Mind images

I take great pleasure -- and sometimes grief -- in revisiting events that I have seen over my life. They may be insignificant or of great meaning, but they have been captured equally by the camera and the audio recorder in my brain.

As in: Sunday the dogs and I were in the park for our long morning walk. There is a play area; it has a slide, monkey bars and one of those short plank bridges for kids to balance on. There was a young dad there with two kids. A baby and a toddler, a little girl.

 The dogs had paused to read a page in that day's doggie newspaper, so we were stopped on the slope just above the play area. I gazed around and my glance fell on them. I saw Dad scoop up the baby and trot off, with the toddler in bouncing pursuit. It's so funny to watch the movements of kids who have only just learned to walk. They seem to progress forward in a bouncy side to side motion that has very little control of itself. At any moment, they could go tumbling forward. Little one chased Dad and baby, bouncing along with Dad slowing down, then finally stopping. I couldn't hear, but the happiness of an unencumbered moment in a sunny park on a Sunday morning was unmistakable.

Dad and kids moved on, and so did we.

I've also noticed how often I've heard the red-bellied woodpecker this spring; usually he is much more noisy in the fall. I've also missed hearing a wood thrush that I have heard consistently each spring for at least the past four or five years. Perhaps I am missing that because we have been walking in to the park a different way. The thrush, which has the song of an angel, always has been in the same place.

The red-bellied, though, he is another story. In the fall, the air seems clearer, lonelier. Many birds are gone, but this big woodpecker sings on, in a high-pitched, sharp warble that echoes in the quiet park. I keep hearing him now, though, confusing me into thinking it is fall.

It isn't. As lovely as the season is, now, especially, with petal snow covering deep green spring grass, it is changing and moving on. The red-bellied woodpecker's stage season will be here soon enough.

Back down to earth

So. I have been home for a week and sleep patterns are finally getting back to normal. By next week, the jet lag questions (all well meaning :) ) will go away and I will be back to my daily struggle of getting up, working, working out, walking dogs and squeezing the rest of life in before and after work. Good problem to have.

I have been thinking a lot about my trip and realizing more and more the depths of my ignorance.

In John Kennedy Toole's excellent, wonderful, biting, delightful, hilarious and insightful "Confederacy of Dunces" the main characer, Ignatius Reilly, complains constantly about inferiors who cannot comprehend his "world view." If you have read it, you know the feeling of recoiling in hilarious horror at the thought of sharing such frightening, bizarre and ludicrous views. Looking at it another way, though, you realize how Toole was using an exaggerated character to mock a general lack of cultural knowledge among, maybe Americans, maybe anyone group of people that lives in such a distinct, unique, community as the New Orleans of his novel was.

Visiting India for such a brief time made me understand that there is much more to traveling than standing by monuments and visiting gardens. It is a chance to understand a different point of view. That view may not be so different if you are Western and traveling in another Western culture. West-to-East is where the viewpoints really diverge.

My view of the world is totally Western, and culturally young. If you are from Asia or even Europe, I think you tend to take a much longer, more tempered, cynical and not-so-excitable view of things.

So now I have this story that I have been part of, and that is now part of me, to adjust the way I view the world.

And to remind me of how little I know. Ignatius Reilly would not stand for it!

Pittsburgh, last day in Delhi in review

How does the time fly so quickly?
Monday, today, is my last day in India. One of the (many!) fascinating things to me about "India" (since I am only in a tiny patch of the subcontinent) is how comfortable I feel here. Not that I enjoy the poverty, the racism, or the ignorance, but I do not feel scared off. And no doubt my comfort level has a great deal to do with the fact that I have been welcome in a home, and have had the extraordinary luxury of, a local travel guide (Kim) and driver. Still, I am fascinated by this place. It is beautiful and ugly all at the same time.

My flight home was scheduled for 10:50 Monday evening, so we had the whole day to sight-see and shop.

I did not want to miss Humayan's Tomb, a beautiful pre-cursor to the Taj Mahal right in Delhi and not far from Kim's place in New Friends' Colony. To put it boringly, it is a crypt, but less boringly, the symmetry of the place, much like the Taj and Lodi garden, remind the visitor of the many elements of Persian/Islamic design involved in creating such a harmonious place. Truthfully, I liked it almost as much, if not more, than the Taj Mahal. (Photos in transit, Camera lost!)

Shopping followed, first in a fly-, stink- infested open air market called Par Ganjh in New Delhi near Connaught Place. Such tight quarters. You walk along the lane; beggars follow you (Hello, hello), rickshaw drivers wheel in and out, horns honk, the occasional (no, I did not get a photo, story of my trip) cow wanders through. You go into a shop, beautiful shoes, purses and outside filth, poverty, crowds, flies, smells (some good), men surround you trying to sell.
After Suresh dropped us off, I asked Kim, "Are we going inside?" We weren't. This was it. This open air market is the place to buy shoes, purses, textiles, you name it.
Kim has got the bargaining down. Whatever the price is, she negotiates down further. And the ridiculous thing is, the prices are so low already. i came home with two pairs of shoes that, here in the U.S, would have set me back $100 (with markup, transport, etc) for $20.
Par Ganjh was fascinating. Bargains amid flies, dogs, chicken vendors, motorbikes, beggars (the familiar woman with baby racket was too much); all shop owners men lounging around under their fabric awnings.
Amazing to think of such lovely shopping in such overwhelmingness, for lack of a better word.
More to follow, but mostly, I am sad to be leaving. After Humayan's Tomb and Par Ganjh, we had a quick lunch at KFC in Connaught Place *(safe food, cooked to death). Beggars outside, small brown child splayed on the walkway, mother figure bent tiredly over him, yet, only tourists around. A constant problem.
More to come on my last day in Delhi (lots of shopping!). Nicest part? Back at Kim's place, Leila and Zola goofing and Kim and I clinking our wine glasses.
We had a lovely connection, even having not seen each other for three years. I felt so at home and so welcome. Maybe that's why India felt so comfortable to me.
Namaste!

Delhi, weekend recovery, April 4 and 5

After our long short trip to Jaipur, I took Saturday off. Kim had an Easter egg hunt and reading for kids in Lodi garden and was up at 8:30 a.m. I slept in, updated the blog and in the evening we went to a gathering hosted by some of her friends whom I had met previously. Nadia, who is Moroccan, served a couscous that was one of the best meals I have eaten.

Sunday after brunch we went shopping in Kahn Market, near Kim's house, at a place called fabIndia. Purses, pillowcases, a vase. I am determined to only carry back my suitcase, so this will be a lesson in packing tight!

I am going to leave this as a short entry. This has been a brief trip and I want to sit back and reflect and write a bit more about my sense of the experience, rather than just transcribe a day-to-day recap of activities.

I have seen just a tiny bit of this country: There is a lot that is sad and repulsive and a lot that is beautiful. The thing that is important to me is that I have met so many people from all walks of life, people who live in all over the world and consider it as normal as any American citizen would consider moving from place to place in the States. So even a short trip truly broadens your perspective on the world. In India, what's news is what happens here, what happens in Pakistan and Afghanistan, the States and then the rest of the world. It makes you realize that the American perspective on the world is by far not the only one.

One of the sad things you see everywhere is people begging; sadder still is some do it for a living and appear to be perfectly healthy. This woman does not look like she has missed many meals and the child may not even be hers.

Jaipur, Rajasthan, Day Six

Hot.
We had buffet-style breakfast on the roof of the hotel under a billowing, bright yellow canopy. There was a little bit of a breeze occasionally, but not enough to entice me to have anything hot to drink. I made myself some tea, but could only manage a couple sips. Kim made a request of one of the staff behind the buffet and I saw a reaction that I've been seeing a lot here. The head waggle.

I'm not sure what to make of it. Does it mean I'll do this even though I don't want to? Does it mean I've told you all I know? There's never a smile with it and it has the sense of being a grudging response. The waggler's head goes left-right-left. Seth Stevenson wrote about it in a series  he did for Slate magazine in 2004, "Trying really hard to like India." Great reading; a coworker forwarded it to me before I left. His description of it as a bobble-head doll motion is absolutely dead-on.

After breakfast, we all piled into cars for a visit to the City Palace, the Jaipur residence of the descendants of Raja Man Singh I, the giant. I got an audio with with my foreigner's entrance ticket, plus and extra set of headphones. Leilah used them sporadically. Deepa got an audio tour, too, and we were off. As a foreigner, I also did not have to pay an extra photography fee (they've got the fee thing down here in India) but I was out of gas on taking pictures of buildings. Photography inside was not allowed, possibly because flash could damage the artifacts, but truthfully, the armour and weapons collection, though extensive, was dull-looking as if no restoration of the metals had ever been done. A display of chain mail on a mannequin was dusty and worn. In the display of textiles, some of the gold threading on a beautiful, rust-colored wedding gown for a maharana was peeling out of the fabric. Some of the other textiles were in better shape and, to be fair, those are not easy to preserve.

We didn't stay too long. Kim and Deepa wanted to get the kids back to the hotel so they could have a swim before we checked out, so they went back in one car with the nannies in Deepa's car and Suresh drove us to a place called the Rajasthan Cottage Emporium for some shopping. As we waited in the the City Palace lot for Suresh to pay the parking, a pig-tailed little girl in a dirty yellow dress approached the car on Deepa's side in the back seat. Something about her face was not right; she had a blank smile showing some teeth missing. Her eyes were set far apart and one appeared to be wandering. She had some bit of something in her hands that she appeared to be eating. She banged on the window, made the mouth-to-stomach gesture, and, though you aren't supposed to give to beggars (you won't get rid of them that way, or more will show up, or both) Deepa relented, rolled down her window, gave the girl a trail mix bar and rolled the window back up.

Response? The girl banged on the window for more. "Tell her you'll take it away from," Kim ordered and sure enough, when Deepa did that, the little girl wandered back to where she had been sitting. From the back, I could see she had a plum-sized red lump growing at the base of her skull. Multiply that little girl by a few million, plus or minus the deformities, and you get an idea of the enormous human problems facing India.

Cottage Emporium is a three-story building that leases space to vendors from Rajasthan. There is one in Delhi, too, with all the states of India represented. I had in mind to buy some jewelry while I was here, but, boy, the shopping mood was not with me, at least for something that would require the decision-making involved in designing a custom piece for myself on the spot. I did buy some pillow covers, a few scarves and beaded boxes. Most will go for gifts.

One of the other things I've seen here, by reason of being with Kim, is racism. On the second floor, two of the vendors saw Kim and began whispering and nodding. She strode over to them: "Do you know who the President of the United States is? Do you know?" One of them finally stuttered out Obama. "That's right! And do you know where I'm from?" One guessed Africa, because "there had been some Africans in here before."

"Do you think you could guess where my friend here is from by the color of her skin? Italy? Spain? France? So why would you make a judgment about me based on the color of my skin?!" The were cowed.

According to Kim, a common reaction among Indians to her skin color is to laugh. Whether that response reflects racism, ignorance, some twisted form or classism or all three, isn't clear. But it certainly isn't pleasant.

After we were done shopping, Suresh drove us back to the hotel. We packed up, checked out, found someplace to eat and got on the road around 4 or 5. Before we even got out of Jaipur, a cop pulled us over because Suresh ran a red light. (People actually do stop for traffic lights.)

He then directed us to pull out of the way of traffic, to a spot in front of some shops. It took about 15 minutes to clear this up and while we were waiting, another cop came by and eyeballed the car. As soon as Suresh got in and started up, this guy shows up and tells us we are in a no parking zone. No matter the the first cop told us to park there. Suresh and Deepa tried explaining but this guy wasn't having any of it.

Suresh had to get back out of the car, pull out his driver's license and give it to the cop. More arguing ensued and finally Suresh came back around to the front. Deepa pulled out a bill and gave it to him. For 50 rupees, Suresh got his license back and we were on our way. That's equal to $1. We had to pay a $1 bribe to be on our way. Why even bother with the pretext of upholding the law? For this cop, it was just an opportunity to squeeze some small fish.

It was still daylight for a few hours of our drive. Rajasthan, despite the trash, the mini-slums, the garish road-side refreshment stands, is beautiful, if forbidding, with its nearly treeless landscape and scrub-covered hills. The colors the women, and even some men, wear here are almost as blinding as the sun. My photography does not do these colors justice, but I've posted one at the top of this entry.

Jaipur, Rajasthan, Day Five

One of the things I’ve decided is that, after this trip, I am not spending any more traveling time seeing monuments. I have seen enough fortresses, battlefields, pieces of armour, bullets, arrowheads and dusty documents to last me a lifetime.

Thursday, the plan was to be up by 6 a.m. out of the house by 7 a.m. and in Jaipur by 10. We overslept, traffic was of course bad and, once we got in to Jaipur, Suresh got lost. So, not into our hotel, Umaid Bhawan, until 2 p.m. Deepa Shah and her two kids, Anjur and Amar, and her driver accompanied us in their car, plus two nannies (ayahs).

Jaipur was laid out on a geometric grid with nine sectors, but, as in Delhi, decay and entropy have set in and whatever structure and beauty lives here is hidden behind trash, grape sellers, corrugated tin, general disorder, haze and noise. By 3 p.m., we headed out to Jaigarh, the Amer, or Amber, Fort which overlooks the old capital of Amer. Sitting on a high hill above a lake, it was begun in 1592, by Raja Man Singh I. It was the capital for many centuries of the Kachhawah ruling dynasty, along with the nearby Amer Palace. These rulers later moved down into Jaipur into what's now called the City Palace. To give you an idea of location, from the fort, the border of Pakistan is just over 400 miles away.

I am proud that I ended up with no fingernail marks in my palms on the way to the fort. The road up to Jaigarh is a series of steep switchbacks and I do not do heights well. At all. At first I was happy because I was on the wall side, but with every turn my position changed so that I would be looking into an abyss. Yet, here I am, alive to write about it. Thank you Suresh.

We did not see the opportunity, but you can take an elephant ride up the hill to the fort, however tourists are advised not to. The elephants are not native to Rajahsthan and suffer from abscesses on their feet from walking on tarmac, often are poorly treated and malnourished to top it all off.

Looking down from Jaigargh, every single spine of hill bristles with protective, crenellated walls -- as if the terrain isn't hostile enough. The fort also is home to tribes of capuchin monkeys, and, outside, flocks of peacocks and the occasional pig. The monkeys are great sport, flinging themselves from rampart to rampart with their black tails curled up high, but they will attack if you come close. I contented myself with watching, since Kim said no one would help if they attack. A fascinating aspect of the fort is the water storage system. There is a watercourse that starts in the mountains above, a wide, deep spillway. During the rainy season, this structure filled a well with enough fresh water to last the inhabitants of the fort for two years. And, there were two wells for waste water. Rajasthan has long been known for its creative ways of wringing the most out of every drop of water.

We had arrived just before closing, made it out by about 5:15 and drove down to Amer Palace.

Again, a beautiful, elaborate structure, with a central pleasure garden, the Aram Bagh, quartered and wedged by watercourses (now dry); winter sleeping quarters on one side of the garden, summer on the other and a separate area for the harem of the aforementioned Man Singh, a very large man (reputed to be 7 feet tall and 500 pounds; we later saw one of his gowns, very likely true) who had 12 wives. Secret passageways for the king to visit each wife, guard towers manned, if that is the word, by eunuchs, a central gazebo for all the wives that was, in its day, hung with curtains (the hooks are still there).

The beauty of these places, when you think about the stark contrast there must have been long ago between the mirrors, the marble, the water, the court and the drama, is amazing to imagine.

We had a nice guide who took his time, took pictures of the children, and, at the end of the tour, as the kids were in the bathroom, told me that in a nearby courtyard the festival honoring the goddess Kali was going on. (There is a temple to Kali too.) When everyone came out, he trooped us out into the courtyard and we saw the descendant of Sawai Jai Singh (himself a descendant of the big guy and there's a story about the Sawai title, but I'll save it for later), who still is the holder of the property. Not too kingly looking: an old man with gray hair a light blue shirt and a garland of red flowers around his neck getting back into his fancy Toyota, surrounded by guards. More like a grandpa.

The courtyard wasn’t to crowded and our guide told us if we wanted to go up and give an offering to Kali, we could. Maria, Kim's ayah, stayed behind with cameras and to guard our shoes and we crowded up some stairs (after having the contents of our purses examined by India’s finest. They missed my camera.) So many people, saris in magenta, turquoise, gold, green. Dark hair everywhere. Men in white shirts, little kids, babies on shoulders, all crowded into a cramped marble stairway up from the festival courtyard, everyone bearing offerings for Kali. Mostly garlands of flowers that you could buy on the way up.
What a parental nightmare. The kids aren’t even mine and my eyes were everywhere. At the top of the stairs was Kali’s altar, though you could not see it. Too many people. Behind the altar was a priest and his assistant. Deepa found a place by one corner and hoisted up her son Arjun, who handed over his garland and received a treat in return. Kim's daughter Leilah was with me so I lifted her up, she handed over her garland and received a red/gold swatch of fabric and a treat as well. The idea is that a gift given is returned with a gift the goddess already has. Oh, and by the way, Kali is the goddess of destruction. Deepa explained later that you pick you gods and honor them.

Off to one side of the altar was a smiling young man in a blue uniform with a tin of red dye. He was anointing everyone and I finally let him dab me between the brows. Result? Staring! Why is this white woman anointed with a bindi between her brows? We got in the car and I caught Suresh staring. Washed off as soon as we got back to the hotel.

What a hot hectic day. I was so tired after Amber Fort that I couldn’t believe were were going to do one more thing, but the consensus was “We’re here, might as well.” Which is exactly right. I can sleep later.

One of the lovely structures I photographed in Jaipur was the Hawa Mahal, or Palace of the Winds. Pittsburgh connection? The Skinny building at Fifth and Wood. Except much grander. The Hawa Mahal was built in 1799, and designed by a poet philosopher named Sawai Pratap Singh. Five stories high, one room deep, it was built for ladies of the harem to be able to watch the street scene below.
That's today's picture. Slideshow to come.

A lazy day and and a crazy day. Taj Mahal (updated)

Tuesday was a deadline day for Kim and I was exhausted from Chandni Chowk, so she worked and I finished putting together slide shows. Despite the traffic racket, it was pleasant to sit on on her garden patio with my laptop.
Wednesday, April 1, we went to the Taj Majal, which is in Agra somewhere around 80 miles from here. But it took four hours because of traffic, which Kim planned for, so we left about 6:30 in the morning.
There are no rules on Indian highways. Trucks that look too tall to have a safe center of gravity, motor rickshaws built for three crammed with thirteen, scooters, bikes even pedestrians all share space. At about 8 a.m., Suresh had to weave us through a mile of stopped trucks. Stopped on the road, off, half on and half off. All with the words "Honk please" hand lettered on the back of the bumper. At least its one admonition the Indians obey.
The road to Agra passes through a rural area. There are shacks along the highway, juice stands, schoolkids, very old people, dogs, cows, water buffalo, monkeys, dust, dirt and trash everywhere.
Kim explained that the trucks ostensibly were stopped for weigh-ins (how in that disordered fashion I have no idea. I saw no station) but the real reason was likelier to be the collection of bribes. The first of the month is pay day for police and other government workers. They don't make enough so they squeeze the smaller fish down the food chain. The long delays for truckers also are on reason for the country's AIDS rate. You can have sex with a prostitute, or with another trucker, to pass the time. She also predicted we would get pulled over. Stopped at a McDonald's for a bathroom break (chains and franchises often recommended for this purpose).
At 10:30 we got to the Taj parking lot. Suresh dropped us off the hawkers descended. "Madam, you come with me. Look. Special pictures, 10 rupees." "Hello. Madam. Look, special tour, can't get inside. I give to you for (however many) rupees."
Little kids. "Madam, please, keychain please? Only 10 rupees." And on and on. Everyone had the same stuff. Really. Except for the guy selling the bullwhips "Very fine leather, Madam." Did they sell a lot of bullwhips when the Taj was built?
Then we had to walk through a "security gate" that was nothing more than a hole in a fence "guarded" by 10 or 15 lounging uniformed officers.
We walked to the ticket gate and Kim bought her ticket then had to elbow away a guy pushing in front of her as she tried to by mine. Even as she was getting change, he was still trying to push his money in past her.

Overall, the Taj was a discouraging experience. Not because this monument to love is not supremely beautiful and serene, but because of what surrounds it. I’ve mentioned the hawkers and drivers who descend upon you. As you walk to the entrance on a sidewalk by a wooded area, you are overpowered by the stench from an open sewer next to the walkway. Trash is everywhere. Guards lounge, guarding nothing. If you didn’t know better, you would not know you were approaching one of the seven wonders of the world.
Once you enter the grounds (and this is not exclusive to the Taj Mahal) men stare and whisper if you are not Indian (as we were leaving, Kim called out a man who was surreptiously taking pictures of a female tourist, a Western woman, doing the familiar “pinching the top of the Taj Mahal pose.” Kim has enough of a command of Hindi to know the comments the man was making to his companions weren’t nice. She dressed him down and later we saw him examining a bullwhip. Character definitely will out.)
It was crowded, but not so much so that we had to elbow our way around. There are unofficial guides inside the main chamber, which houses the mausoleum of the favorite wife of Shah Jahan, Mumtaz Mahal, who died in childbirth. Later, when the Shah was imprisoned by his paranoid son, Aurangzeb, he requested a prison with a view to his creation, so he could see it every day before he died.
The whiteness of the Taj, iconic as it may be, is not how it looked originally. It was encrusted with precious stones, most of them later looted.
One of the unofficial guides snared us as we came in. It is cool and dark inside the main chamber -- photography is forbidden, so they carry small flashlights to illuminate the semi-precious stones including onyx, lapis lazuli, malachite and so many others that make up the intricate marble inlays, in the design of flowers, inside the chamber. The dome rises to 144 feet. Inside, the chamber is acoustically structured so that a call from the floor takes 10 seconds before it echoes back to you from above. Our guide demonstrated; it was disconcerting to hear his voice bounce back 10 seconds later.
The dome is doubled, with a chamber of air between the upper and lower layers for cooling purposes.
The queen’s body is not in the mausoleum, but in a chamber below. You can look down to it through a screen as you come in, but there is nothing to see and the screen is used primarily as a catch for offerings of paper bills.
Behind the Taj is the Yamuna River, dry when we were there, which once irrigated the water courses. Off in the distance in the river bed, we saw oxen.
On one side of the Taj is a mosque, still used for prayers on Fridays and on the other an almost identical structure once used as the guest house.
As you catch your first glimpse of the Taj Mahal, you are struck by the long fountained canal that, if it continued, would intersect the entrance of the shrine on a vertical. The fountains are on, but not dramatically so. One of the principles of architecture in the ancient Islamic world was of the water feature to create a point of view. I’ve never been to the Alhambra in Spain, but it is a prime example of the use of water as a symbol of power in an arid environment and, for example, in the long watercourses, as a way to draw the eye more dramatically to a focal point. The Taj would not be as impressive if there was no cool water with splashing fountains directing the eye to it. The long course is intersected by a horizontal one, extending toward the mosque on one side and the guest house on the other. There are gardens along the course on the guest house side. The principle of symmetry must apply on the other side.
As we walked out, I thought about how hot and serene and shimmering the Taj Mahal must have been in earlier times. I’ve been here only a few days, but I’ve seen enough to wonder why better care isn’t taken of treasures like these. The Qutab Minar in Delhi, the tallest free-standing minaret in the Islamic world, is closed to visitors because it is in such poor shape. Once you could climb to the top.
The Taj Mahal is a world treasure, like so many wonders of the ancient world conceived by vanity, love or both, designed and built by intelligence, mathematics and the hard labor of unremembered thousands. Today, it is surrounded by trash, sewage and sellers of junk.
Outside the gates, one of these vendors, a young man, started to make vulgar noises at us. Being around Kim had soaked in, because out of my mouth came “Shut up, asshole.” He didn’t understand the words, but my tone was unmistakable. Why should I be speaking like that at the Taj Mahal?
As Kim predicted, we got stopped by the police on our way out. There is a press sticker in the window of Kim’s car, since her husband is a journalist. The cop’s excuse? Foreigners in an India press car. Suresh got the papers out and Kim was out in a split second with her camera.
“What’s the problem here? I have kids in Delhi who are hungry!” The cop, stunned by her anger, waved us along but, embarrassed, immediately gave chase to car behind us. We pulled up and stopped next to them and Kim gave the cop attitude for a few seconds before we pulled away. I felt very sorry for the people in that car.
We snoozed most of the way back home. It was a long day.