Arifa here...
I just wanted to add something about our adventures at Akshardham temple. I had read that there was some kind of cultural boatride at the temple where they had replicas of the Ajanta caves and other sites of India. It sounded cool and I was determined that we should see it.
We bought our tickets and went off in search of the boat ride. We found some kind of area and asked if it was the boat ride. The guy at the line told us that we had to go through that building to get to it. We stood in line and entered the building when it was our group's turn. It turned out to be this really creepy, Disney-esque kind of narration about the swami who lived 200 years ago and now supposedly lives on in the guy who had this temple built. It was narrated by Amitabh Bachan and almost every section (and there were many) ended with, "Come... let us see how Swami Narayan..." Later, we would hear Amitabh use that same phrase in his narration at Golconda Fort in Hyderabad.
So this narration thing was creepy. There were sets with animatronic manequins (sp?) acting out scenes from the swami's life. The narration was all very soothing and meant to show you how much better your life would be if you'd follow the swami. His teachings couldn't really be argued with - he just said that we should be selfless and patient and kind and all that. No, our complaint was with the feeling of being trapped in this brainwashing machine with no way out. All we wanted was a boat ride!
Eventually, we did make it to the boat ride. It turns out you actually did NOT have to go through that other building. The line for the boats was much longer than for the brainwashing, unsurprisingly. There was one man in line behind us who was so eager for the ride that every time the line started to move at all, he was like, "Challo, challo!" (go! go!) My mom got so annoyed with him because he would say this even before there was any space for us to move. He eventually cut in line in front of us and we were glad to see him go. Howie commented that this guy really may have benefited from attending the brainwashing session.
