Traveling in India for an extended period of time presents you with all kinds of challenges. One of them is the weather. You almost have to be a climatologist to figure out how to intelligently move around the country without getting drenched by the monsoon rain, getting frost-bitten fingers, or being cooked by the intense summer heat at one point or another.

To add to the complexity, climate change has once again thrown the semi-predictable weather into chaos. We’ve already experienced our first sandstorms Continue…

Video has finally made it to ContemporaryNomad.com! Our video premier had to be good, so we headed down to the famous Karni Mata rat temple in Deshnoke, a village an hour south of Bikaner.

It was a rather bizarre experience as you can see by the expressions on our faces. Notice the mother urging her child to touch the rats for luck – yikes! And don’t miss the white rat; seeing it will bring you good luck.

India is a first-class country to learn the fine art of bribery. Of course, there are no such courses offered anywhere (I hope), but life here teaches you very quickly. Among the sneaky “teachers” are train conductors, police men, immigration officers, and museum staff.

My first lesson presented itself somewhat unexpectedly Continue…