Month: February 2004

Savitri III [en]

At every moment we make an unalterable decision. When I wrote to you in the beginning, I made one.

At every moment we make an unalterable decision. When I wrote to you in the beginning, I made one. I made another when I invited you to Tirupet. After you had been and gone, when I gave you that string of answers to your questions, then again I made a decision. I have not altered it. The psychological basis of my behaviour did not come in the way of this. Only I did not get the response I wanted. Had I got it, I would have come anywhere with you, done anythng for you. Every girl, the instant she is born, comes prepared to leave her mother and her father.

You might perhaps say that you too expected a response and that you did not get it. How can I give an answer to this? To tell you the truth, one ought to be able to arrive at these decisions without resorting to the language of appeal and response.

Now, after writing all this, I feel embarrassed. If reading this causes you any sorrow then forget me for all time.

Savitri II [en]

You want love, and I don’t want it? What is it that I have given you these six years

You want love, and I don’t want it? What is it that I have given you these six years? Only I did not get entangled in the nomenclature of what I wanted, of what I still want–that’s all. You ought to have carried me off, dragged me away–yes, I am writing what’s true, what’s absolutely true. Nothing is ever gained by analysing things. We only become strangers to our own selves.

P. S. Rege, Savitri

Savitri I [en]

When we were children, my friend’s brother was once to have come from a far-off place. I saw her weep because he didn’t come. I even teased her.

When we were children, my friend’s brother was once to have come from a far-off place. I saw her weep because he didn’t come. I even teased her. Then I too sat and wept with her. Today I didn’t weep. Why? Because I am beginning to learn that one shouldn’t look too far ahead nor try to reshape what has already taken place. What has happened must be left as it is–far away. By holding on to it, the shades tend to grow faint. That’s all.

P. S. Rege, Savitri

Deliverance [en]

You are a writer, I told myself; yet you readily give a wide berth to raw reality when you encounter it…

You are a writer, I told myself; yet you readily give a wide berth to raw reality when you encounter it, as if living was a thing apart from the truth of existence of that truth was a thing apart from writing–as if living and truth and writing bore no relation to one another: as if each hung like a cold corpse from its own separate gallows.

Nirmal Verma, Deliverance

First Two Days in Kerala [en]

An account of our package days in Kerala. Nice!

It took a bit of firmness, but it was finally less difficult than I had feared to obtain the various entertainments promised in our package.

We started yesterday evening with a trip around the local canals in a canoe. Peaceful, and nice, glimpses of lives in little houses or huts near the water, and the splashing of the oar in the dark as we headed home, interrupted only by the twilight din of the birds hopping and chirping excitedly in the coconut trees.

The food was nice, although the ‘vegetable curry’ we ordered alongside the fish was ‘somewhat bland’, and we clearly hadn’t ordered enough. For my part, I was thinking ‘family style portions’, but each dish here was clearly meant to feed one person only.

We got up at dawn this morning (6:20 a.m., the birds were at it again with their racket) for a slightly longer tour through the backwaters in a motor boat. Luckily we just chugged along slowly, so the noise didn’t prevent us from enjoying the peacefulness of the morning scenes offered to us: fishing, bathing, and washing up the dirty dishes.

We came back for a hearty breakfast of appams, and discovered that the vegetable curry wasn’t too bad with a little added salt and pepper.

By nine o’clock the car (mini-van, actually) was ready to take us to a neighbouring village for a short trek. There isn’t much to say about it apart from the fact that it was pleasant and allowed the atmosphere to sink in. Anita shot quite a lot of videos with the digicam.

Lunch was a success. We had ordered a lot of food and it was really nice — especailly the prawn masala (prawns naked, if you please). We ordered accordingly for this evening.

Half of the afternoon was devoted to laying around and bathing for me, and hotel-hunting and transport-organizing for Anita. Again, I cannot say it enough: thanks, many thanks.

Around three we set off for a brief visit of the highly coloured temple, a stroll on the beach (the soft sand and warm water made me want to bathe, can you imagine!) and a walk in the town. Our driver, Matthew, turned out to be a very nice chap who told us all about the finest umbrella manufacturer in all India (here in Alleppey only), as well as a local church we peeked into.

I’ve rarely packed as many things in an Indian day as I have today!

A Tourist in India [en]

Some thoughts about being a tourist in India, and how I hate being a tourist.

– ‘Your country?’ Asks the man on the bus.
– ‘Switzerland.’
– ‘Svizerrland!? Ooh. Why you are not staying there?’
– ‘I am staying there. I came on holiday to visit some friends. I used to live in Pune.’
– ‘Ooh, so you are just tourist, then!’
– ‘Well, er…’

That was a week or two back, on the overcrowded bus which was finally taking me down to E-Square to see Ek Haseena Thi. I’ve always hated being associated with ‘tourists’, in India or elsewhere.

Tourists come to see, not to share. They watch the world outside from cozy A/C boxes. They are impolite, they don’t know how to dress or behave, they can’t eat the food or find their way around without a map. They see what they are meant to see, stay in places specially designed for them, and buy things in shops that nobody else would buy. They have money, lots of it.

In some ways, I have to admit that I am indeed a tourist. I take lots of photographs. I buy loads of stuff in shops to bring back to Switzerland for my enjoyment and that of others. I don’t really keep an eye on what I spend, I eat in nice places, I go to the cinema as often as I like.

But on the other hand, I much prefer trying to share the life of ‘normal’ people or just walk around the town I’m staying in, rather than sleep in expensive places and do the things that only the tourists do.

I like people. I do my best not to turn them into objects. I like everyday life. I like soaking in the atmosphere of a place or time.

I’m very suspicious of other foreigners I come upon in India. I kind of assume that they are not like me, more the ‘hippy-dippy’ type, as Aleika and I used to call them. Some sort of anti-tourist snobism, in a way.

Of course, I’m wrong. Lots of foreigners in India are certainly nice people. I almost walked off for ever after saying hello to Aleika, mistakenly assuming she would be ‘at the ashram’. Quite a few of my friends from Switzerland or elsewhere have been to India, so they would therefore certainly have been ‘foreigners nice to know’ had I met them in India.

Ironically, I find myself looking at other foreigners with as much curiosity and maybe more questions as many Indians who see me walk by. Why are they here? What brought them to India? What are they looking for? How long are they staying? Do they ‘fit in’ or not in their home culture? What is their life like here?

The result is that I’ve had very little contact with other foreigners in India, and I’m aware that I’m probably passing by people who would be interesting to know. I keep myself ‘aside’, comfortably settled on a jute bag full of preconceptions and marked ‘Fab India, Pune’.

A Coin [en]

A little girl follows the canoe and asks the two tourists inside for a coin.

There is a canoe with tourists again. A white lady with fair hair, and another lady from the city. I stand on the edge of the water, I say “Hello!”, I smile. They wave back.

The white lady has a big camera. These tourists, they always take a lot of photographs. These two are laughing and talking and playing with their cameras.

I run along the shore to follow them — they aren’t going very fast, it is easy. I wave, I smile again. I think they like me. I am wearing my purple dress.

I ask for a coin. The lady from the city makes me repeat. I think she doesn’t understand.

The canoe is going round the corner — I take the shortcut behind my uncle’s house and catch up with them again. Once more I ask for my coin. As they still don’t understand, the boatman tells them what I want. These ones won’t give me anything.

I run after them again, smile and ask for a photo. The lady from the city takes a picture of me. I wave good-bye, the boat goes off. Mother is calling me.

From Pune to Alleppey [en]

Leaving Pune, travelling to Alleppey and a few words about the resort we are staying in.

Leaving Pune was hard, just as the last times. I was sad to leave the town and the people I love, sad to leave without knowing when I will see them again.

Anita had spent a day in Pune, so we travelled back to Bombay together, which was nice. We went to Bandra to see if I could find nice silvery glittery sandals for my size 41 feet. I gave up, to no surprise — shoes that size aren’t really to be found, especially when the foot they must fit is also wide and high.

For dinner, we had what is probably the best Thai food I have ever eaten. I don’t have a great experience of Thai food, true, but in any case, I’m certainly going back to this place next week before flying back home.

We got on our train the next day after an excruciatingly long rickshaw ride to the station. I was prepared to repeat the Chennai feat of last-minute train-catching, but fortunately it proved unnecessary to excercise ourselves in such a manner.

We travelled in the company of a nice young man named Sharath, who was going to meet his family after two years and a half. We ate surprisingly good train food (including two halves of a chicken — the prices must have dropped for a reason you can certainly imagine), feasted on cashew nuts, raisins and almonds, and shot whacky videos with the digicam. I even jumped out during one station-stop to clean the outside of our windows so that we could film the scenery from inside.

We arrived in Alleppey half an hour late, which is pretty good as far as Indian trains go. As promised, somebody was there to pick us up, and we made it to the resort and into our room without a hitch. The resort looks brand new to me, though it is probably a few years old. Room and bathroom are squeaky clean and equipped with a mosquito net, the latest water-squirting technology instead of the normal tap for the toilets, and a couple of frogs on the veranda to help keep the local bug population under control.

We had booked a 3 day/2 nights package with the resort. Although the resort is nice enough in itself, the package organisation left us a little unsatisfied. We had to fight and insist a little to squeeze into our day and two halves here all the promised items of the package (canoing, water-boat backwater, cruise, village trek, ayurvedic massage, temple visit, etc.). Actually, it seems this resort is mainly populated by a lot of foreigners, most of them middle-aged, who spend a lot of their time sitting around in chairs. Based on the list of “Daily Entertainments” hanging outside the office door, I guess many people settle down here for some time to relax, get ayurvedic massages, take a few yoga classes and cruise around a bit every now and again.

Arrived in Kerala [en]

Arrived in Kerala with Anita. Difficult to get internet access.

Just a quick note to say that Anita and I have arrived in Kerala. It’s nice, a little bit adventurous (more later about that), and internet access is not a straightforward thing (one slow computer for a resort full of white tourists).

Do not fret, therefore, dear friends, if news from me is scarce. My mobile is working, however.

One Chay And Two Cancellations [en]

India is the country of the unexpected. A nice cancellation, a more unpleasant one, and a cup of sweet Indian tea.

India has always been to me the country of last-minute plans (like my departure for Calcutta barely two days after having met Aleika) and cancellations.

On the menu last Thursday, two cancellations — one which upset me, and the other which pleased me tremendously.

First of all, Madhav sent me a message cancelling dinner and our evening stroll in the university campus. I love Madhav dearly, but he does have a tendancy to try my patience (just as I try his, in other ways) by changing plans on short notice and and cancelling meetings I look forward to. I called Nisha and luckily, it wasn’t too late for her to include me in her dinner plans. She cooked a really nice dinner, by the way — puris and home-made gulab jamun — had she guessed that my spirits might need lifting a little?

I was woken up during the dark hours of the night by the sound os somebody coming into the flat. I was supposed to be alone with Nisha that night, as Sagar works night shifts and Shinde had run off to some festival with his fellow disciples from Markal. In my half-sleep I assumed it must be Sagar coming home early. A few minutes later I had gathered together enough of myself to check the time — it was only midnight!

I got up, and to my surprise found myself face-to-face with Shinde. His festival had been postponed by a day, which meant he would have missed my last evening here — so after some internal debate, he cancelled. We stayed up a good two hours chatting before I finally went back to sleep again.

In the middle of all that, or rather before, the chay.

I had been sitting for quite some time in front of my Internet Café during a notable power failure which seems to have wiped out all trace of electrical activity from M.G. Rd to Aundh, waiting for the message which would cancel my plans for the evening (though at that time I didn’t suspect it) or for Bijli Devi (the Goddess of Electricity) to give up her strike and resume normal activity. Sitting and waiting can become boring, even if you have stuff to write up and brightly-clad female construction workers to film on the other side of the road. As he was ordering another round of chay, the Internet Café owner kindly asked me if I would like one.

Sweet, hot indian tea in a small glass. It was nice.