Encounter

On a recent trip to India, I wanted the full Indian experience, so in addition to wandering through crowded markets on foot, riding in a rickshaw bicycle and tramping through endless city palaces, I at least tasted all the food put in front of me. Breakfast, my favorite meal, was easy; nothing too spicy there. After initial testing of some Masala-this and Tikka-that, I learned that the safest thing to order for lunch was a club sandwich. The Indian version comes with a fried egg inside, a welcome addition for a breakfast lover. Dinner was more dicey; even the vegetables were hot-ish land mines. And of course, cows are considered sacred in India where they wander freely on the streets so there was never any beef. As a consequence of all this foreign fair, after a few days back at home, I was dying for a good, old, American hamburger.
No one was available to join me for my hamburger, so I decided to just go it alone. I hadn’t shaved – and didn’t want to – but figured that although my whiskers are now all white, if Harrison Ford can make unshaven a fashion statement, so can I. And I’d worn my most comfortable clothes all day – an old T-shirt, a pair of soft khakis and my orange Crocs – and didn’t feel like getting gussied up. So I just threw a black sweater over my T-shirt and got out that black, soft leather jacket I bought in Turkey some years ago, the precious one I’m always afraid I’ll damage in the rain. If not now, Phil, when? I added a black baseball cap from the Chepe Railroad in Mexico and headed out, feeling vaguely sophisticated in my schlumpy, Harrison-Ford-like adventurer finery. Still, I didn’t want to go where I thought I might see anyone I knew – although the City Café has great hamburgers, it was definitely out; too country club – so I decided to try Alize (or whatever it’s now called), where I’d heard one could just sit at the bar and the hamburgers were, as they say, to die.
Although I hadn’t eaten there in years, I know the restaurant well. Tucked into a semi-grand hotel cum condominium complex, it’s been through several incarnations, each a little more down-scale than the last (and patronized less and less) until it’s now thoroughly flushed of its former haughtiness. Where the so-called socially connected once fought for the prime table opposite the entrance, where they could see who was coming and going, and be seen in return, four men in shirt-sleeves were having an animated discussion over beers and chips. The bar, which used to be marble-topped and subtly shrouded in an air of sweet success, where you might score the latest scandalous gossip or a connection to cocaine, is now just a long top of simple whitish plastic slightly embedded with flecks of mica, which give it a sparkling air of aspiration to its more glamorous past but must make it hard to keep clean. When I arrived, there were only two patrons at its long, Swoosh-shaped expanse, a man sitting near the long side of the angle and a youngish woman a couple of bar stools beyond. Both projected a subtle aura of being from someplace else, as though guests in the hotel, just in the bar, like me, for a solitary meal. An over-large TV slung from one wall was tuned to a football game and even without the sound on, was hard to miss. Underneath it, the woman bartender was busily washing glasses, bent over her work, her hair falling down around her toward the suds. I wondered how she got away with that. I took a place near the angle at the short side of the bar, far enough away from the man so that we might maintain everyone’s natural need for separation but close enough for conversation should that ensue. The bar stools were uncomfortably soft and far too low, and instead of the pose of adventurer I had so carefully assumed, I felt like Lily Tomlin in her sketch as Edith Ann, sitting in an oversized rocking chair. The bartended finally tore her attention away from her dishwashing and came over to ask me what I wanted to drink. Although I usually drink vodka on the rocks, I ordered a Bombay Sapphire gin and tonic, partly because I’d drunk them in India where they’d helped me capture a feeling of the Raj, and partly to boost my flagging sense of adventure. While the bartended moved away to create my illusion, I studied my companions at the bar.
The woman, probably in her late thirties and conventionally attractive in that on-the-road-professional way of a lady drug salesmen – she might be called Diane – in a tailored suit and rimless glasses, was eating her dinner while engrossed in her laptop, perched on the bar next to her plate. The man – let’s call him George - sitting closer to me, had a professorial air, all graying curly, with a full beard, probably in his forties, wearing a non-descript suit with a non-descript shirt, open at the collar. His cell phone was on the bar in front of him as though he was waiting for an important call and he was consulting a sheaf of papers while he nursed his martini. Years of sensitivity to what’s inside and underneath, I concluded that he had a good mind and an average body, but leg man that I am, I could see he had very good thighs. And no wedding ring. In-ter-est-ing. My drink came and I ordered my hamburger, medium please, and hold the proffered garlic aioli, a taste, and a pretension I could do without.
Since there was so little else to do, I watched the football game, but could see that George often glanced in my direction as though tempted to initiate a conversation. I quickly lost my feeling of being Edith Ann as my sense of Harrison-Ford-adventure returned. The next time he looked, I smiled. He said hello and we began to talk. I moved immediately into my Gentleman Host mode and asked him many questions. He was a biologist from Houston where he was engaged in research at the University of Texas. No, he didn’t actually perform the research, but managed a group of people who did. He was moving his whole lab to Hopkins, which had just agreed to fund his research – I was too engrossed in his twinkling eyes to understand just what kind it was.
Shortly after our conversation began, Diane joined in from the other side of him, almost as though she had been laying in wait for her opportunity to attract his attention and now that I had – or we had – broken the proverbial ice, she wanted into the pool.
George turned in her direction to respond to her smiling comments. But I wasn’t to be outdone. I asked him some more questions and he turned back to me. Then she made more comments and he turned to her, his head swiveling back and forth from one side to the other as we, in turn, engaged him. I wasn’t forceful in this competition, not wanting to be too obviously attracted to him, which I was. But I wasn’t going to give him up either. He also seemed more interested in me and she finally went back to her computer. I contemplated him more thoroughly. Could he be gay, and available? Might my evening’s adventure have a productive ending? Should I invite him home? For a drink? Or to see my etchings? I was getting way ahead of myself. But I was having fun.
George was moving here from Houston, he said, and was looking for a house to buy. He’d had trouble finding one but had seen one today that attracted him.
“What attracted you to the house?” I asked, an inane question but one that could at least keep the conversation going.
“Oh, it had a great kitchen,” he said.
“I gather you like to cook.” He wasn’t married and he liked to cook. Not a bad beginning.
“Yes,” he said. “I love it.”
We cha cha-ed some about cooking and he further explained the merits of the kitchen in an end-of-row-unit in Rogers Forge, not the neighborhood he would have chosen – he really preferred to walk to work – but a good one nonetheless. He’d made an offer on the house and in a move he said unusual to him, and vaguely worrying, he’d agreed to a $500.00 escalation over every other offer up to a certain dollar limit. I thought that a good idea. He was creative as well as attractive. My interest grew.
His food came, a breast of duck, he said, a dish he loved. I was surprised that my hamburger joint even offered a breast of duck on their menu and couldn’t imagine it being very good. But after his first bite, he declared it “perfect.” I wondered if he was truly a connoisseur, or only a poseur. Hard to tell.
At this point in my adventure, which up to now had been going well, Diane turned to him again and said, “Oh, you like the breast of duck.” She hadn’t given up after all and had just been waiting for her chance.
He turned away from me and said to her, “Oh. You had the duck, too?”
“Yes,” she said, pointing to her plate. “It was delicious.” She smiled. She had very good teeth.
Harrison Ford would never be defeated by a lady drug salesman I thought, but I didn’t know where to go from there. Luckily, George turned back to me to continue our conversation about his prospective house. I noticed that he attacked his breast of duck in true Falstaffian fashion, his right fist firmly curled around the fork that skewered the meat while he sawed away with the knife in his left hand. He shows gusto, I thought. And a touch of low rent. Not an altogether good combination.
Then my hamburger came, without the aioli, as requested, with French fries in a little wire container with a handle, like a miniature fry basket, the kind used in McDonald’s. Cute, I thought. I dug in.
“How’s your hamburger?” George asked.
“Fine,” I said. “I’ve been away for a while and when I come home, one of the first things I always want is a hamburger.”
“Yes,” he said. “An American tradition. But it can’t compete with a breast of duck.”
So, he was competitive as well. “No, I guess not,” I said. “Not in the same league.”
Then his phone rang. He picked it up from the bar and put it to his ear, looking off into the near distance behind the bar, like we all do, focused more on what he was hearing than what he was seeing. He frowned and got up from his stool and walked away, outside the bar area. Diane went back to her laptop and I concentrated on my hamburger, not the best one I’ve ever had, but serviceable.
When George returned, he was grinning. He also had good teeth. “I got it!” he said.
“You got your house?” I asked.
“Yes. They accepted my offer.” He stabbed the last few pieces of duck and ate them quickly, asking for his check at the same time, with his mouth full. Definitely not a good sign.
“Congratulations,” I said.
“Thanks. I’ve got to go and sign some papers.”
“I hope you’ll be happy in your new kitchen.”
“I’m sure I will be,” he said, sticking out his hand. “It was really nice talking with you.” And he was gone.
A few minutes later, Diane closed her laptop and rose from her place at the bar. As she walked past me on her way back to the hotel lobby, she smiled (or was it a smirk?) in a way that said it all. “Nice game,” it said. “But neither of us won, did we?”
I finished my hamburger and went home.

India Was

I had always thought of India as exotic and colorful and have wanted to go there for a long time. But it was much, much more than I had anticipated: rich in culture and history, steeped in myth and tradition, complicated, mysterious, mystical. It's past is far too complex to absorb, it's present evolving in a whirlwind too extreme to comprehend from just a short scratching of its surface. It's myriad traditions are as bewildering as the secret passageways of its palaces. And any place you might turn your camera is a composition wild with color and diversity. Even though traveling there is difficult, and getting there expensive, I'm very glad I went. I wasn't disappointed. The easiest way to summarize is to steal an idea from my friend, David, and make my own list of adjectives I think apply. India is crowded and noisy, busy, cacophanous, rude and pushy, dirty, poor, disgusting, sad and struggling, impossible, exhausting, incomprehensible, gorgeous, courteous, polite, ancient, dusty, brown, pink and orange and red and yellow and acid green, monotonous, colorless, scary, soothing, friendly and obtuse, smelly, melodious, energetic, and so much more. It's a place of extreme extremes, a genuine adventure, an experience never to be forgotten.

As I travel more - if and when I do - I'll try to keep this blog going. And maybe I'll just add some ordinary thoughts to it from time to time. Thanks for following along. And stay tuned.

March 7-8: Getting Home

Saying goodbye to India was both slow and tedious. My cold prevented me from pursuing any additional adventure in Delhi on the last day. I just stayed in bed late into the morning and then lay around the pool reading in the afternoon. After the four of us who were going home checked out of the hotel about 7:30, there was a tedious wait for new SITA personnel to come to take us to the airport but the mini-bus arrived on time and we piled in, none of us - Cesar, David, Dennis and I - felt much like talking. About fifteen minutes after we left the hotel, our guide explained that he was leaving us and someone new would meet us at the airport. The driver stopped at a light in heavy traffic and the guide simply got out and disappeared. I had visions of the driver taking us down some dark and lonely road (if such a thing exists in India) and abandoning us there, which shows just how paranoid I am when I have a bad cold goes to my head! But another man met us at the airport and helped us through the process, which wasn't easy.

Indians seem far more concerned with security at their airports than we are here. This is both a good and bad thing. Good because it instills a sense of "...well, they're really taking care of things," and bad because it takes so long to get to the plane. As usual, we had to stand in line to enter the terminal and show our passports at the door to a uniformed officer who took an inordinate amount of time looking at my picture and comparing it to my face. Although the photograph is far from flattering, there's no doubt it looks like the real me. But no humor, please; this is serious. Then, in the Bujsiness-First line, which usually moves quickly, another uniformed Continental man stopped me to check all my papers again, even before I'd reached the desk. Then came the usual check at the kiosk where the clerk told me someone would come to take me to a special security screening. When he arrived, and I asked what this was all about, he explained that I'd been especially selected for additional screening. He didn't say why. Maybe it was because my bag is now torn - could that be cause for security concern? - or because my passport is so full, or I was hiding contraband in the Kleenex I was using to blow my nose. He accompanied me to immigration where I filled out yet another form, to get out of the country, just like a form I'd filled to get in. The immigration officer checked them both carefully, kept the immigration form and stamped my boarding pass with a loud and authoritative thump and waved me on to my special security man who was waiting on the other side. Then it got a little scary. He led me around a wall and into a dimly lit office where there were several people in civilian clothes, babbling away at each other. A man at a desk motioned for me to sit down in front of him. Then he went on babbling with the man standing next to him. My companion laid some papers on the desk but the man behind it ignored him. I wondered if this was where they were going to strip search me. Partly to hide my concern, I casually glanced at the papers at the man behind the desk quickly moved them away from me and looked at me for the first time. He asked me a question I couldn't understand and when I asked him to repeat it, he looked at me in disgust and waved me away. That was it. I was happy to be on my way. But wait. Then there's the usual security check to go through. And the lines were long. My replacement knee set off the alarm, of course, and the man wanding me made me take everything out of my pockets even though I'd been careful to be sure there was no metal there. It's very humiliating to pull wads of spent Kleenex out of your pocket for all the world to see. After I was cleared, I had to wait for another security man to check my carry-on and camera case. Even though they'd already been through the usual machine, I had to open them both while someone pushed and shoved around, rummaging through the dirty underwear I'd so carefully wrapped around a marble box I was bringing home. But that was finally all complete and the guard stamped the little orange tag on each carry-on. At the gate, we had another security check - passports, boarding passes, orange tags - and just as we were about to board the plane, we had to go through the process all over again - this time taking off our shoes and the bags going yet again through yet another machine. By the time I got to the plane, I was surely secure.

Fourteen hours is a long time but I slept some, if fitfully - it's not easy to sleep on your side in a chair - and read a lot of a book called "A Princess Remembers" about the life of the last Maharana of Jaipur whose father, brother and husband were all maharajahs. She lived a priviledged life during the Raj and was very involved in politics after. I found her story fascinating. And then we were in Newark, where David and Dennis got their luggage immediately but mine was almost the last to arrive on the belt. While I was waiting, I had visions of it stuck in that dim office back in the Indira Gandhi Airport and having to cope with the lost baggage office and going to BWI to claim it when it might finally arrive. But it came, we breezed through customs, said a hugging goodbye to Dennis who was off to Cleveland and took a cab to Penn Station in Newark where we waited for the first train to Baltimore, which finally arrived amid much very early morning rush hour confusion at 5:45 AM. There were no double seats available on the quiet car so David and I were separated and I finished my book just as we pulled into Penn Station in Baltimore about 8:00 AM. As usual, I couldn't find the keys to the house so I had to drag myself around to the front to retrieve the outside key before I could get in.

I don't know why my house always looks smaller when I return home. Perhaps it's because I've been in the wide, wide world. It was also cold - I'd turned the temperature down to 55 while I was away. I was too wired to sleep (and didn't want to) so I set about with unpacking, laundry and all the usual chores one has to face after a long trip. I was fine until about two, when I got dizzy, couldn't think, and just had to collapse in bed.

Despite taking melatonin, jet lag drags me into bed about 8:30 at night - early even for me - and I sleep in segments of about an hour and a half each, waking up from some strange dream and trying to then go back to sleep. Last night (Tuesday), in the first one, I was covered with brown insects that although didn't hurt were sucking my blood, like leeches, and I was desparate to brush them off me. In the second segment, I was going to war with an Indian general, all tarted up in a Nazi-shaped helmet with a swastika on the side - the swastika is also an old Indian symbol of purity and life - and glitzy golden fringed epaulets, his face colored as for Holi. And in the final dream, I had received an order for 10,000 chairs and while I was delighted with the volume, I had no idea how we could produce so many chairs in so little time. After that, and even though it was only 3:30, I decided it was time to get up and work on this blog.

I'll write one more piece before I end this saga. So if you're still with me, stay tuned.

March 7: Winding Down

I was sorry to leave the lovely Water Palace Hotel in Udaipur: such a lovely setting and beautiful surroundings, such great service, such lavish attention. But it was time to move on, back to Delhi. Among other things, Udaipur is known as a city that has fostered the arts and because we had the time (and I suspect, as always, that our guide receives a commission on anything bought), we stopped at an art school where there was a demonstration of grinding minerals to make pigment, mixing that with sap and water and then applying the paint with brushes made from the eyelashes of camels. So romantic! The paintings were lovely in that ornate and extra fine way of so much art from this part of the world – my uncle was stationed in then-Persia during the Second World War and brought home many paintings on ivory – some of it on bone or marble so transparent that the light showed through. Although I valued the work, it isn’t my kind of art. I was more interested in the carved marble boxes and bought yet another box for my burgeoning collection.
Security at the airports here is very tight. One has to show a passport just to enter the terminal. Then there are several more security checks along the way to the plane, including a final showing of the passed hand luggage just before entering. The flight was routine and, thankfully, short. I always seem to be squeezed into a middle seat between two much larger travelers where the etiquette of sharing the armrest is uncertain or, more likely, first come, first served.
On the way in from the airport, Anil (who was still with us) got a cell phone call from William, the teacher of cinema from Houston, who was connecting directly to his plane back home. Anil thought he had managed everything for William and that he was safely on his way but William called to say he’d lost a briefcase. Some little time was spent on trying to solve this problem but the briefcase was finally found, there on the ground, where William had dropped it, an object so loaded today with terrorist possibilities that no one had picked it up. Poor William. So frail and delicate. I hope he made it home safely.
I was happy to make it to the hotel where due to a terrible cold, I couldn’t wait to lie down for a while. David and I had arranged to meet Shiba and Bobby Singh, friends of the Rosens, who were taking us for dinner. We sat in the lobby for over an hour, missing their message that they would be late. No matter. There was a wedding reception in the hotel and as we were waiting, we got a great view of the guests entering the lobby for the festivities. The women were dressed (mostly) in beautiful and colorful saris, many of them encrusted with stones, some so heavy that the wearer had to hold it up with both hands in order to walk. Most of the women were very chic, carefully made up and suavely groomed. Although I was tempted, as always, to take photographs, I thought it impolite so will have to only remember in my mind this beautiful parade.
Shiba and Bobby took us to Le Meridian Hotel, owned, as I understood it, by Bobby’s family. Shiba suggested that we have dinner in an Indian-fusion restaurant and not knowing exactly what Indian-fusion meant, how could we demur? I suggested that Shiba order for us and although she tried to tone down the spice, it was still a pretty hot meal. We had an interesting conversation about their family and their lives and learned something about Sikhism, their religion.
As our group scattered for their various flights back home, it was sad saying goodbye. We’ve been a mostly cohesive group, with no standout complainers, no one seeking too much attention, no fights. And we’ve made some new friends, particularly Ron and Chad who live in DC and who I’m sure David and I will see again.
I’m nursing my cold today and will stay around the hotel, relaxing, until we leave at about 8 PM for the airport and our scheduled 11:30 flight to Newark. When I finally get home, I’ll probably write a summary of the trip, which has not been a holiday but rather a rich and challenging experience. Stay tuned.

March 5: Another Day, Another Temple

It’s now 6:15 on the morning of Saturday, March 6, and I’m in my lovely room at the Water Palace Hotel in Undaipur, using a laptop provided by the hotel for all guests who want to use the Internet. Unlike most hotels, the Water Palace has no business center but is wired instead for Wi-Fi, which means I can use the computer in my room instead of out in some public room where the birds are already chattering away, which although romantic, is distracting to thought. This is our last official tour day. We fly back to Delhi this afternoon and many on the tour go immediately home from there. Dennis and David and I are booked into the Taj Hotel in Delhi for tonight and leave very late tomorrow night (11:30) for our flight back to Newark.
We had a choice yesterday of going on a tour to a famous Jain temple or having free time. David and I chose the temple tour despite its being at least three hours there and three hours back. Dennis hasn’t been feeling well – like so many others, just getting over his serious bout of Delhi Belly – so decided to pass on the tour and spent some leisure time shopping with Bob and lounging around the pool here.
Gandhi said that if you wanted to know India, you had to go into the countryside and visit the villages. So, our trip was an opportunity I didn’t want to miss. Most of the land is now brown and dusty, waiting patiently for the monsoon rains in July, August and September that will turn them almost overnight into luscious, green fertility. In the background are the mountains, misty purple and mauve, and the blue, blue sky, an unusual combination that, once you’re used to it, seems lovely. We drove through many villages where we were observed with some curiosity, a bus, with white faces peering out through the windows and many flashing cameras. We passed endless opportunities for great pictures, mostly of women in brightly colored saris, their orange or red or brilliant yellow standing out dramatically against the drab background. We stopped a couple of times, once at an ancient waterwheel where two oxen were turning the mechanism that brings the water up from a deep well and women where collecting the water in burnished aluminum pots. The wear of their lives showed on their faces and for a few rupees – ten or less, about a twenty cents in US dollars – you could get a great Betty-Rosen-type photograph. I couldn’t help wondering, as I have before here, what they thought of us, Americans from the big bus with their expensive cameras forcing their way into those rustic lives. Yesterday was also the last day of Holi (celebrated for a week) and in the countryside, the last day is special for children, who build a blockade across the road with rocks and charge a few rupees to remove enough rocks for the bus to pass. As we approached each one – some only a few yards from the last one – the children would jump up and down with glee at stopping such an imposing vehicle. Their faces were often painted blue or purple (apparently the most popular colors) and they crowded around the bus with their hands out, smiling for their five rupees, delivered by the bus driver or his assistant. This scenario provided many opportunities for photographs and, since I subscribe to the maxim that to take great pictures you have only to take a lot of them, I took many.
Jainism is a branch of the Hinduism that eschews ornamentation. Its followers wouldn’t kill even a mosquito (which wouldn’t do for me) and are strict vegetarians who won’t even eat anything that has to be pulled from the ground on the idea that by doing so, one “kills” the entity. Some extreme Jain priests even go completely naked to show their distain for the adornments of the world. It seems therefore seems contradictory that their Adinath Temple at Ranakpur is so incredibly luxurious. Nestled deep in the back country, hidden, as it were, from the temptations of the “other” world, the temple dates from about 1432 and so far as archeologists can tell, took 2000 people more than 67 years to build. Under its central dome sit four statues of their deity in lotus position, each facing a different direction their marble visages startlingly adorned with black eyes surrounded by shiny mica-like whites. In their hands is evidence of homage – usually brightly colored flowers – paid by pilgrims who must wear only white to visit the temple. Sadly, for it would have made a great picture, we were not allowed to take photographs of the deity. Surrounding the central dome are many other domes and the whole structure is supported by 1400 massive marble columns each heavily carved and no two alike. The whole effect is an enlightened gray, punctuated by tourists – many of them Indians – in bright colors, which makes for great photography. The complex also has a dormitory, kitchen and eating space where pilgrims can come and stay for a few days at no cost. We watched as many of them – some obviously European/American – washed themselves and their clothes, and those of us who needed “facilities” (as they call it here) used their toilets, simple holes in the marble where one squats to relieve oneself. I passed. (Desperate for relief one day on a tour in Turkey, I had to use one of these “facilities” and unable to squat because of a faulty knee, I had a terrible time “performing.” Never again!) The temple was lost to the jungle for many years and was only rediscovered, like Machu Picchu, in 1932. Since then, many millions of rupees have been spent on its restoration. Much of this came from the Jain community, which although constituting less than one percent of the Indian population, is responsible for more than 40% of the Indian economy through banking and business.
On the long ride back, we had many more encounters with kids – school was now out – and they threatened to throw paint on the bus if we didn’t pay their ransom. Our guide told us that even though there are only 365 days in the year, India celebrates more than 450 festivals. Every day is something. Menash was also quite pleased with himself, telling us almost immediately that he had once been the guide for Madonna and Guy Ritchie when they came to Udaipur with their three children, two secretaries and two Israeli bodyguards. He also told us that to drive in India, you need three things: a good horn, good brakes, and good luck. I believe him.
Back in Udaipur, where the streets seemed less crowded than in other cities but still sprinkled with heaps of garbage and trash, I was reminded of a story about a Maharana, who when in London, visited a Rolls Royce showroom. He was offended when salesman told him that such a car was more than a “cup of tea.” The Maharana instructed his aide to buy all the cars the showroom had in stock – there were three – and he had them shipped back to Udaipur where he had their tops cut off and used them to collect garbage. When the British representative in Udaipur reported to London what the Maharana had done, Rolls Royce offered to buy the three cars back but the Maharana wouldn’t sell, insisting on using one of the most lauded symbols of British snobbery for the good of his people.
After a shower and a short rest, we gathered for our farewell dinner. I learned there that John and Tom had succumbed to Delhi Belly – even Anil was sick – making me the only one (so far; knock on this beautiful horn-inlaid desk where I’m working) not to have gotten sick. Dinner was at an open-air restaurant where we had Indian music, wailing away, and four dancers in traditional costume, performing traditional dances: put another pot on the head and see if she can still balance the load; how about pots with flames coming out of their tops; swing around until you’re dizzy. Near the end of the performance, we were invited to join in the dancing and one of us – meek, quiet John from Denver – went wild, gyrating madly all over the grass to the obvious displeasure of the girls who found it impossible to integrate him into their act. It was very funny. We enjoyed – I use the word loosely, since many stomachs are still tender – a combination of Indian dishes and there was a fireworks display that made me quite dizzy, straining my head back to fill my ever present need for just one more photograph.
Taking the boat back to the Water Palace was a memorable experience. There was a huge party going on at the other water palace, one that can be rented for such occasions, and it was all lighted up like an ocean liner at night, with loud music pounding across the water. The party was thrown by an American medical company (who else?) and must have cost a real bundle. (I hope they’re making a profit.) From our launch, low in the water and moving slowly, we could enjoy the view of the City Palace, all lit up on the embankment, its reflection making the water appear a burnished copper, and our own hotel, a mirage in the middle of the lake. Ron, who was sitting next to me, said he’d really like to come back and spend some time at the hotel but we agreed that a taste was probably better remembered than a whole meal.
Back at the hotel, we were welcomed by the ever-present major domo who always seems to favor helping me up the many red-carpeted steps to the lobby, and by the clerk who took my room key out of a slotted drawer and laid it on a tray for presentation to me. I thought that a typically glamorous touch to the degree of service here. And I noticed, for the first time, that even the bathroom scales are covered with a worked crewel cozy.
We’re here until noon when we check out for a flight to Delhi, a night at the Taj there, dinner with the Singhs, and the horrors of getting through an Indian airport and its security for the flight back home. I may – or I may not – send another post from there. Stay tuned.

Today, another temple

I’m not sure where the expression came from but at least in this case, the best was saved for last. Yesterday (Thursday) we flew from Jaipur to Udaipur early in the morning. Security here at airports is extremely tight. You can’t get into the airport building without your passport. Then you hang a tag on your hand luggage that has to be stamped, along with your boarding pass, once you’ve passed through security. Then, at the gate, the bags are checked again, to be sure they have the security stamp. Planes are old, the stewardesses impolite, the flights are late, the terminals dirty. You try to ignore all that in anticipation of getting to your destination.
Udaipur, a small city of only 150,000, is the capital of the state of Rajasthan. Because of several lakes – all manmade – the city is known as the Venice of India. It has spectacular sunrises and sunsets and is a favorite honeymoon destination. The city was founded in 1159 by Maharana Udai Singh, who was known as a great warrior. It is said that it’s defenders would rather die than surrender and the women of such warriors would commit suicide rather than be captured. Unlike other Hindu kings, the Maharanas of Undaipur never married a daughter to a Mogul emperor and so are known for their independence and are considered the first among equals. The royal, Mewar (Maharana) family is among the oldest in the world and can trace its family tree back 76 generations to the year 569.The city looks like any other Indian city we’ve been in except not so crowded and it does have an air of some prosperity.
We are staying here at the Lake Palace Hotel, world famous for its location in the middle of the main city lake, Lake Pechola. To get to the hotel, one passes through security at the embankment and then boards a boat that shuttles back and forth from shore to the hotel. We were greeted in grand tradition by a uniformed doorman who met us at the dock with a ceremonial umbrella. He accompanied us up the red carpeted steps to the hotel lobby and as we approached, we were showered with rose petals from the storey above the hotel entrance. Inside, we all were honored with the traditional bindi spot on our foreheads and slumped down in the sumptuous lobby where we were served glasses of watermelon juice while we waited for our rooms. It was all very low-key-grand.
The hotel is one of two on the lake, both originally built as summer palaces for the Maharanas, and still owned by the Mewar family. It’s probably the most beautiful hotel I’ve seen. Although substantial renovated by the Taj hotel chain in the 1960’s, the main spaces are still elaborate in the Maharana tradition: sleek fabrics, many pillows, marble everywhere and room borders outlined in embedded strips of colored glass. My room is furnished in a strange (but elaborate) combination I might call Edwardian/Indian, with a built in window seat, many pillows, lamp shades with glass-ball fringe, furniture with horn inlays and marble floors. It’s the only hotel where I have been presented with a pillow and quilt menu: contoured cervical, micro-fibre, natural wool, natural lamb’s wool, aromatherapy, down, shredded foam – take your pick.
At check in, I received a message that the event planner to the court of the Maharana had called and wanted to get in touch with me. (My friends, the Fords, in Baltimore, had tried to arrange an introduction for me with the Maharana, who is a friend of theirs.)The hotel called her back and after some delay, I finally spoke with her. She insisted that our whole group attend a reception in the City Palace for the inauguration of a collection of textiles designed by the Maharana’s daughter, the Princess Mala (as she is familiarly known). The collection was dedicated to her father, the Maharana, and he would attend as a guest of honor. I could meet him then. By the time we got to the reception, held in a rather small space in a shop in the City Palace, we were all very tired and so we didn’t stay long. The reception was intended to sell these fabrics, many of them very beautiful, and Jodi, the event planner and my contact, insisted I buy something. It was not an intimate affair but more of a presentation and elaborate sales pitch. We left before the Maharana arrived (if he ever did) but I met the princess and she was kind enough to pose for a photograph with me. (Her diamond earrings were at least a half inch in diameter).
Before the reception, our outing for the day was a tour through the City Palace, a complex that includes five palaces built by the Maharanas through the years and all interconnected. The rooms were small, the passageways tiny (for security) and there were many steps and levels. The spaces were interesting and I took many pictures but by the time we finished, I was thoroughly beat and ready to go back to the hotel. But the combination of luxuries, both in the City Palace and in the hotel, has certainly made this (near) end the best,
Now for some miscellaneous thoughts and observations. Out of the group of 18 on the tour, only John and Tom and I have avoided Delhi belly. I’m not sure why. I’ve tried to be careful about what I eat and although I’ve sampled Indian cuisine, much of it really good and not too spicy, I’ve not gone overboard. The moderation may have paid off. And it’s only Friday; I suppose there’s still time for me to join those who take home their illness as a memory of this trip. Chad will certainly have a unique souvenir. Yesterday, while we were getting luggage from the bus, he scrapped his forehead on the compartment door and cut a gash about three inches long. It bled profusely. John, the plastic surgeon, treated the wound and Chad, good sport that he is, just took it all in stride. He said a scar across his forehead this late in his life didn’t worry him at all. He’d given up vanity. Back in Ranthambhore, David lost one of his hearing aids, an investment he’d just made a month or so ago. Fortunately, he’d dropped it in the bus and it rolled forward, where Anil found it. David was relieved and thrilled. William is elusive. He doesn’t seem to want to participate in our activities, often staying behind in our hotel while we make a jaunt to yet another palace or temple. Mark, the anesthesiologist from New York, seemed really nice when I first me him but has since made some comments that were weird, making me understand that I don’t really know him at all. Dennis has been uncharacteristically detached and quiet. Something may be bothering him. Or maybe he’s still feeling the effects of being sick (which is also uncharacteristic of him). And yesterday, I had a scotoma, a brilliant spot in my field of vision that vibrates in rapidly moving jagged lines and grows until it affects the whole eye. Since I’ve had these before – although not often – I wasn’t unduly alarmed and it wore off and disappeared after about an hour.
India is a country of extremes. At one end, there’s the opulence of this hotel, representative of a time when money was not an object. At the other end, there’s the cripple on the street who holds out his hand for a few precious rupees. It’s also mostly drab and gray but punctuated by the intense color of a sari or luscious bougainvillea. India is crowded and pushy, everyone trying to get into that very small space that might provide an advantage. And yet the people are mostly modest and accepting and friendly. And India is obviously very old, even ancient, its bloodlines deep and endless. I’m very glad I decided (at the very last moment) to come here. And at the same time, I’ll be equally glad to get home.
Today we’re off to a Jain temple. The bus ride is predicted to be three hours each way. Stay tuned.

I'm Tired and Dusty

It’s now Wednesday, March 3, if my calculations are correct. I’ve been in a whirlwind of activity and one of the only ways to keep accurate track of the time is to consult my weekly pill container to see which days are empty and which are still full. The last couple of places we were had no Internet connection. Hence my delay. Now, days later, despite my hasty notes as we progressed, I’m sure I won’t get it all correct. No matter. I’ll just do the best I can.
Let’s see. I guess I left you all in Agra after a day at the Taj Mahal, et al. Late in the day, we stopped at one of those shopping places where I’m sure your guide receives a cut on anything one buys. The boys from Lexington, Kentucky, bought two rugs, about six feet square and encrusted with semi-precious stones. Tom said they were for their cabin by the lake. They were $8,000 each, representing a nice commission for Anil, our guide, who steered us there. Some cabin! The only other noteworthy happening was notice by our guide to Dennis that his email account had been breached. One of his sisters had tried to email him and found something peculiar. She phoned the tour office and they emailed our guide. Investigation revealed that the hackers had sent a message to his entire mail list saying that he had been robbed in London and needed funds wired to a certain place so he could return home. It took a while for him to straighten that all out. At dinner that night, I had a nice conversation about movies with William, who teaches a course in the history of cinema at the University of Houston. You might like to know that CASABLANCA is not his favorite movie. He prefers SNOW WHITE where, he says, one identifies with the heroine but falls in love with the prince.
At the end of this day, I was very tired and it occurred to me that his may have to be my last trip this arduous. Walking and climbing steps and getting off and on the bus and being ever vigilant for that perfect photograph has worn me out. Maybe my cruise as a gentleman host was not so bad.
Sunday, February 28: Agra to Ranthambhore to stay in the hunting lodge of the late Maharajah of Jaipur and visit Ranthambhore National Park, which used to be the private reserve of the maharajah. Along the way, we drove to Fatehpursiki, a city founded by Akbar, the third Mogul emperor and son of Humayun, whose tomb we had already seen. The palace and town was built from 1569 to 1575 and later abandoned. It’s now a World Heritage Site. Although not well-educated, Akbar was a very prosperous and clever emperor who tried to bring all the best of many traditional religions together under one faith, something like Akenaton, in Egypt, before him. He founded his capital where he did because of a priest who lived there. He had three wives: one was Hindu, one Muslim and one even Portuguese, combinations that “married” him to many powers in his world (at about the same time in history that Elizabeth I was avoiding marriage for much the same reason). The site is magnificent, all dry construction and far too complicated to describe. You’ll just have to see the pictures.
On the way to the train to take us to Ranthambhore, we stopped for lunch at a mansion from the days of the Raj, a place called Laxmivilas, that has been turned into a hotel. At the sight of food, David got sick and, along with several others in our group, spent the lunchtime in the lobby of the hotel in what we laughingly referred to as the fainting room. Something about the bacon at breakfast we think.
The train ride to Ranthembhore didn’t improve anyone’s stomach. The trains are dirty and the stations common places for vendors and beggars who tear at your heart with their infirmities and their pleading eyes. Often, a mother will be carrying a small child who holds out his hand for a few rupees. Or the deformed beggar on a make-shift platform on roller skates will move up to you and tug on your pant leg. It’s quite wrenching but we’ve been told to ignore them or they will just persist. And if you give them anything, more will flock to you to ask for the same thing. It’s one of the qualities of India that detracts from its charm.
Built in the early 1930’s, the hunting lodge is all art deco in feeling, with round lines and ridges and a verandah overlooking a croquet court. There was a billiards room and a library and a paneled dining room. One could easily imagine being Claudette Colbert or Clark Gable, guests of the Maharajah. I got lucky and drew the Maharani’s suite, all marble floors, a sitting room and a huge bathroom big enough for a cocktail party. The lights went out several times but that didn’t seem to matter.
Monday, March 1. We made our first, early morning foray into the national forest in search of the elusive tiger, the main object of being at this location. There are only about 1400 tigers left in India; 41 of them are in this national park. But the park encompasses 151 square miles so trying to find a tiger in this dry jungle is like looking for the proverbial needle. Finally, coming down off a steep ridge, someone spotted a striped object off in the distance and it was a tiger, taking a dump. Not very majestic, but seeing is seeing. I tried to get a photograph but it wasn’t easy. It’s surprising how well the animals are camouflaged to blend in with their surroundings. Later in the day, we went out again, this time not so successfully. But we saw many deer, of several kinds, and many birds, some of which would come right up to light on your hand. I have a great picture of one on Don’s hat. Sitting at a watering hole, watching the animals feed before dusk and hoping (I guess) for a tiger to come out of the jungle for a kill was somehow very spiritual. Like being in the bush in Africa, I found it calming and eternal, natural, a connection to all that is.
Monday was the holiday called Holi, a celebration of friendship and the richness of the harvest. It’s a time when people drink too much and (oddly) throw colored powder or paint on each other. We saw many people with pink faces and smeared clothes. Anil told us that sometimes the paints used last for months. He and Puram organized a little Holi celebration for all of us by giving us a Nehru outfit of cheap cotton and inviting us out on the lawn to smear powered color all over each other. It was silly, but fun, and we all got into it. The before and after pictures are priceless.
By this time, more than half of us were sick. Even Dennis, who can eat and drink anything, fell prey to this bug and spent the day in bed. Andrew, our HE guide, said he’d never had this kind of sickness in India. Fortunately (knock on wood) I’m one of the lucky few who have remained unscathed.
Tuesday, March 2, we said goodbye to Hollywood and moved on to Jaipur, a city of two million, built about 1787 by the Maharajah of Jaipur and laid out by his architect in wide boulevards and, unlike other places we’ve (I’ve) been, in straight lines. What a relief after the winding narrows of other old cities. Jaipur is called the Pink City because in 1883, when Prince Albert Edward, the British crown prince, was to make an official visit to the city, the Maharajah wanted to show special courtesy to the British crown, and so ordered that all the buildings in the city be painted pink, the color used at the time on maps to denote British colonies. The tradition remains. The effect is startling. After checking in at one of the six palaces still owned by the royal family (but now leased to the Taj hotel chain), we visited a textile mill, which was really a showroom/shop for printed fabrics. After being in the textile business, I found all this quite interesting. And of course, the guys bought lots of scarves, bedspreads, etc. We came back to the hotel looking like a caravan.
Wednesday, March 3 and I’m getting up to date. Hooray! Today we went to Amber, the traditional seat of the Maharajah of Jaipur. The “fort,” as it is called, is spectacular. Built high on a ridge, it looks a little like Lhasa and is actually a fort and palace. We all took elephants up the steep incline to the entrance to the fort, with mahouts commenting so that we would smile so the photographers lining the route could get a good picture (we were expected to buy at the end of our tour). Again, a description of the inside would be pointless. It’s too grand and immense to capture in words. The views of the inside, and the valley the fort commands outside, were incredible. Like much of India, that’s the only word that accurately captures the feeling.
Anile has wanted us to get the real feel of India so we left the cocoon of our bus to walk the streets in the spice market. The sounds and smells, the crowded cacophony of it all was almost overwhelming. I got lots of great shots but the camera gets heavy and I was very tired by the time we got back to the hotel.
On the way back, we stopped at the Observatory, constructed by the Maharajah in about 1787. It’s an outdoors place where there are many kinds of sundial/type constructs that tell time, the phase of the moon, astrological signs and other time/space oriented facts. It was quite advanced for its time and I couldn’t help but wonder how all these renaissances in the arts and science happened in so many places in the world at approximately the same time. Was mankind just entering a new phase? And if so, what caused it?
After the observatory, we toured the City Palace, the current home of the current Maharajah. We didn’t go into his living quarters, of course, but entered many spaces – the open courts, the pillared pavilions – traditional to these “forts.” In one space, the place where the maharajah conducted his audiences, the walls were carved and embedded with concave mirrors so the whole place would be dazzling in the eyes of those who attended. We also saw the two largest silver containers in the world, huge jugs that contained water from the Ganges, and carried by the maharajah when he first left the country for an official visit to England. What one can do when money is no object!
India has worn me out. I’m tired and dusty. And I haven’t been very articulate in this account. My apologies. Tomorrow it’s on to Udaipur. Anil says he’s leaving the best ‘til last. We’ll see. Stay tuned.