Real friends drink coke Coke  Real friends drink coke

Part 1
September 25, 2022

The first part of our central India tour is over. We are in Indore we leave with the night train to Jabalpur where our ethnic tribal tour will start. We intend to make it a pleasant night and look for a seller who sells Coke, but unfortunately that will not work. And we don't think it's wise to drink our Bacardi pure. At one of the stations where we have a short stop, we ask 2 guys who are standing there if they want to buy us coke, the train only stops for a moment and we don't dare to risk looking for it ourselves. The guys are super friendly and go looking for coke, but unfortunately they can't buy it at the station either. We meet the 2 boys and match our Instagram accounts and agree to keep in touch via social media.

Part 2

And what we agreed on also happens. I get in touch with Sonal, a boy of 20. We have nice conversations and we click. Sonal is a student and likes to practice his English with me and we almost do that daily.

Part 3

February 2023 we decide to go to India to photograph Holi we do that in Mathura-Vrindavan. Let me explain why we want to go there.

(Holi is celebrated in a great way in these two places and to know the reason behind it, we have to take a look at the history of this festival. Mathura is considered to be the birthplace of Sri Krishna. It is said that Sri Krishna, when he was young, once went to his mother Yasoda Maa complaining that he was dim while Radha was fair Yasodha Maa advised Lord Krishna to put color on Radha and the other Gopis so that there would be no difference after that in someone's skin color.

While doing so, Radha and the other Gopis started beating Lord Krishna playfully with their Lathis. And thus came the custom of applying colors and playing with lathis on the auspicious occasion of Holi.

In Mathura and Vrindavan, Holi is celebrated for a whole week. Each temple hosts the event on a different day. People travel miles to witness and be a part of this grand event. Following the customs of Radha and Krishna, the boys playfully but neatly apply colors to the ladies. The colors can contain normal gulal or gural mixed with water. And the ladies beat them in turn with lathis, playfully of course. So this is one of the few places where Lathmar Holi is observed where Holi is played with Lathis along with colours)

When I told Sonal that we were coming to Mathura he was pleasantly surprised and told me that he would also come to Mathura to meet us. It was not very far from his residence. He came to the holy place more often. March 2nd I had a meeting with Sonal and his best friend. It was super exciting to see him alive and I was a bit tense. It was a great reunion with my Indian best friend. To my great surprise, he had brought me presents, including 1 bottle of coke. How beautiful can such a meeting be and how sweet that he brought cola. The four of us spent a pleasant day in the beautiful streets of Vrindavan.After the festival we said goodbye to each other, which I found quite hard. We continued to Himachel Pradesh and Sonal went back to his hometown. We would be in touch again when I was back in the Netherlands.

The last day we were in New Delhi and Sonal called me if we would like it if he would also come to Delhi to have another nice day together. I absolutely loved seeing him again. Sonal told me that he really wanted to visit Qutab Minar, we had not been there before and were curious about this monument. We were pleasantly surprised how beautiful it was there and what a nice day we had with the three of us.After drinking another Coke
it was time for us to leave for the airport. We said goodbye again. What a special meeting this was. Cola will never be the same I will never forget our encounters.

Now I'm back home for a few weeks and think back often and with great pleasure to our encounters. We have daily contact again and we have contact via facetime which is super nice. Sonal is going to help me learn to speak Hindi, which he really needs after 12 trips to India.