So!

Rumtek, the town and monastery, are really nice and peaceful. You can generally walk down to the cafe and see a couple of Buddhist monks or locals playing caramboc, a sort of shuffleboard/pool thing. Some of them were really good at it- I remember one who, if he got to break, could sink two simultaneously into opposite corners. It doesn't really feel like you're in India, partly because of the cold and partly because nobody looks Indian, but rather Tibetan or Nepali.

Buddhist monks, at least the ones we met, are really not the serious solemn type they're made out to be. We ended up playing soccer with them on a plateau on the side of a mountain, which was fun but not as smooth as it sounds, because the thing about being on top of a mountain is that everywhere you go is down. They tried as best they could to make it sort of like a skateboard park, with a quarter-pipe all around, but two of the corners open onto a downwards slope that goes quite a ways down and can stop the game for a couple of minutes if someone kicks the ball down there by mistake.

Apart from that the game was great. Apparently they keep playing all day because all week they study and meditate, and that was the day their exams ended.

Now we're back in Gangtok, the capital of Sikkim, and about to head off to Kathmandu in Nepal. It's going to be cold, which is a nice change from the rest of India.

-Bashu

P.S. For some reason most of the girls here are realtors.

So I guess we're in the Himalayas now.

The train from Kolkata was unique. They have these pretty neat sleeper bunks, which fold out and all, and cha-wallas (tea sellers) and such coming by all the time. We arrived in Siliguri eight in the morning, and took a rumbly bump jeep to Gangtok, in Sikkim Province. It's sort of the place. Cold, but welcomely so.

Left our camera in the jeep, but we'll get it back soon I think, knock on wood. So....

I'm going to Nepal, see you guys later.

Oh, and Zaman has something to tell you.

So! Schedule!

First off, we're heading North. Darjeeling maybe, Sikkim perhaps. They're both a good sight cooler than West Bengal which is where we are, so that'll be welcome. We're almost definitely heading into mountain-ranged Nepal, to Kathmandu, because as long as you're up here it's worth going. You need a visa, however, and they only take U.S. dollars, so that was a bit tricky. However it looks like things are looking up for us, as apparently Kolkata is actually the worst of the cities, and everything else will be nice by comparison. Four weeks it will be, with us going northwest as well, and then returning for the 23rd of November to Kolkata for my cousin Dola's wedding which promises to be a big happy affair.

After that, we're going all around, but staying in the north. Varanasi, New Delhi and Rajasthan are all on the schedule, with my dad joining us in New Delhi. Originally we were planning to go to Iran, but it seems he's only allowed to go once a year and the Persian new year starts in March. You can never plan for everything.

Kian's got his bass, and it's really nice. We've been printing out tons of tabs and I've even been learning a bit of guitar, although generally I sing. My fingers are itching for a piano, but for now I'll settle for my harmonica although you can't accompany yourself singing or anyone else for that matter.

Anyhow, this all just so you know where we'll be and perhaps why we don't have any Internet connection, although you never know where you can find an Internet cafe.

-Bashu.

I've noticed something funny about the scene in India, and indeed Dubai and Switzerland too. Pretty much the only way to be cool is to be Western. All the ads show people in leather jackets, buttoned shirts, jeans, whatever, and most everyone under thirty tries to dress the same way. We were at a club to watch a blues band on Saturday night, and I wore my kurti, which is a loose Indian shirt. I'm positive I was the only person wearing any Indian clothes there. It takes all types to make a world, the saying goes, but soon it's only going to need one - the generic American cool dude.

Anything with English words on it is also in. Pointy case, the shirt I got in Dubai, which I promised to tell you about. It's half black, half white, split down the middle, and is covered with badly translated ranting about how teenagers aren't respected and how revolution is imminent. Along the sides are printed newspaper clippings about gangsters or revolution or something, and it's completed with spots of blood across the front. I figure it's stylish just for the kitsch factor.

I have to say, I'm kind of homesick. Friendsick, too. I keep thinking: "If *friend* was here, he'd probably say something like *friend's generic phrase* right now. Oh well. I think I can make it through three more months, easy.

-
Bashu

Well, I suppose today is supposed to be unlucky.

It's been pretty good so far.

Zaman and Ryan ordered a guitar each in a little shop in Howrah, but when we came back to pick them up yesterday they were acoustic electrics with round holes, and one was blank grey and the other was pinkish red. They weren't terrible guitars, but they'd both ordered natural wood colour, acoustic guitars with f-holes. So after a certain amount of wombling around, he told us to meet him in College Street in the morning to see his supplier.

We went there this morning, in rain you could cut with a knife, and after some wombling with them they brought out two great-looking guitars, just like the ones ordered. (One was made by "Givson" and the other by "Hovner", but apparently they're pretty big brands so Gibson and Hohner probably already know). Zaman and Ryan also ordered hard shell cases, so they'll probably be brought home, and Kian ordered an acoustic bass. After that, we went off to the planetarium in another bout of rain, and sat through a decent light show with terrible commentary by a lady with an thick accent and a sore throat. You might think all the rain is bad luck, but believe me in Kolkata you're willing to overlook the soaked hair and flooded streets for the cool air and clean city afterwards.

I'm just sitting in the slow-as-dried-up-mustard internet cafe, printing out some guitar tabs - Decemberists, Marcy Playground and Radiohead. It might be raining again outside, but it's hard to tell through the tinted windows. YIPPEE!

Also, now is the time for you start emailing me and telling me what to bring home. Jewelry, linen, strange Oriental fragrances and curiosities. I'm thinking of getting a xylophone. Someone talk me out of it.

-Bashu

P.S. Happy Friday the 13th

Finally in India

So we landed at the airport, which deserves a paragraph in itself. It's the crummiest airport I've ever seen - looks like it hasn't had new paint since the eighties, let alone decoration. Plus, it's tiny- the building itself is about four times the size of the SOS or something like that.

We went outside, met our uncle and got a taxi. Most taxis are big steady yellow clunkers called Ambassadors, but we got a sort of SUV dealy. Not that it was new, because it seems nothing is here. Then we set off on an hour-and-a-half of traffic to Howrah, a city just over the Ganges from Kolkata, which is what they call Calcutta nowadays.

Traffic is not anything like back home. Most Canadians, if they were going around a corner and saw a bicycler pedalling into their path, would stand on the brakes and maybe honk the horn. Here they're more inclined to stand on the horn and maybe tap the brakes. You rely on sheer force of volume and annoyance to get yourself through the streets, and you swerve a lot. Lanes are sort of whatever, and I get the feeling that if there weren't strong medians people would feel free to swerve into oncoming traffic just to pass. On two-lane streets, this turns traffic into not so much traffic as one long game of chicken. It's actually pretty fun if you're not driving.

The sound is amazing. First come the pedestrians, who will yell if someone almost hits them (depressingly often) but otherwise can't be heard. Then the bikes, which go 'tingly-tingly-ting". The rickshaws, which sound like your average squeezetoy for some reason. Squeaky, squeak, squeak. Then the autorickshaws, cars and motorcycles, which range from a crazymaking 'hee-haw-hee-haw' to the usual wail. Then the buses and trucks, which drive everyone else crazy and which bellow deep and loud.

The residential streets are scarier. On average they're two Sasha-heights wide. They're filled with walking people, but that doesn't bother the cars, rickshaws, bikes or motorbikes which push their way through, keeping the horn blaring so people know they're about to get run over. Passing is crazy.

We got to the fifth-floor flat which had been rented for us, and it was really not so good. No beds, hard-pack mattresses on the floor only. Lizards on the walls, but that's normal. Cockroaches, also normal. The bathroom was, to put it mildly, dingy. You would not wish to know about the toilet paper situation.

The heat is really something. After about five minutes, your skin just lets go and you don't even feel yourself sweating any more, unless you reach a hand behind your back and feel your soaked shirt. We set the AC for twenty-five and we practically freeze (bliss!). Between sweating, walking and climbing stairs, we'd all be losing a lot of weight if it weren't for the generous amounts of good Indian food our family stuffs us with.

Anyway, we eventually made excuses and moved to another flat, this one in actual Kolkata, which our friend Rana owns, and which we're staying at now. Comparative luxury. Throughout all of this, Durga-puja is going, which is a festival for the goddess Durga. People are generally happy, and everywhere buildings called Pandels are going up, which house magnificent handmade larger-than--life statues of the gods,with Durga being featured. Last night was the last day, and all the Durgas from all over the cities were sent into the Ganga to float away. To say it was crazy would be a criminal understatement. People are dancing, drumming and singing all along the banks of the river, and thousands of Durgas keep arriving.

The main problem that I can see with Kolkata is no trashcans, which means people throw their garbage wherever. In a city of 20 million, this is a pretty big problem. I still feel guilty about doing it. When I drink a cup of chai or something, I keep my plastic cup and look for a trash can, then I always remember that there is none and drop it on the ground like everyone else.

India is a pretty good place to spend your hard-earned money. A decent meal in a sit-down place will cost about fifty to a hundred rupees, and a street meal where you sit on chairs outside costs a lot less. Bottle of Sprite, twenty rupees. A guitar, 1500-3000 rupees. Now you're probably wondering about the exchange rate. Fourty rupees to the dollar.

Which means that you can get an good meal for $2.50, a bottle of pop for fifty cents (although you won't want to, because they have something called Slice which is delicious cold, made with mangoes and costs 25 cents), and a guitar for 40-80 dollars. Things are cheap here, if you have money. Of course if you work here, you'd get paid considerably less, so there you are. Tourist destination, what what.

Anyways, bye for now. I'm not sure when I'll get Internet next.

P.S. If anyone's mad about us being in India and them being in school, work, etc- we're mad that you are back home with balmy breezes and silent streets.