[JPM Travel Journals]
INDIA and NEPAL 01
Intro to India
Holi Holy Vrindaban
The Sadhu in Taj's Shadow
Pushkar's Respite
A Sitar & a Vespa in Udaipur
The Clean-Bombing of Mumbai
Goa Beach Hippie Sighting Tours
Unequal Vision in Benares
Everest, Out the Window
Into Their Thin Air
Anna Purr Now
Within You Without You
Rishikesh Part 2
Amritsar: Bold, Gold
His Holiness of Dangerous Liasons
Delhi Visit #5
New Delhi Turns to New York
[ PHOTO ARCHIVE ]
26 June 01
Paharganj, Delhi, India.
So I'm finding myself (no pun intended) again in Delhi, this being my fifth visit, and what a wonderfully wretched place again this place is. I'm parked in a relatively decent guesthouse now in a single room with its very own bathroom (sorry no towels provided) and thankfully a passable Thai restaurant on the roof. Can I Say how refreshing it is to have a good Pad Thai after so many months without? I've been missing a few crucial things back in Boston, one of which is certainly the Thai takeout and sitdown at the Chinatown Eatery. And this brings me to my latest piece of news--
Rickshaws in Paharganj, Delhi.
Yes, this fine young man appears to be making his unfine young way back to Los Estados Unidos (ahem, America) in approximately ten days. I purchased a one way ticket from Delhi to JFK NYC this afternoon, for one week from now, and will be connecting with two nights stay in Vienna, Austria. (Anyone, Anyone?) True to my solo traveling form I've booked a flight that allows me to go somewhere I haven't seen (it was Moscow on the way here) and yet I do wonder if I shouldn't have saved such an anticipated city for a more meditative, more romantic, less rest-stopping kind of a visit. So it goes. Perhaps an opera in Vienna, some practice of my German, and the first good cup of coffee since the new year...
Not that the Paneer and the Curd and the Korma's and the Lassi are wearing thin on me. Rather, I'm coming back with a small bag full of Indian spices and cookbooks and hope to be expanding my culinary repetoire to included much of the fine delights I've been sampling and stuffing with in the last four months. Book your appointments with the chef now, Lodging in exchange for meals is possible. Bon Apetite, achaya achaya achaya!
Prior to a few days ago, I think as noted in my last entry, I was in the mountains having just briefly met the Dalai Lama in upper Dharamsala (McCleod Ganj.) From there I traveled overnight in a crooked bus to Delhi and then by A/C bus for another visit to Vrindaban (where I was during Holi in early March) for a few days. Quite sleepy and yet hot as heck there... but a very enjoyable and warm, full stay before hitching a ride with a slick uniformed driver and straight-talking Hindu business man on his way to Delhi (three hours) in an air-conditioned Tata Suma SUV auto. What a godsend. Feeling spoiled, but when its 40c/105f... even the shade is cooking, and you can only drink so much water.
Delhi is as mad as it always is. How I'll manage here for the next six nights I am not sure, but I anticipate a lot of reading and contemplation.
When the power works and the water runs that means that cold showers and spinning ceiling fans are possible, and this means that I don't get cooked by the heat and discomfort quite as much. The monsoon has officially started, the newspaper reports today; it rains a few hours a day, but this brings in some respite from the temperature. Horns, mud, beggars, sizzling street food, shining yogurt shakes, wires dangling, shopkeepers calling... My last few days in Delhi; in India. For now. Not sure when, if, I'll be back, but am pretty clear on when and where I'd like to go and where I'd return.
Benares (Varanasi), Rishikesh, and Vrindaban probably rank as my favorites, but almost anywhere in the mountains (trekking) in Nepal was an incomparable favorite to that. Second to these-- Dharamsala was lovely, yet overrun with an unlikeable bunch of culturally insensitive indulgents (no nationalities need to be spoken) and the Little Tibet that I was hoping for was perhaps too subverted by the shady merchants and wheelerdealercheaters that control the place. (Thank Buddha for the restaurants and lodges that donate all their procedes to monastaries and refugee funds! How very!)
Pushkar and Udaipur were also stand-out places. Goa was somewhat forgetable except for the kind company I spent the days with-- the beaches were crap compared to Thailand, the south pacific, or Kenyan coast. Bombay was intriguing but more on the aggravating than exciting end of things. Thinking back on colorful Rajathan.. Jaisalmer was excellent to see and taste, as was much of Rajathan-- but mostly in a passing way (a few days here and there.) I think it was really only the more auspicious, meditative locations that scored highest on the postive end of the scale (I find that everywhere in this trip has been a balance of weighing the positive with the negative, like any relationship, like any job, like any day of life.)
I do wish I'd gotten to see Kashmir, Khaujaro, Pune, Darjeeling; and more of the south of India-- Tamil Nadu in particular.
A few more words on my plans or ideas from here-- I'm anticipating a return into New York City on the 4th of July (an ironic date for an almost-expatriate) and spending a few weeks in the USA before taking care of final business and setting sail-- neigh, firing up the jets to Berlin. By late September I hope to be living in the German city I've been dreaming of for several years and from several visits. But first, I have some rounds to make in the states-- hope to see some familiar faces in Philadelphia, NYC, and Boston, and also spend a few days with my brother at his house in Maine.. and reacquaint myself with my stored Vespa and motorcycle in the New England summer country backroads.
Tomorrow its a simple haircut, some sumptious spicy meals, and perhaps a cycle-rickshaw about the city some more.
God, how I am dying to see a french film. Guess that's not very Buddhist nor focused of me-- but for some reason it just keeps coming to mind. Ah, The things we leave behind... the things we hope resume.
New Delhi Turns to New York >>
©2001 JPM. All photography and writing copyrighted.