Mountains, Caves and Spiders, oh my god.

Oh man. This weekend was exhausting. So many fears and anxieties to conquered/to absolutely knock me out. On Saturday all six of us students and four St. Anthony’s students piled in a small van for a long and bumpy 4 hour mountainous drive to the Bangladesh border. Meghalaya (the name of our Indian state) means land in the clouds and there were many times this weekend when we were literally driving through a giant cloud. I don’t know what I prefer - watching our driver speed along a windy road and watching the borderless edge of the highway and the steep steep drop or watching him drive with only about two feet of visibility. Both are equally exhilarating. 

Those planes over there. That's Bangladesh!

Lots of trucks and rocks on their way
to Bangladesh

Objectively I can tell you it was a really beautiful drive. And the Bangladesh border was definitely cool to see. The Bangladesh border control got a kick out of us and let us come on the other side (and then they took plenty of pictures with us). So I went to Bangladesh (unofficially that is) this weekend so that’s pretty exciting. It was also incredibly hot so I jumped back into the van very quickly (unairconditioned but shade is great anyways). After about a 30 minute break at the border, we loaded back into the van to journey four hours back making a quick stop to eat our packed lunches once we got high enough for the heat to die down a little bit. It took me a while to understand the purpose of our 8 hour journey...pretty sure it was just to say “hey, I’m cool, I’ve seen Bangladesh.” 

We got home at 5:30 and I immediately fell asleep...woke up at 7 for dinner and was back to sleep before 9. I could not at all figure out how I was so incredibly exhausted but in retrospect the anxiety of the mountain roads definitely did me in. I can handle the many near accidents and lack of road rules in Delhi but the height really really kills me. 

So for our second sunday when we traveled a different set of narrow roads to see some waterfalls (this time in a very top-heavy blue school bus...perfect for a speeding driver on sharp turns) I learned that closing my eyes made it a little better. It’s like watching a gory movie and closing your eyes when the surgeon is about to cut into someones brain. Your brain knows that there is still a lot of nastiness on the screen but not being able to see it makes it slightly more bearable. Unfortunately this is a little bit more life threatening than watching a movie but you gotta do what you gotta do. 

We stopped by a coal mine. Check out our totally stable and safe blue school bus. 

Below are some pictures from Cherrapunjee, the rainiest place on earth and a picture of the really cool waterfall you could see from up there which we saw for about 2 minutes before the cloud came. 

We saw a lot of beautiful waterfalls. At one point I stayed a little further from the edge and Jill asked me if I liked mountains. Sure I do. I like looking up at them the way they’re meant to be enjoyed.

We made a pit stop at a cave too. That sounds nice and safe right? Yeah okay this cave walk would never fly in the US. We followed a very slippery and wet path (thank goodness I wasn’t wearing sneakers), we squeezed, crouched and climbed never knowing quite how far this little cave trek was. Oh and there was a bat. That was fun too. But I didn’t turn around (mostly because the path was too narrow to do that) but I did it and I was very proud of myself.

To the left is a picture I took before I had any idea what I was getting myself into. And on the right is a picture of a very unsteady bridge we clamored across. Keep in mind that I was crouching while taking that picture. 

And the cherry on top of this weekend of fear and anxiety? THE GIANT SPIDER I FOUND IN MY ROOM. HOLY S&%T. I was nice and safe in my room, ready to take a shower to wash off the cave water when I see this on the wall. The picture does not do it justice. We are talking about a spider you'd see in a zoo! I wanted to die. Jo took the pictures below, I couldn't even grab a camera. I calmly walked to the house and got Jill to take care of it though no one believed me when I calmly said "please help, the biggest spider I have ever seen in real life is in my room." I didn't completely lose it until Jill tried to catch it under a bowl (which was barely big enough) and it moved so quickly down the wall. Oh man.

This weekend. Oh my god. It's going to take me a while to get over the constant fear of a giant spider in my room. Even typing this I'm shuttering. Gahhhhh. Nightmares forever.