Back to Reality!

We have been home from India for a week now and it already feels like a distant memory - it is amazing how quickly life returns to normal and routines and habits kick in isn't it! I think Im driving everyone mad with the number of times I start a sentence with the words 'When I was in India….', but I have so many amazing memories and things I want to tell people about and I really don't want to loose the excitement I felt on the trip so can't help but say it over and over...

I was back at my desk for four days last week to try and get on top of my correspondence and commitments, but by Sunday I was really pining for an Indian 'fix' so Andy and I drove out to the Shaminarayan Temple in Neasden and had a really lovely couple of hours looking at this amazing building inside and out! It's an incredible place and very much worth a visit if you get a chance - I'm already trying to work out when I can get there again!

I have so many India inspired ideas for projects I want to work on and have already started collecting yarns together for things I have in mind, but my priority at the moment is putting the finishing touches to the CAL project I have designed in partnership with Stylecraft yarns.

The CAL will launch when the first free pattern will be available to download from the Stylecraft web site on the 7th April. I am really excited about this project and can't wait to tell you more about it over the next few weeks and show you the design. We will be selling yarn kits for the project via our new web site and should have these ready to pre order some time next week. As soon as we have everything in place I will post the information here and on Facebook.

Working with Stylecraft has been really great and they have been incredibly supportive of me and taken over many of the aspects that I dislike about my crochet design, such as pattern checking. They have given me free reign to design exactly as I please and the result is a blanket called 'Pond Lily' which uses 11 shades of Life DK and features 8 new block designs, each one designed from scratch so you won't find them anywhere else!

Stylecraft are really at the forefront of great crochet design and their yarn palettes lend themselves fantastically to the craft. If you haven't done so already, then you should be following them on Facebook as they are always updating their page with great little offers, info and prizes. The UK based yarn company are currently running a great competition where you can get to choose some yarn shades to be added to their Special DK range - you can find more info about this on the Attic 24 blog and if you haven't visited Lucy's blog before then where on earth have you been?

One of the things I really love about the Stylecraft yarn range is the choice of bright shades and the fact that the yarns are so affordable and hard wearing makes them perfect for homeware designs such as cushions and blankets. Sue Pinner designs a lot of the crochet projects for Stylecraft - you can find her blog here and some of her current designs within the Stylecraft range are shown below:

I have a busy week ahead of me, with a weekend workshop at Missenden Abbey on the horizon - its a knitting weekend so I need to brush up a bit on my skills - last time I picked up knitting needles I had a moment of panic wondering what on earth to do with them!

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The Big Trip - Part Four Mumbai

We arrived in Mumbai on Wednesday. I really liked it there, the city is cleaner and the inhabitants are incredibly proud of their rich heritage, including the days of the Raj and their British history. The city is home to many of the Bollywood stars and it is a much richer city than many of the places we have visited.

Soon after we arrived we went to a tailors to drop in some fabric for alterations that a couple of the ladies in the group wanted doing. The pictures below are of the street side tailors shop - there were 8 boys in a very small space all working on different projects. The boys ages ranged between 15 and 22. Look closely at the image and you will see how old the sewing machines are and notice the iron the boys are using - cast iron with hot coals inside - like a relic from the Victorian era!

The pictures are a little yellow as it was quite dark outside and they were working under strip lights.

The image below was taken in a near by dress shop. If you take an interest in ANYTHING then the guys who work in these stores will promptly open up about a hundred choices for you until you have seen so many dresses your head is swimming! I'm not really in the market for a ball gown or a prom dress - but this is certainly the place to shop if you are!

We ended the night with a bowl of Falooda at the ice cream parlour - an amazing mix of Kulfi, milk, noodles (which I think are made from arrowroot) and nuts. Being presented with the bowl reminded me of that scene in Indiana Jones when Indie is given a bowl of soup with eyes in it! 

I'm joking of course - it was totally delicious!

On Thursday we got on a ferry and took the one hour journey out to the Elephanta caves. These 2000 year old carved stone caves are very important to Hindus as they are one of the earliest representations of Shiva. The caves are on an island and there is very little else there, but they are well worth the trip! 

The local people arrive on the island in much smaller boats - I love the picture of a group walking the pier onto the island:

The carved stone statues inside the caves are amazing - I have added in an image with some of the group in it so that you can see the scale of them.

The trip to the caves took most of the day, but we had a couple of hours site seeing in the late afternoon. We were shown the British Architecture - most of which looked like a cross between Harrods, St Pancras Station and The Natural History museum! Below is my Mum standing in front of The Taj Mahal Hotel

We visited Dhobi Ghat - a place that the tour guide described to us as 'the human washing machine'. This is a pretty big area within the slums of Mumbai where men wash the uniforms, bed linen and towels of the Mumbai hotels. Its an incredible place - and once again a place that made me feel really lucky! The men work 7 day weeks and rarely have time off. They sleep in rooms with between 15 and 20 other men and get paid a pittance and they wash and scrub all day long. The images below show the tanks that are used to soak the washing.

And the washing hanging to dry - it is hung on twisted rope and is incredibly clean!

We have seen so much slum area in India and sadly I have to admit that I have become a little immune to it over 3 weeks - it was such a shock in Delhi and Agra at the beginning of the trip, but then we have seen it pretty much every day since in every place we have visited and so it has become the norm, but visiting the Dhobi Ghat really made me realise just how poor the majority of people in the country are and how hard their lives are.

Below is an image of people queuing for Kerosene and a couple of Barber shops (these weren't taken in the slum):

After a couple of days in Mumbai we came to Dubai. 

We have done the things I imagine most tourists do when they come here - we have been on a desert safari, smoked shisha and have had a camel ride. We have looked at the huge gold necklaces and elaborate saris in the meena bazaar and have peered up through coach windows at incredible sky scrapers and driven along the Palm Jumerah, but to be honest, it all seems a little surreal - there are no signs of poverty, just opulence and monuments to wealth. It's proximity to India makes it feel obscene, fake and self indulgent to me so I have decided not to post any images of it on this blog, despite enjoying a couple of quiet days here and having a laugh in the desert!

A final note about the 'Big Trip':

My wonderful Dad, Roy, paid for us to take this trip and even supplied us with spending money! So I just want to say via the blog just how grateful I am to him for allowing me such an amazing chance to visit the land of wonders and exotic geraniums - love you always Daddy! x x

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The Big Trip - Part Three

After seeing some of the 'nitty gritty' of India in Delhi, Ahmedabad and Rajkot, we took a couple of flights down to Goa to see the side of India you see in the holiday brochures - the lovely sandy beaches, the palm trees, the gated resorts with the pools, the spas and the barbecues.

There is no doubting that Goa is beautiful and the views, the food and the weather is as lovely as you imagine, but it is hard to believe that it is just a couple of hours away from some of the poorest places in the country. Of course Goa has the tourist trade and until 2 years ago it exported iron ore so was a prosperous place, however it is now seeing a huge decline in the number of tourists coming - our tour guide told us they have seen a drop of 80% in tourists arriving from Russia since the strength of the ruble dropped and, as Russians made up most of their tourism income, this is likely to have a big impact.

Goa was colonised by the Portuguese in the 16th Century and did not formally become an Indian state until 1987. Goa has the most churches in India and the most practicing Christians. We visited the Basilica in the old town.

And we walked around some of the streets in the capital. The colours of the buildings are amazing - bright pinks, lime greens and purples set against faded olive shades and weathered oranges.

From Goa we flew to Hyderabad. We are here until tomorrow when we travel to Mumbai. Hyderabad is inland and is locally known as 'the rice bowl of India' and as such it is famous for Biryani!

We visited Hyderabad Fort - an incredible walled city dating back to the 13th Century. 

The fort was amazing, but my focus for my photographs always ends up being the people around me. These 2 ladies agreed to pose for me after they asked if they could take pictures of us. As I think Ive said already, Mum and myself are a bit of a novelty!

From the fort we made a short journey to the King's tomb complex. This place left me totally gob smacked. The size and beauty of these incredible tombs was breath taking.

The tombs are currently bring restored. The first image above (where the masonry is creamy white) is a restored tomb.

Whilst here in Hyderabad, we have also visited the Chowmahalla Palace which still belongs to the Royal Family. Built at the end of the late 19th Century it is a show case of opulence and can now be hired as a wedding venue - indeed preparations for a wedding were taking place during our visit.

The images below were taken in the thrown room. Incredible chandeliers!

These ladies were sat peeling hundreds of onions and cucumbers ready for the wedding feast.

These guys are polishing the huge copper serving dishes:

There are galleries surrounding the thrown room showing some of the Royal collections. I didn't enjoy the sword and knife room particularly, but did find a few pieces of inspiration in the china cabinets!

From the palace we walked through the busy market streets to the Charminar (Gate Of India). The streets were packed solid with bikes, motor bikes, tuc tucs and barrows. Walking through in the throng of people was both enthralling and terrifying at the same time and I have to admit to counting my blessings that we all made it out safe and sound!

Once again I am going to attempt to upload a video so you can see just what the Charminar area is like on a quiet Sunday afternoon!