Falling down stairs

My friends are leaving me, and I've already written so much today, I'm having trouble coming up with the words to express my sadness and dismay at having to regenerate another set of comrades to tackle the coming months. Of course I could always just pretend I'm not in India, refuse to meet anyone new, and sit on my ass with my thumb inexpertly placed below me. But I don't feel like that, so I'm off to the races... BTW, Anjali is in Bangalore, we hung out last night, its been 17 months since I've seen her...WTF

17 hours

The sun beat down hard. Paint has flecked away from most of the visible surfaces leaving dark reddish brown patches. I don't want to think about where I am. Seventeen hours on this bus. No road with bumps or holes of the same size. I'm getting tired of this. And her voice, filling all the available space with its peircing strength. I have to be careful anger doesn't come over me, I don't want to hurt anyone. Its been like this for too long. I don't like her. She is not my type of person or friend. Skinny farm muscle hiding insecurity with an obnoxious siren.

Uncountable light beams bounce off the tapestry of Kerala's green kaleidoscope landscape. We walk down the muddy path to the waiting boat. It is long with an iron pointed tip protecting its wooden nose. Covering it is a wicker mesh supported by bamboo struts. I take one of the light brown wicker chairs and wait with the others, talking softly. After a few minutes a small man with dense muscles takes the 5 meter bamboo pole and pushes us away into the murky green water. The only sound comes from the lapping of the water and the beating of the sun on our protective roof. The boatman walks backwards, pushing the boat forwards. We all relax into deeper states of contentment as our minds release the tension of the Indian cacophony. I look into the water and see small fish following us hoping for small bits of bread. A small indian boy next to me throws them their desire. We slide into a green island. A large pile of half coconuts withers to our right. The boatman walks over to one of the palm trees leaning over the water, ties short lengths of rope to his feet and hands, then climbs the tree, raining coconuts down on us for a few minutes. After he comes down again he takes a short sickle blade and cuts off the top of each coconut and gives each of us our own fresh coconut milk. The clear milk slides down my throat, cooling my insides while avoiding my dislike for other coconut products. The milk keeps me awake for the rest of the day.

Singing in the rain

Epiphanies are cool, especially when they're yours

Ganesha's trip

I've been places, places that smell, places that rot, places that smell and rot at the same time.

Only 13 hours on a bus... I told myself I could handle it, and it really couldn't be that bad, comfortable seats (relatively speaking), only slightly tattered, and the smell on the inside was generally better than the smell on the outside. We exit the city, taking the average route of a comptetent bus driver "almost run over rickshaw driver, brush past a couple pedestrians slowing down slightly to make sure they aren't getting up to call the police, test springs by finding the largest potholes possible..." Normal busri..d...e.... Night falls, the speed increases, the amount of trucks on the road increase, motorcycles and small cars mysteriously disappear to hide until the sun brings safety again. The wolves prowl the highways of India now. Slow moving oxen (transport trucks) are too large for them to hunt alone, but this certainly doesn't stop them from trying. This ferocious struggle is the epitome of the simple game of chicken repeated over and over again all night long... the bus driver moves out to pass one of the slowmoving oxen, yet notices that an oxen actually occupies the space he is trying to move into. Rather than moving back behind the first oxen, the wolf increases to impact speed, actually manages to decrease the width of the bus, and slides around the first oxen while deftly avoiding the second one by mere milliseconds (I tried to count the seconds it took before the trucks flew past us in the opposite direction, filling the space we had just left... but I didn't have time). Style points go to those busdrivers who can actually shave paint off the passing trucks and even more extra points if you can hold a conversation with someone behind you, taking time to maintain eye contact for emphasis on key points. This game moves into hyperdrive when you have two busdrivers (wolves) who are trying to pass each other on a slightly narrower than two lane road, with oncoming traffic, in the rain... breath deeply, close your eyes, pray...

We make it to Bijapur, right on schedule, a few years stolen by stress-induced panic attacks, and slightly jealous of all the indians around us who are stretching after their pain free nights of sleep, but alive.

I missed the puddle of shit waiting maliciously for my foot as we stepped down, my friend Valeria did not. Funny though, when she took off her shoe to wipe it off, somehow it had managed to spell out 'Welcome to Bijapur!' Capital letters and exclamation mark included. It still stunk.

The streets are surrounded on all sides by pigs, dogs, cows, rats, mosques, and people, people of every color as long as you only look in the "dark brown" light spectrum. In towns sometimes unremarkable for their lack of things to see, this one looked to be quite special in this regard, yet appearances are decieving, or rather, they're not decieving, the town looked, smelled, and acted like shit, but there were some gems beneath the surface (visible for kilometers in every direction)... Ruins from medieval centuries, Moghul and Arab mausoleums standing dozens of meters tall, Mosques that fit thousands of people, manicured gardens surrounding domed stoneworked temples of impressive symmetry considering they were built almost a thousand years ago... All of this you would have been able to see, and more, except my camera is broken (anybody who wants to start a charity fund to get me a really nice digital camera so they can experience all of this vicariously, feel free)

And then the busride home, which we almost missed due to an especially delicious mouth burning meal, yet saved the torture of an extra ticket by the grace of god, a cell phone and a slow rickshaw, then 20-25 near death experiences to put me to sleep from fear-induced exhaustion.

Good fun...

More to come...

Evan

Don't trust the mob

Its easy to say, and seems like a pretty simple formula, but really, they're decieving, especially when you can't speak their language, they have a monopoly and even though they have posted prices, these are arbitrary to both them and the local police standing around. After my experience I think the police were actually confirming that the mobsters/boatmen were charging enough to complete payment of their bribe for the day.

Along those lines, I spent 12 hours on a bus, charged triple prices ($2.50) for a boat ride around a dirty river to see waterfalls that were easily 1/3 of the size anyone advertised. I'm beginning to think in India, if they actually do advertise themselves, then there really is no need to go. However, if you have to find out about it, or ask questions of the locals to force them to give you the knowledge, well, at that point you can be fairly well assured the object/location of desire will be absolutely amazing, if it doesn't really really suck.

The moral of the story is, never trust anything someone on the street says unless they are already agreeing with you, and then only trust them halfway...

A good night's sleep, but...

Man, there's nothing like 5 billion mosquitoes to interrupt a badly needed night's rest every half hour. And as soon as you turn on the freaking light, they're gone like the wind, man its killing me (literally, I'm losing pints of blood). Luckily I'm getting some of them back, there are quite a few little spots on the wall I"m unsuccessfully hoping will drive away the other mosquitoes when they recognize their sisters.

Bastards.

Teaching is fun when all you do is give them a good project, see them get excited, then start writing letters as they run and do their own thing. At least thats what I think.

First things first

I tell a story about whatever I want to children between 6 and 12 years of age most days on the busride into my daily inebriation test. 4 hours of sleep doesn't seem to be cutting it anymore, well, it never did, but I'm getting tired of running on a quarter steam, so its time to recharge the batteries for a week or so.

I think my brain is in the middle of one of those gastronomical nightmares you can only find in India...

This weekend, to some waterfalls, I don't really know where, but I know they cost money to get to, money to eat at, and money to get back from, so they better be good, because money is not something I have. I would ask if I could ride on the top, but I know the roads and especially the highways around here, and its definitely not worth trying to do anything without a soft seat and two or three handgrips.

The flower party last night was pretty lowkey, reminded me of a Mexican parade mostly... But I had the most amazing meal (too much of the most amazing meal as I found out later when I couldn't move) It was this Curry/masala dish called kaja masala... and consisted of a light brownish thick curry sauce/gravy mixed with vegetables and fried cashew nuts. My god, I thought I was in heaven, a light taste somehow mixed up with a heavy texture that managed to stimulate all the olfactory organs, and every taste bud I thought I had lost over the years. Nothing like indian food to wake up the cuisiniere in you.

Tired...