(alternate map: Tourist map of Delhi)
Saturday, December 15th
Back with Abhi, we met his mother the night before (she too had presents: she gave Andrea a necklace and Abhi gave me a Tiger t-shirt from the zoo). In the morning the six of us (Andrea, Matt, Anshu, Renuka, Abhi, & Abhi's mom) got into our small tour bus and went on a tour of Delhi.
1st stop: some temple that we don't remember the name of.
2nd stop: The India gate, a memorial to Indian servicemen who have died in battle.
3rd stop: Humayun's Tomb, a large, awesome tomb built by the emperor Humayun. Ironically, he actually died by falling off of the thing.
4th stop: Qutub Minar, an enormous tower and surrounding fortress
5th stop: Lotus Temple (Baha'i House of Worship), an impressive temple in the form of a lotus flower which signifies purity and peace. The Baha'i faith represents oneness of God, religions, and mankind, therefore no idols or objects of adoration in the temple.
Done with our tour of Delhi, we headed off for a five hour drive to Jaipur, further west.
...
Tuesday, December 18th
We arrived back in Delhi in the afternoon. Since our flight back to the States wasn't until after midnight, we checked back into our hotel and spent the afternoon doing some wandering around and then catching a last meal.
Around 8, we headed to the airport for a 4 hour wait until the flight and a brief 34 hours travel time back to the U.S., via Bangkok and Taipei. Homeward bound!