an anniversary. So we made a tiny side trip to it in borrowed shoes to check it out. On our way out of Amritsar, we made a small side trip to Jallianwala Bagh. During the British imperialist rule, the Britishers had attacked a peaceful gathering here and opened fire on everyone including women and children, killing all in attendance. We couldn't enter the memorial since it had just closed but I did get a picture of the outside and was glad for whatever glimpse into history I could get (albeit an unpleasant piece of history).

After bidding farewell to the Nani Buas, we headed over to Fagwara where I got to meet Harneet's maternal grandparents. His grandma reminded me of my maternal grandma. Long entertaining conversations which I understand only half of. I make do by just nodding my head and saying yes to the rest. Sadly, Harneet did not get a chance to meet either of my grandmas. I still remember how excited they were to hear about our wedding and to meet him. Unfortunately, they both passed away soon before we got married. I still think of them fondly and meeting Harneet's grandparents brought back a lot of those fond memories. And oh, yes, they had a new cute little newcomer there.

So a couple of quick road trip stories. We stopped to get some juice along the way. The juice was of a popular punjabi citrus fruit kinu (kinnow). As we enjoyed the drink, we noticed that we had a flat tire. Papa and the driver Parveen fixed the flat while mummy showed me some fields around there - they had just finished the rice crop and were planing the new wheat crop. Unfortunately, composting is not a thing here and a lot of farm waste is still burned, resulting in a lot of pollution in the area.

My second story is kinda funny. As we made our way through the zillion toll stations on our way to Amritsar, one of them gave us a fake 10rs coin. On being questioned, the toll guy said it was real. The next day, on our way back, Parveen returned the same 10rs coin to the same person. They were like, this is fake. Parveen replied "When you gave it to me yesterday it was real, how could it be fake today 😂". The guy was forced to take the coin. I have to take a small minute to talk about the food. Some of my friends were recently whining about how horrible it makes them feel so I just couldn't help myself. Here are some pictures of my tandoori aloo pyaaz (potatoes and onions) paratha breakfast at Sukhdev in Murthal yesterday, my breakfast today of sarson da saag (mixed greens) and makki di roti (corn flatbread unique to Punjab), rasmalai, and a late lunch today at Haveli Karnal (no picture of the food but I captured some of the decor).

We are back in Delhi now (the traffic and smoke clues you in) and I bet I'm going to sleep like a baby tonight. But not before I finish a game of ludo and snakes and ladders 😊.