We were lucky enough to get a 2AC to Chittorgarh with a friendly newly-wed English couple… they’re on their first week of a year-long round-the-world trip! Frankly, I think six months would be my max. I know that travel would start to feel like a job…
***************************************************************************************
We had to wait at the Chittorgarh train station for a couple of hours. It was very hot, dusty, minutes passing slowly. Sitting there on the platform, we began to notice the tired parade of poverty… and we were suddenly a part of it. What is it about these Indian train stations. For the traveler, it’s a place of flux. You arrive from somewhere else. It brings you to the next place. There’s an atmosphere of mutability. For the homeless, this is the end of the road. Too many natty-haired, mucus-faced children… moon-eyed. To them, a white face means prosperity. They come to us, open-palmed and filthy, imploring with those eyes.
And the adults, too. We gave one woman ten rupees, and a smile instantly spread across her whole face. She walked away pronouncing some sort of thanks, and we watched her show the little note to her family. Ten rupees… that’s like 20 cents. A woman thrilled to get 20 cents…
Another woman came by, clutching a 2-year-old with no pants on. The baby was covered in her own snot, with that hard stare that you never see on the face of a western child. We gave her a zip-lock bag full of half-eaten cookies. She glowed with gratitude. Really, her face was beaming. She let the baby hold the packet and then brought it to her family huddled on the platform, where they started sharing the cookies and passing them around. I broke. I couldn’t stop crying under my sunglasses. Something shattered inside me.
I’ll never forget their faces. They will haunt me. The desperate, grasping look of the beggar; the broadening smile of gratitude. For ten rupees. For a bag of half-eaten cookies. For nothing nothing nothing.
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Friday, April 17, 2009
Monkey Stick
I was going to give up on this blog, because I've posted everything on Facebook. People have been reading and responding to the Facebook blog, but this one has gotten lost in the shuffle. However, I suppose a few of you are still out there who are not on Facebook. So I'll publish here, too!
The next day we trawled the bazaars (they were making bangles on the street!), and eventually wound our way up to the crumbly old palace at sunset to gaze out over the amazing view. We scrambled up to the abandoned fort ---- a haunted place ---- and explored its dark nooks and crannies. There were creepy paintings of battles and goddesses peeling on the walls, vines crawling over gaping holes in the ground, stairways disappearing into the darkness.
Just as the sun began to set, the monkeys started appearing. It was clear that this was their time, their territory. They followed us out. A large male came charging at us down the steep rocky path while I was taking a picture of a baby… we scrambled down the hill quickly, brandishing our monkey stick. By the time we got down to the palace, it was crawling with monkeys. They were springing madly around the courtyard, climbing up to the incense-swirling shrines and eating the altar offerings, looming ominously on the high palace walls, eyeing us darkly. It was eery. They didn’t want us there…
***********************************************************************************
The next morning, we had a sunrise breakfast on the roof and caught our last glimpses of this fairy-tale village. An ochre light was burning up the sky, doming over the misty-pale streets, resting on the rooftops. Blues of the buildings were changing minutely, spreading out and bolding. It’s like one of those rajasthani miniatures: tiny details and curls of color tinged in gold. But for us, Bundi will always be the beautiful people who treated us with kindness and incredible generosity. It will always be the people.
The next day we trawled the bazaars (they were making bangles on the street!), and eventually wound our way up to the crumbly old palace at sunset to gaze out over the amazing view. We scrambled up to the abandoned fort ---- a haunted place ---- and explored its dark nooks and crannies. There were creepy paintings of battles and goddesses peeling on the walls, vines crawling over gaping holes in the ground, stairways disappearing into the darkness.
Just as the sun began to set, the monkeys started appearing. It was clear that this was their time, their territory. They followed us out. A large male came charging at us down the steep rocky path while I was taking a picture of a baby… we scrambled down the hill quickly, brandishing our monkey stick. By the time we got down to the palace, it was crawling with monkeys. They were springing madly around the courtyard, climbing up to the incense-swirling shrines and eating the altar offerings, looming ominously on the high palace walls, eyeing us darkly. It was eery. They didn’t want us there…
**************************
The next morning, we had a sunrise breakfast on the roof and caught our last glimpses of this fairy-tale village. An ochre light was burning up the sky, doming over the misty-pale streets, resting on the rooftops. Blues of the buildings were changing minutely, spreading out and bolding. It’s like one of those rajasthani miniatures: tiny details and curls of color tinged in gold. But for us, Bundi will always be the beautiful people who treated us with kindness and incredible generosity. It will always be the people.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Strangers with Curry: A Dinner Invitation on the Street
It’s a relief to be in Bundi after the harrowing 13-hour train ride. After the freezing cold, nauseating smells, and being in a horizontal position for 12 hours, this little village feels like an oasis.
It’s quiet. It’s tiny. Our room is bright and colorful with stained glass and rajput paintings on the ceilings and walls. This is the first real breath of calm we’ve had thus far. And now we’re at our leisure to rest or wander as we please.
******************************************************************************************
I’ve never experienced so much humanity as I have in India. I’ve felt such generosity and desperation in equal measure. In Bundi, the people were lovely and warm. Children kept asking us to take their photo, and amidst the mild chaos of picture-taking and handing out spiderman pencils, one of the boys asked us up to his house for tea. So we went in their rickety house up a series of very steep and narrow stairs, where we met the mother. We were ushered into a little bedroom where they served us chai masala. An older brother appeared, who could speak English. He was a very gentle boy, but insistent that we come back at 8:00 for dinner. We gave a non-committal “we’ll try,” and he said “No try, it is necessary for you to come!”
With much trepidation (and visions of gastro-intestinal explosions dancing in our heads), we arrived at their house at 8:00. We returned to the little bedroom, where we met a sassy aunt who was openly burping and showing off her English skills. The father, who was wearing nothing but a towel and a shirt, greeted us warmly (and later stood up on the bed and put his trousers on in front of us!). When we sat down to dinner (on the floor), the whole family sat around and watched us eat. They presented us each with a big round silver platter covered with little piles of food and a basket of chapati. It was a bit awkward, especially as we had to eat on the floor… with our hands. They chuckled at our clumsy fingers fumbling around the little piles of food, but tried to make us feel comfortable. The food was very interesting: there were delicious spicy chick pea curries; some sort of odd, crunchy, dry mixture; a strange gelatinous dessert made from ghee and cinnamon.
When we finished, they insisted on showing us their other house in the country. The next thing we knew, Matt and I were both on the back of a little motorcycle behind the teenage boy, driving fast and furious down the tiny streets of Bundi! As we sped over the cobblestones, dodging cows and oncoming traffic, my life was flashing before my eyes. I kept thinking, “I’m so glad we bought travel insurance!”
Finally we arrived (in one piece), and they proudly showed us around their house and their little garden. We were shown everything, from the bathroom to the storage room. They were absolutely beaming with pride. The mother even managed to get out a few words in English: “Our personal house. Personal.”
We capped the night with a cup of chai and watched the beginning of Obama’s inauguration on their (plastic-wrapped) T.V. I thought it was interesting what Shabhom (the teenage boy) said about him: “Obama is very lucky.” We never see our presidents in this way, as the recipients of good fortune. We see them as extremely hard-working and deserving of what they receive, good or bad.
While we sat with them for the last few minutes, they invited us to stay with them at their house. We were surprised, but of course declined, explaining that we were already staying in a hotel. They said it would be easy to go get our things and come back to their house together, but we had paid for our hotel in advance. They were visibly disappointed, but accepted this explanation and offered another invitation for the next time we come. “Next time you come to Bundi, you must stay for seven days, and you must stay with us!” The father declared that they felt a deep friendship with us. I’m still bewildered by their hospitality.
We climbed back on the motorcycle behind Shabhom, and the rest of the family (all four of them!), piled onto the second motorcycle. When we were safely ahead of the family, Shabhom tentatively queried, “Can I ask you a question?” I said, “Of course.”
“Did you know each other before you were married?”
“Yes, we met at University.” (That seemed to please him.)
“Because… I have a girlfriend.” (said he shyly) “I met her at a marriage ceremony.”
(wedding)
“Do your parents know about her?”
“No, no! It is top secret!”
“Do her parents know about you?”
“Top secret! Sometimes… when I’m alone… I call her.” (pause) “She is soooo pretty.” And thus another Indian tale of star-crossed lovers, albeit a perfectly innocent one.
We finally arrived, wind-blown, back to their house. The youngest son presented us with a gift (a daily planner?!) and they would not say goodbye, because they invited us to dinner the following night. We never went back.**
We will never ever forget those people. I still don't understand why the opened their hearts and their homes to us so dramatically, or what kind of world is so free of suspicion. I definitely learned something from that.
**However, we have already been in touch through email. The modern world!
It’s quiet. It’s tiny. Our room is bright and colorful with stained glass and rajput paintings on the ceilings and walls. This is the first real breath of calm we’ve had thus far. And now we’re at our leisure to rest or wander as we please.
I’ve never experienced so much humanity as I have in India. I’ve felt such generosity and desperation in equal measure. In Bundi, the people were lovely and warm. Children kept asking us to take their photo, and amidst the mild chaos of picture-taking and handing out spiderman pencils, one of the boys asked us up to his house for tea. So we went in their rickety house up a series of very steep and narrow stairs, where we met the mother. We were ushered into a little bedroom where they served us chai masala. An older brother appeared, who could speak English. He was a very gentle boy, but insistent that we come back at 8:00 for dinner. We gave a non-committal “we’ll try,” and he said “No try, it is necessary for you to come!”
With much trepidation (and visions of gastro-intestinal explosions dancing in our heads), we arrived at their house at 8:00. We returned to the little bedroom, where we met a sassy aunt who was openly burping and showing off her English skills. The father, who was wearing nothing but a towel and a shirt, greeted us warmly (and later stood up on the bed and put his trousers on in front of us!). When we sat down to dinner (on the floor), the whole family sat around and watched us eat. They presented us each with a big round silver platter covered with little piles of food and a basket of chapati. It was a bit awkward, especially as we had to eat on the floor… with our hands. They chuckled at our clumsy fingers fumbling around the little piles of food, but tried to make us feel comfortable. The food was very interesting: there were delicious spicy chick pea curries; some sort of odd, crunchy, dry mixture; a strange gelatinous dessert made from ghee and cinnamon.
When we finished, they insisted on showing us their other house in the country. The next thing we knew, Matt and I were both on the back of a little motorcycle behind the teenage boy, driving fast and furious down the tiny streets of Bundi! As we sped over the cobblestones, dodging cows and oncoming traffic, my life was flashing before my eyes. I kept thinking, “I’m so glad we bought travel insurance!”
Finally we arrived (in one piece), and they proudly showed us around their house and their little garden. We were shown everything, from the bathroom to the storage room. They were absolutely beaming with pride. The mother even managed to get out a few words in English: “Our personal house. Personal.”
We capped the night with a cup of chai and watched the beginning of Obama’s inauguration on their (plastic-wrapped) T.V. I thought it was interesting what Shabhom (the teenage boy) said about him: “Obama is very lucky.” We never see our presidents in this way, as the recipients of good fortune. We see them as extremely hard-working and deserving of what they receive, good or bad.
While we sat with them for the last few minutes, they invited us to stay with them at their house. We were surprised, but of course declined, explaining that we were already staying in a hotel. They said it would be easy to go get our things and come back to their house together, but we had paid for our hotel in advance. They were visibly disappointed, but accepted this explanation and offered another invitation for the next time we come. “Next time you come to Bundi, you must stay for seven days, and you must stay with us!” The father declared that they felt a deep friendship with us. I’m still bewildered by their hospitality.
We climbed back on the motorcycle behind Shabhom, and the rest of the family (all four of them!), piled onto the second motorcycle. When we were safely ahead of the family, Shabhom tentatively queried, “Can I ask you a question?” I said, “Of course.”
“Did you know each other before you were married?”
“Yes, we met at University.” (That seemed to please him.)
“Because… I have a girlfriend.” (said he shyly) “I met her at a marriage ceremony.”
(wedding)
“Do your parents know about her?”
“No, no! It is top secret!”
“Do her parents know about you?”
“Top secret! Sometimes… when I’m alone… I call her.” (pause) “She is soooo pretty.” And thus another Indian tale of star-crossed lovers, albeit a perfectly innocent one.
We finally arrived, wind-blown, back to their house. The youngest son presented us with a gift (a daily planner?!) and they would not say goodbye, because they invited us to dinner the following night. We never went back.**
We will never ever forget those people. I still don't understand why the opened their hearts and their homes to us so dramatically, or what kind of world is so free of suspicion. I definitely learned something from that.
**However, we have already been in touch through email. The modern world!
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
13-Hour Train Ride of Despair
I don’t have too many criticisms of the Lonely Planet, but I think they missed a crucial warning. Other travelers we met along the way seemed to know. So how did we end up on a general-class sleeper train? Had I known what a horrific nightmare it was going to be, I would have re-routed the entire itinerary and traveled around Rajasthan counter-clockwise. I blame it on you, Lonely Planet!
The first thing I saw upon boarding was the open door of the train bathroom… and there was *#@! all over the floor. As the night is progressing, everything is conspiring to keep me awake and make me feel profoundly ill-at-ease. Random jumpy Indian music on transistor radios. Coarse tuberculin coughing. Children randomly screaming and whining. Man on the adjacent bunk staring at me. Bugs. Weird food smells. Overpowering whiffs of the latrine (I mean, like my nose is a lead pipe that is being pumped with raw sewage). Growling snores. Rattle of the train. Yeah, I’m freaked out. We’re the only westerners on the whole damn train. So everyone and their cousin has noticed us. If someone had thieving instincts, they’d come straight for our bunks, I’m sure.
I think that guy is still staring at me. I’m afraid to look.
You couldn’t pay me a million rupees to step foot in the bathroom, either.
The first thing I saw upon boarding was the open door of the train bathroom… and there was *#@! all over the floor. As the night is progressing, everything is conspiring to keep me awake and make me feel profoundly ill-at-ease. Random jumpy Indian music on transistor radios. Coarse tuberculin coughing. Children randomly screaming and whining. Man on the adjacent bunk staring at me. Bugs. Weird food smells. Overpowering whiffs of the latrine (I mean, like my nose is a lead pipe that is being pumped with raw sewage). Growling snores. Rattle of the train. Yeah, I’m freaked out. We’re the only westerners on the whole damn train. So everyone and their cousin has noticed us. If someone had thieving instincts, they’d come straight for our bunks, I’m sure.
I think that guy is still staring at me. I’m afraid to look.
You couldn’t pay me a million rupees to step foot in the bathroom, either.
Friday, February 13, 2009
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Taj Mahal: What a Grave!
It’s a profound privilege to see one of the wonders of the world. It was Matt’s birthday today, and I’m sure it will be one that he remembers always.
It was very foggy this morning. The Taj Mahal looked like a ghost, insubstantial, almost transparent. Peculiar how dream-like the Taj is, and yet the red buildings surrounding it, beautiful as they are, seemed perfectly solid and tactile, while the Taj floated, like it was suspended in milk.
What a strange and beautiful monument to love. From far away, it has a pale, ephemeral quality. But up close, it’s built of huge slabs of solid marble, covered over with sinewy and delicately flowering designs. It’s unquestionably the most extraordinary mausoleum in the world. It’s the clean, pure heart of a filthy, chaotic city.
We went to eat a birthday dinner at a rooftop restaurant nearby… a magnificent view of the Taj. And a very different view from the postcards, too. From our vantage point, the Taj Mahal was rising like a fairy-tale cloud palace in the midst of a sea of corrugated metal, trickster monkeys, and buildings in an advanced state of decay. Open sewage runs through the streets of Agra; dogs skulk with dirty children in the alleys. But the Taj is always there, omnipresent, floating whitely above the refuse.
There is some unintentional comment here about death. What is it. Purity? Or something shadowy and hidden? Something crawling in the dirty streets and peering darkly through the gates into a magnificent garden…
I feel it all around me. But I feel life, too. Even if it comes out in smudged colors and cage-rattling coughs.
It was very foggy this morning. The Taj Mahal looked like a ghost, insubstantial, almost transparent. Peculiar how dream-like the Taj is, and yet the red buildings surrounding it, beautiful as they are, seemed perfectly solid and tactile, while the Taj floated, like it was suspended in milk.
What a strange and beautiful monument to love. From far away, it has a pale, ephemeral quality. But up close, it’s built of huge slabs of solid marble, covered over with sinewy and delicately flowering designs. It’s unquestionably the most extraordinary mausoleum in the world. It’s the clean, pure heart of a filthy, chaotic city.
We went to eat a birthday dinner at a rooftop restaurant nearby… a magnificent view of the Taj. And a very different view from the postcards, too. From our vantage point, the Taj Mahal was rising like a fairy-tale cloud palace in the midst of a sea of corrugated metal, trickster monkeys, and buildings in an advanced state of decay. Open sewage runs through the streets of Agra; dogs skulk with dirty children in the alleys. But the Taj is always there, omnipresent, floating whitely above the refuse.
There is some unintentional comment here about death. What is it. Purity? Or something shadowy and hidden? Something crawling in the dirty streets and peering darkly through the gates into a magnificent garden…
I feel it all around me. But I feel life, too. Even if it comes out in smudged colors and cage-rattling coughs.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Shock of Filth, Shock of Poverty
I kept a journal while we were in India, and I'm copying here in all its emotion and artlessness. This trip had such an impact on us... that I want to share it. Forgive, in advance, moments that may seem melodramatic or sentimental. I just don't have the skill (or the distance) to reproduce my experience in words. I assure you there was nothing melodramatic or sentimental about our trip. It was an experience of life and raw humanity.
We’ve been in India for two days, and my senses have been assaulted, violated, sprung open. As soon as we got off the plane I could smell it. Like an animal exhaling in the night air. Like warm skin sprinkled with cumin and coriander. Like burning excrement.
A man from the hotel was there to meet us at 3 AM in Jaipur, and we rattled off into the night. Some people were still out at that hour, huddled around small fires they had built in the streets.
The first shock is the shock of poverty and the shock of filth. This morning, waiting for the train, my eyes locked---- paralyzed---- on the sight of human feces and urine on the tracks and engorged rats sniffing around and the stench of it was rising up in waves, and I was gagging uncontrollably over and over again. It’s a smell so indescribably putrid that I feel like I never knew the full spectrum of smells before. I suddenly realized that the traintracks are the public bathroom, and the realization made me almost vomit. It’s sickening. It’s nauseating. It’s saddening.
People were spread out everywhere, ragged and dirty and hopeless-looking. Children with mucus-encrusted faces and nappy hair sitting still, quiet, moon-eyed, while their mothers are sleeping on the concrete.
Yesterday I saw a peacock picking its way through a pile of trash. It’s like these sad-eyed women in their butterfly-colored saris. Picking their way through the trash.
Aren’t the people beautiful. Driving by, a whole family of four packed on a scooter, the children giddily waving at us. A leathery old man with glasses propped beneath a crimson turban, squatting on the ground reading the newspaper. A little old lady in a grey sari, asking me to write out the information for her train ticket.
And scary, too. Scary/sad/disturbing. A half-naked man, stork-limbed, who painted himself red, wild-eyed, walking through traffic like he’s in a dream. The eyes staring two ways at once. A leper. A man with a dead foot. The mad. The insane. The touts. The hustlers. The beggar children.
I feel like an intruder sometimes, armed with my camera and shooting mercilessly at their poverty.
And what about those children. Those moon-eyes.
Now we’re on the train from Jaipur to Agra. The country-side is rolling past in green and yellow. Villages flashing by, impossibly decaying. The occasional fantastical sweep of bright paint on a decaying wall, or red, blue, and green flicks of color on a tiny cupola. Monkeys share space with peacocks and humans, always conniving ways to steal and spring away.
Away from the villages, people live in mud huts with thatched roofs. There are round straw huts----granaries. Everywhere are huge piles of cow dung shaped into flat round circles and lined up for drying or stacked ready to use as fuel. No running water, no modernity.
The people stare at us, shocked, as the train slows down. And then we rattle away forever.
India is seeping into me. I’m helpless.
We’ve been in India for two days, and my senses have been assaulted, violated, sprung open. As soon as we got off the plane I could smell it. Like an animal exhaling in the night air. Like warm skin sprinkled with cumin and coriander. Like burning excrement.
A man from the hotel was there to meet us at 3 AM in Jaipur, and we rattled off into the night. Some people were still out at that hour, huddled around small fires they had built in the streets.
The first shock is the shock of poverty and the shock of filth. This morning, waiting for the train, my eyes locked---- paralyzed---- on the sight of human feces and urine on the tracks and engorged rats sniffing around and the stench of it was rising up in waves, and I was gagging uncontrollably over and over again. It’s a smell so indescribably putrid that I feel like I never knew the full spectrum of smells before. I suddenly realized that the traintracks are the public bathroom, and the realization made me almost vomit. It’s sickening. It’s nauseating. It’s saddening.
People were spread out everywhere, ragged and dirty and hopeless-looking. Children with mucus-encrusted faces and nappy hair sitting still, quiet, moon-eyed, while their mothers are sleeping on the concrete.
Yesterday I saw a peacock picking its way through a pile of trash. It’s like these sad-eyed women in their butterfly-colored saris. Picking their way through the trash.
Aren’t the people beautiful. Driving by, a whole family of four packed on a scooter, the children giddily waving at us. A leathery old man with glasses propped beneath a crimson turban, squatting on the ground reading the newspaper. A little old lady in a grey sari, asking me to write out the information for her train ticket.
And scary, too. Scary/sad/disturbing. A half-naked man, stork-limbed, who painted himself red, wild-eyed, walking through traffic like he’s in a dream. The eyes staring two ways at once. A leper. A man with a dead foot. The mad. The insane. The touts. The hustlers. The beggar children.
I feel like an intruder sometimes, armed with my camera and shooting mercilessly at their poverty.
And what about those children. Those moon-eyes.
Now we’re on the train from Jaipur to Agra. The country-side is rolling past in green and yellow. Villages flashing by, impossibly decaying. The occasional fantastical sweep of bright paint on a decaying wall, or red, blue, and green flicks of color on a tiny cupola. Monkeys share space with peacocks and humans, always conniving ways to steal and spring away.
Away from the villages, people live in mud huts with thatched roofs. There are round straw huts----granaries. Everywhere are huge piles of cow dung shaped into flat round circles and lined up for drying or stacked ready to use as fuel. No running water, no modernity.
The people stare at us, shocked, as the train slows down. And then we rattle away forever.
India is seeping into me. I’m helpless.
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