Tag: bath

Indian Things I Love [en]

I’m regularly told that I give a bad image of India (the horror stories and all that). Here is some of the nice stuff that I never write about. Things I like about India.

I’m regularly told that I give a bad image of India (the horror stories and all that). Here is some of the nice stuff that I never write about. Things I like about India:

  • the rivers
  • poha
  • riding on the back of Madhav or Shinde’s bikes
  • the shopping stalls near Laxmi Rd
  • walking in the university campus
  • going to the movies
  • mad shopping binges
  • kathi rolls and kheer kadam from Radhika’s
  • chay
  • the smell of incense and fresh coriander
  • people who smile at me or compliment my dress
  • rickshaw drivers who go by the meter
  • chatting with people on the train
  • coloured clothes and cloth
  • travelling by train
  • shopping
  • changes of plans and surprises when they go the way I want them to
  • painted signs and boards
  • rangoli
  • sari bags
  • krack cream
  • the dampness of the air on arrival in Bombay airport
  • kulfi and gulab jamun
  • butter naan and butter chicken
  • the warmth
  • having all the time in the world to take my bath and eat my breakfast
  • glass bangles and silver anklets
  • reading for days on end
  • children in school uniforms
  • eating on the kitchen floor
  • the cup of tea offered by the internet café manager because I’m waiting for the end of the power outage
  • Hindi and Indian English
  • negociating seating arrangements and luggage storage with fellow train-passengers
  • sticking 46 large stamps on the 6.5kg book parcel I’m sending home
  • the Kal Ho Na Ho ringtone on Anita’s cellphone
  • sweet-smelling flowers in the night
  • Hindi music in the car
  • chay with milk straight out of the goat’s udder at Taramai’s

Back Home [en]

Back home in Switzerland. Got the cat back, but not the cellphone.

Switzerland is grey and dark and cold. No colours, no sun.

I’ve got my cat back (with a bit of extra weight, just like his mistress who now feels a little tight in her trousers), my brave little car started at the turn of the key, only one of my plants has died (it was already on the way down before I left), but my cellphone has been blocked.

I feel a bit dazed. The change has been brutal. I feel disconnected, as if my presence here wasn’t completely real — or worse, as if India was just some kind of weird dream, a sensation I sometimes have when I am over there. Something else I need to sort out at some point, I guess.

I’m not too sure what I’m going to do now. There are lot of things to unpack, an extra CD/DVD-rack to buy (!), a few things to type up, and lots of photos and videos to upload and organize. The flat still needs work, too.

I think I’ll take a Lush bath.