It always made me smile when someone asked me. My name was always good in India.

Yep. Exactly. (Singapore)

It’s been a long time since I’ve written a blog post. Actually, I wrote an entry weeks before I came home but I was derailed from posting due to a nasty eye infection that made using the computer impossible for weeks. UGH. Wouldn’t recommend that as your last hurrah in India. (I’m convinced I got the infection because I was a little too smug about being so healthy on the trip. A lesson in humility, perhaps?)

Then I got caught up in coming home…

Home. I’m home. I guess. No place feels like home at the moment. Everything feels foreign. I feel completely changed but the changes aren’t yet fully integrated. I feel more lost now, more lonely than I ever felt traveling. I am overwhelmed by all my stuff that this life contains– physical (why do I have five different shampoos?), mental, emotional. Stuff I was relieved to leave behind when I set off for the unknown.

***

“I am going away to an unknown country where I shall have no past and no name, and where I shall be born again with a new face and an untried heart.”  ~Sidone Gabrielle Colette

***

The beauty of those last seven months is that my days were completely mine. Mine. I cherished them without apology, without answering to anyone. I savored moment-by-moment experiences. The future and past lost potency, and there I was, for the first time in my life, fully present to the Now (most of the time). Now that I’m back in my western life, it feels like both ends of the time-space continuum are crashing in on me. I’m at risk of falling back into the unsatisfying trappings of my Old Life, and that vulnerability makes me feel shaky and paranoid. I’m afraid that if I’m not careful I’ll slip back into those old stories that steal my peace. And my peace, discovered on trains and bicycles in India and Vietnam, was hard-won.

Except…. when I start down that tired old path of fear and clinging, a small but playful voice reminds me I’m not the same person as when I left, I’ve changed in ways that continue to be revealed and cannot be lost. And I’m left with a soft gratitude. I can actually feel the integration happening, slowly, piece by piece. One day at a time. Patience is still hard for me.

***

“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language.  ~Ranier M. Rilke

***

And… then I panic again. So it goes. This “coming [redefining] home” is sort of a train wreck, and it’s all part of the journey. It’s all perfect.

Lately, I’m feeling the truth of Buddhist teachings I received along the way: There is no home, all is emptiness. Home is just a state of mind, like everything else. I can find “home” within me, or anywhere I want. The whole world is my home!

Cutest cow known to man. No wonder Indians think they're holy.

Backup. A little recap of my last month, there were some real gems in there. Actually, my last month was the best time of my trip, which is especially meaningful because I almost came home early at one point. My last blog entry from a month ago evidenced some serious burnout. Travel is often hard, don’t let my waxing poetic fool you.

After my epic tantrum at the train station in Ooty, I made my way to Fort Kochi, which was exactly what I needed to recover from the Burnout. Namely, no rabid honking and smog. I felt my whole being relax. I cherished my time alone in the peaceful fishing town. I spent the week at “Green Woods Bethlehem,” a home stay nestled in a tiny jungle of palms and banana-trees. My room actually had decorations instead of mold — amazing what some little pictures and trinkets can do to make you feel at home. A giant doe-eyed Jesus, pinned to a cross above my bed, gazed mournfully upward. The owner, Sheeba and her husband Ashley, cooked their guests delicious Keralan breakfasts in a little open-air, upstairs dining room in the canopy of palms. Every day I’d take my rusty bicycle steed all over town exploring churches, galleries, and cafes (once the seat flew off while I was riding at full speed. Amazing I dodged any serious damage from the metal pole. Shudder). I cruised lazily along the beach where the fishermen were working the Chinese fishing nets, and continued on to inhale the spice markets and explore the cobblestone streets of Jew Town (yes, seriously, that’s its name). One day I joined a group of four sassy, 60-something German ladies on a ferry and long bus ride to an undiscovered white-sand beach. I took a cooking class, read two books, and had the best fish of my life: tuna caught that day and simmered in a rich coconut-cashew curry.

Kathakali (traditional Keralan dance, done only by men) dancers putting on their makeup, an elaborate process that takes at least an hour.

Kathakali.

On the day I had to move on, Sheeba grabbed my face in her hands and sat me on her flowered couch and told me she would miss me. She fervently insisted I find the light of God in everyone. She reached over and grabbed Bill Clinton’s biography “My Life” and read me the dedication, in which Bill thanks his grandfather for teaching him to find the good in people. She told me I have to look harder in some people, but we all have the light within us. Then she smooshed me to her breast in a fierce hug and told me she loves me as I fought stinging tears and felt my heart splooshing around in my chest.

Classical South Indian music performance, which I heard on Diwali, India's equivalent to Christmas (sort of).

I regretted having to leave Fort Kochi, but was excited to see Adrienne, my friend from San Francisco. She’d been traveling for a month in Thailand, and we were both ready to share the trip with someone we already knew. I wasn’t really lonely on the trip, but I did sometimes get tired of the rather generic conversations with fellow travelers… you don’t really go too deep. Adrienne and I made up for lost time, talking nonstop for days and probably annoying everyone around us. We spent a couple of days in Alleppey, a town famous for being on the Kerala backwaters, a vast network of canals amidst jungles, villages and rice paddies. We stayed a little outside of town in a gorgeous guesthouse right on the backwaters and laid in hammocks watching heat lightening and fireflies in the palm trees. The next day we took a long cruise around the backwaters in a covered canoe rowed by a guy named Arju. It was amazing, the canals were full of village life: preparations for a huge wedding, fishermen crying out to announce their catch for sale, women washing laundry and babies, and, of course, cows. We stopped for someone to hack us open coconuts with machetes so we could slurp the sweet water, and again later for perfect masala chai served in a small glass brought right to our canoe.

Suz & Adrienne

There wasn’t much to do in Alleppey after touring the backwaters, so we took a three-hour bus ride to Varkala, further south. It was a sweet beach town built on a cliff, forty feet above pounding surf. We made friends, including a waiter named Syam (pronounced “Sham”) at our favorite restaurant. He gave us Indian names: I’m Anu (pronounced “ann-OO”) and Adrienne is Resme. He asked for an American name and we tried out a bunch and settled on Barak, which made him giggle (All the Indians I meet LOVE our President. Often when I say I’m American they respond “BARAK OBAMA!” with a fist pump in the air. It’s nice; I didn’t get quite the same reception abroad with Bush in office).

Varkala sunset.

Working hard on a boat in the backwaters.

Traffic jam in the narrowest canals of the backwaters.

Favorite dining experience in Varkala: Pick your own freshly caught fish for grilling in banana leaves or added to a rich curry. Bliss!

I’ve said it before: Indians take religion seriously. It’s not relegated to Sundays, it’s every day. Whether it’s Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, or Christianity, doesn’t seem to matter much. There are plenty of examples of religiously intolerant Indians (let’s not talk about Pakistan), but every expression of religion I saw in India was beautifully open and curious about spirituality.  After years of eschewing all religion, it’s nice to find myself curious again too.

I experienced a very interesting immersion into religious life at an Ashram in south India. I stayed there for two weeks studying yoga, meditation and kirtan (Sanskrit chanting, part of bhakti yoga, the yoga of devotion). It was wonderful, gnarly pinkeye(s) not withstanding. We rose before the sun to meditate and chant, did 4 hours of yoga per day, had amazing, healthy vegetarian food, and studied various yogic scriptures and philosophies. At first I was a bit weirded out chanting to all these Hindu deities I’m not devoted to, and in a language I don’t understand, but after a few days I found the chanting so mesmerizing and peaceful I realized it didn’t matter. Suddenly, I had this epiphany that all religion is the same, deep down. Devotional practice, when kept in its rightful place as separate from politics, is beautiful in any language and practice, far as I can tell (I’m sure there are exceptions, but don’t burst my bubble). At least the parts that matter. And that common thread is all I care about. It’s like I got clarity around why I have said for years “I’m spiritual but not religious.” (It always seemed like such a cop-out… like, I care about universal consciousness, peace, love, and my soul… but I don’t wanna commit or have to do any devotional practice). Now I get what my system wanted but had no words for.

Don’t worry, I didn’t join a cult. I’m just more open in ways I’ve wanted to be open. It’s left me feeling more grounded and compassionate… and that was the whole point of this trip.

Right about the time I was experiencing this groovy spiritual opening, I broke the ashram rules to walk around the giant dam that was just outside the ashram (we weren’t supposed to leave the grounds). The eye problem was so bad I couldn’t practice yoga that day and I was going stir-crazy. The morning was gorgeous; it had rained biblically (no pun intended) the night before, and everything was steamy and glowy in the tropical heat. The dam was surprisingly beautiful, the reservoir was a giant lake with crocodiles and fringed by tropical plants. I strolled along feeling joyful, notwithstanding my oozing eye, and promptly got lost. I didn’t care, I’d find my way back eventually. A little girl in a grubby school uniform ran to join me and could barely contain her excitement at asking me questions, including the unanswerable “what’s your favorite thing about India?” She skipped off to school and I kept following the twisty road as it wound through a small village of shacks, chickens, wary dogs and garbage. The village was quiet, almost eerily quiet. Then, as I rounded a corner I startled before a little boy standing in the doorway of a dilapidated shack. The boy’s little brown body was naked except for a thin string around is waist, a thick head of black hair, and a small black dot painted between his eyes. I struggle to describe how strange and wonderful this meeting was. He gazed at me reverently through rich glowing eyes, a soft and loving smile on his face. He didn’t seem surprised to see me, which was strange because every other child I’d encountered in India registered an expression of horror, excitement, or both at seeing a blonde ghostly white girl.  Something about him stopped me in my tracks. His smile was not a child’s. It was as if this boy had been expecting me, and he’d been waiting a long time. Lifetimes. When I waved at him, he raised one hand softly, his smile remained soft and luminous. I felt it on my back when I passed by.  I still wonder, did I stumble upon an incarnation of Vishnu or Krishna or Anjuna? Or a Buddha? Or Christ in another body? Naaaah, it couldn’t be.

Could it?

Kanyakumari, the southern-most tip of India where three oceans meet. The statue is of Swami Vivekananda, who was influential in introducing the Hindu philosophies of Yoga and Vedanta to the West.

On the ferry to Vivekananda Memorial Rock. This picture really captures the casual affection of Indians.

I imagine this will be the last entry… no one probably wants to read about the adventures of a girl re-discovering her stuff in a mildewy storage unit and looking for a job. Thank you for staying connected with me by reading this blog. I couldn’t have done this without all the love from back home!

Tabor, happy to see her mama and mama's laundry.

This vague sense of impatience that has been plaguing me lately was compounded by a series of uninspiring stops on my route south and some real classic annoyances of traveling in India. That was a rough ten days.  Definitely my hardest time during this six months, and I suspect the worst of my travels.  Kind of felt like a Rite of Passage I had to go through, everything had been going so well for so long…

Nothing overly bad happened during those ten days, it was just a combination of small, heavily irritating things.  From Hampi, I took an overnight train to Bangalore.  No problems, it was an easy journey.  I paid far too much for a hotel in Bangalore, such as it is in big cities.  Supposedly Bangalore is the “Silicon Valley of Asia,” a hub of technological genius and the receptical of much of our outsourcing.  Sure didn’t look like Palo Alto.  Dirty, smoggy, loud, exhausting.  And from what I saw, boring.  One day was plenty.

This picture was a funny surprise in the waiting lounge of the Hospet train station.

Only cool thing I found in Bangalore (granted, I didn't look hard, I hid in my hotel and watched TV in a "burnout allowance day") was this gorgeous orange library. I've told you before: Indians rock color.

Then, a long, painfully long, bus ride to Mysore.  I was looking forward to it, Mysore just sounds exotic.  The palaces of the maharajas, spices, silks, oils, bazaars.  The Lonely Planet called Mysore “one of the most flamboyant cities in India.”  That’s saying quite a lot, so I expected to spend a full week there.  When I arrived, it was… meh.  Looked like just another crazy Indian city to me.  Maybe it was the burnout talking, but within two hours it became clear I wouldn’t be there long.  Suddenly, I was having a really hard time tuning out the constant honking, smog, “hello madame, where you from?”s, and pushy shopkeepers and rickshaw drivers.  I was jumpy, anxious, irritated. I started actually wanting to hang out in my bug-and-mildew infested hotel rooms.  This was not good.

Despite my funk, I had a few fantastic Mysore experiences.  My first night, I met a 19-year old kid that became my jolly tour guide.  I didn’t ask for his help, but he just kept appearing and showing me amazing things and I’d give him a couple bucks.  I figure, heck, I had no plans and he was really a nice guy, not pushy and very polite, and he seemed trustworthy.  The first night he took me to a shop to see incense being made and really high-quality ayurveda oils, not the watered down crap you can get at most of the shops and markets.  I’d heard of this and was very excited to buy oils from India, the good stuff.

At the shop, three women sitting on the floor rolling globs of grey ashy looking substance that had the most odd texture I’ve ever felt onto thin bamboo sticks, to become the incense I burn at home every day.   I had no idea it was such a labor-intensive process.  I’ll have a bit more respect when I burn a stick.  (And I’m so bummed I didn’t bring my camera to this funky shop.)

Upstairs a man sitting in front of a table of beautiful glass bottles beckoned me to sit.  He was so charming and handsome I forgot why I was there, and I got sucked into trying about 20 different oils on different parts of my arms and hands.  Lotus, jasmine, frankincense, sandal, rose, saffron, musk… all with differing medicinal properties.  I kept forgetting which ones I liked, and re-applying them over and over.  Soon my arms were bathed in treatments for everything from sinus headaches to insomnia to aphrodisiacs.  I was becoming drunk off the heavenly smell (or maybe the clouds of smoke from the charras in the other room).  I could tell it was extremely high quality oil, so I blew my budget on six small bottles.  The man gave me an enormous bundle of incense as a gift.  The whole way home I kept huffing my arms, vowing never to bathe again.  The incense is struggling to stay lovely amidst my laundry.

The next day, my 19-year-old friend, whose name I never did understand, took me to his house where he volunteered his mother to give me a cooking lesson.  I felt a little bad but he insisted she didn’t mind, she liked tourists (and I suspect the extra income helps a lot).  She spoke no English, so he translated.  She was very sweet, asked me what I wanted to make, and I said “masala?”  She grimaced and we made some puttu, a boring cream-of-wheat like breakfast dish with coriander (which is what they call cilantro over here) and spices.  It wasn’t much of a cooking lesson, but seeing the inside of a real Indian family’s house was fascinating.  At one point she looked very sad, and her son told me she was saying that she was ashamed because they are so poor.  This made me feel very sad too.  Her neighbor, a woman about my age, and her little daughter came over and watched me watching the woman cook.  The neighbor squatted down next to me and un-self-consciously put her arm around my shoulders while she talked to the other woman, and the little girl peeked at me from the other side of her mom.  What sweetness, that moment.  I am constantly touched by the casual displays of physical affection in India, like two men walking down the street, one with his arm draped over the other’s shoulder as they are talking.  Or standing there holding hands while engaged in conversation.  It’s a sign of friendship, nothing more.  (Not unique to India, this seems to be an Asian thing).  It’s charms the heck out of me, almost as much as the head bobble.

My friend and his mum. And the mush.

The neighbor and her daughter. Wish I was better at remembering names...

I love this picture, it captures a certain sadness. Which was shortly after transcended by a sassy little dance, this woman had us all laughing.

Then…. the Mysore Palace.  Wow, it was amazing!  It was absolutely stunning, and it’s a real shame photography was not allowed inside.  There were about a million Indian tourists in there with me, but fortunately it was huge and well-laid out, tourists moved along a set numbered path from room to magnificent room.  Wow, WOW!  Marble pillars; stained glass atria with designs of peacocks and gods and goddesses; massive granite-carved leopards; marble floors inlaid with huge gold paintings of the royal family parading on elephants; the royal emblem carved into ornate gates and doorways of Burmese hard wood.  Amazing that the royal family used it until 1947.  I stood listening to my headset, complementary to foreigners, through which a jaunty British accent described the context and contents of each station.  While I waited and listened, a long line of Indians passed by, staring at me as if I were part of the display.  In fact, where were the other foreigners?  I hadn’t seen another white face since Hampi.  Strange, as I didn’t expect that I was off the tourist track.

Entrance to the palace. The ticket window was an absolute mob, I had to elbow little old ladies. Not pretty. But the rest of it was pretty, very pretty.

Outside of palace. This does not even begin to do the insides jusice.

Mysore proved to be an expensive stop:  I next bought some silk for my sister and I from the Government Silk Factory, where the worms and weavers were hard at work.  This was the highest quality stuff, and priced accordingly.  I didn’t let it stop me that I can’t sew and have no idea what to do with this big gorgeous hunk of Indian silk.

Onward, to Ooty.  I had decided I didn’t need 7 days in Mysore, and on a whim decided to head up to the mountains.  Ooty (also known as Udhagamandalam; every place in India seems to have two names) is, I discovered, where many of Tamil Nadu’s residents go to vacation.  It is waaaay up in the Nilgiri mountains of the Western Ghats, 36 nauseating hairpin turns on a minibus.  We passed through a national park and I saw wild elephants and langurs!  No tigers or leopards, alas.

The temperature was blessedly cold, was nice to wear jeans and I regretted sending all my trekking gear home with my sister.  It was cute seeing all the Indians in their scarfs and wool hats.  Ooty is famous for…. wait for it…. chocolate.  Oh yes.  Literally every fourth storefront sells hand-made chocolates.

Otherwise, Ooty pretty much just annoyed me like the last two towns.  It was loud and chaotic, and I had problems with both my guesthouses.  And to be honest, my burnout was at it’s all-time high.  Never in five months have I wanted to come home, and suddenly, I felt…done.  Every honk from a car or rickshaw would send my heart pounding, it occurred to me my nervous system was completely fried.  I quickly decided I would be there only two days, just enough time to inhale as much chocolate as I could.  I needed to keep moving until I found a peaceful place, and the state of Kerala had a lot of promise.

Since my traumatic, failed attempt at trying to buy a train ticket my first day in India in the massively intimidating New Delhi train station (see my first Indian blog entry), where I was scammed before I even found the ticket counter, I have opted to purchase train tickets through travel agents.  Yeah, they get a commission, but it’s a couple of dollars and I get a lot less hassle and someone to interpret the somewhat confusing procedures for wait-listing and classes.  But for some reason in Ooty, no travel agents would book train tickets.  I asked about six shops before it became apparent I’d have to go to the station to take care of business.  Eh, well, time to suck it up… I could handle it.  I’m smarter, tougher, and my bullshit-avoidance tactics have been perfected by dealing with rickshaw drivers every day for months.  Plus, seems like this is an experience I should have.

First thing in the morning, I hopped in line at the train station.  After waiting for an hour, the window slammed shut.  Eight hours later, I came back; this time I was #2 in line because the window wouldn’t open for another hour and a half.  #1 in line, an incredibly probing Indian, woman asked me about 100 questions, including whether I could find her work in the U.S., and insisted I be her pen pal as soon as I get home.  When the window finally opened, I was told I’d need to come back at 8:00 the next morning but go to the other window.  Defeated, I set off to buy more chocolate.

I arrived at the station at 7:30 sharp the next morning, thinking I was clever to get there early.  There was already a line of about 30 people in front of me.  I was the only non-Indian, and the only woman.  Everyone was holding half-sheets of paper.  I figured out they were ticket requests and grabbed a form.  I had no idea what train name or number went from Coimbatore to Ernakulum, so I just put those town names in the “Train Name and Number” and hoped for the best.  I could easily imagine getting to the window and being turned away for not having filled out the form correctly, so I practiced my doe-eyed-pathetically-helpless-tourist face.  It’s come in handy many times.

Before the window even opened the line got uncomfortably dense and rippled with agitation.  The guy behind me was particularly excited, I had to keep asking him to please stand back.  Suddenly, the window opened and I was pressed forward, a river of bodies compressing to half its size.  No problem so far, I had long accepted that in a country where three grown men will ride pressed together on a small motorcycle “personal space” has no meaning.  As I looked ahead I noted that, while the line formed a lovely snake-like queue at the back end, towards the window it devolved into a mob of flailing arms waving sheets of paper.  It became clear I was going to have to play rough, just like the boys.

Suddenly the man in front of me was finished and I catapulted myself to the window, throwing myself  front and center before the mob from the sides could fill in the vacuum.  It was beautiful; I’d been preparing for it for 40 minutes.  Like a deranged linebacker, I planted both arms on the counter by the window to block my spot, and commenced being squashed like an insect from all sides.  Arms flailing around me shoved the sheets of paper through the small window at the ticket guy, and he accepted them and barked out “Wait list.  AC/3 available Nov. 2.  Wait list.  Wait list.  2975 not available.”  I shoved my sheet at him, and said with practiced dumbness, “I’m not sure if I filled this out correctly?”  He ignored me for a bit then suddenly took my sheet and set it in front of him… and ignored it to accept 10 more flailing sheets from arms shoved into the window from all sides of me.  I waited for what seemed like eternity, my patience dissolving.  I tried to keep breathing but was becoming steadily more panicked by the crush of bodies.  For all I knew someone was pawing through my backpack, though I’d taken out all valuables.  (I kept the backpack on as a body shield.  It was not working.)

“Morning train not available.  1300 Erkenalum Express.  AC/2 not available.  AC/3.”  I suddenly realized he was talking to me.  “Yes, OKAY!  AC/3 FINE!!  YES PLEASE!”  I nervously shouted.  I wanted out of there more than anything in my life.  I threw a 500 Rs bill at him.  The ticket was 360 Rs.  I waited for my change.  “Change please?”  I yelled, getting desperate as my legs were starting to buckle from being squashed against the counter.  The smell of bodies and breath was nauseating, and it seemed 100 people were yelling in my ear at once.  He didn’t look at me: “One moment please, no change now.”  I stood my ground, even as a man next to me told me to move over and wait for my change.  I knew if I got out of that line I’d never see the change, or at best wait 2 hours for it.

Suddenly I felt someone pulling at my backpack and a wave of panic coursed over me.  I spun my head around, incurring a searing pain in my injured neck but not wanting to lose my grip on the counter and get pulled out of the line.  I couldn’t believe it, some German lady probably 60 years old and with a huge backpack was writing on me, using my backpack to fill out her form.  “Don’t move I’m writing!” she said with a huge cheery smile.  The smile of someone who was oblivious to the fact I was about to explode.  “Get off my back, lady,” I snarled, the only time I’ve ever been rude to a fellow traveler.  Her eyes grew wide and she shrunk back, and I returned to face the ticket man in what was the world’s stupidest showdown.  (For the record, 140 Rs is about USD $3.25).

Three more times I asked for my change, watching the train conductor accept money and put it into a drawer in front of him.  He was literally 3 feet from my face, and his drawer was filled with rupee notes.  Each time I asked, he said “Wait, madam.”  Two men around me also replied, “Just wait, change is coming, please move out of the way.”  I was starting to hyperventilate as the crowd was growing more out of control.  I begged the ticket man, “Just give me 100 Rs and I’ll leave, I see you have it right there.”  I thought that was more than fair, but he ignored me.  I asked again in a louder, bordering-on-crazy voice.  “Just wait, madam, no change now.”  This went on for about ten going on eternity more minutes.

Suddenly, I lost it.  All the little (and not so little) frustrations of traveling in India that had built up for months was a tinder box and this was the flame.  I puffed up to about 3 times my normal size and bellowed, in a voice that was more Satan than Suzy:

“I CANNOT WAIT HERE ANY LONGER.  I’M GETTING CRUSHED.  GIVE ME 100 RUPEES SO I CAN LEAVE.  GIVE IT TO ME NOW!!”

The last word came out in a primal scream that I didn’t know I had in me.  I could feel my eyes about to pop out of my head.  Oh look– the ticket man suddenly had change: He quickly threw me one of his many 100 Rs notes.  I spun around while swinging my arms to punch two men on either side of me, and yelled at the mob: “GET OUT OF MY WAY YOU FUCKERS!”  And just like that, the sea parted and I marched triumphantly through unheeded.

And that, friends, is how you buy a train ticket in India.

Now.  You may think I’d be ashamed of such a display, that I’d feel that didn’t exactly show off my best self.  Honestly, it was… awesome.  I think it’s the most proud I’ve been.  There’s a difference between dysfunction and abuse, and while some may not see it this way, I was being abused.  It felt good to discover that I won’t put up with abuse, even in a foreign country, and I can and will stand up for myself when enough is enough.  As soon as I left the train station I broke down laughing.  It was just so insane! I had so much adrenaline coursing through my body at finally being real, finally stopping pretending that the bullshit doesn’t get to me, that I laughed all the way back to my hotel.  Since that day there’s been a shift; I feel lighter and more confident, and doubt I’ll have to bust out my Inner Bitch again any time soon.  The rickshaw drivers don’t give me as much shit now.

The next day I hopped on the local bus, preparing for the worse.  This is the “chicken bus,” as opposed to the fancier (though still pieces of crap) tourist buses that most foreigners take.  I knew I’d be the only white person on the bus.  The first challenge was finding the right bus; there are no signs, many times the drivers only speak a few words of English, and it’s a crapshoot if there will be space for my stupidly large bag.  I wandered around in the rain, having trouble even finding any bus drivers to ask, until I eventually found the right bus.  The driver, bless him, gestured for me to sit right in the front, where there was just one seat by itself and my bag could squish beside me.  (This is common:  the bus drivers take care of their single female travelers, it’s really wonderful). LITERALLY right in the front:  I was right even with the driver, pressed right into the front window.  I popped in my headphones and marveled that I paid $0.75 for a three hour ride with the best view in the house and prime opportunity to keep an eye on my luggage.  We barreled down the hairpin turns, leaving the cool forested mountains for Coimbatore, a chaotic and most non-touristy town where I would stay one night just to break up the trip to Fort Cochi.

Despite the struggle to get the ticket, the train ride from Coimbatore to Ernakulem was pleasant and even relaxing.  Riding the trains in India has by far been one of my favorite experiences.  It’s comfortable, I’ve had minimal annoyances, and I’ve generally felt safe.  Plus, a guy walks through selling hot-off-the-deep-frier samosas that are scrumptuous.

From the train station, I took a ferry to Fort Cochi, and felt my entire being relax.  It is exactly as I’d hoped.  I found an adorable guesthouse with a cute CLEAN room.  Since my nights in Ooty and Coimbatore had been spent arguing with incompetent (or just stubborn) hotel staff over my toilet not flushing– this is two different hotels, mind you– I decided to up my budget.  I will not last one more month in filthy rooms with non-functioning basics.  So, now I’m paying $16 a night, and it’s amazing the difference!  Of course, I’ve lost all merit with the “Smug Travelers.”  The STs wear a lot of Indian jewelry and those baggy backpacker pants that look like diapers, and love to ask, “soooo, how much you payin’ at that place?”  And if I was to admit 700 Rs, they’ll grimace like they swallowed something painful and tell you, smugly, that they are paying 200 Rs.  Good for them.  I hope they enjoy the wretched crick in their neck from the 1 inch mattress on a hard plank of wood and their bedbug and flea bites like I’ve cherished each of mine.  I paid my dues.

Fort Cochi is SO CUTE!! It’s exactly what I needed.  It is a relaxed fishing village with beautiful tree-lined streets and gorgeous architecture, many tasteful home stays, cafes and restaurants, and beautiful shops selling antiques, jewelry, gorgeous clothing, and ayurveda oils.  And bookstores to feed my new addiction.  Best of all:  It’s beautifully quiet.  Touristy, but not obnoxiously so. Very few cars, no honking, only a smattering of rickshaws.

After my first two nights I checked into a more remote home stay that is set in a gorgeous palm and banana tree forest.  When I visited the day before check in to see if they rent bikes, Sheeba the owner grabbed my (sweaty) arm lovingly and said she and her husband were so glad I was coming tomorrow, why don’t I come early to join them for breakfast, and would I like some tea now?   The Lonely Planet says Sheeba looks ready to sign your adoption papers when you arrive; this is true.  It’s been a few nights at “Green Woods Bethlehem” guesthouse, and Sheeba and Ashley are my new Indian parents.

More on Fort Cochi later, it’s been wonderful here.  Maybe all the crap from the last three towns was designed to make me appreciate this place.  I’m so much more relaxed.

Last night I discovered firni:  a dessert made with milk and rice flour, flavored with saffron, pistachio, and cardamom, and decorated with thin shavings of real silver (can you eat that?  I’ve seen gold on desserts, but silver?)

Things are most definitely back to good.

Vijayanagara, commonly known as Hampi, in central Karnataka, is famous for being the capital of South India’s largest, wealthiest, and most powerful kingdoms. The city was established in the 14th century, and lasted until 1565 when it was sacked and deserted. Now, what’s left of the ancient city is haunting ruins set in the most lovely of landscapes.  It’s along the Tungabhadra River and spread between massive grey, ochre and pink granite boulders, formed not by earthquakes but by three thousand million years of erosion.  Banana trees and palms sway in the warm winds along the river and between the rocks.

Hampi’s also famous for receiving several mentions in the Ramayana, the Hindu epic that continues to be revered in India. (For a creative take on the Ramayana, the animated film “Sita Sings the Blues” is super fun.)  For this reason, Hampi receives many pilgrims from all over India.

The view from my seat at The Mango Tree restaurant, where I pissed away many hours. You can see why.

Doll in a swing hanging from the mango tree.

So in short, Hampi is dang amazing. It’s historically fascinating and hauntingly gorgeous. Yet, did I immediately love Hampi? Nay. I’ll tell you why: Severe Traveler Burnout (“STB”). STB makes it hard to enjoy anything.

STB sucks. It’s symptoms are extreme impatience, an infection of whining about how “getting anything done in India is so @!!@$#% hard!,” and frequent fantasies of first-world comforts. In short, STB looks a lot like a real bad case of PMS. I’ve suffered STB only twice in five months, so I’d say I’m doing really well.  I guess unsurprisingly, both times were right after my visitors left– first Whit, then Christina. It’s like I have to re-adjust to the unique challenges of traveling alone after the relative ease of having a buddy to share the journey with. It’s been normal on this trip to have lots of ups and downs, but the downs are so mild compared to the ups I can laugh them off knowing an up is just around the corner. With STB, I want a gun and I want to shoot people with it, and both times that feeling has lasted for a couple days. Unpleasant.

Back up: Before my Hampi STB hit, I had a most wonderful time on the train from Goa. I took a day train and shared a berth with a couple from Chicago, a couple from Israel, and a woman from Holland. Great conversation, and it was such a relief to have other foreigners to buffer the beggars and starers, of which there were blessedly only a few. I was next to an open window and for 8 hours watched the landscape pass me by as I left the tiny state of Goa for Karnataka in central south India. At one point we went through jungle so beautiful it made my heart hurt. We arched around the mountain and right over the top of a raging waterfall and I stuck my head out the window (you can do that in India!) to see the end of the train snaking around behind us. At that moment, I was in the best place on earth.

Indian train rides are never dull, that’s for sure.  Example: Across from our berth in 2 seats facing each other sat a young man and a middle-aged woman. I could tell they were of higher caste (caste is still a very, very big deal in India, though India’s 50-year old constitution explicitly prohibits discrimination based on caste). Suddenly a young woman walked down the aisle and stood right next to the older woman. The young woman started singing loudly in a startlingly deep, raspy voice and waving her hands in front of the older woman’s face. At first I thought the younger woman knew the pair, then I started to think she was mentally ill. My Chicago buddy leaned over and told me the younger woman was not a woman, but a man in a dress, an “untouchable,” and on closer look I saw it was no doubt a man. A hijra, I’d read about them: a low caste of transvestites and eunuchs. My friend told me he/she was tormenting the higher-caste woman by pretending to touch her. I looked over and the older woman was squirming and trying to ignore the attention, clearly embarrassed. Across the aisle we tried desperately not to laugh, but it was such a strange spectacle. Every now and then the hijra would come down the aisle and just stand right next to the older woman, torturing her. Ah, India.

Alllll sorts of sexy ladies on those temple walls.

A random cactus garden planted in front of a small ruin.

That wasn’t what sent me into STB. It was after we got off the train. Now I’m no stranger to annoying rickshaw drivers, but this was absolutely insane. We decided we’d take a local bus the 20 minutes to Hampi. We were immediately surrounded by rickshaw drivers. Now, you’d think a firm “No Thanks” would send them away. No. Neither does a polite “We are taking the bus, we do not need a rickshaw.” Neither does ignoring them. We couldn’t see the bus station and after much confusion, made worse by the 10 men surrounding us and yelling they would rickshaw us to the bus, we set off in the hot sun in what we hoped was the right direction. Turns out it was a good 20 minute walk to the station, during which I was internally cursing my friends for wanting to save a whole $1.50 by taking the bus. It would have been a nice enough walk, but the rickshaws drove little circles around us like little lawn mower vultures. I made the mistake of trying to reason with one guy, explaining first politely, then firmly, we wanted to walk to the bus, please leave us alone. He latched onto me and became My Guy. “Just give me business,” he whined, “I make you good price.” (He did, it turns out, come down in price so low as to be comparable with the bus, so I can understand his disbelief I’d rather slog my luggage in the hot sun then just hop in his rig. But by then it was a matter of principle.)

Finally, after 10 minutes of goading and whining and his rickshaw hitting my roller bag, I lost my shit: “SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP! GO. AWAY. WE DO NOT WANT A RICKSHAW! LEAVE US ALONE NOW!” Not my finest moment. But did it work? No, he just continued his appeal, even more desperately, as soon as I’d run out of breath. Unbelievable.

Eventually we made it on the local bus, which was a lurching, jarring ride with no seat and me tripping over my luggage ($1.50… really?). I was hot, tired, sweating like crazy, and my body hurt from the long train ride. Finally we hopped out and flipped open our guidebooks to try and make sense of Hampi Bazaar, the small main town and backpacker center. Guess who was waiting for me when I popped out of the bus? My Guy. He’d raced ahead and there he was, begging me to come see his “very good and cheap room, best in Hampi” guesthouse. “What the F… seriously? You followed us here?” I asked, incredulously. He giggled. “Just one look madame, if you don’t like no problem.” He started to grab my bag. “Ahem, no thanks we have a room already.” I looked up to see my friends following another tout to see a room. Ah, what the heck, I had no room reserved so I jumped in with my friends. My Guy tagged along too… I was starting to feel some admiration for his stamina. “If you don’t like this one, then you come see my room.” I ignored him. The first room was a dank, moldy cave, and I decided maybe I’d be willing to spend a bit more than $4. Exhausted, tired of lugging my bags, and drooling for a shower, I looked into the eager face of My Guy. I suddenly started laughing and held out my hand for a shake and told him “I like you.” He giggled, and we went to look at his guesthouse. What can I say, he wore me down. In the end, he won… it was a good room for a decent price. And in staying at the guesthouse where he got a commission for bringing me in, I have tortured future travelers by encouraging his painfully annoying tactics. (You’re welcome, future travelers!)

RAWR! Vishnu (or Krishna? I forget. So many gods...) in Lion-headed form. HUGE statue.

The rest of Hampi Bazaar wasn’t much better, hustlers-wise. And nothing seems to WORK– trying to have a skype conversation with my neglected boyfriend, frequent power outages, the two ATMs in town ran out of money, my shower had none of the promised hot water (pretty much par for the course at my budget), and none of the phone lines worked for me to make a call to inquire why my credit card has been blocked. Suddenly, everything seemed so… hard. And the constant, grating yells from the doorway of shops, guesthouses, food carts: “HELLO Madame! Banana! HELLO!” Or, one of my favorites, “Hello! You need something. Hello! HELLO!!” Like I can’t hear them, or see their shops, like if they yell hello enough times (and not in a friendly way; in a get-over-here-and-by-my-crap kind of way) I’ll realize, by God, I do NEED SOMETHING!

Suddenly I just kind of snapped, STB full-on. I just hated India, all of it. I didn’t want to go home, I just wanted India to be more like home.

…quickly followed by a bitter layer of self-judgment, what was wrong with me? When did I turn into such a demanding, princess? Why travel to difficult places if I want things to be easy? This wasn’t the Traveling Goddess I’d imagined! So in that cranky, sorry-for-myself state I set off for my rickshaw tour with “Mr. Paul,” a handsome young man who had some pretty hilarious marketing, including a series of business cards and posters with him posing like a model looking into the distance next to his trusty, heavily-stickered rickshaw.

Mr. Paul drove me all over to various temples and ruins, heavily utilizing his horn that was amplified to ambulance levels. I had been in no mood to do anything, much less wander historical sites, but the magnificence of the crumbling, ancient kingdom won me over. It was incredible. There weren’t many tourists and I spent a lot of time just staring at the ruins, trying to imagine the magnificence in their heyday.

The Lotus Temple. I waited for this lovely old woman in the bright blue sari to walk in front, just to show off how India rocks color.

The elephant stables in front of the royal parade grounds. I tried my hardest to picture the crazy festivals that must have taken place here...

I read a report by Nicolo Conti, an Italian traveler, from 1420– the earliest recorded visitor to Vijayangara. I have to post a portion of that report here:

“In [Vijayangara] there are estimated to be ninety thousand men fit to bear arms. Their king is more powerful than all the other kings of India. He takes to himself twelve thousand wives, of whom four thousand follow him on foot wherever he may go, and are employed solely in the service of the kitchen. A like number, more handsomely equipped, ride on horseback. . . . Also, at a certain time of the year, their idol is carried through the city, placed between two chariots, in which are young women richly adorned, who sing hymns to the god, and accompanied by a great concourse of people. Many, carried away by the fervor of their faith, cast themselves on the ground before the wheels, in order that they may be crushed to death. Others, making an incision in their side, and inserting a rope thus through their body, hang themselves to the chariot by ways or ornament, and thus suspended and half dead accompany their idol. This kind of sacrifice they consider the best and most acceptable by all.”

Hard core!

Other early traveler reports note fabulous riches, royal elephants, elaborate festivals. Now, just decaying, crumbling ruins returning to nature. My STB was subsiding; the spell of Hampi was cast upon me. My heart completely melted when I felt something strange on my leg and looked down to see a doe-eyed, carmel-colored cow licking me from ankle to knee. From that point on, I’ve experienced an almost overwhelming urge to lovingly pat the heads of every cow I see.

Vitthala Temple. Apparently some of the pillars play musical tones if you hit them just right, but I didn't test that out because of the guard staring at me.

Another view of the Lotus Temple. This time the blue sari lady wasn't around, but the sunset on the pink marble was spectacular.

On my way out of my yoga class the following day, things really turned around. I ran into three lovely Australian women I’d met previously, and they invited me to go watch the sunset from some giant rocks on a hill. On the rocks, the air was warm and tropical with the palm trees swaying in the breeze, and the giant pink and tan boulders balanced against a sky streaked with clouds. My body was singing from the yoga and meditation, and I suddenly felt a deep sense of okay-ness. We laughed over our worst India moments, and suddenly everything felt light again. That instantaneous bonding with fellow travelers can be so charming. As can seeing a lone little rickshaw winding along a road below, into the sunset. The sky turned crimson and we fell silent. Heat lightening illuminated the clouds. I loved Hampi, and India and I were back on speaking terms. On our way back we passed a gorgeous illuminated ancient ruin of Ganesh, and I promptly stepped in some squishy, dank mystery liquid up to my shin. Yes, I know I’m back in Sane Traveler Mode when I can laugh about that. That night I sat Indian-style (ha) on pillows with a large table of travelers in a funky rooftop restaurant while Indians and westerners jammed on guitars, drums, and wooden flutes.  I had incredible spinach, cheese, mushroom momos (a Tibetan steamed dumpling) and the most exquisite papaya-pinapple juice.All is well again.

"Heeeelp!"

"DIE, dog-lion-like creature!"

The royal Cabbage Patch Kid, in lotus pose.

Onward… overnight train tomorrow, stopover for a night in Bangalore, the “Silicon Valley of Asia,” then onto Mysore for a week for silk and sandalwood.

Sidenote:  Just finished a book called Snakes and Ladders by Gita Mehta. I really recommend it, it’s a collection of very short, easy essays on modern India, it gives a fascinating overview and left me with a ton of respect for this crazy place that is like no other, for all that India has accomplished as an ancient civilization(s)/ young democracy… amazing place, this is.

On October 11, the Piluso sisters sought to recreate a past, flawless meeting in the Bangkok international airport (2007), this time in Mumbai.  But, unlike last time, we hadn’t exactly thought out the details… like, any details.  We had a general time estimate for our arrivals, but no concrete meeting place and it hadn’t occurred to us we’d be coming into two different terminals (Suz from Delhi, Christina from Amsterdam).  We also didn’t account for my flight to be an hour late and for the terminals to be half an hour drive apart (or for me to wait too late to get Christina my flight details (oops)).

Result:  Complete meet-up failure.  And, an exhausting introduction to Mumbai.

I raced over to the international terminal as soon as I could, but I was already an hour late from my flight delay and I had no idea if I’d be able to even get into the pre-paid taxi booth, where I expected to find Christina.  When I arrived, Christina’s arriving flight wasn’t even on the reader-board anymore and there was no way I could get into the terminal without a ticket.  It was 12:40 a.m.  Christina had either gone ahead to the hotel or was sitting by the taxi stand inside the international terminal waiting for me after a long flight from Oregon.  I took my chances, and got a taxi to the hotel.  The driver, of course, spoke virtually no English and had no idea where the hotel was.  Right out of the airport he pulled into a dark alley and left me alone in the cab.  Suddenly there were three dark women clad in ragged saris, two holding babies, with their faces in my open window.  “English coin please? Milk for baby?… Chocolate?”  I shook my head no, I wasn’t about to pull out my wallet.  I frantically looked for the driver.  I knew he was just finding directions and I was fine, but a part of me that doesn’t like dark alleys at 1:00 a.m. in a strange big Indian city (go figure!) panicked.  A woman shoved a baby at me through the window and I literally had to roll up the window, feeling sick.  Jarring, to say the least.

The cab driver returned and we proceeded to drive in circles for 45 minutes, completely lost, my patience waning.  I was crossing all my fingers and toes Christina was safe in our hotel room.  When we finally found the room, I found no Christina.  I tried to swallow my growing anxiety by watching Bollywood music videos– if that can’t calm a girl, what can?  Finally, Christina arrived an hour later, completely cool, despite having gone through the same left-in- dark-alley-with-begging-women-with-babies routine and her driver just as lost as mine.   Not an easy introduction to India.  But we made it.

Mumbai, we loved that crazy city.  So much liveliness.  It beats to its own drum, and we could not figure out what tune was being played.  Exhausting and exhilarating.  So much better than what I saw of Delhi, which was actually quite a bit.  SO much to see… and we saw a lot in two days.  A highlight was the Chor Bazaar (a.k.a. the “Thieves Market”). We decided at the last minute to head there during rush hour and took a harrowing, honk-crazy taxi ride to a non-touristy part of town that was bustling with women in burqas, bicycles, dogs, goats, motorcycles, taxis, pedestrians, touts, the occasional cat or chicken, and, of course, cows meandering down the narrow streets with a sense of holy entitlement. We immediately nearly got crushed by traffic, foot and motorized. We wandered through the dusty streets popping into shops selling antique statues, crap, signage, curios and other fun randomness. Goats wandered the streets munching on whatever wasn’t bolted down, and an egg from an unknown source fell from the heavens, splatting near our feet and spraying egg juice on our legs.  Oddly, in our entire time in Mumbai we saw only a few white people.  Where were the other tourists?  Or expats?  We were clearly an oddity at the bazaar and were met with many (not unfriendly) stares. After buying some fabulous textiles, we realized it was starting to quickly get dark and decided we should get a taxi to take us back to our hotel. We didn’t have a problem getting a taxi to the bazaar or anywhere else, so we didn’t anticipate how challenging it would be to find one willing to take us back to our hotel. It got darker and darker, and the streets grew more and more chaotic with the incessant honking and crush of bodies, traffic, and animals as we tripped around the streets asking taxi after taxi to take us back to our neighborhood. After some negotiating, we found a willing driver and sat back, relieved to be making our way back to our peaceful and incredibly tiny hotel room.  Crisis averted.

But on the whole, I was impressed with Mumbai, particularly compared with Delhi.  The streets were mostly clean (in comparison), considering the massive population and poverty.  There seemed to be a sense of order in the chaos, and beautiful architecture, waterfront, and parks.  The air pollution, though, is suffocating, particularly with the mix of humidity.  My poor sinuses couldn’t handle it after five weeks of cold, clear Himalayan air, and I came down with a nasty infection that gave me my first visit to an Indian medical clinic (which was fine– efficient and cheap, though I wouldn’t want to get major surgery there).

Cow meandering in Mumbai.

Goat lounging at the Chor Bazaar

Beautiful Marine Drive

Yum!

Chapter 2:  Goa

Much as we liked Mumbai, we were more than ready to head for a more relaxed beach pace (and cleaner air), and after two days we took an easy flight to Goa on the west coast, India’s smallest state.  Unfortunately we arrived before the real tourist season, which means many of the restaurants and hotels are not yet open and the monsoon is still dragging on.  Fortunately, this means less dread-locked hippies, cheaper rooms, and a chill vibe– ahhh.  The rain hasn’t been so bad; it didn’t rain at all the first couple days, and just a bit the other days, and it is warm and tropical.  And it hasn’t stopped us from riding all over the backroads and beach towns on our little black scooter, Mirabelle.  (I’m driving, Christina is the peanut gallery on the back spouting hilarity and driving tips).  Most of our days are spent eating or talking about what we’re going to eat next.  And wandering, lounging, exploring.  Mostly we’ve been spending our time catching up and laughing about stupid stuff and creating new stupid inside jokes that send us into hysterics.  I feel so lucky my favorite sister is here, and I’m not allowing myself to think about when she leaves in a few days.

Back to Goa:  It’s a very relaxed, beautiful place that has in many places been overrun/tainted by tourism.  But, there’s some seriously charming places, like sleepy villages that are going about their business without infusing themselves with internet cafes, backpacker restaurants, and crappy clothes booths.  And the Catholic influence from being a former Portuguese colony, very different from the rest of Hindu-dominated India.  It seems like the trance music/hippie scene has gone pretty far underground, or maybe it’s just that the high season is a ways off yet (or maybe it’s because we can’t stay up past 10:00).  Glad we’ve seen Goa; don’t need to spend much more time here.  But a great place for sisterly bonding and relaxing.

Our overwhelming impression of both Mumbai and Goa:  Some of the nicest, most helpful people we’ve ever met.  In fact, every single person I’ve asked for any kind of help has gone well out of their way to help us, from a police officer that walked us 15 minutes to the Foreigner’s Registration Office, to the hotel proprietor that drove me on the back of his scooter to the doctor and waited with me until I was finished to drive me back (and wouldn’t accept any payment).  I’ve been incredibly humbled by the kindness and humor of Southern Indians, it makes me want to stay here for a long, long time.

Power outages do not stop us.

Manguesh(?) Temple in Goa

Inside a church in Goa

The entrance to The Tropical Spice Plantation

It is indeed monsoon season... this is the courtyard of our lovely guesthouse during a monsoon rain. Luckily they don't last long.

A "little" rain has not stopped us from cruising around Goa on our trusty rig.

Speaking of the scooter... we ran out of petrol, conveniently in our guesthouse's driveway. Luckily our nice taxi driver stopped and filled up our liter bottle for us.

Ah the lovely beaches. The water is the perfect temperature.

The cows like to come to the beach too.

Ahhhhhh relaxation!

I wasn’t planning on doing another blog entry in Nepal, but I spent my last three days in the country at a place that must be shared. Boudha (pronounced “Bode-ah”) is famous for its massive Buddhist stupa, called Boudhanath, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the largest in the world. For you non-Buddhists, a stupa is a structure containing holy relics and often the remains of a high lama or Rinpoche, and is used as a place of worship.  People walk around stupas clockwise, chanting mantras and spinning attached prayer wheels. There are many monasteries near Boudha and heavy Tibetan influence.

I’ve fallen in love with Boudha and wish I could stay longer. Compared to the maddening chaos of Kathmandu (only 7 miles away), this place feels quiet and sane. A three-day long sigh of relief. I am staying at a guesthouse at the end of a clean street of large, flat stone, next to a monastery. Being next to a monastery is lovely with all the monks and nuns passing by chanting mantras and fingering prayer beads, but it’s got its downsides: Namely, the 4:30 a.m. bellowing of conch shells. After a good hour of conching-for-Buddha, the monastics start clanging bells and horns, and throw in some gongs for good measure. So for the last three nights I’ve had lousy sleep, but it’s such a fascinating place I’ll gladly suffer a few sleep-deprived nights.

The best part is the stupa itself. It forms the hub of activity from which small, twisted roads branch off, little markets and tourist shops. There is a giant path around the stupa and during the early morning (which I’m sure to catch, thanks to the conches) a flood of people circumnavigate the perimeter of the stupa. It takes about 5 minutes for the pleasant stroll around the stupa, and there are fabulous people-watching opportunities the whole way. You can tell it’s an important spot for locals to catch up on the latest gossip while accruing karmic merit. Doing a few laps around the stupa has become my favorite past time on a warm late afternoon or early morning, after which I duck into one of my great little cafes to be a coffee bum for a while. (There’s one cafe here that the Lonely Planet says “should be in Portland, Oregon.” Tis true, with it’s fabulous little downstairs book store).

The stupa.

Eyes of the Buddha on the giant stupa.

But there’s a rather complex vibe to this place. There are some of the saddest beggars I’ve ever seen– deformed children, lepers, amputees. And the most wretched mongrely dogs.  At night Boudha feels a little edgy; those dark alleys make me glad my friend and trek buddy Terray is here to walk me back to my guesthouse after dinner.

Speaking of Terray, I thought I’d be ready for tons of alone time after the trek, but it’s been great to have a friend in town, and he speaks quite a bit of Nepali from a study abroad here in college– very helpful. Yesterday we went hiking to a monastery in the hills above this village and had tea with a family he met before the trek. It was very interesting to see the inside of a Nepali home; this one was a Brahman (highest caste) family. It was a gorgeous hike, very long and exhausting– amazing how quickly I’m getting out of shape after the trek, sigh.

Inside one of the temples near the stupa.

It’s a good time to be in Nepal if you have a strong stomach. Dashain has started– Nepal’s biggest Hindu festival. It lasts for fifteen days and honors Durga and all of her bloody manifestations, and, more generally, the victory of good over evil. The whole country celebrates and schools shut down for weeks as family members travel from all over to commune and eat special foods. And slaughter things. Apparently the temples turn into bloodbaths with thousands of goats, water buffalo, and chickens being sacrificed to appease the gods. In one temple in Kathmandu they behead 108 goats (an auspicious number in many religious traditions) and 9 water buffalo. I read the streets actually run with blood (probably a bit of an overstatement) as people smear animal blood on vehicles (even Nepali Airlines), bicycles, and streets for protection. The sacrifices start on Day 8 so I won’t be here for that, not that I’d be able to get into the temples anyways. Or that I’d want to see it. But I have noticed a lot of goats being led into town. On that gruesome note, I end here, since I’m already back in India with my little sis, Christina. We wrote a joint blog entry we’ll post tomorrow.

With five other trekkers, ten crew (Sherpas, porters, mule boy, cook, kitchen boy– out of the ten, only two spoke English), and 6 hard-working mules.  We took two flights on tiny planes to get to one of the most remote places on earth.  Straddling the Tibetan Plateau, Dolpo is more Tibetan Buddhist in culture than Nepali (Dolpo and neighboring Mustang used to be great kingdoms of Tibet prior to the late eighteenth century). It’s weeks of hard walking to the nearest roads, the dirt paths are traveled by the cheap Chinese gym shoes and plastic sandles of traders bringing their load-ladened yak, of semi-nomadic villagers fleeing the tundra-like winters for lower ground, of ancient women foraging for yak dung to burn. The trails are often empty save for the occasional shadows of circling lammergiers and griffins. Dolpo is difficult enough to get to that it has avoided the ill effects of tourism plaguing the popular Everest and the Annapurna circuits– so far.

On our first day, we walked from the Juphal “airport” (a grassy field high in the mountains, so high our plane barely made a descent; it just pulled right up like it was a car being driven into a garage) to the village of Dunai. It’s cliched to say it, I know, but these villages seem frozen in time. Curious stares met our awkward glances as we clomped down the stone path “main street” of the village.

The Juphal airport. No building; this is it.

After arriving at our first camp, we took a little side hike to a B'on school. B'on is a precursor to Buddhism, with more animistic elements.

We happened to arrive in Dunai on the day of the Hindu Teej festival, honoring the Goddess Parvati and drawing the women and girls to dance in the street to infectious Nepali folk music as soon as the sun went down. I went with two guys in our group to spy on the revelry. Of course I was almost immediately pulled into the dance circle, feeling silly in my trekking gear and pale, pale skin. Arms spun me around and we all laughed as I helplessly mimicked the sassy hip-thrusts of a tiny giggling girl. Laughter turned to guffaws as the women dragged my two guy friends into the dancing circle. A small, coffee-colored girl with wide doe eyes grabbed my right arm with both arms and squashed up against me, holding on tightly and melting anything hard within me. We finally untangled ourselves to head back to camp elated and marveling: what a perfect beginning to the trip.

Easy hiking to start off with as we began acclimating to altitude. Especially easy when a mule is hauling your loot.

This photo of the Suli Gad doesn't do it justice. It's the most beautiful river in the world. The carving is called a "mani stone." The mantra is carved by monks into stones all over Dolpo.

We began significantly climbing on the third day, upstream along the Suli Gad. Matheissen described her as the most beautiful river in the world. Yes, it must be so. Aquamarine, translucent, charged with frothing white rapids and glacial purity so complete that the river sustains no life. Matheissen: “The trail meets the Suli Gad high up the valley, in grottos of bronze-lichened boulders and a shady riverside of pine and walnut and warm banks of fern.” In case I would forget for a moment that I was hiking in Asia, I’d pass an occasional delicate wisp of thin bamboo by the trail, and at the end of the trip we were surprised by a large troupe of handsome langurs.

More mani stones. We often came upon whole walls made of these.

Leaving the Suli Gad, beginning our first major ascent.

Climbing, climbing. Really climbing. Breath shorter, sharper, less-productive as we gained thousands of feet of elevation. Thankfully, our saintly Sherpa Kamal (strikingly similar in ways– namely, his selflessness– to Matheissen’s Tukten, for those of you who’ve read the book) set a glacial pace suitable for western lungs. Slow plodding death march. One foot before the other, steadily keeping the creeping momentum. Eyes locked just one step ahead, mind grinded to a halt except for “Om mani padme hum,” that Buddhist mantra carved on the mani stones all over these mountains. The Jewel in the Heart of the Lotus. As good a mantra as any to get me in shape, fast. Om (step) Mani (step) Padme (step) Hum (step) Gaaasp… Sweat beaded my forehead despite the early shadows in the coming of Fall and in deep canyons. A tiring yet deeply peaceful walking meditation.

A surreal view of the source of the Suli Gad: Phoksundo Lake. You can see the Suli has turned into a raging waterfall in the lower part of this picture.

Phoksundo Lake. Looked like someone had photoshopped it in, it was so unreal blue.

Looking down on our campsite from my yoga spot. We stayed at the beautiful lake for 2 nights. The porters/sherpas were glad for a day off, and we were excited to explore the village, ridges, and gompas of the surrounding area.

Woke up one early morning to Fall-- snow on them hills!

The beginning of the Suli Gad. Actually looked pretty wimpy, considering how rushing it was when we first met the river, but it is fed from numerous streams as it gathers steam going downhill. The prayer flags were a nice touch.

One day, I snuck away from the group, seeking my precious solitude on a steep ridge. Though it should have been a rest day, a stupa built high into the rock cliff beckoned me; I was curious what it was doing way up there. It was deceivingly far away. More climbing, mind quieting, minutiae of home– the things that keep me tightly bound– slipping away among rolling, shifting clouds playing shadows on the valley floor. To nonsense thoughts: “No room, no room up here.” Those mountains, such explosive geology, I lay on the rocks and tried to imagine how something so incomprehensibly BIG could form. My fellow trekker Terray found a fossil of sea anemones and sponges. Imagine, remnants of sea life at over 13,000 feet!

The little stupa carved into a rock protrusion. I sat up here, contemplating that stupa and the surrounding mountains and cloud-watching, for three hours. Time well spent.

Being above a lammergier is exhilerating, they are BIG birds.

Back at camp, an unseen goat herder in the distance sang a high, ululating pitch, a haunting tune carried on winds with the soaring carrion birds. Matheissen talked of being inexplicably moved to tears, and I understand. I thought of the dignity of the man on our trip staring down death and loss. I thought of the differences between victim/poverty mentality and love and freedom, and the choices we have no matter what our life circumstances. I started feeling unbound. Om mani padme hum.

Circumventing Phoksundo on our way on. You can barely see the people on the path. This path was so precarious the mules had to be unloaded (according to villagers, a mule had fallen to its death there a week before we arrived), meaning our porters had to make multiple long trips back and forth that day.

...which is no fun for the porters, because you can see they carry 100 pounds or so STRAPPED TO THEIR HEADS.

...all so we can be spoiled. That was a bit of a surprise, discovering this was a luxury trek. Lest you be under the false impression we were totally roughing it.

Another day, all lessons lost, I write in my journal: “I hate this. Hate it. I feel like a child for not listening to [our head Sherpa] Chet and landing myself ass-first in the creek out of stubbornness. I hate the rain (when will my boots dry?). That this climbing is hard, that the air is thin and I have a headache, that I don’t want to be around people, is no excuse for this withering self-pity. What happened to the girl on the ridge top, crying with gratitude! Bad days in a place like this should be outlawed.  Poo.” Later, shadows passed, they always do. Rich drinking chocolate in hot sheep’s milk works miracles.

YAAR, I am the Queen of the Knoll!

Speaking of, Matheissen said it best: “I love the common miracles . . . the contentment of doing one thing at a time: when I take my blue tin cup into my hand, that is all I do . . . Gradually my mind has cleared itself, the wind and sun pour through my head, as through a bell. Though we talk little here, I am never lonely: I am returned into myself.” Yes, here, doing this, easy to taste that sweet relaxation of nowhere and no one else to be. There is literally nothing, nothing in the world, that makes me happier and more content than exploring beautiful landscapes by foot.

Woman weaving.

Nearing the summit of Kang La Pass, the first and highest of our four passes. At 17,800 feet, Kang La is higher than any place in the U.S. outside of Alaska. I'm nearing a heart attack, don't be fooled by the delerious smile.

Pretty dang happy about reaching those prayer flags that assure me this is the top.

View from our camp at Shey Monastery, overlooking a small semi-nomadic village.

A day hike from Shey to a cliffside gompa. The resident lama opened it for us and showed us ancient texts, fascinating.

From inside another gompa, looking out the window.

Lama at Shey and his granddaughter. He told us, through our Chet, that he was in "Himalaya", the movie about Dolpo that was made 13 (I think) years ago using only locals as actors. He also said he remembers two men who stayed at Shey for 2 months, 30 years ago, studying blue sheep and snow leopard-- Matheissen and his research companion George Stallier! Maybe...a lot gets lost in translation.

The lama's wife and the granddaughter. Such a lovely family.

At dinner at our highest camp, Terray and I casually tossed out the idea of getting up at dark and hiking the nearby ridge under the almost-full moon to see the sunrise hit the peaks to the northwest. When morning came, we didn’t expect everything to be covered in snow, made soft blue by the moonlight. Bundled in down jackets and heavy gloves, we galloped across the valley past the yak herd sharing our camp. I tried not to whoop. We hit the steep climb at an enthusiastic pace which Terray, with his long Colorado mountain legs, could sustain. I slogged and gasped and ground to first gear. It was, like every climb in those mountains, steeper and longer than it looked. False summits are so cruel! Soon our snow-covered tents and the yaks were just specks. I lost Terray and suddenly I had an eerie, exhilarated feeling of being watched– if there was ever a chance to see a snow leopard (or yeti), this was it. Instead, we saw a panoramic unfolding of morning light over snow and craggy mountain, holy alpenglow. The trip down was triumphant, and steaming porridge and tea never tasted so good.

Almost the top, sun's just starting to come up to meet the moon.

This doesn't even come close to doing the ridgetop sunrise justice.

Another day: Out of nowhere–  I was feeling so good, really had my rhythm!–  I was slammed with a dangerous mix of migraine and altitude sickness on the way up our second of the high passes. I’m no stranger to migraines, but it had been years since the last one and this one came on surprisingly fast and hard. The altitude seemed to mess with my neurology, constricting blood vessels to my head and eyes, and I quickly became dizzy, lost parts of my vision, and incoherent. It was scary for all of us. I heavily medicated with Amidrine, Diamox, and rehydration salts, thankful for the doctors in our group, and our skillful Sherpas got me quickly up and over the 17,000 foot pass to our lower camp. Though it was a bit dangerous to climb higher before lower, there really wasn’t a choice; with no phones, rescue would have involved sending a Sherpa ahead for a long race to a village with a phone and then a helicopter ride.  It was best to just get over the pass and down the other side.  No one really understands altitude sickness, why it can hit people who have previously summited Everest with no problems. I fully recovered by the next day, and, blessedly, had no more problems with altitude (or headaches) on the trip.Two days later, I was bathing happily in a river when a red helicopter scared the crap out of me and sped down the canyon before I could pull on my pants. We found out later it was rescuing an altitude-sick Japanese trekker off a nearby pass. Made me realize how lucky I was.

A happier, easier summit. This was the last of our four high passes. I'm tying a khata (ceremonial Buddhist scarf) to the prayer flags in celebration and gratitude to Masta, the mountain god.

We began our final descent, leaving behind the fourth and last of our high passes. My knees whimpered as we dropped steeply, shedding altitude like old skin and skidding down the dusty trail. At our lunch stop, as if some collective hand was clasping our shoulders to stop us from missing what was before us, we decided to stop short and spend the day in the magnificent valley.  I had started to feel a little panicked at leaving these magical high places behind. After lunch I climbed up one of the ridges to see a high mountain lake supposedly on the other side. I climbed like a woman possessed, never have I hiked so determinedly and fiercely. I couldn’t believe how good I felt. I just kept thinking, this is the body I’ve told myself for years has been broken by accident, injury and pain. Well that story holds no water now; it’s not overly-dramatic to say that hike changed my life.  Without stopping, I gasped all the way to the top, it felt exquisite. A gorgeous, mythical, turquoise lake rewarded me at the top, sitting in a geologist’s dream, a glacial masterpiece. I sat for a long time before I noticed a shivering white horse, also restless, staring at me from just below my little hill, not 50 feet away. We watched each other, and I kept hoping the horse would calm down, but it wasn’t until I ducked behind the hill he finally resumed grazing. It was my most intense day of both climbing and descending. I fell asleep at 8:15 and dreamed of the white horse.

The valley we couldn't stand to leave. If you'll notice by the angle of my friend, this was one knee-crunching descent.

Yak are amazing (except when they leave their steaming piles this close to my tent...). They can only live above 3,000 feet because of their heavy coats, but they produce gorgeous wool, milk, meat, poop for burning, have short strong legs suited for the mountains, and killer endurance. I salute you, yaks, and thanks for your tasty cheese.

"The hiiiiilllls are aliiiiive, with the sound of muuuuuuuuuusic...."

Down, down, down now, descending too fast now. Blurring dreamlike: mountains, monasteries, canyons, cliffs, caves, rivers, waterfalls, blue sky, blue sheep, snow peaks, wildflower, mani walls, Tibetan villages, yak, birds of prey, langur and rhesus. An old, weathered woman passed us spinning wool on a little wooden spool between her hands. With her, two small girls with long braids. All wore colorful traditional Tibetan aprons and shared matching radiant, youthful smiles. Hands in prayer position, we mismatched groups exclaimed “Namaste!” as we passed, the girls’ voices were shy and sweet. After we’d walked a little further, I turned around to see the two girls stopped in their tracks, facing us frozen and staring open-jawed. What did they see?

Descending quickly now, that's a small village straight ahead, we're re-entering civilization.

Kamal, our second-in-command Sherpa, who had (before I startled them away) had all these baby chicks gathered around his foot for a cuddle. It killed me I couldn't express my gratitude to this most gracious and giving of men, but he wouldn't have heard it anyways-- as Matheissen describes, the selflessness of Sherpas is to the task itself, not to the person receiving. Buddhism (or maybe just Sherpa culture) is lovely that way.

Our sweet, lovable, funny, helpful, skillful head Sherpa, Chet. I love him, even though he stuck a snowball in my ear.

This will be a time to really disconnect from my life– no email, no blogs, no TV, no contact with people I love.  A time of connecting with my heart and my spirituality, which lives in mountains, forests, rivers, and big sky.  And, a major victory for my body– I’ve been actively rehabilitating my back and neck for 2.5 years after my motorcycle accident, and I feel ready for this great physical challenge.

OK, that’s a lie– I’m nervous, I don’t know how my body and mind will do.  Nothing left to do now, the night before I leave– I’ve done all the practice hikes and yoga and meditation I can squeeze in.  Trust is all that’s left.  And that’s convenient, because that happens to be the point of this whole year.

Please send a little thought of encouragement my way.  Will see you in this blogosphere in a month!  Here’s info on the Dolpo Snow Leopard Trek if you’re interested.

I just experienced 2 days and 2 nights of an Indian wedding, and… WOW.  It was fascinating.  I’d been hoping to see an Indian wedding during this trip, ever since watching Monsoon Wedding I’ve been intrigued.  But I had no idea how to make that happen.  In an incredible stroke of luck, a gal I met in Vietnam, Julie, had casually mentioned she’d be in Delhi for a wedding, and if her original date couldn’t make it and if I were in town, I could join her.   I was super excited about that but didn’t believe it’d actually happen.  I forgot about the conversation soon after.

Fast-forward 2 months.  Out of the blue I got an email from Julie saying her friend couldn’t make it.  It just so happened I’d be in Delhi only for 3 days and over the exact time of the wedding!

Julie worked with Rohit, the groom, in Australia but didn’t know him that well.  No matter; the groom’s family took amazing care of us and showed us the true meaning of Hospitality.  They own a clothing shop and spent 3 hours with us picking out and measuring saris for the big day.  We spent a lot of time in their home drinking chai and meeting the steady stream of relatives.  And then the ceremonies… wow.  There are so many details, but I’m short on time and I think the event is best represented by pictures.

The wedding was amazing, filled with music, dancing, color, food, and family.  There were about 400 people in attendance.  So much happiness and celebration, and we were treated like esteemed guests.  As the only foreigners, everyone made sure we were comfortable, entertained, fed, and dancing.  My face hurt from smiling, and I was completely exhausted afterward.  Can’t imagine how the bride and groom feel, and those who actually made it to the end (we cut out at 4:00 a.m. because I had a flight at 10:00).

Enjoy the pictures!~  A word about the slide show:  For some reason, WordPress has it move really quickly.  So go to the first picture and move your cursor until the “stop”  icon (square) appears.  Click on that square to stop the slide show and then you can click on the right arrow to move to the next picture at your own pace.  And, sorry the captions are kind of weird formatting… not sure how to fix that.  And, the pictures are out-of-order because I combined a few from Julie’s set.

For the last three weeks I was in Dharamsala, home in exile of Tenzen Gyatso, the living incarnation of Avalokitsvara, the Buddhist deity of compassion– better known as His Holiness the Dalai Lama. The vast majority of the population in Dharamsala is Tibetans who, like the Dalai Lama, fled Tibet after the Chinese occupation and fifty years of continuous oppression. I’ve been a big, big fan of His Holiness for years, a living incarnation of compassion indeed. And for years Buddhism has had me curious and I’ve been casually poking around in the dharma (teachings) and visiting a temple in San Francisco from time to time for meditations and teachings. So Dharamsala was a major draw for both cultural and spiritual reasons. And, in no small part, for the promise of green lush mountains and fresh cool air. The anti-Delhi, if you will.

Looking down on Dharamsala (more precisely, McLeod Ganj) from one of the steep roads.

A peak at the Indian Himalayas just in the distance on a rare break in the clouds that are persistent during monsoon season.

Dharamsala was very, very good to me. As I mentioned in my last entry, I’d hurried up there from Delhi to meet Jeff, a friend of a friend who I’d been emailing with since Vietnam. Jeff is also a new lawyer from San Francisco and was in Dharamsala for 4 months on a fellowship studying Tibetan human rights issues. He was scheduled to leave a few days after I’d arrive. We got together the night of my arrival and he invited me to lectures and performances by several Tibetan artists and writers discussing the continued Chinese oppression. It was fascinating. Over late dinner, Jeff described his draft 150-page report on the Chinese crackdown on Tibetan intellectuals, artists, and writers, and specifically the legal tools China’s using to systematically crush any expressions of Tibetan identity. I immediately wanted to become involved and offered to spend what time Jeff had left in Dharamsala editing his report. His jaw fell open as I became his Editing Angel. And I, in return, got a nice sense of Purpose, however small in comparison.

And, in a beautiful stroke of Right Place at the Right Time, Jeff informed me His Holiness would be leading prayers the next morning– a rare and exciting event. To give some perspective, I read that some Tibetans cross the Himalayas on foot (a two-year journey) for a glimpse of His Holiness. I couldn’t believe it– I had been in Dharamsala less than 12 hours and so much inspiration already.

The prayers were incredible. In the security line of Tsuglagkhang Complex , His Holiness’s monastery, I started chatting with an Australian gal and we became fast friends. She and I resigned ourselves to sitting in the very back of the temple against the metal railing– there was no chance of seeing His Holiness in that crowd, may as well get some back support. Suddenly a murmur erupted in the crowd and the monks began fingering their prayer beads and everyone stood and stared right in our direction. We looked at what everyone else was looking at and just there, right below us, came four maroon-robed monks waiving bowls of incense on long silver chains. Just behind them, bowing and smiling, was His Holiness. We had the best seats in the house for his entrance! I don’t know what happened, I was suddenly overcome with an explosive choking feeling, swept up in tides of reverence, moved by the energetic explosion that filled the temple. Tears filled my eyes as I watched His Holiness bow and pat the hands of those who grasped excitedly at him. The young Tibetan man next to me was beside himself with tears and said he’d been waiting his whole life for this moment. His Holiness disappeared in a sea of monks and suddenly the speakers erupted in his low, hypnotic chant that lasted nearly continuously for an hour and 45 minutes. The Tibetans around us chanted along, swaying and some prostrating. A young monk filled my little Nalgene bottle with scalding chai. My Australian friend and I kept giddily pronouncing how amazing, how amazing. I later found out the prayers were in mourning for those who had died or lost their homes in the floods in Ladakh.

Afterward, I met Jeff at a coffee shop. He’d invited me to join him and Geshe Thupten Phelgye , an esteemed member of the Tibetan Parliament and founder of the Universal Compassion Movement. I was shy and in awe of this monk with the most boisterous, radiant laugh I’ve ever heard. It filled every audible space and kept escalating until it was a little shocking, and then he’d stop as quickly as it’d begun and say something incredibly insightful. He was a brilliant man, having reached the status of Geshe, which is said to be the equivalent of 4 PhD’s. He spoke of his five years meditating in a cave and said it was the best time of his life. He only stopped because his mother became sick, and after he’d come down from retreat to care for her His Holiness advised him his path was politics. We discussed how the legal profession is in dire need of a soul (so to speak, Buddhists don’t believe in souls), and how compassion must be fostered within the profession. Then the talk drifted to the rifts within the Tibetan government-in-exile between those who want to continue the fight for independence and those who want the “Middle Way,” including His Holiness, in which Tibet would agree to fully succumb to China’s authority with the exception of self-governance over certain domestic matters. Such a complex issue, and so fascinating to get an inside scoop.

Jeff and I chatting with Geshela Pheylge at Mandala Cafe on Temple Road after the Dalai Lama's prayers. Thanks to Jeff for the photo.

On the note of Tibet. I’d sort of forgotten about it after my “Free Tibet” college bumper stickers, in vogue at the time. Sadly, many seem to have forgotten Tibet. But after just a few days of studying the issue, let me tell you, people, it’s bad. For fifty years China has sought to systematically crush the spirit of Tibetans with ruthless cruelty and inhumanity, and in blatant violation of international law. Jeff’s report described how Tibetans that have courageously dared to express a dissenting opinion, or even to celebrate Tibetan culture, are being thrown in prison without representation or into “re-education camps” (hard labor camps with horrific conditions) for 15 years to life….for publishing a website or writing a song! Another human rights report documented how children in Chinese-run schools in Tibet were forced to bring in an animal they killed– a point for a fly, two points for a beetle, more points for a cat, etc. This demanded of children who for their entire lives have been taught the first Buddhist precept: Thou shall not kill any sentient beings. How traumatic for the children, sickening. Don’t forget Tibet. If you are interested, this is the organization that sponsored Jeff; his report will be published there when it’s finalized: Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy

After Jeff left and I had finished my editing gig, I began a 10-day “Introduction to Buddhism” course at Tushita Meditation Center. It was fascinating. The course was held in silence, and it was an experience by itself to be with fifty people eating, sleeping, meditating, and studying, and have no eye contact or words. At first it felt sad, like we were all mourning something, and then as we settled into our processing it felt peaceful. Meditating has always been hard for me, damn monkey mind. But I learned so much, and had some big breakthroughs with my physical pain. One of the highlights (and frustrations) was the resident rhesus macaque monkey troup. Though we were not allowed to feed them (for good reason), the resident monks did daily and so the monkeys had set up camp in and around Tushita. They were both fascinating to watch and nerve-racking as they harassed us to steal our food, and sometimes for no reason at all. One day I had just sat down outside overlooking the misty trees, feeling completely relaxed after a meditation session and yoga, and about to savor a large lunch feast. Out of nowhere, a giant hairy body flew through the air and landed on my plate. I bolted back and broke the silence with a loud “Ohhhh…. SHIT.” He won, sitting there smugly wallowing on my plate and shoveling fistfuls of rice in his sharp-toothed mouth. Two days later, I was doing yoga on a roof one afternoon when I glanced at my foot and gasped at the massive male monkey laying near the top of my mat gazing up at me seductively. In my shock I leapt back and then I delicately reached for the opposite corner of my mat to pull it away from the monkey. Suddenly he leapt up and ran at me snarling with bared teeth and ripped the yoga mat out of my hand. The next day as I sat deep in thought on the steps of the meditation hall he dropped the yoga mat on to my head. Guess he’d had enough asanas.

Glad this guy is feasting on the dumpster and not my lunch.

But mostly, the monkeys were the best part of the course. I spent an average of three hours a day monkey-watching. I started calling the 10 days “Monkey Camp.” For the first half of the course it rained for five straight days, and one afternoon the sun finally broke through radiating everything in mist and light. The monkeys went crazy, like we Oregonians after the last rain of the long wet season. They flung themselves off the prayer flags and leapt from tree to tree, tarzaning into a brick pool of water and having a ball. Again and again they chased each other around the pool, up into the trees, and canonballed into the water. Two monkeys got so rowdy they miscalculated and smashed simultaneously into a cement wall with a painful thud. It was very, very difficult to maintain our silence when we were laughing so hard. Two tiny babies, with their bulging eyes and adult-sized ears, swung around on prayer flags hanging from a pole like a tether ball. Then a teenage monkey came and pushed them aside and swung around as hard as he could. Finally an old male monkey kicked the teenager off and tether balled upside down,, dangling from his back feet and showing all of them up.

Tushita's meditation hall, where we spent most of our days when we weren't monkey watching or defending our food from monkeys. Usually the hall is filled with meditation cushions. Very serene space.

The last two days of the course were only meditation sessions, seven of them each day, and by the end of that I was about to go crazy with the need to move my legs. I spent my last three days in Dharamsala hiking in the hills and waterfalls in a last-ditch attempt to get in shape before my Nepal trek, taking 2 hour yoga classes (good ones, and for $2.25…I LOVE INDIA!), running into my Tushita friends, and making new friends over chai. On my last day in Dharamsala I hiked up a trail to see what I could find, depressed that I couldn’t go as far as I wanted (even though I love hiking alone at home, it’s not safe to go alone in India). Just as I reached a crossroads that signaled my obligation to return home, I met four Israeli girls who readily invited me to join their trek to Triund, 9 km up the mountains. I was thrilled– I’d been wanting to go to Triund but it’s distance made it impossible alone and I thought I’d run out of time. It was quite a trek, and two of the girls turned around halfway. McCleod Ganj, where I was staying, is at 1750 meters, and we ended at over 3,000 meters, definitely an intense workout because we were racing the daylight. It was gorgeous– clean trails, breathtaking views of the Himalayan foothills when the clouds would break for just a moment, waterfalls, green valleys below, little chai shops along the way. We saw a few people heading down, but our only other company was an occasional group of goats and their Tibetan herders, and a forlorn cow. Wonderful company, too– I have met so many Israeli travelers and have yet to meet one that I don’t instantly like.

Tired and happy, at the misty top. Realizing we'll be racing the light on the way down... but a moment of celebration is in order.

This is how you celebrate reaching the end of a remote hike in India: 2 chais, a copy of the India Times, and a bag of Lay's potato chips...Masala flavored (!)

Trail friend.

Morning after breakfast with my Israeli hiking buddies, Moran and Mor. Thank you, Moran, for sending me these pics so fast and letting me use them in my blog!

My last story for this blog involves something that should be simple: Shipping a package home. I bought 9 books in a Tibetan bookstore because Indian books are incredibly cheap– a new book published “for sale in India only” can cost $4. I stocked up and lugged my bag to a tailor, as I’d heard I needed them to prepare my shipment. It was fascinating. They wrapped my books and my yak-hair blanket and thangkas (Buddhist paintings) into a box that seemed impossibly small, and then hand sewed the whole thing in fabric. Then they used a wax seal on all the edges. Then I had to provide the post office with two customs forms and two copies of my passport and visa. This involved dragging the box all the way back to my guesthouse waaaaaay up the hill (I was glad this was my only task of the day), and then waiting in a painfully long line at the post office. Fortunately, another westerner advised me how to address the box, in a way that was absolutely not intuitive (is anything intuitive in India?) When I asked the post office guy if it would be sent to a port or to my home address, he said “Yes ma’am.” I tried every possible way to get the answer to that question, including cleverly not asking a leading question: Where will my package be sent? “Yes ma’am” (head bobble). Ah, OK then. As I left the post office I looked down on my receipt and saw that on it had been printed “Shit Gurley”…. I’m sure my boyfriend WHIT Gurley would not appreciate that. I flew back into the door without thinking, yelling “NOT SHIT! NOT SHIT!!” and pushed my way up to the line to thrust my receipt back in the face of the postman. Everyone in the post office had a great laugh, except for the postman, who blushed and crossed out the Shit in pen and hand-wrote Whit. I noticed he didn’t change it in the computer. So, Whit, please be on the lookout for a package addressed to “Shit.” (and, sorry, I love you)

It was a beautiful, relaxing time in Dharamsala. It became so easy to make friends there I found myself wishing I had more alone time. This is not a bad problem to have. I am leaving India in a few days (temporarily… I’ll be back in 6 weeks) with great energy and a feeling of centeredness and easy laughter. But my last stop before Nepal is Delhi for three days for an Indian wedding. No doubt I’ll have great pictures and stories for my next entry….

My first lesson in Indian half-truths was at the immigration counter in the airport, in which I inquired if I’d have trouble getting back into India from Nepal (there is a confusing requirement of being out of the country two months before trying to re-enter, but I’d hesitatingly determined in SF an exception applies in my circumstances). The customs officer said musically, “no problem” and charmed me with his uniquely Indian head bobble. Like a light figure-8 of the head. I have come to so adore the mysterious head bobble. It means yes, no, maybe, I like you, fuck off, and any combination of the above, good luck figuring out which one. In most cases you can’t trust it further than you can bobble your own head back. Better to trust in the Rule of Threes: Ask three different people before tentatively trusting the answer. On the visa issue I’ve received three different answers, so it remains a work in progress. (Deep, yogic breaths).

My first 24 hours in India predictably kicked my ass. I didn’t know air could smell like that. A blend of dust, shit (holy cow and human), exhaust, too many bodies, and delectable spices from tandoori ovens and markets. Add a dose of hot, fetid, stagnant, humidity. I’m cursed with a heightened sense of smell, so I could hardly stand it, it felt like a full frontal assault. Taking in only the tiniest sips of air made me even more anxious. And oh, the seething humanity… so many people! I read that Delhi was designed to hold a quarter of its ever-exploding population. Add a mess of auto-rickshaws, bicycle rickshaws, cows, cars, trucks, buses, and motorbikes. Then pack that into streets that are, at best, one and a half cars wide. Oddly, Delhi is ripping itself inside out for the Commonwealth Games. According to the Indian Times, the construction projects were too ambitious and inadequately funded, so the city will remain looking like an earthquake hit indefinitely. A lovely ankle-breaking minefield of mud, dust, holes and bricks. I debated about staying in the nicer parts of Delhi– there are supposedly swanky parts if you get over to the tree-lined remnants of the British Raj. But I wanted to meet other travelers, and thought, hell, if I’m going to do India, than give me India. So I headed to the narrow, twisted, convulsing streets of Pahar Ganj, the “backpacker” haven.

I got way more than I bargained for.

Nothing terrible happened, but those first 24 hours were not for the feint of traveler. I stepped out into the sopping polluted heat and immediately almost got hit by a rickshaw driver. Unlike Vietnam, here there’s no reason to the driving madness, no predictability. Those damn lawnmowers are vicious. They are dodging holes and bricks and cows and people in incredibly narrow roads. I would leap out of the way of one and right into the path of another. Also, and without reason, I was immediately completely panicked that everyone was out to steal my backpack, that I was in imminent danger. Complete over-stimulation of every sense. People yelling at me “Rickshaw, madam!” or “Where you go!” or “Helllloooo!” A small, dark girl with a metal hoop jumped in front of me and started doing tricks, dancing in and out of the hoop like a trained monkey for a few rupees. I am donating to OXFAM in lieu of giving money to beggars, but my heart hurt to see her desperation, to imagine the suffering in her life. Welcome to India.

I realized I had to get out of Delhi, I didn’t have the mind state to handle it well and it was imperative I regroup. But my plans to head to Ladakh, the northern high desert mountains of largely Tibetan culture, had dissolved in light of the unheard of flooding in the region. The landslides had destroyed much of the village and claimed the lives of over 100 villagers with many more missing, 4 western tourists. I met an Israeli traveler who had been there when the floods hit and spent 3 days helping to dig for bodies. There was no clean water and rumors of cholera. Heartbreak for the villagers affected in a place where there is never rain. My Israeli friend said the villagers were terrified, they’d hardly seen rain in their lifetimes, much less floods. Prayers of gratitude that I narrowly avoided the disaster myself.

So what to do. I’d been emailing with a friend of a friend, Jeff, another lawyer in San Francisco, who was in Dharamasala, the home in exile of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and a largely Tibetan population, doing human rights work. He was only to be in Dharamsala another few days, and I felt compelled to meet him and learn about his work. And to head for the hills… anywhere that would get me out of Delhi. So I set about buying a train ticket immediately.

Trying to buy a train ticket was the kind of experience that defines how seasoned of a traveler you are… not in the mishaps, but in how you handle it. I definitely bumped up against my limits. I’m finding that every first-time traveler to India has one or ten of these stories. Here’s my first: It begins with being unable to even find my way into the train station. I was at the giant building but couldn’t even find the entrance, and every time I’d so much as pause a rickshaw driver would run up to “help” me. I didn’t trust anyone– I had read about touts taking you to their special “tourist office” for a fat commission from selling you a crappy overpriced ticket. I had been advised me to find the “tourist office” at the train station. That’s what I was looking for and I stood my ground….until I realized it was nearly getting dark and I wasn’t sure I could find my hotel in the daylight. The idea of being lost on my first night in Delhi at night made my blood run cold. Where was the entrance to the damn station? I just needed to get Into. The. Damn. Station. I panicked, and just then a nice-looking man asked me, in an accent so thick I wasn’t sure he was speaking English, if I needed help. I whined I was just trying to find the entrance (waah). He steered me to a doorway which didn’t feel right, and when I walked into the building I was shooed out by an Indian guy who barked “Indians only.” I hovered around helplessly (One tip: Never hover around helplessly, you’re an easy target). Within seconds another guy approached, told me I needed to go around the corner to the tourist office. He threw me in a rickshaw. This was exactly what I’d read about, I knew it wasn’t right, but I was suddenly so exhausted I couldn’t fight it. I was taken around the block to an office that was so obviously bullshit. I knew I wasn’t in danger, but that I was being taken for a ride. For some inexplicable reason, I went up a very narrow staircase anyways, where sat two shady looking dudes in the fluorescent lights next to faded “Incredible India!” posters on the peeling walls. They wouldn’t look at me.

Me, trying to look cool: “Is this the official tourist train ticket office?”

“Yes, what you need.”

“The official tourist office? I thought it was just a counter in the main station? Are you official?” (Wow, seriously? That came out of my mouth? Jeez. I could have punched myself.)

“Yeswhatyouneed.” The guys seemed to be in a great hurry, which I already understood is not a typical Indian trait. Abort! Abort!

Despite I was 100% certain this was crap, I really needed to cross this one off my list. I didn’t know where else to go. It was getting dark. Of course they tried to sell me a bus ticket for 900 Rs, saying all the train tickets were full for 5 days (which I now know was probably true). I hemmed and hawed, and finally walked out. My intuition won. Talking to other travelers, that was indeed a scam, definitely not the real government tourist office. Never did find it. But what I did discover was the monsoon. I ran out of the fake tourist office and smack into rains so hard the mangled streets rose into rivers in a matter of minutes. I, of course, had no umbrella, no rain jacket, nowhere to wait it out. Did I somehow forget monsoon season? Every overhang, underneath every tree, packed into the rickshaws– filled with Indians. Indians sat under cows. Now, a little seasoned after few weeks, I would jump under an overhang and laugh with my brethren, just fellow humans keeping a shred of warmth. But there, on my first day, I was scared and traumatized. I couldn’t stand everyone staring at me, I knew I was a ridiculous spectacle. So, I dove into the streets and half-ran, half-plowed to my hotel, tears pricking my eyes. I was instantly soaked, thinking of my poor ruined journal and praying my passport was adequately buried. I slogged calf-deep in the dirtiest water you could imagine. By the time I made it back to my hotel room I was shivering and filthy. Of course there was no hot water, but as I scrubbed and scrubbed I suddenly started laughing. And laughing. Here I was, hello INDIA! I sat huddled in a blanket and rocked and laughed because what else can you do. Then I watched Indian music videos, Bollywood and infectious Punjabi tunes, and danced like a cobra being charmed.  And all was well again. (Seriously, people, if you are ever feeling like life’s too much, do yourself a favor and find some Indian music videos. Will cure whatever ails your aching ego.).

I hid out after that, eating and reading in the restaurant across the street and retiring early. A word about Indian food. HEAVEN. I don’t even like Indian food in the U.S., had one too many cheap Indian buffet in law school. But here…oh sweet India, you redeem yourself in your savory spices and sweet gingery chai. Swoon!

That night I seized awake at 3:00 a.m. through my earplugs (travel necessity!) by the sound of a man on the street wailing like someone who has discovered death, or is extremely drunk, or both. Dogs yowled in response and I felt sick.

Despite my rude first day, I woke up feeling ready to try again with India. I forced a jaunty step to the restaurant across the street and had a great talk with a woman from Seattle, and another from Washington DC, both also solo travelers. DC was new to India too, but Seattle had been coming for 11 years. She is my age, owns a little import shop and comes to Rajasthan to buy clothes and jewelry for her shop and festivals. I am pretty sure she was my travel angel, because she chuckled kindly at my stories about the train station, nodding sagely. She bestowed priceless travel tips like jewels and assured me I’d fall in love with India and won’t be able to stay away. She said she loves traveling in India because it’s so beautiful and so safe for women, if you know how to play the games (such as: how to look like you know where you’re going, how to lay on the well-intentioned charm, how to both smile and say “leave me alone” with your eyes, how to abandon your logic for patience, how to buy a train ticket and which class to buy, how to become zen with getting sick, which are the best of the best culinary delicacies). I left with a spring in my step and smiling benevolently at everyone, even enjoying the chaos and people-watching, bartering in shops and getting lost in the twisted alleys of Pahar Ganj. Why, hello India!

I ended up purchasing an overnight bus ticket to Dharamsala from my hotel’s travel agent, 750 Rs and leaving that night. While Delhi and I had established a tenuous truce, I couldn’t wait to head for the hills and breathe for a bit. The guy assured me it was a “luxury tourist bus” with reclining seats. Oh no, not even close. It was a piece of shit clunker with no reclining seats and brakes that squealed me awake all night. The ride was unnecessarily long, with inexplicable stops including sitting for 1.5 hours at a police checkpoint at 3:00 a.m. Fortunately I’d made friends a couple of other fellow solo travelers, which kept me sane. Of course, I found out they had paid 450 Rs for the ride. Eh… om shanti om.

We climbed and climbed, the temperature dropping accordingly, and arrived in the drizzle at 9:30 a.m. A couple of potent weeks later I’m a new person. So many beautiful, transformative experiences in cultivating peace and compassion for all sentient beings here in the foothills of the Himalayas, among Tibetans and His Holiness. Among verdant evergreens and monkeys playing in the mist. Among a town that’s exploded in tourism to become too big for its water supply, too western for it’s roots, but still healing nonetheless. Stuff for another blog entry.