Now don't get excited, I'm not buying anything for you but I thought I'd just mention about some of the things we've bought so far and their prices. I'm sure I didn't pay the lowest price for any of this but te prices do seem so low compared to back home.

In Agra, just outside the Taj Mahal - it isn't usually a good idea to buy anything near a tourist attraction but we couldn't help ourselves - we bought some lovely coasters made out of "marble" (I don't think!) with inlaid "precious stones" (not!) and carved too: 3 sets of 6 for Rs450, that's about £6.50.

A little boy selling guide books started out with his price for a rather ropey looking Taj Mahal guide book at "normally I sell for Rs2000 but for you Mister, RS1000". I laughed, walked on (repeat many times) and finally got it for Rs120 (£1.60ish)

In Jaipur the girls bought their Salwar Kameez's for £10 each and considering that Amy's was tailored made, I thought that's pretty cheap.

In Amber, Amy bought two cloth puppets (Maharajah and Maharani) with painted wooden faces for Rs150 (down from Rs1600) which is about £2.

In Pushkar last night we bought some cushion covers for Rs350, which is about £5.

With less than a week to go things are getting pretty exciting in this house - as if they weren't already: the planning for this trip has been going on for ages.

I've just finished the Where In The World page on the blog with options to view a static or animated version of the route and also(by default) you can see where we are. Each city/place we're stopping at has a map marker which you can click on get more information including links to Wikipedia, Flickr, the weather and (if I ever get to upload any pictures) my gallery.

Today is the only day available for getting things together and loosely packing up the suitcases/rucsacks. The obvious plan was to travel light but things like this never seem to happen and it's mainly my fault; what with the two cameras, three lenses, monopod, camcorder, chargers, DSs, flash readers. The medical kit also outweighs both kids by 2 to 1. Luckily though our concern about the kids getting ill has meant that Dioralyte and Imodium WILL survive the credit crunch.

Tonight, without phoning a friend or asking the audience I'll be watching Slumdog Millionaire for the third time. Oh no, of course, I can't do that, it's not out on DVD yet.

For years it's been the same old cries of 'Macaroni Cheese please Mum' followed by 'I hate that can I have sausages please'. For those of you that know us, you'll know which kid said which!

As soon as we mentioned about going to India things changed and an interest grew in all things curried. But how do you start introducing such food without wanting to cook a decent meal and then having to hurriedly cook something else (maccy cheese / sausages).

I dreamt up 'International Food Day' where we'd spend all afternoon with the kids preparing a dinner that they would eat. Generally we'd cook a few main courses and buy in a few starters. This approach went very well although International Food Day only made it over to China once before the kids said "can we have curry again". Good news, they're hooked.

Next, on one of their school's teacher training days, I took them to Cafe Tusk in Fareham. A great restaurant with an always on, all you can eat buffet, with a great selection of food. The best bit being the price: lunchtime for adults is only £6.99, for kids under 10 it's only £3.50. This turned out to be a great idea as it allowed them to try a very small bit of many different foods before filling up on the newly discovered preferences: Amy, anything Tikka; Emilia, Korma and Bhuna.

Since then the Winchcombe Sunday Roast has been replaced by Curry Sunday where Emilia and I have prepared loads of new dishes, even down to Puris and Chicken Cafreal. The best bit for me was a couple of weeks ago when whilst chopping chillies I tried to get them to eat a bit of raw chilly. Emilia tried it straight away, Amy more hesitant, Jane even more so. After the dish was cooked and contained large slices of green chillies, Emilia tucked in saying 'they're not that hot'. Good girl!

Luckily, England has a fascination of India and this extends into our television programmes, including documentaries about cities/wildlife/travel/religion/gardens and children's educational programmes.

So armed with a Windows Media Center that will record any programme containing (in it's title or description) the words 'India', 'Rajasthan', 'Tiger' and 'Maha'*, we've ended up with loads to watch over the last nine months or so. Some of this is very good stuff for the kids, others not.

• Firstly, there's a wealth of regular programmes that have 10 minutes on India. Usually not very informative, they're still worth watching. This include holiday programmes like Holiday Showdown and other holiday shows, one-off wildlife documentaries.
• Primary Geography is a series of 10-15 minute children's educational programmes all about kids in India. There's an overview programme, one about Kerala, one about Rajasthan and many more. The Rajasthan one included footage of a boy who lived in the area near Sam/Khuri desert and another part featuring the niece of the current Maharaja of Jodphur.
• Paul Merton In India was quite a good series where Paul saw some of the more unusual/eccentric elements of the country. I thought it was done quite well as at he always promoted the activities with an open eye, daunted at first, respectful at the end.
• Tiger, Spy In The Jungle was a series following tigers within Pench Tiger Reserve in Maharastra. As with all BBC and Sir David Attenborough the quality and content are superb.
• India with Sanjeev Bhaskar. For me the jury is out on this one and it's interesting that the first site I found (linked in on the left) felt the same way. I like Sanjeev as a comedian but as a documentary lead I just found him a bit too up himself. Unlike, Merton, he didn't seem to want to get too close to the locals, apart from when he was retracing his ancestry to Pakistan. Still, there's great footage includingn interesting time spotting tigers, in Pench, where it took him two weeks to find a tiger. Funnily enough this series was shown on TV at the same time as Tiger Spy In The Jungle, so perhaps Sanjeev should have followed Sir David around, he may have had better luck.
• Michael Wood The Story Of India. A bit too old for the kids but we showed them the more interesting parts.

The BBC has a list of India & Pakistan related shows, most of which are finished but are bound to be repeated.

I thoroughly enjoyed most of the TV shows listed above too, but I was on a roll with the title 'Preparing The Kids' so I couldn't rename it halfyway through!!!

* keyword of Maha was included just in case Mahabharata ever turned up again on telly. Having read the book in 1996 it's never been back on TV.

It seemed important that the kids could see glimpses of India before they went as with only Europe as a reference, they'd be in for a quite a shock.

Over the years I've bought a couple of videos - videos eh? remember them? - about India so we decided to go through them.

One's to mention are

• City Of Joy. I didn't care for this film very much but I rate the book as my favourite read, so much so that I bought it last week from Amazon after lending my original and never getting it back. The film does show some stuff that the kids might be horrified by (violence, scams, muggings, leprosy) but they got through it. A few questions, mainly about leprosy, later they were fine. It was a good introduction for two trusting kids on the art of scamming.
• Gandhi. I felt it important that they know about Gandhi and this was the best (infact only) introduction to him I could give. I'd forgotten how long this film was - over three hours - so we did it over four days as it is hardly fascinating viewing for an 8 year old. It took four days as we only managed to watch 45 minutes a day, but each 45 minutes actually took 75 minutes, what with numerous pauses/questions.
• The Darjeeling Limited. A slightly boring film for the kids but it's got lots of train footage in it and the train travel footage is mainly shot around Jodhpur in Rajasthan.
• Slumdog Millionnaire.. What! It's not yet out of DVD so how did they get into the cinema? Of course, they didn't and there's no other way they could have watched it... is there () ? All I can say is that if they had have watched it they would have thought that: lovely film; slightly gruesome but not worrying; really makes them want to go to India more; Mumbai looks huge; looking forward to train travel; be careful buying water, check no glue round cap;wish they were Milyunaires.

Tonight, we're going to watch The Fall as it is partially shot in Jodhpur.

UPDATE: 9th Feb...wow, the locations and cinematography are fantastic but....the film?...I'm not so sure. Check out this site about all the locations in the The Fall.

Whilst planning this trip I've found loads for me to read. Be it, my old Lonely Planet India, the new Rough Guide of Rajasthan/Delhi/Agra, the AA Guide to India bought for me by Secret Santa, let along the gerzillion or so articles I've read on IndiaMike. All of this is factual stuff I need for booking hotels, trains, blah blah blah. I've started buying myself some India related novels (City Of Joy, White Tiger, English August, Last Song At Dusk, Above Average) through Amazon as they're so cheap.

But what about the kids?

Today I happened across a site which I've found very useful to find a list of books that the kids might actually enjoy: http://www.travelforkids.com/Funtodo/India/india.htm

It's got lists of books recommended for children and thanks to Amazon's used book sellers I've bought a fair few of them, mostly for under £3 each including delivery.

Here's what I've bought:

• The Conch Bearer
• The Mirror of Fire and Dreaming (Brotherhood of the Conch)
• Shiva's Fire
• Magic Tree House #19: Tigers at Twilight
• Jahanara, Princess of Princesses (Royal Diaries)