monoceros blogsA friend of mine in Tamil Nadu wrote me today, and I remembered that I needed to write about India before the year ends, before work absorbs me once more and turns me into either a manic lesson-planner or a sad-eyed grader of English essays or both (very likely).
I'll start with the antique store in Madurai, where my friend, Zubi, works. Zubi is originally from Kashmir, and so fair that I could not place him at first. He doesn't speak English very well (his written English is even worse, and he doesn't quite understand punctuation, nor does he use it much) but we got on very well when we first met and were soon trading stories. He told me he couldn't get a visa anywhere because he was from Kashmir, and thus a presumed terrorist. I was pretty sure he wouldn't make a very good terrorist. He didn't seem to be a very good salesman either. I told him I couldn't afford the camel-bone paintings in the section of the store he was assigned to and that I wasn't planning to buy anything. He showed them to me anyway, more paintings than I could count. He held them up carefully against a small lamp and I watched the soldiers and musicians and lovers come to life. I held them gingerly in my hands, listening to Zubi explain each scene and the story behind it.
I wandered through the store, from room to room, like a wide-eyed Alice, admiring large ancient-looking rings, boxes made of camel bone, enameled perfume bottles, paintings with scenes of war and images flushed with music and the tenderness between lovers, and heavy brass statues of Saraswati, a Hindu goddess who represents intelligence, consciousness, creativity, education, enlightenment, music, the arts, and power. She held me fast. I stared at her four arms that represent - among other things - the four Vedas, which are the primary sacred books for Hindus, and these Vedas symbolize the three forms of literature: poetry, prose and music. A goddess who blesses books and musical instruments? I was smitten. But I couldn't find a statue that was small enough to carry home or one with a price I was willing to pay. Contemplating what I learned about her, I decided to pass over physical renderings of her image - Saraswati is known for her preference of knowledge over worldly material things. And knowledge of her and what she represents is already a treasure.
Spending a small measure of time in India - just two states in southern India, Kerala and Tamil Nadu - increased my meager knowledge of the country. We traveled by plane, bus, jeep, and house-boat, and I paid attention to the skies, the trees, the people and their words, their names, the air, which was warm and heavy in the cities and then brisk and biting when we reached the mountains. While riding the bus from Munnar to Madurai (crossing the state border between Kerala and Tamil Nadu), I listened to Ravel's "Introduction et Allegro" which perfectly reflected the pastoral scenes that unfolded through the bus window. The orderly tea bushes of Munnar - they formed an impossibly green carpet that stretched for miles - the mist-filled valleys, the craggy rocks and steep cliff faces, gray and brooding. I loved even more the regal silver oaks that stood amidst the tea plantations. And then the huge African tulip trees with their startling red blooms.
Everywhere I went, I felt compelled to talk to people. Perhaps because a good number of them wanted to talk to me too. They also wanted to have their picture taken or wanted to take my picture(!). So I spent a lot of time talking to museum guards and weavers and shopkeepers, and a young couple - all of 21 years - sharing a snack by a river. I took many photographs. And some of my subjects took pictures of me. Somewhere in India, on some young man's phone, there is a photograph of me smiling in a temple, with one eyebrow cocked above bewildered eyes. I have pictures of elephants and goats and one bright green parrot. I was standing on a bridge trying to photograph the ramshackle houses below when I heard a shout. Far below, two men were washing themselves, and one of them began waving his arms, trying to get my attention. He grinned and pointed to a cage beside him. I leaned over for a better look. He then took out a rather large green bird and held it high, as proud as a father of a newborn babe. I obliged and focused my camera on the parrot.
And did I say how much I enjoyed playing with the kids (both baby goats and children)? I've always loved baby lambs and goats; they have the most innocent expressions and seem so gentle (most of the time!).
Speaking of animals, I felt like one during my Ayurvedic massages. I had two, and both involved what seemed like bucket-loads of herbal oil. I chose to have a Shirodhara massage, during which herbal oil was drizzled on my forehead (the "third" eye) and into my hair. The therapist said she used half a liter of oil for my head because of my long hair. That was very relaxing. The body massage, on the other hand, made me feel like a terrified pig being prepared for a sacrificial ritual. I was oiled from top to toe and as the small Indian woman squeezed my limbs and tapped the soles of my feet with her strong fingers, I slid about on the wooden table in a daze. I nearly laughed out loud.
I laughed a lot during my brief journey in India. Laughed, gambled, ate with my hands, read, did yoga, drank copious amounts of tea - masala and my favorite, Kashmiri tea, made with saffron, cinnamon, and cardamom. I had my lazy days drifting down the river in a house-boat and then some whirlwind periods moving from place to place via bus. And when I came home, I thought about going off again. One of the books I read on the trip was Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat, Pray, Love, and like the writer, who spent a year living in India, Italy, and Indonesia, I felt a strong desire to be away from everything that is familiar and easy. But not in this coming year. Not yet. Soon though.
Introduction et Allegro (Ravel), by The Kodaly Quartet
My new phone (not so new; it's actually a few months' old now) isn't a smartphone. However, it's smart enough to let me make calls, send messages, take photos, and customize my ringtones, and that's all I really need. It's also a clamshell model, something I've wanted since I got tired of slider phones.
Yeah, I wanted a clamshell phone even though everyone else seems to be toting one of the many smartphones on the market. I wasn't tempted by the iPhone and I doubt I'll be swayed by this HTC phone either, but the ad really got to me. Especially the remix of Nina Simone's "Sinnerman." I'll have a new ringtone, at the very least.
Sinnerman (Felix Da Housecat remix), by Nina Simone
"As soon as she landed in India, it seemed to her good, and when she saw the water flowing through the mosque tank, or the Ganges, or the moon caught in the shawl of night with all the other stars, it seemed a beautiful goal and an easy one."
- from A Passage to India, ch. 23, by E.M. Forster
River life in Tamil Nadu
Exploring one of the long halls in the Meenakshi Sundareswarar Temple
Lying among tea leaves in Munnar
Remnants of an old palace in Kerala
Another world through the wall