Hey All!

Alright, so first is first. We met my dad in Kolkata, I'm gladder than rain he's here. It's already a little easier to move through the markets. After having one last crazy hectic meal with the family, we pushed off for Varanasi. WOO! What a trip, I guess Zaman already said it all. In Varanasi, we took some pictures with the new camera my dad brought, so I can finally show you what all this is like. Well, not all, because there's some sensitive information that Zaman and Kian want to hide, so there you go.

I tell you, monkeys are the best people in India. Me and Ryan ended up bringing tons of peanuts down to Tulsi Ghat, where the monkeys hang, and feeding them. You generally have to be careful because they will go into your pockets if they see where you keep the peanuts. When I brought some biscuits, they even jumped onto my legs and hung off my pants.

We tried all sorts of tricks with them- Ryan found a clay chai cup, which are thrown away like plastic wrappers in India, and showed a monkey a peanut, put it on the ground and put the chai cup over it. After a few tries, a monkey went over to it, lifted it up and stuffed the peanut in his mouth. But that wasn't enough for Ryan, he had to get two more cups and shuffle them around and try and get them to find out which cup had the peanut in it, step right up and try your luck. I'm not kidding you, this guy plays the shell game with monkeys. Of course as soon as he started moving around the cups they figured it was just another of those crazy things humans do and ran off to fight each other.




Ryan also put peanuts on the end of his guitar and held it out to them, why I don't know.


We did have one promising moment, where Ryan showed two monkeys and their kid a pencil and paper, made marks on the paper, and then gave it to the little monkey. He held it for a moment, squinted at it, went "ee" and started nibbling on it. Eventually Ryan managed to get it back, by distracting him with peanuts. He's probably going to frame it or something.

Anyways, I could probably write about monkeys forever but I wouldn't get to the point, which is... hmm. Well, never mind anyways. I can't talk more about what we did in Varanasi because some of the stuff we did was secret, although all will be made clear when we come back.

Although I can tell you about this great art-student named Sanjoy we met on the 26th. He was 12 years old and talked like the stereotype cute kid out of a cartoon, although probably not deliberately. But his painting.. man, it was great. We met him doing the usual thing Varanasi art-students do, which is sit on the ghats and sketch everything, which let me tell you doesn't get boring fast. You've got to be there to appreciate the variety of people you can find sitting on the steps. Anyways, his stuff was really amazing. Watercolour, pencils, collages, anything, and we watched him doing it too.



Eventually a bunch of flower-sellers came along, to do whatever flower-sellers do when they're not shoving baskets of flowers in your face and urging you to buy one so you can put in the river with a candle in a little leaf boat and make a prayer. They're usually around 10 or younger. They saw Ryan's guitar and made a big old clamouring, so he dragged it out and let them all strum. After that we decided to go, and Sanjoy asked us to take one of his drawings, so we chose a watercolour, and Ryan chose one, and we promised that if he emailed us we'd email him. So it goes.

The next morning we all piled our stuff into a big jeep and rode off to find Isis, or to go to Khajuraho, a town west of Varanasi and east of Delhi, famed for its.. wait for it.. Erotic Temples. The shop sellers won't let you forget this fact, going to the point of shoving obscene little metal mechanical toys in your face and showing you how it works and saying "see, see, want to buy?" Makes ya sick.

Mind you you can't really say that the temples are not "obscene" either. All you could say is that the carvings are incredible. Really incredible, we're talking dragons fighting warriors in deep relief carved out of a single piece of stone. Strangely, the carvings reminded me of Celtic designs more than anything else. There's a four-pointed flower that's a common theme, and a sort of swirling vines pattern that could be straight out of illustrations for "The Faerie Queen".

On the other hand, Khajuraho is very much a tourist town. There's oodles of souvenir emporiums, bicycle rentals, tours, kids trying to invite you to just look at their shop, they don't want you to BUY things goodness no, just have a little cup of tea and look around, etcetera.

We rented a couple of bicycles and biked a little ways out of town to see a "stone castle" which my dad saw from a rooftop restaurant. Turned out to be an elevated plaza surrounded by shrines, of which we counted 64. Later found out that this was the Chausathi Yogini temple, believed to be used by a cult in the sixteenth century, and devoted to the 64 Yoginis or female servants of Kali.

Nearby on a little elevation we found blackened granite blocks lying around, not very many. Looked closer and they were carved with the same patterns as in the still-standing tall temples. There's nothing left of the ruined ones except blocks, not even foundations. Really blows your mind.

Returning the bikes to the rental place, I was called over by two Indian guys leaning up against the railing looking over the lake. Usually if somebody calls you over they say something like "come look at my shop" or "hey pretty man, you want to come here?" or anything that they think will get your attention. This guy said "Hey, can I talk to you for a little?" and I thought I might as well give them a chance. They talked to me for about an hour, but for the life of me I can't remember anything except little snippets of philosophy and staring into the setting sun behind their heads and nodding. Parts I remember:

"Indian Guy 1: My name is Kumar, okay?
Indian Guy 2: My name is Baba.
Bashu: Really? But.. er.. what is your good name?
Baba: Well, nobody says my good name but my family, everyone says Baba. Okay?
Bashu: Yes, okay, but what's your real name?
Baba: Haha everyone calls me Baba, okay?
Bashu: Okay."

"Kumar: Yes, I have a Canadian girlfriend actually, she's from Montreal, you know, French. She's in France now, in Par-ee. I'm flying to see her soon, but haha you know I also go to.. well, I have three-four girlfriends in Europe, you know, Czech Republic?

Baba: Haha, you know I have no girlfriend, so I am not near. Near, you know? When I have a girl, I am near, but when I have no girlfriend I am far. Haha?"

"Baba: What does your father do?
Bashu: He's a psychologist.
Baba: Ah, you know I am a psychologist too but I don't read psychology, I know people's feelings, I look at them and see them and...
Bashu: *stares into the sun
(a little later)
Baba: Trees.
Bashu: Huh? What?
Kumar: You came to India to see trees, right?
Bashu: Yes, sure.
Baba: No, no, people are like trees. They have branches, and maybe they have a lot of birds in them. That is how you can tell feelings. You look at the tree and say, it is good, it is bad, and you move on, you know?
Bashu: Yes. *stares into the sun again*"

Crazy guys, extremely babbleful. All I remember besides that is them talking about yoga, and the bike guy seeing me talking and taking the bike from my hands and saying "thank you, bye", then I guess eventually I managed to tear myself free, promising I'd try to come back with my brothers and friend if I could.

I guess I should mention at this point we're staying in Khajuraho courtesy of Mr. Gautam, who knew my mother last time she came to Khajuraho 23 years ago. He used to be one of the kids hawking on the street with his three brothers, and eventually started up a store called the Chandela Emporium which grew huge. After that he started the Holiday Inn in Khajuraho, and etc etc now everybody in Khajuraho knows his name. A crazy story, to be sure, and probably would be better told by my mother.. http://www.journey-to-india.blogspot.com

I have to say, living in India is somehow much more intense than living in Canada. In Canada you can buy things online, without having to deal with anyone in person, and even buying something from the supermarket is a quiet, uneventful task. Ridiculous! In India you would have nine people offering to take you to their shop and give you the best prices you'd ever heard, and then letting you battle your way through pricing, picking through, and dealing with five kinds of bull.

Anyways, we went to the Eastern Temples today and lounged around in the sun. I did, at least. I get the idea that the others were hard at work sketching the carvings, etc. I just laid in the bright-hot sunny lawn and played with the puppies that were staggering around the place, bought some chapatis soaked in milk for them, read a thick old fantasy book and shut down my mind. I said "I feel sort of like Jesse Easter must feel all the time", but no-one was listening. That's okay.

Fwoof. Well, until next time (possibly next year) I'm Bashu signing out.

-Bashu

So, finally, here we are with my dad in Kolkata.

To start with, rewind two days to a train in Andal, a small town three hours railride away from Kolkata. The train is stopped.

Generally people are just sitting around talking or taking advantage of the quiet to get some sleep. Some have gotten off and walked around the town, to no particular purpose as all the shops are closed, owing to the 24-hour state-wide strike. This is also the reason the train has stopped, and by all accounts it won't be moving until about six that night. So, me and Ryan go to get some food at the railway canteen.

It's crowded and mostly people are eating quietly, only since these are Bengalis we're talking about "quietly" means "talking when you're not eating and eating when you're not talking". So we order two plates, hoping that whatever the man in the kitchen decides to put on them is good. It's the usual dry rice, watery dal and thick sabzi (vegetable curry) on tin trays. And then we order coffees, and two of the best espressoes we've had on this trip come out in little brown ceramic cups with subtle designs. It boggles the mind. I had to go back for more later. This is a railway canteen we're talking about. It's supposed to have metal mugs of dark brown water for five rupees each.

So anyways, we go back to the train and sit around for a while longer. We were talking with Sandeep in the next compartment, a guy with a high laugh and a genuine twinkly eye. He tells us that there's being a free meal served at the club. Woo. We figure, why not, and so me and Zaman march off with a band of men to see what's cooking. Out of the station, down tree-lined roads, and to a dirt field, fenced-off all around, with a volleyball net and some men standing over huge vats of sabzi and rice and dal cooked together, which is called kichuri. About a hundred more men are standing around in a sort of rectangle thing. So we figure, excellent, a free feed, I wonder why, oh well.

Little did we know.

No, really, we didn't know much at all.

Anyways, we sat down with Sandeep's father on these benches around the field and cups were handed out. Sandeep's father smiles and says "liquor tea!". What are we supposed to say? I say, "Liquor tea?". Sandeep's dad says, "Yes, liquor tea!".

It was just lemon tea.

So they start handing out banana-leaf plates and just before they get to us, a man comes along and talks to Sandeep's dad in Bengali, then asks us "You are from Canada?". Well, yes, I suppose we are. "Have you taken food?" No, we haven't. "Then come with me, please." Well, why not.

So we walk back across the field into this little hut with about a dozen Indians and a grinning South Korean guy sitting on this bench who greets us and says "Hello, you are like me, eh? Come from the train looking for food?". Well, actually, that pretty much catches it all.

So eventually a lost-looking Israeli guy in the same boat wanders in -Later he claimed they had been walking down the road and was shaghaied in-, and we're all sitting on benches in this dark hut, and hoping like hell that somebody's going to start handing out the food so we can get back to the train, and then a tall Bengali guy who looks like he owns the place lights up a cigarette and states: "YOU, Are Canadian. WE, Are Bengali."

Oo-er.

"YOU.. have a problem.."

Ooo-er.

"Then WE... will help you. Just tell your heart if you have problem, okay? We are very friendly people and we will help."

Ooo-kay.

He quizzes us on all the general stuff. What grade, do we like India, how come my name's Basu, etc. We're pretty much used to this so we breeze through and evidently pass. Next he starts on Hwan, the South Korean guy.

"From which country you are from?"

"Uh, South Korea"

"Ah, South Korea. WE are jealous of you. You know why?"

Hwan says, er.... no.

"Because INDIA! was number ONE!"

Oo-er.

"AT HOCKEY!"

Hwan says, Oh.

"And then South Korea took away that place. So we are jealous. Do you watch hockey?"
Hwan says, no, he doesn't get much ch-
"Ah, do you follow Asian Games?"
Hwan says, No, I can't read the Hindi newspaper-
"Ah, do you know who is number one in cricket?"
Hwan says, No, he doesn't like much cri-
"What? You are telling me, you are student and you don't know ANYTHING, about sports?
Hwan says, No, in South Korea he doesn't have a TV so he -

The tall Bengali guy waves a finger at him and says "You are living a mechanical life." Well, why not.

So, this enemy dispatched, he starts in on the representative from Israel, Chem. "You are from Israel? What do you know about Fidel Castro?"

Chem says, No, well, he smokes cigars, yes, but I don't kno-
"You're from Israel and you don't know anything about Fidel Castro??"
Chem says, No well, I know of him and uhm just the cigars he smokes, they don't really connect, Israel and Fidel Ca-
"Fidel Castro is a great HERO to us."

Zaman asks, why?

The Bengali guy who is now sitting down stares at his feet for a bit, letting his cigarette burn and thinking about this. Then he perks up. "Because he FOUGHT... for his freedom and the freedom of his people."

It's about this time we realise, holy cow, he's a Communist.

I don't know if I mentioned this before, but West Bengal and Kerala are the two states with a Communist government. You don't really notice much difference besides a touch of red around the place.

Then he goes on to completely lambast Chem about how "we" hate capitalism, the British and how economics follows politics and you cannot have politics without economics. At one point he says "You are friends with America. Isn't it?" He says "Isn't it?" every time he wants to mean "Right?"

"You are friends with America. Isn't it?"

Chem says, No, that's oversimplifying it, they give us four billion dollars a year and tell us who to elect. Personally, I'm not friends with America, but if you mean political relations-

"No, no, I am not asking personal friend, I am asking political relations. You are friends with America. Isn't it?"

Chem says, Well, alright.

And then he turns to us, I guess to educate us.

"If you know anything about history, anything, you know that the British occupied us for two hundred years, isn't it? And the British invaded everybody and now it is America's turn. Isn't it? So that is why we hate capitalism. We don't like America!"

Chem says, Ah, but you're mixing up capitalism and colonialism.

"NO! They are capitalists and colonialists and so that is why we are not friends with them, isn't it? India, is great friends, with ehhh, Russia, China... what's it, Vietnam, North Amer- no, South-America, South Kor- no wait, North-Korea, Pakistan," I really don't know what he was talking about with that last one. But no one argues with that. "Canada, is very close to America isn't it?" Well yeah they're right next doo- "They are friends" Politically. He goes on and talks about how "you have two arms and two legs, and I do too, why should you rule me? We are equal" .
There's a sign on the outside wall of this shack that says "Members Only".

When we try and bring up that you could say India is friends with America he just shakes his head and completely denies it. I don't think he know about the U.S. selling them nuclear technology or how many Pakistanis really don't like them. By now he's pretty much declared himself as king of the chain-smoking mafioso types who are about to fly off their handle. So Chem stops pushing him.

So it goes like this. After a while, thank god, Sandeep's dad comes back in and cuts him off in mid-monologue and conveys that it's time to eat. Woof.

We come back outside, and realise that everyone we were sitting with before has already eaten and left and this is the second batch. Oh well what can you do. We sit down on these blankets that have been folded and placed on the field, and the banana-leaf plates get handed out. I should explain the idea of the banana-leaf plates.

Indian Feature: Banana-Leaf Plates.

You take some banana leafs, which are wide and strong, and pin them together with toothpicks, thread or whatever, in the shape of a plate, and then let them dry in the sun. Then you pack as much messy food as you can onto it, eat it, and toss it out onto the compost pile for the cows to eat. It's refreshing after seeing pounds of styrofoam and plastic in the gutters of Kolkata.

--

So we're sitting there in lines with our banana-leaf plates. Talking with Huan and Chem. Waiting for this prophecised masala. Chem leaves. At first nobody tells us anything, and we just sit there boredly. After a while a guy comes along and says, five minutes. Then we sit there satisfied that we'll get it in twenty minutes. After thirty-five minutes they come along with pots of really soupy kichuri (rice and dahl mix) and ladle it into our plates, slap on some sabzi (curry) and salt on the side and leave us to figure it out. Most people tried it with their hands and burnt them. I saw somebody tearing off a piece of banana-leaf and using it as a spoon, so I tried that until it cooled. The heat and liquid seemed to be making the leaves curled up and I had this awful feeling that I was going to get to the bottom of the food and find out that I'd been eating off the ground, but it was fine.

We still had an audience sitting across from us. One guy was staring at us with alot of determination. I tried smiling at him, but he didn't blink an eye.

So it turns out the strike was called by an opposing party of the ruling communist party we think about some farmland that the corporation "TATA" had unfairly paid farmers for to build a car factory. And the communist party was just trying to smooth things out by feeding everyone for free.

Anyhoo our dad's here so we're just touring around and he's meeting the family.

Tata.

- Zaman & Bashu

I forgot to say

Last night we walked into Old Varanasi, which is all tight alleys stuffed with wallshops and trees squeezing up through four tight stories to get to the sun, plus monkeys and people and somehow motorcycles. The Shops were nice, yes, but what was really nice was the temples. Small shrines everywhere but also a main temple called Vishwanatha, the Golden Temple on account of how its spire is covered in gold.

It's in the same plaza as a huge mosque, which is a bit of a problem.

We visited on December sixth, which although we didn't know it until that day is the anniversary of the Babri Masjid being torn down. The Babri Masjid is a mosque that was torn down by Hindu fundamentalists in 1993. Muslims and Hindus have alternately tolerated and hated each other in India since the Muslim Moghuls invaded North India hundreds of years ago. The Muslims decided on this day to spend the day in prayers in their mosques, which is uncommon as usually there's fights. The Hindus, on the other hand, decided on this day to spend the day in celebration, lighting lamps in their temples and setting off fireworks, which just goes to show something disgusting.

Anyways, on this day there were about ten armed soldiers scanning and searching everybody entering the plaza, as well as more checkpoints in the entrance to each place of worship. To make things happier, you couldn't enter the mosque unless you were Muslim and coming to the regular prayer, and we didn't even try with the temple - a plaque outside said "Gentlemen not belonging to the Hindu religion are requested not to enter the temple".

I was okay with that, though. I sat between the mosque and the temple, watching the monkeys. I told my mother that and she reckoned I should write it down, so here I am writing it down.

Monkeys. I really do love monkeys. They're so pure and simple. Yes, they fight at the snap of two fingers, but at least they're honest and don't muck about, badmouthing other monkeys behind their back or throwing insults at each other, and if you give them a date they're fine with you.

A jolly Brahmin guy called Santosh came along and started talking to me. I thought he might be trying to sell something but he was just curious about why I was sitting there, and if my mother was Hindu. A Sikh soldier in a pillbox said something to him in Hindi and Santosh asked if he was bothering me. I told him no, and Santosh told the soldier "Tig-hey", which basically means it's okay and it's alright. After that the Sikh guy came down from the pillbox and talked to me as well. He asked me what my mother state was. I asked him, in Canada? He said no, in India. I said West Bengal. Good as any, and I do sort of have an attachment to it.

A colonel or something came along and asked me "What are you doing sitting here!?"
The Sikh guy laughed and said "Uskaa ma Hindu hey", or "his mother is Hindu".
I guess that was all okay, then.

Peace is a rarity here, but when you get it, nothing I've had in Canada can compare to it.

Indian Feature: Bandhs.

Bandhs are Indian strikes. The way people strike here is quite interesting. They can't really afford to actually stop working, so whatever they think about politics they usually express in less drastic ways, until a bandh happens. It's amazingly simple. Take a current issue. Mamata Banerjee's party is angry that Tata, a company that makes EVERYTHING, from salt to cars, is buying land for factories from farmers and apparently not paying them enough. So, they announce a bandh, maybe a day in advance. Then when the day comes, they roam the streets in gangs, carrying big sticks, and if they see someone whose store is open and operating, they smash the windows and beat up the shopkeepers. Simple as mud.

Well, that's the way it works in Kolkata anyways. It's a really simple way to drum up support for your cause - "if you don't strike we'll strike you".

-Bashu

Last night after dinner watching the sunset we walked into a stone carving store. Tiny handmade marble elephants the size of your pinkie, hollowed out into a cage, with another tinier rougher elephant carved inside, for fifty cents. I feel like a criminal.

We bought material for suits- Zaman a white corduroy, me a brown polyester, for a few dollars each. The tailoring will probably bring it up to ten dollars each. I feel like a criminal.

This morning we got up to catch the sunrise, walking along the river-ghats till we reached Dashaswamedh (Ten-Horse Sacrifice) Ghat, and then had breakfast: curry and four pieces of Indian bread with chutney and sweets. For both of us, with drinks, 75 cents. I feel like a criminal.

Ryan felt sick and couldn't finish his. We paid a rickshaw-wallah to bike us home for 75 cents, which is actually a fair price here. Nevertheless, I feel like a criminal.

The sunrise, however, was priceless.


-Bashu

Varanasi is very India. That's about the size of it.

Let me see,

Cow dung in the streets, rickshawsautorickshawsbicyclestrucksholymenandofcoursecows jockeying to get ahead, two chai shops a sweet shop and a general store on every corner, close alleys and dusty roads, monkeys gambolling around on top of walls and through trees, too much yelling, people you've never seen before constantly striking up short-lived conversations with you involving rickshaws, fine clothes and a very good shop they know, people working hard everywhere you look, kites flying from every building-roof, everybody spitting paan as if their tobaccojuice glands are overworking, dogs running everywhere, and a partridge in a pear tree for fifty rupees only.

I could go on but I would end up spitting all over the screen.

The academy we're staying in is still being worked on although it should have been finished in September, because time moves slower in India, presumptively because it gets stuck in traffic like everybody else. We still go over to the house of the Mishras and teach young Indian kids English and also draw with them. They love the drawing. They go crazy for the drawing. You give them crayons and paper and they might as well be eating them for the speed they go through.

We also go down to the river and, well, it's the Ganges. Dirty, mighty, flows through every city worth its dirt, loved and polluted, holy rolling. The city bends to its curve, and as such feeds off of its sanctity. If you walk to Varanasi, you redeem yourself. If you shave your head in Varanasi, you gain favour with the gods. If you die in Varanasi, enlightenment is yours. As you might imagine, this makes for an interesting populace.

There are kites everywhere. Kiting in India is different from the sissified, passive standing-around-and-forgetting-about-it kiting of Canada. In India most people tie their strings to a length of wire coated with ground glass, and then tie that to their kite, then go out on their roof (people in India would be amazed at people in Canada who have never been on their roof or indeed don't go up there on a daily basis), get it flying and then try as hard as possible to cut down other people's kites. Kites are everywhere, yes, flying from rooftops, but also in trees, powerlines and in the street, fallen from the sky. We had about four or five kites cut down by our neighbours. Luckily they're about two rupees each. Harmless fun. The trick is to get your kite to loop around their string, I think.

We have also been privileged to hear some really excellent tabla and sitar playing at the Mishras'. If you want to know what the tabla sounds like without actually bothering to download any Indian music, you could imagine five men tapdancing on a hollow stage. A good tabla player can get this effect with ten fingers and keep at it for hours. The sitar is like a delicate guitar with more notes. Indian music is richer in tones than ours, having not only half-tones but also quarter-tones. It's a bit of a blindspot in our music system. I can't figure out why.

I am richer by one watercolour in this trip. We stopped at Dashaswamedh Ghat - the ghats are platforms clustered on the banks of the river where people pray, live, wash and work. Sitting there we noticed several art students sketching everything around them, and one of them was doing a watercolour sketch. I asked him if he would sell it, and he said he wouldn't, no, but if I liked it he'd give it to me. In return I gave him a haiku, which didn't quite seem fair but was all I could come up with. The strangest transaction I've had on this trip.

The haiku:

Varanasi is
always there; Varanasi
can never be here

Anyways

I am

-Bashu