The synchronicity of the world constantly amazes me. Yesterday I wrote about traveling to India, and today I receive an email from my friend, Dorothy, who hails from Edinburgh, Scotland. Dorothy and I became fast friends when we both attended a very special Yoga retreat in a remote area of central India a few years ago.

Dorothy strikes a Yoga pose on a deserted beach

We ended up in adjacent bunks but we shared more than a bedroom – we both came down with a case of Delhi Belly and kept each other company from our sickbeds. Here’s what she sent me as a reminder:

“In case you have not heard of him Robert Burns is much celebrated Scottish Poet and we have Burns suppers on 25th January where we eat haggis and neeps (turnip). This is a rip off of the poem ‘To a Mouse.‘ I can do a translation of the Scottish language for you if you like!

The day after the Burns supper….

TAE A FART

…..oh whit a sleekit horrible beastie
lurks in yer belly efter the feastie
nae maiter whit yae dae
abodys gona hiv tae pay
even if yae try tae stifle
its lyk a bullet oot a rifle
hawd yer bum tight tae the chair
tae try n stop the leakin air
shimmy yersel fae cheek tae cheek
‘n pray tae god it disnae reek
oot it cums lyk a clap o thunder
ricochets aroon the room
michty me a sonic boom!
God al michty it fairly reeks
hope I huvnae shit my break

Dorothy x”

This photo, taken on the occasion of her son's wedding, is proof that Dorothy really could do a translation from the Scottish! In fact, she speak with a brogue so thick that sometimes I can't understand her, which sends us into gales of laughter!

But Even without the English translation, I think you probably get the gist of the poem. Good memories, Dorothy! I still say it was providence that led us to choose the two beds closest to the bathroom in the first place. Miss you and love you a bunch!

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Ah, India! Just saying the word conjures up images of the Taj Mahal in the soft light of dawn, camels trekking across deserts, worshipers bathing in the sacred Ganges, mountains of spices in marketplace stalls, and women wrapped in luscious silk saris. India also means being exposed to filth, poverty, masses of humanity, beggars on the streets, incessant touts, and bouts of “Delhi Belly.”

Planning to travel to India? You MUST get this book!

Nowhere else in the world are these contrasts so evident as in Mother India, and many visitors arrive on the sub-continent wholly unprepared for these incongruities. I saw all this and more when I traveled to India a few years ago. In areas of Mumbai, shanty towns constructed with scraps of scavenged wood and cardboard stretched as far as I could see. Here, people lived in abject poverty, clad in rags and defecating by the side of the road. Garbage was strewn throughout the streets and the overwhelming stench of sewage permeated everything. Homeless wraiths curled along the edges of the sidewalks in front of my hotel each night, yet inside everything was luxury and staff in starched white uniforms. Fortunately, I was forewarned. I had a friend who had been to India and he repeatedly told me what to expect so that I would be prepared.

I encourage everyone to go to India, at least once in their lifetime, but it would be wise to take steps to be prepared for the experience. One of the best ways to do so is to read the recently published book by travel expert Beth Whitman, “Wanderlust and Lipstick: For Women Traveling to India.” Although Beth gears the book for women travelers, it’s an excellent primer on India for anyone planning to visit. She thoroughly covers taboos such as: never eat with your left hand (this is the hand Indians use to clean themselves after using the bathroom), never pat someone on the head (it’s considered rude), never allow your feet to touch someone (feet are considered dirty), never curl your finger in a “come here” gesture (this is considered provocative). The book provides an excellent overview of the various modes of transportation and types of accommodations available across India, as well as a good overview of Indian food. Beth also provides dozens of invaluable “hot tips” throughout the book.

In short, my advice to anyone planning a trip to India is to get this book! It is well worth the affordable price of $14.95 and may just save you ten times that much through the advice it provides. I wish I had read it before I went to India, and when I return you can bet this book will be in my backpack.

Beth Whitman is the founder and editor of Wanderlust and Lipstick. For more than 22 years, she has been traveling the globe and inspiring women travelers, combining her love for travel with volunteer work, adventure trips, travel writing and business.

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As I drive from the southern border of our great country to the northern, I am painfully aware of my carbon footprint. Although I am somewhat comforted that my car gets 30 miles to the gallon, and that when I am home in Sarasota I walk everywhere, it doesn’t change the fact that travel is not an environmentally friendly activity.

Someday, we will have the technology to reduce fossil fuels; Virgin Air is currently testing a jet engine fuel that contains a high percentage of biofuels, and numerous manufacturers are bring electric vehicles to market. One of the latter, the “soleckshaw,” is a motorized cycle rickshaw that can be pedaled normally or run on a 36-volt solar battery.

Earlier this month the solar rickshaw was unveiled in New Delhi, India, a city that suffers from extreme pollution. The soleckshaw is being road-tested in Old Delhi’s Chandni Chowk area, one of the city’s oldest and busiest markets. This byzantine maze of narrow, winding streets is daily choked with buses, cars, scooters, cyclists and brave pedestrians.

Rickshaws have always been environmentally friendly. Unfortunately, the masses of middle-class Indians turned up their noses at the traditional mode of transport, believing it to be beneath their dignity to travel in a conveyance run by human pedal-power. It is hoped that the soleckshaw will gives the rickshaw a totally new image that will be more acceptable to the middle-classes, thereby reducing the number of gas and diesel vehicles that clog the roads. And if this photo is any indication, they are well on their way to achieving that goal:

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