For Marianna!

Friday's run was a typical example of why your donations are so important to me. If Marianna hadn't generously donated, here are all of the reasons why I would have stayed home.

1. It's getting hot in Delhi. Damn hot.
2. I have a bit of a knee thing happening.
3. I'm staying up late trying to catch up on work.
4. It's hot.

We try to run early to avoid the heat, so we left at six hoping for the best. I know it's whiny, but the heat really effects my training. One more week in Delhi, then it's back to cool Minnesota for another three weeks of runs!

As you can see in the map below, this run is themed! After miles and miles, the roads start making shapes in my head. Occasionally, after staring at the maps for hours, the shapes just make sense. This is the result - The Giraffe 4 Miler. The head is formed by taking an alley behind the State Visiting Houses on Kautilya Marg. The ear is formed by taking a lap around the Police Memorial Park. Take a moment to click on that link and read about the park's controversial history. Keep reading to find out why it's so creepy.

The park was never finished. In the center of the park is a large, raised platform. Underneath, there was meant to be a museum. Instead, there is nothing. It's completely abandoned. The staircases still take you down to the dark, creepy space. Picture any abandoned parking garage, half-finished apartment complex or the like from any zombie, drug addiction, kidnapping movie and you have the idea. Bernie and I went down to check it out and with each step we took into the darkness, our hearts beat faster and our steps became slower. It's creepy. Really creepy.

We surfaced, alive, and continued back to school.

This run belongs to Marianna!

I'm dedicating runs to raise money for a campship in memory of our friend Ty Taylor at YMCA Camp Miller. Click here or here to donate. Please make sure you choose the Ty Taylor Campship option. And please let me know if you've made a donation so I can thank you!

RUN STATS:

Distance - 4.13 miles
Time - 33:24
Soundtrack - BS 2000, Simply Mortified

April 30, 2013

Today's run was inspired in part by yesterday's. Today I ran two roads that I've run past a million times, another that I wasn't sure if it was really there or not, and into one of those parks I mentioned. I was lucky enough to have company again, which always helps, especially when my company humors my crazy requests to go on scouting missions.

The old memorial-image by Deepak CC-BY-SA-2.0

The run today hinged on the National Police Memorial, a park I've gone past a lot. I convinced my running partners to join me on an exploration, so we hopped the fence and went inside. One of my them had heard that there was some type of memorial that had been taken down (it was, in 2007) or was controversial(it was, a waste of government money and an eyesore), so I looked it up when I wrote this post. Here is a site from the Indian government announcing a contest to design a new memorial. The entries were due in 2011. A winner was announced, by for now, the site sits abandoned. Here's a link to the plans by the winning firm. There are staircases that lead under the central pavilion, where the tower once sat, I suppose. We went down to explore and I was sufficiently creeped out, peeking around the dark, rubble filled area. But to my surprise, there were no vagrants, miscreants, hobos or even stray dogs. Just an overriding sense of decay. Here's to hoping that Delhi eventually gets it act together and invests appropriately in infrastructure.

RUN STATS:

Distance - 4 Miles

Time - 39:48

Soundtrack - Fade to Black, A Bluegrass Tribute to Metallica