When I come down, I manage to catch the last few minutes of a program called "Boogie Woogie"--an Indian reality show where westerners try perform Hindi songs, hoping to snag a role in a Bollywood film. Soon after the scantily clad German girl finishes, I hear the distant bell tower chime 9 o'clock, and we, like nearly every family in Kalimpong, huddle together for the main event.
First, the classic opening: anonymous, computer animated figures step forward into stardom. Then, the lights on the stage rise, and the five performers jump out in gaudy costumes of black and gold. Each one holds a sparkling sequined later: D...I...S...C...O!. Their song finishes, and the hosts enter, announcing with enthusiasm the start of the Indian Idol (Season 3) Disco Special.
The similarity to the American version is startling. The make up of the judges, from what I could tell, was exactly the same: a grumpy, mean, critical one, a super-nice female one, and a slick, cool one. The announcers and the judges flicker back and forth between hindi and english when discussing each performance. When the third performer comes on, my aamaa cooes and my host sister squeals. It's Prashant, the hero of Darjeeling.
At their core, the Idol shows are little more than a popularity contest. In India, this manifests in the country's peculiar ways. Region, tribe, caste, language--these all make up an individual's identity far more distinctly than personal achievements. Most people in town will readily acknowledge that Prashant is hardly the most talented singer or performer of the bunch, but that doesn't seem to matter. Prashant is the first major contestant to come from the hill areas of Darjeeling.
The next twenty-four hours are a silent bustle of activity in Kalimpong. Text message drives have been organized, funded by contributions from various members of the community and set in motion by the local town government. All over the bajaar and from a big banner in front of town hall, Prashant's face stares out from posters encouraging--no, demanding!--that residents vote for him. When Saturday night comes, it is all made worthwhile. Despite his obvious mediocrity compared to several of the other contestants, Prashant is safe. In the distance I hear fireworks.
There is a telling insight to be found here concerning the differences between the Indian and American perspectives on individual value and community. In America, where your home town, religion, and ethnicity matter less, and where there is not the multiplicity of languages, favorites are picked based on looks, personality, and actual talent. Here in India, where community identity is so strong, whole states may rally together for a local champion. In Darjeeling, the long standing feelings of alienation and rejection felt by Nepali speaking Gorkhas amplify this sense of group identity to a palpable fervor.
There is a precedent in Darjeeling for this sort zealous support for an individual. In the late 1980s, when agitation for an autonomous Gorkhaland state reached its peak, Mr. Subash Ghising, the charismatic and nearly messianic leader of the Gorkha National Liberation Front, had all but unanimous approval among the hill towns. Strikes were called, ultimatums and manifestos were sent, and official platforms were touted, but still the state and national government refused to grant the Gorkhas statehood. As the frustration and discontent grew, the government called in the Central Reserve Police Force--a group synonymously throughout the country with trigger happy violence and police brutality. For nearly a near the CRPF occupied the Darjeeling district and Ghising's stronghold here in Kalimpong. They looted homes, raped young women, killed indiscriminately, and arrested the families of the dead as militants. All in the name of restoring law and order.
People in Kalimpong don't talk much about this dangerous, tragic period. But they talk about Prashant. The Gorkhaland movement may not been in full force anymore, but the sharp desire for recognition from the rest of India is obviously still very much present. Now they've found a new messiah to put their hopes and dreams on, and, for the moment at least, it's exciting. Inevitably, though, the show will, and Prashant probably won't be the last one standing. What will people do and say when their hero is eliminated? What will happen when the sound of fireworks doesn't come? I don't know, but I expect quiet disappointment. Most folks in Kalimpong seemed to have lost their appetite for violence twenty years ago. Prashant will probably fade into the ether, and people will start looking for another messiah. Another idol.
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Shankar Karki
The first day I met Shankar Karki he took me around his one acre property, pointing out the fruit trees and the big tree that marked the edge of his field. We sat with his neighbors in a concrete public shelter with an aluminum roof, and he named the landscape for me in Nepali: tree, rock, stream, road. Little children run up to him with pinches of tobacco leaves, which he grudgingly accepts. "Bad habit," he says with a wry smile. He points to his chest and adds, "Hard drinker, also." He tells me a story, which I could only partly follow, about a time when he got drunk and crashed a motorcycle. "Do not tell Prakash," he adds, chuckling.
The second day I showed him the articles I had to read on Hinduism. He slowly read the titles aloud, and then quickly launched into a description of his religious philosophy. Because there is only one Supreme God, he explained, he worshiped all gods equally, and all of the various personages that God had been when born as a human here on earth: the Buddha, Jesus Christ, and Sai Baba the living god, a picture of whom hangs over our front door. His reasoning behind this seemed to include an elaborate conspiracy theory about man's first landing on the moon. When Neil Armstrong stepped down the steps, apparently saw and felt red clothed hands push him down towards to the lunar surface. He never told anyone until coming to India.
The third day he greeted my return home with sharp Nepali commands shouted out the family dogs. "Bite! Attack!" he barked, laughing and smiling warmly. The dogs ignored him.
The fourth day I asked him if he did Hindu astrology. He giggled and shook his finger at me. "Who told you? Who told you?" I admit that it was one of my language teachers, and he chuckles all the harder. He promises to give me a reading later that week.
The fifth day when I wake up I see him walking down towards the stream. "Namaste!" I call after him, but he doesn't seem to notice. Later that night I catch my host sister reading lips. Sharkar Karki is nearly deaf.
The second day I showed him the articles I had to read on Hinduism. He slowly read the titles aloud, and then quickly launched into a description of his religious philosophy. Because there is only one Supreme God, he explained, he worshiped all gods equally, and all of the various personages that God had been when born as a human here on earth: the Buddha, Jesus Christ, and Sai Baba the living god, a picture of whom hangs over our front door. His reasoning behind this seemed to include an elaborate conspiracy theory about man's first landing on the moon. When Neil Armstrong stepped down the steps, apparently saw and felt red clothed hands push him down towards to the lunar surface. He never told anyone until coming to India.
The third day he greeted my return home with sharp Nepali commands shouted out the family dogs. "Bite! Attack!" he barked, laughing and smiling warmly. The dogs ignored him.
The fourth day I asked him if he did Hindu astrology. He giggled and shook his finger at me. "Who told you? Who told you?" I admit that it was one of my language teachers, and he chuckles all the harder. He promises to give me a reading later that week.
The fifth day when I wake up I see him walking down towards the stream. "Namaste!" I call after him, but he doesn't seem to notice. Later that night I catch my host sister reading lips. Sharkar Karki is nearly deaf.
Saturday, August 25, 2007
Graffiti
English graffiti in and around Kalimpong:
"Cast your vote at the symbol of the drum."
"CPLM" (Next to stylized hammer and sickle.)
"Vote for GNLF" (Gorkha National Liberation Front)
"From east to west, GNLF is best!"
"Election is a election
Decisive it is
Big
Selection"
"We want Gorkhaland."
"I love you."
"Cast your vote at the symbol of the drum."
"CPLM" (Next to stylized hammer and sickle.)
"Vote for GNLF" (Gorkha National Liberation Front)
"From east to west, GNLF is best!"
"Election is a election
Decisive it is
Big
Selection"
"We want Gorkhaland."
"I love you."
Friday, August 24, 2007
Jackfruit
America suffers from a tragedy of flavors. Lemonlime, strawberry-kiwi, dragonfruit, acai berry, guava, jackfruit. Go into any supermarket and you can find sodas and fruit drinks of every flavor imaginable, made with 2% juice from every fruit on the planet. But how many of those fruits have we eaten? How many of those flavors would we recognize in anything but soft drink form?
The other day I ate a jackfruit. It's strange to say the least, a lumpy oblong thing the size of a watermelon. Its thick but supple peel is covered in tiny round spikes, like the skin of some alien. Inside is a thick cylindrical core surrounded by oddly shaped sections about the size of an egg. My aamaa scoops these out with a large metal ladle and plops them down onto a clean plate--off white and sticky looking.
I go to put one in my mouth, but my host sister Uma squeals for me to wait. I spit it back out onto the spoon, and the whole family laughs. Giggling, Uma squeezes one of the sections open. Each one contains a hard, smooth pit the size of a ping-pong ball. Putting the fruit back in my mouth, I work the pit out with my tongue and teeth and spit it onto the plate. Uma claps her approval.
This edible part is sweet and smooth. My pallet isn't used to its subtle taste, but when I closed my eyes and concentrated I thought (or imagined) that I could detect some of the same flavor from the jackfruit Vitamin Water I used to drink back in New York. Eating the actual fruit, however, is a completely different experience. The texture is strange, gelatinous and stringy. As I slide it around my mouth thoughtfully, I wonder about what other "flavors" are like in their original form. What does a dragonfruit look like? What's an acai?
I enjoy the sorts of sweet, flavorful beverages that we have every day in the states, and, based on the popularity of coca-cola and fanta, I'm pretty sure most Nepalis do too. What concerns me is that these drinks claim association with a fruit they bare little or no resemblance to. Like parks of concrete or astro-turf, our tragedy of flavors makes believe that we are close to nature, that we've experienced the "real thing." I feel unnerved and slightly betrayed at how different a real life jackfruit is to the soda-inspired one of my imagination. But this is the true mixed blessing of travel, and perhaps the most compelling reason to do it. It shatters our illusions and assumptions, and gives us a more accurate, more complete, and, in the end, more meaningful view of the world. I can't pretend that it isn't hard or disappointing sometimes; the India of real life could never be quite as magical as the India of my imagination. Still, eggs and omelets, right? More and more I'm finding my imagination racing further and faster than it has in years, not crushed but fueled by this double edged knowledge.
My adoptive host brother Ganess brought home another jackfruit yesterday. I've been eying it in anticipation as it sits quietly in the corner of the kitchen. My aamaa promises that we'll eat it tomorrow, but I'm not sure if I can wait. The desire to taste it again, to further enrich my understanding of that one tiny aspect of the world, is a difficult one to deny. Knowledge, once tasted, is transformative. It grows in you a second stomach, one that digests experiences for the nutrients of tolerance and better judgment they contain. I feel it rumbling now. I'm hungry.
The other day I ate a jackfruit. It's strange to say the least, a lumpy oblong thing the size of a watermelon. Its thick but supple peel is covered in tiny round spikes, like the skin of some alien. Inside is a thick cylindrical core surrounded by oddly shaped sections about the size of an egg. My aamaa scoops these out with a large metal ladle and plops them down onto a clean plate--off white and sticky looking.
I go to put one in my mouth, but my host sister Uma squeals for me to wait. I spit it back out onto the spoon, and the whole family laughs. Giggling, Uma squeezes one of the sections open. Each one contains a hard, smooth pit the size of a ping-pong ball. Putting the fruit back in my mouth, I work the pit out with my tongue and teeth and spit it onto the plate. Uma claps her approval.
This edible part is sweet and smooth. My pallet isn't used to its subtle taste, but when I closed my eyes and concentrated I thought (or imagined) that I could detect some of the same flavor from the jackfruit Vitamin Water I used to drink back in New York. Eating the actual fruit, however, is a completely different experience. The texture is strange, gelatinous and stringy. As I slide it around my mouth thoughtfully, I wonder about what other "flavors" are like in their original form. What does a dragonfruit look like? What's an acai?
I enjoy the sorts of sweet, flavorful beverages that we have every day in the states, and, based on the popularity of coca-cola and fanta, I'm pretty sure most Nepalis do too. What concerns me is that these drinks claim association with a fruit they bare little or no resemblance to. Like parks of concrete or astro-turf, our tragedy of flavors makes believe that we are close to nature, that we've experienced the "real thing." I feel unnerved and slightly betrayed at how different a real life jackfruit is to the soda-inspired one of my imagination. But this is the true mixed blessing of travel, and perhaps the most compelling reason to do it. It shatters our illusions and assumptions, and gives us a more accurate, more complete, and, in the end, more meaningful view of the world. I can't pretend that it isn't hard or disappointing sometimes; the India of real life could never be quite as magical as the India of my imagination. Still, eggs and omelets, right? More and more I'm finding my imagination racing further and faster than it has in years, not crushed but fueled by this double edged knowledge.
My adoptive host brother Ganess brought home another jackfruit yesterday. I've been eying it in anticipation as it sits quietly in the corner of the kitchen. My aamaa promises that we'll eat it tomorrow, but I'm not sure if I can wait. The desire to taste it again, to further enrich my understanding of that one tiny aspect of the world, is a difficult one to deny. Knowledge, once tasted, is transformative. It grows in you a second stomach, one that digests experiences for the nutrients of tolerance and better judgment they contain. I feel it rumbling now. I'm hungry.
Onomatopoeia
Waakwaak: "About to throw up."
Rangibirangi: "Made of many colors."
Chijbij: "Stuff."
Oocus moocus: "So full I can't breath."
Gilli milli: "Many colorful lights."
Garunggurung: "Thunder."
Rangibirangi: "Made of many colors."
Chijbij: "Stuff."
Oocus moocus: "So full I can't breath."
Gilli milli: "Many colorful lights."
Garunggurung: "Thunder."
Dreamsicle
The white and orange kitten jumps into my lap. At breakfast I slip it bits of roti and a piece of onion from my omelet. Dreamsicle never purrs, but always seems to be smiling. Smiling with banana-yellow eyes.
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
V.I.P. Tailors
In Kalimpong even nice stores are holes in the wall. The upper and lower cart roads leading into town are dotted with tiny general shops and stands that people lucky enough to have a house directly on the main path have set up in lieu of a front room. Most of these sport bright signs advertising ISD, PCO, STD, Aircel and other kinds of local and international pay phones. Like the street vendors I'm so used to seeing in New York, these places all seem to sell the same things: soda and potato chips, cookies and biscuits, some local unpackaged products that aren't safe for westerners, and individually wrapped mints, soaps, and medicines that hang from the low ceiling in long dangling strands of colored plastic.
Once you get off Dikshit Road and into Kalimpong proper, however, things diversify a bit. The general shops have been replaced with pharmacies that vary in size and sketchiness (the Tibetan store is supposed to be the best) and are spaced out between restaurants, dirty looking hotels, barber shops, and dark, occult looking places filled with grimacing masks and twisted, grinning Kali figurines. But the tiniest places of all, crammed into every remaining meter of storefront space, are the tailors.
The prospect of getting cheaply tailored clothing excited me since deciding to go to India. Check the tags on any given dress shirt, and there is a fair chance it was made in India. In the States, getting a shit tailored could run you at least a hundred bucks, but here in All India, where man hours are the most abundant resource, they'll do it for two. Since the program had told us to pack light, shopping for clothes and other essentials was high on our lists of priorities. Last week we finally went, with Tanya and Bishu taking the girls off to pick out punjabis and Lalit and B.B. leading Josh, Ansel, and myself through the crowded, haphazard sidewalks to buy cloth. The store was one of the larger establishments on the main road and, like fabric stores anywhere, was filled with color. After much browsing and subsequent haggling, we got our cloth and went across the street, walking quickly to avoid the mobs of rowdy teenagers chanting their football victory at the Mela Grounds.
V.I.P. Tailors is the smallest of the tiny tailors. Every available square foot is dedicated to hanging finished clothes or tiny push-peddle sewing machines. Outside rusty square table is used by a bookie to take bets on sports unknown, the nearby wall pinned with sheets of lottery tickets and paper prayers from the last holiday. Now and then the inconspicuous bookie will reach through a hole in the store's Plexiglas window and pull a mysterious and unreadable strip of paper from a small ticker machine. Inside its dark and hot. The irregular beats of the half dozen sewing machines are punctuated by the constant thumping of a small, vicious ceiling fan hanging just a few inches above my head.
The attendant tailor measures us and asks vague questions about pockets and pleats, all the while scribbling in some arcane combination of sewing script and devanagari. His notes form strange half circles around quick, crude sketches that somehow indicate style and preferences. He cut two tiny squares out of each of our fabrics, stapling one half into his heavy, leather-bound spellbook, and other to our indecipherable yellow recite. Assuring us that our clothes would be done by the 19th, he waved us out without a smile.
I went back on the 19th. A different man glanced at my recite and shook his head. The 21st, he said. They'd be ready on the 21st.
They were ready on the 21st. I went in and a third young man took my yellow slip in a sloth-like daze. He pawed aimlessly through the racks of hanging clothes until, finally, I pointed at a thinly lined white shirt I had ordered and said, "Tyo." I this-ed and that-ed four more items which the man pulled down, along with a few others I was sure weren't mine, to compare to the little squares of material snipped off the week before. Thanking and paying, I took my stuff and left. Tailoring for three shirts and two pairs of slacks had come to a total of US$10.50.
Once you get off Dikshit Road and into Kalimpong proper, however, things diversify a bit. The general shops have been replaced with pharmacies that vary in size and sketchiness (the Tibetan store is supposed to be the best) and are spaced out between restaurants, dirty looking hotels, barber shops, and dark, occult looking places filled with grimacing masks and twisted, grinning Kali figurines. But the tiniest places of all, crammed into every remaining meter of storefront space, are the tailors.
The prospect of getting cheaply tailored clothing excited me since deciding to go to India. Check the tags on any given dress shirt, and there is a fair chance it was made in India. In the States, getting a shit tailored could run you at least a hundred bucks, but here in All India, where man hours are the most abundant resource, they'll do it for two. Since the program had told us to pack light, shopping for clothes and other essentials was high on our lists of priorities. Last week we finally went, with Tanya and Bishu taking the girls off to pick out punjabis and Lalit and B.B. leading Josh, Ansel, and myself through the crowded, haphazard sidewalks to buy cloth. The store was one of the larger establishments on the main road and, like fabric stores anywhere, was filled with color. After much browsing and subsequent haggling, we got our cloth and went across the street, walking quickly to avoid the mobs of rowdy teenagers chanting their football victory at the Mela Grounds.
V.I.P. Tailors is the smallest of the tiny tailors. Every available square foot is dedicated to hanging finished clothes or tiny push-peddle sewing machines. Outside rusty square table is used by a bookie to take bets on sports unknown, the nearby wall pinned with sheets of lottery tickets and paper prayers from the last holiday. Now and then the inconspicuous bookie will reach through a hole in the store's Plexiglas window and pull a mysterious and unreadable strip of paper from a small ticker machine. Inside its dark and hot. The irregular beats of the half dozen sewing machines are punctuated by the constant thumping of a small, vicious ceiling fan hanging just a few inches above my head.
The attendant tailor measures us and asks vague questions about pockets and pleats, all the while scribbling in some arcane combination of sewing script and devanagari. His notes form strange half circles around quick, crude sketches that somehow indicate style and preferences. He cut two tiny squares out of each of our fabrics, stapling one half into his heavy, leather-bound spellbook, and other to our indecipherable yellow recite. Assuring us that our clothes would be done by the 19th, he waved us out without a smile.
I went back on the 19th. A different man glanced at my recite and shook his head. The 21st, he said. They'd be ready on the 21st.
They were ready on the 21st. I went in and a third young man took my yellow slip in a sloth-like daze. He pawed aimlessly through the racks of hanging clothes until, finally, I pointed at a thinly lined white shirt I had ordered and said, "Tyo." I this-ed and that-ed four more items which the man pulled down, along with a few others I was sure weren't mine, to compare to the little squares of material snipped off the week before. Thanking and paying, I took my stuff and left. Tailoring for three shirts and two pairs of slacks had come to a total of US$10.50.
Sunday, August 19, 2007
Ants
This cold war just got hot. The ants finally attacked.
We've been at a standoff for days now, a grim agreement not to pursue further aggressions. They would poke around our defenses in the ceiling, and we would make forays into their territory to grab a book from the library. No formal attack had been made. Yesterday morning, however, I felt one bite me on the toe. It was a big motherfucker, the size of a lima bean. I smashed it with my notebook three times, but it just shrugged it off like it was nothing. When we got back to the room, we found them swarming out of a new hole in the ceiling, this one inside our first ring of protection. These weren't the small, tame ants from before; these were giant mutant evil ants. They crawled down towards floor, occasionally hurling themselves from the wall or ceiling onto the floor and beds with a sickeningly audible "plink." Soon they were all over everything, some carrying squirming white packages in their mouths--larva to hide in our pockets and poison our toothpaste.
I ran to Bim and got more magic chalk, but it was no use. These ants had adapted, like the Borg. When faced with a thick line of the yellow chemical dust, they just steeled themselves and rushed across. The borrowed vacuum had been returned to its owner elsewhere in the village: this time we had to Great Machine. We spent a few minutes vengefully stamping them into the carpet with our flip flops, but they were too many. Defeated, we beat a hasty retreat.
We spent the next few hours discussing various plans of action. There were spiders around that we could collect and turn loose in our room, but that seemed like it would create worse problems than it would solve. Finally, we decided that more reconnaissance was needed, poked our heads nervously into the room. They were gone. Other than a few mysterious and perfectly intact ant corpses scattered around the room--not our handiwork, I'm sure--there was no trace of their presence. I can only assume that they got what they came for.
The others cleared out the dead and laughed it off, but I'm still nervous. To leave after such a total victory doesn't seem to be in the ants' M-O. Tonight is my last night sleeping here at the program house, but I can't help but wonder what else they have in store for us or, more worryingly, what strange faction chased them away while we were gone.
Nature here isn't pretty and safe like in the states. It's loud and dangerous and in your face. It is clear to me now that humans are only here by the grace of being mostly neutral in whatever great secret war dominates the insect world. What would happen if we lost the protection of such neutrality or, worse, one side won? I don't want to think about it. For now the tides of battle seem to have shifted in our favor, and it seems wise not to push our luck.
We've been at a standoff for days now, a grim agreement not to pursue further aggressions. They would poke around our defenses in the ceiling, and we would make forays into their territory to grab a book from the library. No formal attack had been made. Yesterday morning, however, I felt one bite me on the toe. It was a big motherfucker, the size of a lima bean. I smashed it with my notebook three times, but it just shrugged it off like it was nothing. When we got back to the room, we found them swarming out of a new hole in the ceiling, this one inside our first ring of protection. These weren't the small, tame ants from before; these were giant mutant evil ants. They crawled down towards floor, occasionally hurling themselves from the wall or ceiling onto the floor and beds with a sickeningly audible "plink." Soon they were all over everything, some carrying squirming white packages in their mouths--larva to hide in our pockets and poison our toothpaste.
I ran to Bim and got more magic chalk, but it was no use. These ants had adapted, like the Borg. When faced with a thick line of the yellow chemical dust, they just steeled themselves and rushed across. The borrowed vacuum had been returned to its owner elsewhere in the village: this time we had to Great Machine. We spent a few minutes vengefully stamping them into the carpet with our flip flops, but they were too many. Defeated, we beat a hasty retreat.
We spent the next few hours discussing various plans of action. There were spiders around that we could collect and turn loose in our room, but that seemed like it would create worse problems than it would solve. Finally, we decided that more reconnaissance was needed, poked our heads nervously into the room. They were gone. Other than a few mysterious and perfectly intact ant corpses scattered around the room--not our handiwork, I'm sure--there was no trace of their presence. I can only assume that they got what they came for.
The others cleared out the dead and laughed it off, but I'm still nervous. To leave after such a total victory doesn't seem to be in the ants' M-O. Tonight is my last night sleeping here at the program house, but I can't help but wonder what else they have in store for us or, more worryingly, what strange faction chased them away while we were gone.
Nature here isn't pretty and safe like in the states. It's loud and dangerous and in your face. It is clear to me now that humans are only here by the grace of being mostly neutral in whatever great secret war dominates the insect world. What would happen if we lost the protection of such neutrality or, worse, one side won? I don't want to think about it. For now the tides of battle seem to have shifted in our favor, and it seems wise not to push our luck.
Saturday, August 18, 2007
Rain
Yesterday morning we celebrated the first day of winter, praying to Kali and the Nag snake gods to bring us good fortune with the end of the monsoon season. A few minutes later it started to rain.
A monsoon isn't just normal rain; it's the whole spectrum of wetness. Every possible combination of water and air flashes over the mountains with startling suddenness. Usually the clouds just drizzle, or sit in the air around us as a soggy mist. When it does rain, however, it pours, and within seconds the city is transformed.
For a city built on steep mountain slopes without any sewer system to speak of, water can be a problem. Every road, path, and piece of property is crisscrossed by crude aqueducts and dotted with makeshift drains that send the water spilling out buried pipes and hoses onto the next terraced level below. This is never enough, however, so the streets still flood with rivers of rushing brown water and rice paddies form a multitude of muddy waterfalls. Umbrellas are the order of the day, but they do nothing to help with the mud. Lawns that started out simply soggy quickly become treacherous sink-trapped ordeals to cross. Every time I go out I roll up my pants legs and steel myself for a squishy walk to the program house, and every time I return to my room I walk gingerly to the bathroom to wash the dirt of my feat.
We're still trying to figure out why the city doesn't simply wash away. Everything is so haphazard, it seems like only a matter of time before the whole town just tumbles down the mountain into the river below. Landslides are common. Whole neighborhoods are made inaccessible to taxis by places where the asphalt road broke and sunk down five or ten feet to create a jagged, gravelly cliff. The mountain is not made for cars.
Whatever the holidays may say, the monsoon season will continue in practice for another month or so. Glimpses of blue sky or--most glorious of all!--the sun are rare and cause for excitement. I haven't tried to wash my clothes yet, but the girls said it took theirs a week to dry. Knowledge that people have lived in monsoon regions for centuries gives me a sort of grim hope, but I still don't know quite how I'll adapt. These seasons are so strange. I'm not sure I could handle them, with the months of endless rain.
A monsoon isn't just normal rain; it's the whole spectrum of wetness. Every possible combination of water and air flashes over the mountains with startling suddenness. Usually the clouds just drizzle, or sit in the air around us as a soggy mist. When it does rain, however, it pours, and within seconds the city is transformed.
For a city built on steep mountain slopes without any sewer system to speak of, water can be a problem. Every road, path, and piece of property is crisscrossed by crude aqueducts and dotted with makeshift drains that send the water spilling out buried pipes and hoses onto the next terraced level below. This is never enough, however, so the streets still flood with rivers of rushing brown water and rice paddies form a multitude of muddy waterfalls. Umbrellas are the order of the day, but they do nothing to help with the mud. Lawns that started out simply soggy quickly become treacherous sink-trapped ordeals to cross. Every time I go out I roll up my pants legs and steel myself for a squishy walk to the program house, and every time I return to my room I walk gingerly to the bathroom to wash the dirt of my feat.
We're still trying to figure out why the city doesn't simply wash away. Everything is so haphazard, it seems like only a matter of time before the whole town just tumbles down the mountain into the river below. Landslides are common. Whole neighborhoods are made inaccessible to taxis by places where the asphalt road broke and sunk down five or ten feet to create a jagged, gravelly cliff. The mountain is not made for cars.
Whatever the holidays may say, the monsoon season will continue in practice for another month or so. Glimpses of blue sky or--most glorious of all!--the sun are rare and cause for excitement. I haven't tried to wash my clothes yet, but the girls said it took theirs a week to dry. Knowledge that people have lived in monsoon regions for centuries gives me a sort of grim hope, but I still don't know quite how I'll adapt. These seasons are so strange. I'm not sure I could handle them, with the months of endless rain.
Third Mile Temple
Everything is wet and green. The dark rocks are splotchy with mold and lichen, and the fog-shrouded distance is lined with the trunks of tall, thin trees that branch only at the top. It has been raining off and on all day, but I lost my umbrella two temples back. Not that it would help much here, where the forest canopy collects the rain into scattered spills. Picking my way down the slick, uneven steps, I'm glad for the first time today that I had decided to wear shoes for our temple tour. My paint-stained hands desperately grip the rusty handrail on my right and brush against the dirty colored Tibetan prayer flags that hang from the rail and cling to the mossy rocks. The site manager had warned us that the path was too slippery to be safe, but Prakash seemed to think we could handle it. "I grew up on mountain, so I am like mountain goat," he jokes, trotting easily down the steps.
The going is slow, but after the cramped jeep ride I'm happy to have my feet on the ground. Fifteen of us had crammed into the rickety, low ceilinged vehicle, and I had opted for the extra elbow room afforded by the backless end seat in the middle row. As we bumped along, I felt grateful for the handbar in front of me, but its presence made our ride feel too much like a roller coaster for my tastes. The jeep careened around endless switchbacks and precarious mountain roads, as if ready at any moment to hurtle off the ledge and triple, spiral loop-the-loop down into the valley below.
About half way down the path we half to stop and take off our shoes. I try not to think about the loosely bandaged gash in my left foot that I'd gotten stepping on a suitcase latch the night before. I can feel it pinch with every step, but I don't have any attention to spare it. I've been stuffed up all day, and the last couple legs of our jeep ride had shifted the gunk out of my sinuses and into my right ear. My balance is shot, so I have to watch carefully where I put my feet. Now and then I hear a squeal as sometime slips on the moist stone, followed immediately by an "I'm alright!" Comforting.
Ahead of us our guide is explaining something about how this site was discovered just a few years ago by a swimming boy. He's a strange looking man, with smooth rounded features, high cheekbones, and a prominent chin-dimple. He looks so much like the Hindu deities in the pink pastel dioramas that decorate a few of the temples we have seen. Here and there along the path are mysterious copper boxes welded into the stone. Each features a tiny, burnt looking bowl that I figure must be used to burn incense during the drier months. Small nooks will be filled with half-hearted shines, as if trying to soak up second-hand sanctity from the temple below.
More altars around the cave entrance below. Hindu shrines are like nothing in American churches. They are dirty, cluttered things, smelling of rotten fruit and buzzing with bees drawn to the flowers and milky sugar water. From outside the cave is little more than a hole in the wall. Lalit hands us his dim flashlight, and Nita lights up a tiny flickering candle. I switch on the LED on my pocketknife. Not much light. Three of us go in first, ducking blindly into the hole. I can sense stairs under my feet, but the roof isn't high enough to do more than crawl. We pick and feel our way through the short tunnel, twisting past jutting rocks with contortionist purpose. Thick, wet drops of water plop down onto my neck and scalp, causing the thumb-pressed dots of paint on my forehead to run down my nose like multi-colored mascara running form a teary third eye. The wet walls dance red in the candlelight. Ahead we hear chanting.
We sit off to the side and wait our turn, lulled into fascination by the fast, arrhythmic chanting of four orange-clad monks. My ears pick up the occasional rhyme, and unconsciously my head starts to nod, waiting for someone to drop a beat over this elaborate freestyle prayer-rap. The shrine is as messy as the ones outside, but seems somehow to have been arranged with more purpose. Yellow painted stars glimmer on the ceiling, and for a moment I forget how claustrophobic the space is. The air is hot and choked with incense. Around us the earth silently rumbles.
The three monks get up, and the priest motions the three of us down. Indicating that we should repeat, he starts to recite the puja. When he pauses we intone the words as best we can. There is something relaxing, trance like about it. The prayer speeds up, repeating with minor variations. With a practiced calm, he summons Ghanesh, then Vishnu, then Kali, then the hundred million other gods whose names I do not know. We're babbling, not really sure what we're saying. The priest lights a couple of sugary looking squares with a match and tosses them into a golden object resembling a candlestick. We reach out to touch it, and together the four of us wave the flame in circles before the altar. A moment later he is thrusting sticky balls of orange, sweet smelling rice into our hands and pressing yet another daub of caked red paint to our foreheads. We namaste and stumble out, dazed.
Outside we sit on benches and wait for the others to finish the worship. Our guide informs us that the rice balls are prasad, the jutho (saliva) of a god. Human jutho is ritually polluting, but jutho from a god is a great blessing. Unfortunately it is not hygienic for westerners to eat, so, at Prakash's suggestion, we wait until no one is looking and surreptitiously slip them into Nita's offering basket. The idea that a blessing could make you sick just wouldn't make sense to most Nepalis.
I'm a good fourth of the way up the path before I realize that my sinuses are clear and my balance restored. Grinning, I leap up the stone steps with more energy than I've felt all day. Once we're back in the jeep it fades pretty quickly, but still I feel renewed. Back at the program house I catch a short nap, dreaming of echoing tunnel chants and yellow-starred rocky skies.
The going is slow, but after the cramped jeep ride I'm happy to have my feet on the ground. Fifteen of us had crammed into the rickety, low ceilinged vehicle, and I had opted for the extra elbow room afforded by the backless end seat in the middle row. As we bumped along, I felt grateful for the handbar in front of me, but its presence made our ride feel too much like a roller coaster for my tastes. The jeep careened around endless switchbacks and precarious mountain roads, as if ready at any moment to hurtle off the ledge and triple, spiral loop-the-loop down into the valley below.
About half way down the path we half to stop and take off our shoes. I try not to think about the loosely bandaged gash in my left foot that I'd gotten stepping on a suitcase latch the night before. I can feel it pinch with every step, but I don't have any attention to spare it. I've been stuffed up all day, and the last couple legs of our jeep ride had shifted the gunk out of my sinuses and into my right ear. My balance is shot, so I have to watch carefully where I put my feet. Now and then I hear a squeal as sometime slips on the moist stone, followed immediately by an "I'm alright!" Comforting.
Ahead of us our guide is explaining something about how this site was discovered just a few years ago by a swimming boy. He's a strange looking man, with smooth rounded features, high cheekbones, and a prominent chin-dimple. He looks so much like the Hindu deities in the pink pastel dioramas that decorate a few of the temples we have seen. Here and there along the path are mysterious copper boxes welded into the stone. Each features a tiny, burnt looking bowl that I figure must be used to burn incense during the drier months. Small nooks will be filled with half-hearted shines, as if trying to soak up second-hand sanctity from the temple below.
More altars around the cave entrance below. Hindu shrines are like nothing in American churches. They are dirty, cluttered things, smelling of rotten fruit and buzzing with bees drawn to the flowers and milky sugar water. From outside the cave is little more than a hole in the wall. Lalit hands us his dim flashlight, and Nita lights up a tiny flickering candle. I switch on the LED on my pocketknife. Not much light. Three of us go in first, ducking blindly into the hole. I can sense stairs under my feet, but the roof isn't high enough to do more than crawl. We pick and feel our way through the short tunnel, twisting past jutting rocks with contortionist purpose. Thick, wet drops of water plop down onto my neck and scalp, causing the thumb-pressed dots of paint on my forehead to run down my nose like multi-colored mascara running form a teary third eye. The wet walls dance red in the candlelight. Ahead we hear chanting.
We sit off to the side and wait our turn, lulled into fascination by the fast, arrhythmic chanting of four orange-clad monks. My ears pick up the occasional rhyme, and unconsciously my head starts to nod, waiting for someone to drop a beat over this elaborate freestyle prayer-rap. The shrine is as messy as the ones outside, but seems somehow to have been arranged with more purpose. Yellow painted stars glimmer on the ceiling, and for a moment I forget how claustrophobic the space is. The air is hot and choked with incense. Around us the earth silently rumbles.
The three monks get up, and the priest motions the three of us down. Indicating that we should repeat, he starts to recite the puja. When he pauses we intone the words as best we can. There is something relaxing, trance like about it. The prayer speeds up, repeating with minor variations. With a practiced calm, he summons Ghanesh, then Vishnu, then Kali, then the hundred million other gods whose names I do not know. We're babbling, not really sure what we're saying. The priest lights a couple of sugary looking squares with a match and tosses them into a golden object resembling a candlestick. We reach out to touch it, and together the four of us wave the flame in circles before the altar. A moment later he is thrusting sticky balls of orange, sweet smelling rice into our hands and pressing yet another daub of caked red paint to our foreheads. We namaste and stumble out, dazed.
Outside we sit on benches and wait for the others to finish the worship. Our guide informs us that the rice balls are prasad, the jutho (saliva) of a god. Human jutho is ritually polluting, but jutho from a god is a great blessing. Unfortunately it is not hygienic for westerners to eat, so, at Prakash's suggestion, we wait until no one is looking and surreptitiously slip them into Nita's offering basket. The idea that a blessing could make you sick just wouldn't make sense to most Nepalis.
I'm a good fourth of the way up the path before I realize that my sinuses are clear and my balance restored. Grinning, I leap up the stone steps with more energy than I've felt all day. Once we're back in the jeep it fades pretty quickly, but still I feel renewed. Back at the program house I catch a short nap, dreaming of echoing tunnel chants and yellow-starred rocky skies.
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Taxis
Taxi drivers are the same everywhere. Here they charge by the ride, not the distance, so they are even more eager to zip and weave around mostly oblivious pedestrians and a few startled cyclists. Lacking stop signs or traffic lights, they blare the horn at every bend in the twisty, crumbling road. The streets are filled with potholes, but most drivers seem to have the rough patches memorized. Occasionally the taxi will screech to a halt to carefully crawl over a speed bump. The car stalls every time, offering a few jarring seconds of silence before the cabbie revs the engine maniacally and zooms off again.
A chartered cab is forty rupees (one dollar), but to jump in one already going in your direction is only ten. The cabs themselves are cramped boxy things with musty, mattress spring seats that lack anything resembling a safety belt. I have to hug my knees when I clamber in, but somehow we still occasionally manage to fix six passengers in a single vehicle. "Bong busty garnus," I say as I squeeze in next to Ansel. "Mountain hut?" the driver asks, seeing that we are American. We nod vigorously, and the taxi takes off. A moment later the driver stops, and a handsome young Nepali man climbs in next to us, grinning. "Mero saathi," our driver explains. "My friend." Along the way we introduce ourselves to our driver and fellow passenger. We try to use what little Nepali we know, but their English is far better. Just two dozen yards from the entrance to the program house, our driver interrupts our conversation and points out the window. "My home is here," he says happily. Apparently he lives next door.
A chartered cab is forty rupees (one dollar), but to jump in one already going in your direction is only ten. The cabs themselves are cramped boxy things with musty, mattress spring seats that lack anything resembling a safety belt. I have to hug my knees when I clamber in, but somehow we still occasionally manage to fix six passengers in a single vehicle. "Bong busty garnus," I say as I squeeze in next to Ansel. "Mountain hut?" the driver asks, seeing that we are American. We nod vigorously, and the taxi takes off. A moment later the driver stops, and a handsome young Nepali man climbs in next to us, grinning. "Mero saathi," our driver explains. "My friend." Along the way we introduce ourselves to our driver and fellow passenger. We try to use what little Nepali we know, but their English is far better. Just two dozen yards from the entrance to the program house, our driver interrupts our conversation and points out the window. "My home is here," he says happily. Apparently he lives next door.
Independence Day
Everyone has come to Kalimpong. People of all ages and dressed in all colors meander around the crowded streets. This is what they mean by "throngs"; I can barely move for stumbling over small children carrying toy AK-47s or bumping into groups of bling-clad high school kids making their way to and from the football pitch. Every time I brush against someone, I pat my pockets on instinct, but stealing doesn't seem to be in the spirit of the holiday.
Today is Indian Independence Day. After noon dal bhat I grabbed my camera and headed down towards town. The rain had stopped by the time we left, but the town is still engulfed in mist. Watching the kids slip and slide across the muddy field, I can't even see the far goal. Despite the gray, or perhaps because of it, the people seem to pop with color. Old men selling small bottles of soapy solution stand in the main square blowing streams of bubbles out of small brown pipes, while in the more twisty corners of the bazaar middle aged women push unsettlingly sharp swords at us from under yellow tarps.
Little children and drunk twenty-somethings wave at us as we pass, motioning for me to take their picture. Even cops and old women smile when they see my camera pointed in their direction. This is so different than New York, where I had to fight for every people shot. Here kids call over their friends and try to flash gang signs, chattering for just one more picture, just one more. Most move on after a few shots, but a few stop to talk. "America is my best country," says one thugged out 14-year-old when we tell him where we are from. We ask him why he doesn't feel more patriotic on his country's independence day, but he just shrugs. "America is best."
Today is Indian Independence Day. After noon dal bhat I grabbed my camera and headed down towards town. The rain had stopped by the time we left, but the town is still engulfed in mist. Watching the kids slip and slide across the muddy field, I can't even see the far goal. Despite the gray, or perhaps because of it, the people seem to pop with color. Old men selling small bottles of soapy solution stand in the main square blowing streams of bubbles out of small brown pipes, while in the more twisty corners of the bazaar middle aged women push unsettlingly sharp swords at us from under yellow tarps.
Little children and drunk twenty-somethings wave at us as we pass, motioning for me to take their picture. Even cops and old women smile when they see my camera pointed in their direction. This is so different than New York, where I had to fight for every people shot. Here kids call over their friends and try to flash gang signs, chattering for just one more picture, just one more. Most move on after a few shots, but a few stop to talk. "America is my best country," says one thugged out 14-year-old when we tell him where we are from. We ask him why he doesn't feel more patriotic on his country's independence day, but he just shrugs. "America is best."
Mottoes
School mottoes in Kalimpong:
"Love, truth, friendship."
"Strive towards excellence."
"Truth is God."
"Omnipotence."
"Love, truth, friendship."
"Strive towards excellence."
"Truth is God."
"Omnipotence."
Monday, August 13, 2007
Bugs
Hordes of ants line our ceiling in clumps of shivering black, arming for their next campaign, massing for their next attack. Their colony looks like potting soil, but writhing with horrible collective purpose over their lumpy white larve. We're pretty sure they weren't here this morning. Bim brings the vacuum to counter their invasion, but we don't get far before the power goes out. When the lights flicker back on, we suck up their whole encampment with glee, but this only seems to make them angrier. More and more swarm out of the ceiling and into the black hole doom of our great machine. Bim takes the ant-filled vacuum bag outside and pounds it happily with his fists. When we finally seem to have quelled the tide, we draw a line around the hole with special chalk, and again all around the walls of our room, just above our heads. Eventually we go to sleep putting our trust in the chemical magic of our yellowish ward. Science prevails.
Bug are everywhere. Huge spiders that spin webs that look large enough to capture small cats. Mosquitoes and wasps that dive bomb our heads and buzz sinisterly around our feet during class. We are assured that most are harmless, but we have heard stories. In the last few months, eight people were killed by the venom of tiny crawling beetles that glow like fireflies. The victims died within ten minutes. No one seems to know where this new threat came from, but demons are suspected.
Bug are everywhere. Huge spiders that spin webs that look large enough to capture small cats. Mosquitoes and wasps that dive bomb our heads and buzz sinisterly around our feet during class. We are assured that most are harmless, but we have heard stories. In the last few months, eight people were killed by the venom of tiny crawling beetles that glow like fireflies. The victims died within ten minutes. No one seems to know where this new threat came from, but demons are suspected.
Clouds
Grains of fog pour in through mud-caked windows, and by noon the clouds have encased us in a wall of dull white. There is nothing in all directions; we can't even see the next hill. As the mist moves closer, our world disappears--erased, as in a dream.
It feels so strange to have the sky so close. "Imminent" is the word. Clouds of all consistencies tumble and roll around the valley below. Every time I glance up, a different set of wispy wet titans grapple and twist through the air. I've always observed them from below, but never so intimately. When they wash over me, leaving me dew-drenched and hiding the world, I can't help but feel reverent, made small by these meteorological deities, these untouchable atmospheric gods.
It feels so strange to have the sky so close. "Imminent" is the word. Clouds of all consistencies tumble and roll around the valley below. Every time I glance up, a different set of wispy wet titans grapple and twist through the air. I've always observed them from below, but never so intimately. When they wash over me, leaving me dew-drenched and hiding the world, I can't help but feel reverent, made small by these meteorological deities, these untouchable atmospheric gods.
Language
I am bleeding words. After just a few days of language training, I find myself overflowing with new phrases, new grammar. It sinks into the creases of my mind, and flows out feeling unexpectedly natural. You can't think about it, can't try to translate; what Nepali I am managing to speak doesn't feel like something is said, it feels like something that happens. Every new part of speech I learn, I can't help but want to extrapolate, to find the whole language. It is incredible how many possibilities are unlocked by learning words as simple as "this" and "that."
Learning a language in such immersion is like drowning in deep water. A part of you is screaming, desperate for land, but deep down you know that, if you can only learn to swim quickly enough, you can not only survive but thrive.
This tongue is so beautiful, it wounds me with its acuity.
Learning a language in such immersion is like drowning in deep water. A part of you is screaming, desperate for land, but deep down you know that, if you can only learn to swim quickly enough, you can not only survive but thrive.
This tongue is so beautiful, it wounds me with its acuity.
Thursday, August 9, 2007
Color
The dusty sunlight gives the town a pastel vagueness, but color is everywhere. It tickles at my eyes and tugs at my camera lens. Oh city, your darkened alleys call to me. I shall follow soon enough.
Airports
Airports are disconcerting places. Everyone in them is uncomfortable, and only those who can make your life miserable are certain about what they should be doing. The international terminal in Bangkok is a disorientingly long mall, a little bit of 5th Avenue that repeats every hundred yards. I had to walk the length of the place to get from my arrival gate to my departure gate. All along the way Clive Owen and that guy from Lost stared out at me from huge posters, willing me to buy their colone line.
The worst was Delhi. No one around seemed to be able to help me, and a man who grabbed my bag demanded larger tip than what I reluctantly offered. Have these touts no shame? In the domestic terminal, my baggage was screened half a doezen times at half a dozen points. Apparently x-ray machines are cheaper than channelling foottraffic more efficiently. This would have only have been a minor annoyance, had I not had my two bags of film, which the security staff became more and more reluctant to check by hand the closer I got to the airplane. In the end, though, I managed to make it through the whole ordeal without exposing my precious picture tape to image killing radiation. A precious victory.
The worst was Delhi. No one around seemed to be able to help me, and a man who grabbed my bag demanded larger tip than what I reluctantly offered. Have these touts no shame? In the domestic terminal, my baggage was screened half a doezen times at half a dozen points. Apparently x-ray machines are cheaper than channelling foottraffic more efficiently. This would have only have been a minor annoyance, had I not had my two bags of film, which the security staff became more and more reluctant to check by hand the closer I got to the airplane. In the end, though, I managed to make it through the whole ordeal without exposing my precious picture tape to image killing radiation. A precious victory.
Friday, August 3, 2007
Packing
It is now two o'clock in the morning. I have been packing for more or less thirteen hours now, and I still keep finding nooks and drawers I haven't cleared out yet. I have taken to simply throwing out useful items and possibly valuable documents simply to save room. How did I ever allow myself to get so much crap? Some of these things can't possibly be mine. A pair of women's shoes, a Jewish calender from 2006, entirely too many hand towels. I suspect conspiracy.
I am drinking soggy powdered Gatorade mix out of a soup bowl. Part of me is dimly aware that this is the lowest I've sunk in a while, but I'm too busy gleefully stuffing pristine unread magazines into trash bags to care. There is something vaguely cathartic about getting rid of excess possessions so spitefully. It simultaneously shuns one's inner consumerist packrat and environmentalist snob. I secretly hope that the half-full jugs of detergent explode on the trash barge in the summer heat, or that the empty bottles of cleaning products melt and drip down through the landfill to mate with something poisonous and scientific.
In a couple days I leave for India. Feels like less. Dad called to tell me that the BBC is reporting on huge, monsoon-born floods displacing twenty million people around the region I'll be heading too. It's been thunderstorming here for five hours now, taunting me. The weather in this city can be so fucking smug sometimes.
I am drinking soggy powdered Gatorade mix out of a soup bowl. Part of me is dimly aware that this is the lowest I've sunk in a while, but I'm too busy gleefully stuffing pristine unread magazines into trash bags to care. There is something vaguely cathartic about getting rid of excess possessions so spitefully. It simultaneously shuns one's inner consumerist packrat and environmentalist snob. I secretly hope that the half-full jugs of detergent explode on the trash barge in the summer heat, or that the empty bottles of cleaning products melt and drip down through the landfill to mate with something poisonous and scientific.
In a couple days I leave for India. Feels like less. Dad called to tell me that the BBC is reporting on huge, monsoon-born floods displacing twenty million people around the region I'll be heading too. It's been thunderstorming here for five hours now, taunting me. The weather in this city can be so fucking smug sometimes.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)