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Health & Fitness

Blog: The India Experience

Newport Beach resident Colleen Bevacqua returns from an adventure in India and discovers it isn't a trip for wimps.

When I mentioned to my dental hygienist we were planning on leaving Newport Beach for a trip to India, she said to me, "Oh, no, why would you want to go there? Don't they eat bugs and disgusting things?"

After being back for more than a week, I can happily report the food didn't include bugs or anything horrible. In fact, a large population of Indians are vegetarians and they had non-meat dishes available at every meal.

Oh, and no beef dishes to be had anywhere. In the back of my mind I knew the cow was sacred but I didn't really expect them to be roaming the streets, going wherever they wanted and given the right-of-way in heavy traffic. Out of curiosity, we dropped into a McDonalds and found they don't serve hamburgers at all, only chicken and veggie burgers.

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I have to admit my first concern was how to stay healthy on the trip. Everyone that knows about travel to India mentions "Delhi Belly." On arrival we were told to drink bottles that were sealed and only brush our teeth with the bottled water. The one problem we had was because we weren't used to eating their spicy food (even though they made it as bland as possible for us). All of us ended up with an upset stomach from too much spicy food.

I found you have a choice when you are in India: either you hate being there or you succumb to her charms, warts and all. 

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