12.4.2006...Back So Soon? Yes, in Delhi!

Sunday evening we boarded the Rajdhani train from Ahmedabad to Delhi:

We settled in to watch about an hour or so of lit travel scenery before the sun set for the evening.

Here I am contemplating the passing images...




They served us tea and snack early on and then dinner shortly after 8pm. Although I wasn't too tired, I thought time would pass better if I went to sleep on the earlier side.

Here's my bunk...



It's an odd thing travelling by train when you are sleeping. So many of the motions make you feel like your cot is bend at odd angles or that you will fall out. Nothing happened, of course, but it was strange nonetheless.

This time around I was a pro at using the toilet facilities. I knew the difference between Western and Indian...and it didn't mean who could use which.

~~~

In the early morning the light began to break through and the outskirts of New Delhi revealed themselves. Billowing smoke rose from the morning fires of slum settlements among the trees and dilapidated buildings along the rail side.

We were stopped for some time just outside of Delhi and I took this snap. It reminded me of times when I was stopped on the Hudson line heading into New York. There were places that looked just like this in my memory.

The sight that was most, I don't know, 'noticeable' were the morning squatters. Like small boulders and brush spotting the landscape dozens and then hundreds of people, young and old, passed the time casually while making the morning toileting rounds.

No, it isn't the neatest thing to bring up, but it is what it is. They were simply making do with the open areas outside of their slum dwellings.

We started to then see 'graffiti' along the walls and buildings lining the track.

And then there was this bosom bunch of holy rollers. I really only call them that because most often I see them 'rolling' along the countryside. It really hasn't been as common to see them just hanging out. I suppose the time of day warranted that.

Once in Delhi, we took on this porter to help with the luggage and made our way to the 'safe' side of the train station to meet the driver.

I was told the other side wasn't safe because a lot of foreigners hung out there and caused trouble. One group were the hippies.

"Hippies breed crime?"

"Yes, when they need money for their drugs."

"Oh."

Hippies aren't really regarded well in India from what I can tell. It's odd considering how cool they are in the States.

Our lodging while in Delhi was to be in Gurgaon, at the DLF City Center Club.

Gurgaon is part of Delhi's metropolitan area, but about an hour south of city center.

Along the way I noted another Gandhi statue...

I liked this one because of the other people depicted in it. Most often I've seen him alone...like he did everything alone...pah!

I was also interested in seeing the advertised use of Clean Natural Gas (CNG) on Delhi's buses.

After 2 and half hours from the time we got off the train we finally made it to the club. It literally is the nicest place I have stayed in India to date.

The adventure continues....


Peace,

A Pink American

12.3.2006...And Away We Go...Again!

To Recap First:

1) The night after the Garba we attended the connected wedding reception. It was a fairly modest event in that only several hundred people were there. Although the governor of the State of Gujarat also showed up. This was not to be our only close encounter with him this week.

2) A day of shopping in Ahmedabad. Well it was a focused trip to a store called Reve that sells AHIMSA silk products. This is an exciting alternative to traditional silk products in that the silk worms are allowed to hatch from their cocoons and then the silk threads are collected.

On the way home I spotted signs for the circus in town:

(it's the small sign with the tiger...but the tents were big and lovely)

And our car was side-rear ended...at like 1mph. It was hardly anything, but it happened in front of a traffic cop in the middle of the intersection. The cop tried to brush it off and told us to go, but mummy wanted to get the driver's info, just in case.

We soon realized why the cop had tried to brush us off...the governor's motorcade was coming through the area. This also explained the inordinate number of traffic police smoothly directing traffic that day.

For lunch we went to a restaurant called "The New Yorker". It was very well designed in the interior. And the scale-wall model of New York was accurate to present day settings.

Furthermore, it is the only place I've been able to get decent spaghetti in Ahmedabad. Now I don't begrudge Ahmedabad for not providing better spaghetti, but for the number of places that have it on their menus, it tastes nothing like actual Italian spaghetti.

Here's an odd bit of me-trivia...this is the fourth city that I have seen a fairly decent Statue of Liberty. Of course I saw the original in New York. I also saw it's mini-version in Paris. One in is in Las Vegas (New York New York) and now here in Ahmedabad India. Perhaps I've seen more, I can't rightly recall, but I think it's fabulous that these four cities can claim a such an obscure common thread such as this.

3) Another wedding! Last night we went to an appropriately large wedding. You may ask: "Large? You said the one the other night only had several hundred guests...what is LARGE?"

Well large is at a party plot that can hold over 1,000 guests...these views are a 1-2-3 pan of the plot. It's all outdoors too.

At these weddings I feel like I'm in a garden party. A Lewis Carroll garden party, where lovely and bright flowers (albeit inverted) float and flutter across the green grass. But that's just if you look at the ground the whole time.

The one thing about these weddings I don't like is the pushy-ness of the guests. There is shameless line cutting and many can be extremely rude to the servers. It's not like the entitlement-arrogance I have seen in some Americans (when Americans just think they are the best...period), but this comes out of the legacy of the caste system. Although it is officially deinstitutionalized it exists in the words and actions of every person I have encountered (with a few exceptions). Honestly it is more ingrained even then the legacy of slavery is in the US. Of course that isn't so strange since slavery was younger than the caste system, but who goes around asking people: were your family slave owners or slaves. This is a much bigger topic of conversation than can be addressed here and now, but I hope the picture is there.

I tried to pose properly after the wedding but had some timing issues:

Caught woefully rolling my eyes and head in impatient waiting for the snap...shoot.

Okay this is better....although a bit cheesy

AND FINALLY...

We are off to the North:

We leave in a few hours, by train, for Delhi. The train departs about 5:30pm and is an overnighter that gets in near 9am. I'm pretty excited about all of this. I'm thankful that Surnish's parents are indulging me, but they generally travel this way to Delhi anyway.

Surnish will be leaving around the same time on Sunday in the States. We will finally meet up with him Tuesday night at 7:30-ish in Delhi...yay!

I bid you all a found farewell until I post again....which will be while I'm on the road.

Peace,

A Pink American

11.29.2006....Block Prints and Garba

Not the most inspiring title, but accurate.

Block Printing in Old Ahmedabad

Today we made our way into old city Ahmedabad (ooooOOOoooh). Well I shouldn't mock it as it was the seen of some of the worst violence during the 2002 riots. However, it is relatively peaceful nowadays because there seems to be highly dependent chains of labor, particularly for textiles.

One piece of this chain is block printing.

Through a contact of mummy's (by the name of Kokali) we were introduced to a master block printer. He was a very polite man who had inherited his shop from his father before him. He also had stacks and stacks and stacks of very old wood print blocks.

We stayed and watched for over an hour as the printer of the shop laid out a print for a customer:

First select the print block...

Lay the print block....



And set the print...


Then repeat numerous times.

Watching this extremely labor and time consuming process gave me a sense of awe with how much is put in to making one simple cushion cover or sari. Remember this is only one step...you have the cloth weaver, dyers and tailors too.

We picked up a few items from the store and after a nearly 3 hour visit, and made our way home.

Going to the Garba

A friend of the folks had a son get married and they arranged a garba the night before the reception.

I had heard much about these events and was really looking forward to it. I got all spiffed up to dance too.

Unfortunately this was not the blow-out even that I had expected.

Mummy said proper garba's have hundreds if not thousands of attendees who are dancing everywhere. There just weren't enough people.

Of those who did dance it was pleasant to watch. I never felt the mood strike me to dance despite many, many please from others. I suppose I won no graces this night.

The most interesting part of the event was watching house maid and house mistress alike dance side by side throughout the evening. It gave a sense of a great equalizing effect.

Watching the garba action...

Taking a break...

Only a few more days now until we leave for Delhi and Surnish will be joining us on Tuesday.

Peace,

A Pink American