27 May – Monastery Row

Having some file problems, but here are some photos from an amazing day!

26 May 07 – Climbing to the Palace

What a wonderful day this turned out to be. I slept fairly late and had my usual thin omlette. I’ve decided they use chopped up green onion tops in them for the mildly spicy taste. Yum. And you gotta love the hot coffee when the weather is soooooo cold! My number one priority today is to get something warm to wear. Anything. It’s just freezing here.

Freezing or not, I went to the rooftop restaurant for breakfast and sat in the sun. When the wind off those snow fields stops and the sun comes out, it’s almost tolerable. Met an older guy up there who lives in Chang Mai (Thailand) but comes here every year for a month, and he told me about some great things to do around the area. Dunno what he does…maybe he’s retired. Anyway, we talked over breakfast, and I found out that today is election day so everything is closed. Yeah, everything. Tourist shops, clothing stores, restaurants, Internet cafes. Oh well, so much for an altitude-pampering day of shopping. Headed for Leh Palace hoping, since I had to walk across town to get there and hoped I’d find something open.

Nothing was open, and the path to the Palace wasn’t exactly marked well. Take the road by the mosque, I was told, and look for the red trash can that says “2 Palace.” Well, I found it! Headed up through what seemed like back alleys with the little sewage troughs on the side giving the walk that unmistakable odor. Felt (and smelt) lots like a place David and I went off the coast of Kenya a couple of years ago, Lamu. Also ran into a loud, disapproving Israeli woman who was looking for the Palace, too, and was complaining that the $2 entry fee was going to be rip off. She thought all of Leh stank, too. And the way wasn’t marked clearly enough.

Saw a couple of teenagers and asked them the way. My recently-acquired companion didn’t trust them, so I left her and went to the 17th century Leh Palace myself. It’s a very cool place built in traditional Ladaki style with a square design and firmly seated on a rock outcrop. The place has been neglected for years, and restoration work is only beginning, but that was part of what I liked about it – there was still a sense of abandoned, er, grandeur about it. As I wandered through the various rooms and floors, I noticed damaged and faded frescoes, worn or broken decorative wood carving, and doors and windows just being restored. It was a real pleasure climbing up and down the makeshift ladders to get to the various floors and their verandas that overlooked the city. What a wonderful, exotic place it must have been in its heyday. One room seems to have survived somewhat intact – the storeroom/library. This was a very dark room with lots of dirty, aged, ritual paraphernalia and stacks of texts of rectangular scripts wrapped and tied up in bundles. The room reeked of dark, musty, not-totally-forgotten and not-totally nice wisdom.

From one of the verandas, I saw the Israeli making her way up the slope beyond the palace with a new companion…going, alas, in the direction of my next goal, the early 15th century monastery and temple, Chanbal Lhankhang. It was quite a steep climb, but as I wasn’t passing out or panting from the Palace experience, I headed on up, passing the two on the way. I met a very friendly monk at the top who opened the temple for me to see the Buddha in it and asked me not to use my flash. It was striking; this temple was build before Columbus set out to find India. I found the same sense of old learning here as I’d seen in the Palace, though with slightly less menace.

The Israeli soon entered with the British traveler she’d met. She wanted to use her flash and insisted on it when she was told no. The Brit tactfully took her camera and offered to do a photo for her. Then, she wanted to climb up on the altar and stand between Buddha’s legs so her photo would show scale. She argued with the monk, saying it was important for her picture while the poor monk implored her to stay off the altar. Again, the Brit intervened and said he could show scale if she stood where she was. I restrained myself from telling her to have a little respect for beliefs other than hers; I went outside before I opened my big mouth.

The Brit guy came out of the temple after awhile; he was in Leh for trekking, some of the best and most reasonable in the Himalayas, apparently. Thirty-five dollars a day…wow! How great would it be to do a 10-day Himalayan trek for $350? Another trip? Miss Personality soon joined us and told me I had missed the country by flying to Leh instead of taking the two-day bus trip. Again, I deferred from telling her that if she paid a bit more attention to what was around her, she would miss less of the country herself. Instead, I walked on higher up the mountain to where there was an abandoned fort above Chanbal Lhankhang and enjoyed the wind, prayer flags and sharp breeze. I stayed up there until the two were well on their way down the slope.

Feeling pretty good about avoiding the feared altitude slam, I walked on down the slope and back to Leh. Met the hotel manager and arranged to hire a car for a couple of days to visit some temples and monasteries outside the city. Then slept very heavily.

25 May 07 -- COLD!

Wow! Up at three and to the airport to catch the flight to Leh, which was delayed until 7:30. No prob…I’d rather wait than have some nut trying a risky landing in the Himalayas. And it was a beautiful flight. Way above the clouds, I noticed the mountains in the distance, and the last part of the trip was directly above them, heading to the (slightly) lower plateau beyond. It was fantastic, seeing the abrupt, jagged peaks with rivers of snow and ice flowing off them…eventually leading to a trickle of glacial run-off which ran through a pure gray-brown landscape that, too, was rough and pointy. Spectacular, dramatic and wonderful. Golly!…this is the Himalayas. We circled a couple of times until a group of clouds blew away, and we landed, coming in so low over a ridge I felt like I could’ve put my hand out the window and touched them.

At the airport, there was a similarly striking view – brown all around with snowy peaks not so far away. Most of the valleys were similarly dry, but I’d notice that Leh itself was a set of green terraces in this arid environment. As were a couple of other villages. I got a very nice taxi driver at the airport, and we headed to the hotel I’d chosen. I had some apprehension about the day in Leh, but for now, it seems I might have overestimated one thing and underestimated another. OK….I’ll freely admit I was worried about the altitude. It’s 11,000 feet here, and I have nothing but bad – very bad – memories of altitude. Dizzy and almost passing out in Chavin, Peru; splitting headache and unable to walk or breath at Todos Santos, Mexico; dizzy, disoriented, weak and congested on Kilimanjaro. Why can’t the cool stuff to see come with oxygen? However, as things turned out, I just spent the first day sleeping a lot and, when I moved, moving slowly; so far, so good on the altitude front.

What I underestimated was the temperature. It is COLD, and I mean REALLY COLD! I thought I heard the pilot say six degrees Celsius….no conversion thing handy, but I think that’s low 40s. This is just unbelievable when, earlier today, I broke a sweat just making the six steps to the car. No sweater, no long sleeve shirt here – the baggage allowance was only 10 kg, and my camera and laptop were most of that. I think I’m the only person in the whole city with short sleeves. It’s time to buy a sweater…or a coat.

Had a pot of tea at the rooftop restaurant before I started my four-hour nap. My god…the views! On one side, the snow-capped Himalaya emerging and vanishing under clouds; on the other side, a perfect view of the Leh Palace, done the same style as the Potala Palace in Llosa, Tibet. Also had a chatty Nepalese server and listed to lots of drums and chanting in the distance. This is what I’d hoped Dharamsala would be like, I think. Small, very friendly people, not too overtouristed and definitely low-key. So far.

And the rest of the day was rest. After my four-hour nap, I read some, had dinner, and went to bed at 9 pm. I have great hopes for surviving the lack of oxygen.

24 May 07 -- La Fortress Rouge

Hmmm....I have to find this file!

23 May 07 -- Art! Café! News!

Ah….la vie en vacances!

Got up late today, perhaps because I was soooo busy the day before. Found a place to rent a car for a day ($20), so I booked one for tomorrow and proceeded on my plan for the day. When I was in Delhi ten years ago, I bought a couple of large watercolors from an artist, and I still owed him some money for them. I had contacted him from the US, and I called him when I got to Delhi so I could meet him at his gallery to give him the balance. Was he surprised! Unfortunately, he had to go back to Rajastan for some family emergency, so I just dropped off an envelope for him at the gallery. However, I took advantage of that time to talk to the gallery owner about photography and got the contact information from a couple of photographers here. I plan to stop by to see them tomorrow, when I have the car.

Unbelievably, it was lunch time by then. I went to a nearby restaurant that looked dark and cool, and I had a pretty nice lunch there – my second stuffed potato. It’ll be hard to go back to cheese stuffed potatoes after this. Here, the potato is baked and prepared with lots of different spices and vegetables. At this particular restaurant, they used what I call the “sweat spice.” I don’t know what it is, but there’s some spice here that doesn’t taste hot but makes me sweat like a….drowned rat. So there I was in my cool, dark restaurant with my Dollar Store hankie, dripping like a leaky shower. But that potato was so good I’d do it again without a moment’s hesitation.

Of course, it was then nap time. Then café time. I got a newspaper and headed down the road to my usual café.

The news here is always interesting to me. It’s hard to pick out the major stories, but here are a few:

Pepsi bottle explosion – A guy opened a bottle of Pepsi, and the bottle exploded, injuring the man’s arm, chest, neck, shoulder and jaw. He sued and got nearly $400. I have to think this is India’s version of the hot coffee suit against McDonald’s, but at least it’s finally some bad publicity for a Coke competitor.

Serial killer – A guy was arrested for killing six men. He decapitated them and removed their limbs. He threw the heads in the Yamuna and the limbs in the garbage, and then he dumped the torsos near a local police station. He said his motives were that one of the guys ate too much meat, another spent too much time talking to women, and another smoked too much. This is creepy, but it’s interesting to see that psychosis takes a cultural expression. That hadn’t occurred to me.

Punjab unrest – The situation with the Sikh religious leader is still in flux, and now there are rumors that Pakistan is trying to incite the conservative Sikh establishment to riot against the “moderates.” However, I have to say that, every time anything bad happens here, the press seems to say Pakistan did it. And the only news I see from the US here (outside of movies) is related to American relations with Pakistan.

The Sikh thing has brought up an interesting law here in India – it’s illegal to insult or disrespect a religion (this new guy is being charged with disrespecting the Sikh religion and its 10 gurus because he dressed up in imitation of them and postured himself in their mode). Given my incredibly low opinion of religion, you might expect that I’d dislike this law, but it’s interesting that here, in a very pluralistic state, it’s illegal for one religion to promote itself over another one. Proselytizing, for example, is illegal because it’s showing a lack of respect for another faith. Of course, when an artist here recently did an exhibit that showed genitalia on Shiva, he was charged under this statute, and so would be people who drew images of Mohammed (like in Denmark). But I have to say that a statute like this, a statute that says to leave people alone and let them live their own beliefs has a certain appeal. I’m not sure I have a problem with a law that essentially says to respect the beliefs of others. And it clearly helps ensure a bit more peace in a diverse country.

Election – The party of the Dalit caste (untouchables) won a flat out victory in the Uttar Pradesh state elections, which is pretty much unheard of. With 18 parties in the election, they still won well over 50%, and the country is waiting with bated breath to see the implications in the rest of the country.

CEO compensation – Prime Minister of India (kind of a laissez-faire economist) called on Indian CEOs to limit their pay so as not to make the underpaid, lower classes resentful and thus destabilize the state.

AND – last night, a frontloader operator was working on an overpass in Delhi and accidently dropped a huge block of cement over the side. The block landed on two people sleeping there (because of the heat), killing them instantly, and then bounced onto two others, killing them, too. Sometimes, events in this country are so terribly poignant.

22 May 07 -- Shopping

Several major discoveries today. First, I found that, if you wear sunglasses, sellers don’t bother you as much. That’s GREAT to know as the closer you get to the big tourist hotels, the more you get hassled. Now, if I can just avoid breaking my last pair of Dollar Store sunglasses, I’ll have it made.

Second, and bigger, discovery is that I finally got out of the overprice bubble I’ve been in. I’d about given up on getting anything really cool on this trip because things seemed just too high, but I saw a note about some government-sponsored emporiums in the Lonely Planet, so I decided to drip over there. Whew…this heat. In the government stores, I found a real range of prices. For example, in the Maharashtra store, I found the sculptures I like so well, but they were only marginally cheaper than the ones I’d seen previously, and marginally wasn’t cheaper enough. However, I spotted some tacky, painted wood carvings in the window of the Tamil Nadu emporium, and I’ve learned that, where the wood is painted, there are also often unpainted statues (for the Euro-shoppers). I was right! And a lot of the work was to die for!!! And affordable!!! Whew. Spent a while looking at the great work there, but being on the un-air conditioned top floor of the store and needing food, I decided to adjourn to a nearby restaurant that the salesperson recommended.

Best food I’d had in India, and I was SO SORRY David couldn’t be there! He would have loved this place. At first, I thought I was being seated at a service table because there was a large, metal tray (we’re talking two-foot diameter) with six metal ramekins on the upper edge and an assortment of napkins and tableware on the tray. However, I looked at the nearby tables, and people there were eating food off the tray and out of the ramekins. While I was trying to figure out how this worked, the wave of food started. The style here reminded me of Dim Sum. There was one guy who brought around four different dishes, and he put some of those in four of the little ramekins. Another guy brought around more kinds of food, and another guy brought around a fantastic soup and a little soup bowl. There was water and yogurt to drink, and another brought two kinds of bread; another, four kinds of sauces (dabbed on the tray); and another, two more kinds of bread. Then came two kinds of rice. And the taste of this variety of food was simply the best I’d had in India. It tasted fresher -- sharper and more distinctive -- than the other food I’d had. Oh…then dessert, which I just couldn’t manage. I’ll be back there, for sure.

After the food orgy, I could hardly move, so I sweat-waddled my way back to a nap. Then coffee. Then shopping more. I also found that, in the state government emporiums, while some stuff was high, if you looked, you could find some kind of nice things that were more reasonably priced. It was a great, relaxing day.

21 May 07 -- Delhi, Old and New

Ah….back in the sightseeing saddle. Since I couldn’t get my money back from Paul’s Rentals for the extra day of car rental, I insisted on a car today, and poor Bharat had to take me around yet again. At least he seems over his cold…I don’t think you can keep a cold in this environment because it just gets sweated out of you. He seems happy back in the heat; I just sigh, get out my Dollar Store hankie, wipe my sweat and move on out.

I decided to take advantage of the car to see things that would be too widespread to see on foot (in this heat). For beginners, I wanted to visit the area that’s roughly similar to the mall in Washington, DC, so I had Bharat take me to the India gate and Rajpath. Architect Edwin Lutyens did the main layout for British New Delhi, and he used a series of axes pointed throughout the city, a la Washington, DC, Paris and, to some extent, London. The main administrative axis is the Rajpath. On Raisina Hill at the top of the axis is the President’s home, but it used to be the Viceroy’s home…the seat of British government when it wasn’t this hot (when the temp went up, they decamped to Shimla). As you’d expect, the former Viceroy’s home is big, imposing and colonial with a colonnaded façade and rotunda on the top that faintly suggests the US capital. Here’s where power was. Leading on down the hill and on either side of the mall are more colonnaded buildings with wings that come out toward the center of the Rajpath. These are administration buildings, and they’re made of the same red sandstone as the Red Fort. The Rajpath continues a long distance down – parks and fountains along the way – until it ends at the India Gate, something like a small Arch de Triomphe that’s both a war memorial and focus for ceremonial occasions. The whole Rajpath is very imposing, grand and imperial. Off to the side is a circular building – Parliament! It’s on another axis envisioned by Lutyens, but you can tell by the fact that it’s not even on the Rajpath that, in colonial India, Parliament wasn’t worth much. Looking at this relatively inconspicuous building, I recalled a quote from the Brit who’d proposed the first ‘representative assembly’ in India to the effect that he’d never have suggested the idea if he had thought it would lead to anything resembling a parliament. Ha!

I knew it’d be closed on Monday, but since it was close, I wanted to see the Bahai Temple. It was as nice as I’d heard. I think it was built in the mid-80s, so it’s very modern architecture, and its form is meant to suggest a lotus opening. As I recall, the Bahai faith sees each religion as a path to the truth, so the Bahai welcome anyone to worship. I associate Bahai with the mid- to late-70s, but that’s probably just my little late hippie experience. As so many places here in Delhi, there’s a great garden around the temple.

Next, we headed through very intense traffic and development to the 13th century Qutb Minar, and as we were going through all the bustle and construction, a sudden realization came to me. There have been many Delhi-s in history – Hindu rulers established their kingdoms here, Afgan invaders built their capitals beside and over these, the Mughals wanted their own Delhi, and the British built their own: New Delhi. Each of these Delhi’s is still extant (Qutb Minar is part of one), so there is Delhi beside Delhi beside Delhi. After visiting the Rajpath, I realized that the British Delhi, New Delhi, is just as dated today as the Qutb Minar and Tughlaqabad Delhi-s; people live in those older parts among the historic structures, but there is a Newer Delhi shooting up that is a massive, unique response to the movement of power and capital in India. This Newer Delhi has wide streets and parks, but it has malls instead of lines of small stores and medical complexes instead of a peppering of doctors’ offices. The Newer Delhi has gigantic mass transit and, for those who can afford it, parking. Newer Delhi has it’s own structure and architecture, and going through it, I was struck by what a genuinely unique historical moment this is in India; what a privilege to get to see this moment as it is taking form and expressing itself in yet another Delhi, replacing the outdated New Delhi with the Newer.

But I was all keen to get back to an earlier Delhi, so I was glad to get to the Qutb Minar complex. This part of Delhi is, I think, the first Moslem settlement of the city, and it marked the end of Hindu rule in Northern India. The Qutb Minar itself is a tall tower that commemorates the Islamic victory; it was started in the 1193, but various rulers over the next 150 years added to it. Still…..it just boggled my mind to look at the refined, sophisticated construction in the area -- the elegant mosques; the gracious, polished gateways; the refined courtyards and tombs – and to think that 12th century Europe was the crude gargoyles and the somber, blocky churches of the Romanesque. Seeing this site drove home to me the advanced level of Islamic culture at this time in a way nothing I’ve read has done.

As much as I liked the Qutb Minar itself, there were other things in the complex that were just as beautiful. There was a 16th century Lodi tomb (another group of rulers in Delhi), and a very beautiful, ornately-carved 14th century gate. Of all these though, I especially enjoyed the Quwwat-ul-Islam Mosque, build contemporaneously with the Qutb Minar itself. When I walked into the mosque, I was struck by how ornate everything was, but on further inspection, I realized that there was an awful lot of representational imagery in the mosque’s carvings. In fact, there were human figures (forbidden in Islam) and vegetal decoration that you never see in mosques. Back at the information panels, I found out that Qutb-ud-din, the guy behind these 12th century masterpieces, had put the mosque right on the location of several large Hindu temples. Since the building material was there, he just tore down the temples and appropriated the pieces for into the mosque, kinda like the way the Spanish would later put churches where there had been Mayan temples and incorporate the material from the earlier temples. A pretty effective technique – not only does the conqueror get material to build with, but by tearing down structures of the conquered and using the pieces in the new construction, you’re sending a message about your power vis-à-vis the loser’s. And a last note – acknowledging that my Asian art history is somewhat weak, I couldn’t help but notice that some of the “Hindu” figures looked lots like Buddhist asparas; I had to wonder if all the Hindu temples had been created as Hindu (and Jain) temples or if there had been Buddhist structures in the area whose parts the Hindu rulers had used when they gained dominion, just as the Moslem victors were later to do.

The last thing I wanted to get a glimpse of was the “Ashoka” pillar in the courtyard of the mosque. Ashoka was a great, early (250 BC) emperor in India, still revered for his reign. Buddhist, as I recall. In any case, this 21-foot high pillar is made of iron, and an inscription on it dates it at late 300 AD. It was apparently brought this site when Qutb Minar was a collection of Hindu temples, and when Altamish added a courtyard to the 12th century mosque, he just build the courtyard around the pillar. It’s amazing that this iron column is 2000 years old and hasn’t rusted yet.

An interesting thing about being a single guy wandering around tourist sites is that people often ask to take your photo. At all these places, 99.99% of the tourists are domestic, and I’ve had my picture taken time and again with Indians who are on vacation. I figure that’s only fair since I’m always doing the same thing, and I’ll usually hit the photographers back by asking to take their photos, too. While I was looking at the iron column, a family from Tamil Nadu started talking to me, and we all ended up taking each other’s photos. The grandmother in the group was kind and beautiful, and I gave her one of my cards.

At this point, I was hungry, so when Bharat mentioned stopping briefly at a mall, I jumped at the occasion. I’m not above fast food if it’s in air conditioning. However, the “mall” was just a super-high end Cottage Industries place with wonderful crafts at outrageous prices. I looked at some bedspreads and statues, tried to keep a straight face at the prices, escaped the carpet salesmen, and fled to the car. Close call! Stopped by Air India to get a reservation for Leh but found THAT too expensive, too. I’d found a cheaper rate on Orbitz at the Internet café. Good to know. And one more craft gallery. By this time, I’d wised up and asked for a cold Coke before looking at the overpriced merch. Again, the stuff I liked was way too expensive, but I at least had a couple of cold drinks. Dang…the price thing is just disappointing, but I’d rather take back nothing than something far overpriced or something reasonably priced but shabby. What a concept -- my bags might be light enough for me to carry when I head back!
Finally got to an air-conditioned restaurant and had lunch! Love this Indian food, and my tummy is clearly getting used to it. Went back to the hotel afterwards, took my usual nap, and then decided to go out for my usual tea time coffee. From there, I went to my Internet café and booked a flight to Leh. YEA!!!! I finally have some closure on that, anyway. Leave at 5:40 am (!) on Friday. Figure I’ll loose 1-3 days to altitude at Leh and then get to do at least a little sightseeing.

20 May 07 -- Delhi Redoux

Yuk! I forgot how bad the coffee is here!

Woke up this morning to the discovery that my room is separated from the one beside mine by a simple, thin door, and I can hear the old guy in there shuffling around. He’s fond of Indian music, and he has his TV tuned to some traditional music channel that has typical, singsong Indian music playing 24/7. As if that’s not enough, he sings along, in a very passable falsetto, with the super-high-pitched voice of the singer, sometimes even doing counterpoint and sometimes just hitting the high note accents with the singer. He has a pretty good voice, but I think I’m going to have to change rooms.

Otherwise, this was a pretty relaxing day. I just ambled around and went into shops when I got hot or thirsty. Looked at movie times and offerings, stopped into a couple of cafes, found a few bookstores I want to try to get into when they’re open. Low key, relaxing day which I think I needed after the last week.

19 May 07 -- Drowned Rat Redoux

Work up this morning to an experience I haven’t had in a long time. Slept great last night…best night’s sleep in India, I think, because of really thick drapes, very little traffic outside my window, and wonderful air conditioning. Awake, I headed to the phone to order my usual omelet-and-toast breakfast, and as I approached the drapes, I could tell that that part of the room was warm compared to the rest. It’s always raging hot outside when the window area of your room is 15 degrees warmer than the rest. Sigh….

Nonetheless, it was 8 am, and I was going to see a few last things in Chandigarh before I left. Bharat was ready to go, so we first stopped by the Rose Garden. I think I could live in this city. There are big roads, a huge number of parks, an almost gentile (for India) traffic circulation, and trees throughout. The whole city, perhaps because it is planned, seems organized, clean and pleasant.

While anyone will tell you I’m no special fan of roses, the Rose Garden was fabulous. It’s a wide-open park, almost as big as Piedmont, with rose beds scattered throughout. As I walked in, and the whole time I was there, I was walking through the aroma of rose blooms. There were also groves of willows and other trees whose names I don’t know, and there was a tree with bright yellow blooms planted throughout. I also saw a really odd bird – huge, orange beak and kinda squat body that was lemony green/yellow on the lower half and lime green on the top. It was defending its nest in a tree cavity from the ubiquitous magpies, so I got a great look at it. I’ll have to check it out. And there were also quite a few people out already enjoying the aroma and the freshness in the air. Of course, I was sweating profusely, but I had wonderful 40-minute walk there.

We next went to Le Corbusier’s well-known government buildings. Chandigarh is a special zone that isn’t part of any state (like Washington, DC), but the governments of both Punjab and Harayana are located here. The Ministry of Justice has three large, colored, vertical panels that support part of the building, and it’s still a striking structure these many years out. We accidently parked next to a guard station (you couldn’t tell…it was a mud brick house with a few trees in front of it), and an officer in a sweaty tank top came over to say hello. His blue-grey eyes are characteristic of Himanchal Pradesh, where I’d just left, and as he watched sweat drip off my nose, he told me I should go to Shimla. Ha! Behind him in the front yard, a couple of very handsome and hunky soldiers were taking their morning bath. There is a little tension in Punjab today because some Sikh religious leader who had been setting up religious communities was just mildly denounced by the mainstream Sikh religious leaders for modeling himself as the 11th Sikh guru (“mildly” being that they called for dismantling the communes and tossing the guy in jail for five years). Sikh fundamentalist thought the denunciation too mild, and there were riots throughout Punjab and attacks on the communes while I was visiting the Stone Garden yesterday. Pictures in the morning paper showed angry crowds of Sikh men brandishing swords and calling for the head of the guru. While the government was assuring the world that Punjab was open for business, most banks and stores were closed, and there is a ban on assemblies of more than five people. That’s why the military guy came out to see what I was doing.

Chandigarh was going about its Saturday routine, though. There were walkers in the Bougainvillea Garden (the size of the Rose Garden), and the same in the main park (many times bigger than the Rose Garden and filled with brushy, acacia-like shrubs). Le Corbusier also built a lake in Chandigarh, and there were people milling about there, too, discussing what was happening outside their Chandigarh bubble (in my fantasy of their conversation). Chandigarh really is a lovely, calm, easy city…if you have a car.

And I have a car, but we had to leave the bubble and re-enter unzoned India, with its dust, its chaotic commerce, and its loud, unruly traffic – the road to Delhi.

The trip up wasn’t too bad, even though it was so hot the AC on the Ambassador couldn’t quite keep up. Took a nap, wrote my blog, stopped for a cold Coke (I’m supporting you, David!) and fixed a flat tire at 2 in the afternoon in the heat of the day. What luck…30 minutes from the hotel! It was interesting to watch oblivious Bharat methodically take out the jack and crowbar and jack up the car as lanes of rickshaws, busses, trucks and passenger cars hurtled by honking (just honking, not necessarily at him). Then he inspected the tire in the middle of the road as traffic diverged around him. I sat on the curb sweating in the shade, partly from the heat and partly from anxiety. What do you do if someone gets hit by a car in India?

The rest of the day was business. Tried unsuccessfully to book a ticket to Leh. The travel agency was just booking the ticket on the airline site, so I tried to get the site to accept my credit card. I don’t think Visa liked my cc info and the Delhi phone numbers, and the site wouldn’t let me use American phone numbers. No go. Went to Thomas Cook to change some money to pay Bharat, and joked with the guys there about the rate, which has dropped since Dharamsala. I told the guys to stop working so hard (it was a Saturday) because the rupee was too strong; they told me to blame Bush for my weak dollar.

So it was soon dinner at the York and good, long night’s sleep.

18 May 07 -- Return to the Cauldron

Nice morning to get up in Shimla and take a farewell view of the Himalaya before I head back down into the plains and heat. Oh, those monkeys. Heard a loud noise at the window this morning and turned around to see a small monkey looking over the window sill; had I not been here, it would have been rummaging around the room, sans doute. Chased it away and watched a couple of flocks of parrots screech by before getting down to the car.

Just how high was I here? We drove down and down and down. Half the day. The usual parade through different vegetation zones, this time even past eucalyptus and to the flat, Deccan plain. Good bye, Himalaya; hello, hot. Have to say I was more than a little sad to leave the mountains. It was so nice up there…cool and just left alone to wander around.

There is good news on the way to Chandigarh, though – I stop by a restored Mugal garden, Yadavindra Garden. 17th century.

Yadavindra is yet another gem tucked away in the most unlikely place. Outside is some loud, tacky, carnival-like stuff, but you pay the 25-cent entry, and you’re back in an over-the-top time. I can see the link between the garden where Humayun’s Tomb is and this one. Both are symmetrical and rectangular, and both have a building as the focus. Here, you walk into the garden and come to a long, flowing pool that drops a level and leads to a large, delicate, gazebo-like structure where some people are sleeping out of the heat. There are tall palms on either side of the walks that flank the pool, and behind them groves of fruit trees (mango and something I don’t know). When you come to the covered platform, a delight awaits you as you see five more layers of pools, structures and groves below you. You can’t beat a Mugal garden.

I stayed in the garden for nearly two hours, walking in the various fruit groves and hibiscus plantations and resting at different little gazebos set throughout. Everything was tightly symmetrical, but the garden didn’t have the rigid feel of a French garden, perhaps because of the plants. For example, while I was walking the along the central pool on one level, I noticed two trees symmetrically placed on opposite sides of this axial pool. They were equally distant from the axis and in the middle of groves of other trees. They were the size and shape of live oaks – far taller than the surrounding fruit trees – and were covered in crimson blooms the size of a softball; each had a lounging platform around and under it. A French garden would not have used such large, rambling trees; French gardens feel more clipped and linear, while this one, symmetrical though it may be, is shaggy and symmetrical. It was delightful sitting in the heat under the large, scarlet canopy of these trees, and I spent time with both of them.

I wonder about the planning and history of this garden. One source says the garden is 300 years old, and the other says it dates back to the days of the Mahabarata epic, when Pinjore (then called Panchpurra) was discovered by the Pandavas, the good gods in that ancient work, during their 12 years in exile. Even when restored to their empire, they would come back here….until they finally vanished into the Himalayas. I like the 1000 BC version of the history of the garden, but there’s more documentation for Mugal architect Fidai Khan’s hand in the design and execution.

Whichever, my point is still this: what kind of vision does it take to plan and create a garden that uses such slow-growing things as mangoes and live oaks? There are ample hibiscus in the garden, so do you plan the long-term garden and overlay that with the more immediate view? Do you use a lot of shrubs and bushes until the larger plantings are established? What a wonder it is to see such a fantastic design in its maturity; how fortunate I was to be able to wander in an environment Khan would never see fully realized.

We were only ten miles out of Chandigarh, so I eventually relented and got back to the Ambassador to head on. Thinking of grandiose, long-term planning, I was looking forward to seeing Le Corbusier’s fifty-year-old planned city.

India seems to excel at experiments with planned cities, and there are lots of ruins to testify to the fact that such planning doesn’t always work; at least two emperors tried unsuccessfully to create cities. Le Corbusier’s city, though, seems to be working so far.

This is one of the BIG IDEAS that the 50s had for the developing world – create a perfect area (in this case, a city) with wide avenues, lots of trees and gardens, logical zoning of housing and work. I’ve seen these in places before – Nairobi, Dakar, Addis Ababa, Lusaka – and they end up as dirty, dusty places with sewage running down the middle of the street and poor people living in the parks, traffic circles and road medians…, usually after they’ve cut down the trees Chandigarh hasn’t gone that way at all. The city is lovely. There are wide, four-lane streets with tree-lined medians, and the sidewalks and bike paths are respected and used, the bike paths by rickshaws. The city is impeccably clean, and people actually obey the traffic signals and even, to some extent, stay in their lanes. And very few drivers use their horns. It’s green, clean, organized, logical and comfortable. Aside from the fact that the city really demands you use a car (or maybe bus), I don’t see any downside to it at all. I’d later notice that Indians like it so much that they’re replicating the zoning and other planning features elsewhere in the country.

Chandigarh is so comfortable and spacious that I had no trouble finding a hotel. Because the city is a government center, there are lots of them, and they aren’t too expensive (for me, anyway). Found a nice one and checked in. Also, had the distinct impression that Bharat was planning to sleep in the car, which made me wonder if he’s been doing that all along. It’s so very common to find public places to bathe, that I now wonder if he’s been sleeping in the car all along to save money. The heat in the parking lot in Chandagarh was just stifling, and can’t imagine not being able to get to some AC.

Well, I’m paying a lot of the car, and that’s supposed to provide a hotel allowance for him (I was assured that), so it’s Bharat’s choice. Me, I took a nap. In AC. Bharat was at the car and ready to go at the appointed time, and we went to the Rock Garden. Honestly, I wasn’t at all enthused about going. It sounded like a space created by and Indian engineer who liked miniature trains or something like that. However, all that I read said it was a must-see, so I got my sweat hankie and allowed myself to be taken there.

I am so glad I went! What a fantastic place this is! When I first entered, there was a wall made of hundreds of electrical insulators that then broke before the wall continued as stacks of spherical clay pots. Wow, I thought, his is like Finster, only with a lot more awareness of texture and form! Pretty soon I was going through entire environments, some as high as three or four stories, with waterfalls, pavilions, bridges and resting nooks. Throughout there were echoes of Mughal gardens, Thai architecture, and, most strikingly, contemporary art. As I proceeded through the garden, the spaces just got bigger, more spectacular, more wonderful and more engaging. I was simply in awe at being in such a fine, art environment. And a garden, again. I spent three wonderful hours here and would go back at the first occasion I could. I definitely want to learn more about the artist, Nek Chand.

However, if I ever get to go back, I want it to be in the winter. The heat really took it out of me, and when I got to the hotel, I took a cold shower and went to bed without eating because I was so tired.

17 May 07 -- Roger vs the Monkeys

Back with the car today as I wasn’t going to walk all the way off the Lonely Planet city map to see the Viceregal Lodge. A nervous Bharat was waiting for me at the bottom of the ridge where a no-nonsense police officer was trying to chase him off. Keeping two-way traffic open on a one-lane road is something that only an Indian policeman could do anyway, but if someone stops and blocks half a lane…well, with the cars, busses and trucks using the little road, you have a massive jam. Bharat was blocking part of the road.

Recounting all the reasons he hates driving here – no parking, no roads, aggressive drivers, mean policemen – Bharat settled down to trying to find the Viceregal Lodge. I think he’d never heard of the place because he didn’t know what I was talking about. I eventually just told him was past the Cecil, a very famous and swank hotel, and he got directions from there.

Well, almost. We still got lost several times, and I finally spotted on old sign in English pointing up a footpath. It looked steep, but it was better than trying to turn our awkwardly maneuverable Ambassador around in the middle of a crowded, narrow street of two-way traffic. He parked, and I started the climb.

Whew! Hugely upward! And I couldn’t breath, either. After getting off on several wrong paths, I finally came to a big, locked gate that I suspected was the old entrance. I had no intention on going back down and turning the car around again, though, so I backtracked a little and heaved my way up a little path and over a big wall. I found a path on the other side and started following it.

I soon came to a scene out of the Wizard of Oz. The path turned to yellow bricks, and I was surrounded by beautiful beds of flowers in full bloom that were attracting clouds of different butterflies. OK…the path wasn’t yellow brick, but it felt like it among the butterflies, flowers and sunlight.

Then the path made a turn, and behind an old, tall cedar, I found the Emerald City – a three-story, Scottish Revival baronial estate with a huge clock tower and a sprawl as big as Buckingham Palace. This had been the summer residence of the Viceroy of India, the seat of British administration of all of India during the summer months. And regal it was.

Since I’d sneaked in the back way (I later found out), I went walking in the grounds. Here, the comparison is to Versailles as the formal gardens and lawns descend the side of the ridge in a series of terraces, each lined with balustrades and flower gardens. It was a magnificent garden that afforded impressive views back up to the Viceregal Lodge. You could easily see a hundred years of British soldiers, diplomats, and businessmen meeting with maharajas and administrators in these gardens…along with their spouses. (With all the information available about the men who ran the empire, I was stuck after seeing a large photo of the wife of one of Viceroys that I knew next to nothing about half the Brits in India. What were the spouses doing while the men were administering? What was life like for them?)

My book tipped me to a half-hour tour of the Lodge, which is now the Institute for Higher Studies, so I walked back up the gardens and to the entry hall. The tour was short with a couple of interesting points, but I think it would have been especially interesting to Lou. I don’t believe they’ve done much with the furnishings here since Independence, and there was a lot of really ornate furniture setting around with a lot of very faded fabric. One room had silk-covered walls with brocade at the seams of the cloth.

The one furnishing I (and most of the tour) was interested in was the little round office table where some clever clerk worked out how to divide India to most separate the Muslims and the Hindus. We were all slightly awed to see the little table in the big palace where that auspicious decision was made, a decision that cost tens of thousands of lives. In this setting you could see how it would look so logical, though we were all thinking of the practical horror that logical decision would unleash. My thoughts went to the US in Iraq. I wonder where we’ll make the decision to partition that country, and I wonder what the practical consequences will be of our logical planning.

After seeing a large exhibit of photos of famous people visiting the Lodge, I went back out to the gardens. There, I found my footpath, went back down to the paved path I’d started on, and back to modern India. Almost to modern India, I came across a little troupe of monkeys. There are monkeys everywhere in Shimla; one of the biggest Hanuman temples in the country is here (I’m NOT walking up to it), and it’s hard to say what caused what, if the temple was built because of the monkeys or if the monkeys have had a nice life because of the temple. Whatever, there are a lot of them.

I decided it was time to get my monkey pic, so I focused my camera on one that was at eye level because it was on a retaining wall. Unfortunately, I crossed into the animal’s personal space while focusing, and it howled and put on the meanest face ever. Simultaneously, one of his 40 lb troupe-mates landed on my back pack and scared the shit out of me! I backed off fairly quickly, nursing a scratch on my arm from the ambushing monkey, and I spent the next three days awaiting the first symptoms of monkey-scratch fever, a disease I’m sure must exist.

When I got the rest of the way down the hill, Bharat was reluctant to leave, having finally found a place to put the car that wasn’t blocking traffic. However, we weren’t staying among the cannibal monkeys because my driver had found a parking space, so I had him take me around the ridge to the proper entrance of the Lodge. I wanted to visit the aviary there.

The bird park was a piddling affair; I see more birds on a Spring morning in my back yard, and that’s counting the aviary’s collection of roosters. And my back yard smells better. Since it was close, I decided to continue on and taste the high life of lunch at the swank Cecil.

Which wasn’t all that swank. I thought this was an old, heritage hotel, but I guess I was in the spiffy new wing. It was after noon, but the restaurant wasn’t open yet, so I had a sandwich and beer in the bar. Gotta say, though, great service! One person to bring the menu, one to bring the bar snacks, one to take the order, one to bring the beer while another set up my silver. And while I was sitting there, someone else in an apron on the way to do another job even made a detour to refill the half of my glass that I’d emptied. Hard to beat. There was pretty much nobody there, and I suspect it was the music: Zamphir doing covers of Titanic and “I Can’t Help Falling in Love with You.”

Back in my Ambassador, I put on my ipod (Oscar Peterson) and went back to the foot of the ridge below my hotel. I told a relieved Bharat that I was done for the day and that we’d meet in the morning, and I struggled up to the hotel and took my usual siesta.

Then it was time for my evening promenade. Same routine: walk, coffee, walk, tea, look, look, look, look. Strolled until well past dark, and headed back to the hotel. A kid in one of the intensely-lit booths in the Lakkar Bazaar asked me to take his photo, so I did.

16 May 07 -- Shimla

Very nice day today. Although I love my Ambassador, I was finally able to convince Bharat that I didn’t need to ride in it just because I had it available, and I spent the day walking around the hill station of Shimla. A very nice day of walking.

Shimla isn’t exactly what I expected, but it’s still fairly inviting. I had the most leisurely morning, and as I was finally getting out the door about 11, a storm blew up. The view from my windows is fantastic…I can see a whole valley with the Himalayas going off in ridges across the horizon. But at 11, it got almost as dark as night and a strong wind came up. It soon started raining with tremendous thunder and lightning. Then the storm blew over the top of the ridge behind me and was gone as quickly as it came…I watched the last wisps blow up and over the valley wall to my left. It was practically cold after this, and I had to wear a heavy sweater.

Shimla has an interesting story. It was a retreat long before the British arrived, but after they figured out how hot it was in the plains and how nice it was up here, the Brits moved in quickly. Shimla became the summer capital of India, and the Brits moved the whole government here from Calcutta, and later Delhi, when the hot season started below. And for that reason, I was expecting to see a lot of 19th century British colonial things.

I wasn’t wrong about that, either. There are a number of imposing, square-shaped, grey stone buildings up here along the mall; more than a few tudor-style buildings, too. Shimla is built on a ridge, and the mall is a somewhat level strolling area that runs a mile or so along the ridge. It’s not exactly at the top of the ridge…I guess it’s a table just below the top…so you have a steep drop-off on one side and a wall of green that goes up steeply on the other. Because this promenade has been here a while, there is also the occasional wonderful, huge Himalayan conifer growing on the sides.

What I hadn’t expected, despite everything I was told, is that the town is mobbed with people getting out of the heat. Thousands. And because there are so many people, the colonial grey-stones and tutors are squeezed between small sari shops and souvenir stands as far as the eye can see. When you come to steep areas of the ridge where these shops can’t be built, there are great views, but otherwise, you wouldn’t know you aren’t on a street in a small town somewhere.

One nice thing about the place, though, is that you’re pretty much left alone (after dealing with the hotel touts). I stopped many times during the day to look at my map or take photos, and no one bothered me at all, neither nice folks who just want to talk or the pests who want to sell prayer wheels. Everyone was just walking along enjoying the air.

That’s what I did all day. I strolled, stopped for the occasional tea in a room with a view over the valley, took pictures and read about the area. This is yet another great way to spend a vacation day.

15 May 07 -- The Road to Shimla

Would have liked one more day at Dharamsala, but a day here is a day not somewhere else, so made a leisurely start to the morning and headed down the mountain. Whew…DOWN! Bharat said he was going the direct route down; we couldn’t come up the direct route because the Ambassador doesn’t have enough power, but it’s all gravity on the way down, so you don’t need the engine. Just the brakes.

While we were heading down, I picked out a few stops along the way. One great advantage of being in a car is that you have a lot of freedom to stop and see things when you want. While we were looking for Kangra Fort, it suddenly dawned on me that Bharat can’t read, at least not in English. And not well in Hindi if at all. He’s always stopping for directions, even on the occasion that there are signs that I can (English) or can’t (Hindi) read. Sometimes I show him place names in the book, and he just remembers the place on the page I’m pointing to when he asks for directions.

Anyway, the fort was no big deal to find, and it was wonderful. I’d expected something that was falling down and pretty ramshackle since it’s near nothing in the world touristic, but instead it’s an almost Walt Disney fantasy castle with high, rambling walls and access ways that go way, way, way up. The fort is on a simply unbelievable spot, at the confluence of two rivers and up on a cliff point that seems as high and steep as Grand Canyon. I was also surprised to find a few people there. Of course, there were some people working on the place (you see that everywhere), but there were also a few Indian tourists. One nice woman offered me a bit of her breakfast. Since we had a long way to go, though, I feigned stomach trouble and sweated my way on up the steep road to the interior of the castle.

As I entered the main part of the interior… the keep, I guess…I was surprised to come across big light reflectors, tents, booms with microphones and motion picture cameras. A music video was in production! This country is film and video mad…but here at Kangra Fort? An Indian guy standing near me said hello with an unmistakably American tone, and it turns out he’s from NYC and here to work on the singer’s make-up. The singer (don’t remember who) is doing a sad love song, the guy told me, so it’s not an MTV type of thing. I detected a slight bit of dismissive ness in his tone.

I went on to the top of the fort and the fantastic view down two glacial river valleys. I was out of breath and sweating a good deal, but what a fine moment to be so far up here, alone in all the natural grandeur and history (fort easily dates to the 10th century and is probably much older than that). There was an interesting square pool (tank) in the center of the summit with a jaguar head as the spigot. AH! A Mayan connection! Uncanny how New World-y it looked.

It was getting hot (and late) fast, so I headed fairly quickly back down the fort. On the way, I passed my make-up buddy tending to a sweaty, corpulent, cranky guy in a chair under a small canopy; neither acknowledged my greeting as I passed.

Just coming to the exit of the keep, I was stopped dead in my tracks by an amazing sight in the corner of my eye – a huge, rock-cut temple complex right there in the corner of the courtyard. Workers were stabilizing walls opposite the carved face of the temple, but it looked to me that, when the fort was constructed in the 10th century, the builders had just walled up and around this façade and, perhaps, smoothed off the other side of the temple. With Hinduism and Buddhism vying with each other in this area for centuries, it wasn’t at all uncommon for one to “adapt” the temples of one for its own use. I can’t wait to compare my images from Mansoor with these. I know from memory that some of the carved imagery is the same…I wonder how extensive the similarity is. This façade could give us an even better idea of what Mansoor had been like before the earthquake. And I wonder if the tank above had been related to the temple here. There was a huge tank in front of the temples at Mansoor. I’ll have to pass these details on to Jane.

The hour delay caused by my little discovery sent me scurrying on down the mountain. Though I wanted to stop at yet one more temple, Bharat (politely) suggested we get our asses on down the road or we might be driving at night. Experience tells me to listen to experience, so I acceded, and we headed on toward Shimla.

It was a long and pretty tough drive, continually winding up one valley wall and down the other. You could see for miles and miles across the mountains and up and down these canyons. The walls were so steep that I got used to watching the vegetation change with the altitude – rich forest with ferns, evergreens, and deciduous trees up high, piney woods below that, and eucalyptus groves at the lowest levels we went to. Then the reverse order as we climbed the other wall of the valley. Again and again.

We stopped for lunch at a grubby little stand, and Bharat advised me to eat dal; they have to fix that fresh every day, he confided. Much later, Bharat suggested we stop for tea at an open little place as he said he was now sure we’d make Shimla by dark. That was quite a pleasant stop.

When we got to Shimla, I began to see a pattern emerge: my great hopes of a quiet, pristine environment being dashed by loud, congested roads and a huge crowd. After looking for a room in a couple of places and rubbing off a persistent tout, I got a wonderful room in a hotel just off the Mall in Shimla. Shimla is spread out across a ridge, and you can’t drive up a lot of the roads, so I hired someone to carry my luggage up to the hotel and (tried to) follow the porter. I think he got there 10 minutes before I did. What IS the altitude here? When I went down three flights of stairs to see the room, I was winded for five minutes after I walked back up to the desk before I could say I’d take it.

I just dined on soup and what I think of as Indian margaritas -- fresh lime soda with salt.

14 May 07 – Tracking Tibet

I was out fairly early this morning to get a jump on the crowds and the good photography light, and I wasn’t disappointed. With the steep angle of the mountains (there’s not a flat spot within miles…the nearest airport is about 30 miles and can only handle the smallest of planes), the sun comes in at an especially strong angle in the morning. The air was as cool and sharp as the light.

Went by the chortan in the center of town first. “Chortan” was a new word to me, but it’s apparently Tibetan for “stupa” which is just a mound with a spire and a Buddha statue or something similar in it. McLeod Ganj’s chortan is a large structure with four exterior walls of prayer wheels, and when I got there, people were stopping by on their way to work to make the circuit of the chortan spinning the prayer wheels. As is the practice, supplicants made the circuit clockwise, and they spun each wheel in a clockwise direction. On each prayer wheel -- cylinders in this case -- there is a prayer (sometimes scrolled inside, too, I think), and each time you spin the wheel, you get credit for saying the prayer. I couldn’t help but think how much more efficient a prayer wheel is than a rosary.

That said, a lot of people had prayer beads with them and were saying prayers at the same time at the same time they were spinning the wheels. It was an interesting group at the chortan. First, nearly everyone was clearly Tibetan, either refugee or at least from that ancestry. Their broader, rounder faces, narrower eyes and lighter skin were different from the features of the Hindu population, which is mostly in town for tourist business, I’d guess. Tibetans look much more like Chinese than most Indians. In addition, most of the women wore what I think of as more traditional Tibetan clothes – long, full skirt with a big apron and a blouse with a vest. No saris, and definitely no bright colors. However, the same kind of syncretism I saw at the Golden Temple was apparent here, too, with the scattered Hindu-appearing person making the prayer wheel circuit, too. Mixed in with quite a selection of monks.

From here, I went down to the Tsuglagkhang Complex (a word to win a Scrabble game with if I ever saw it). This large enclosure has two temples. One, the Tsuglagkhang Temple, is the central temple of the refugee community, analogous to the big temple in Llosa. It has three statues, one of which is Avalokitesvara, the diety the Dalai Lama is the incarnation of. It faces Tibet. The Kalachakra Temple has a fantastic mural in it; “kalachakra” is the wheel of time, but I couldn’t make much out of the mural or the lengthy English explanation that the temple provides. There were some pretty mean faces on it, but I’ve learned that mean faces don’t mean mean deities; sometimes, a mean face just looks mean in order to repel a mean diety. India has pretty much made me despair of ever understanding another iconography. I’ve had all kinds of art, literature and religion classes about Christian iconography, and I still don’t understand all the saints and their layers of significance. Polythesistic Hinduism seems even more complicated. Mix in Buddhism, with its many types(!), and I almost quit. At times, I can’t even tell if a statue is Hindu or Buddhist.

I enjoyed my time at the Tsuglagkhang and its café, and then I headed back up the mountain to my hotel. On the way, a monk struck up a conversation with me, and we chatted as we walked. He had only been in India for four years after leaving Tibet, and he’s settled in a Tibetan Buddhist monastery in Karnataka; he was here to study at the Tsuglagkhang. He was a gentle little guy, warning me about the rude traffic here and telling me how a car had pushed him into a hole and made his sprain his ankle. As we were walking, we met one of his fellow acolytes, and I talked to the two of them for some time. The new guy, too, was from Tibet, and he’d been here for six years; I think he was the first guy’s mentor here in McLeod Ganj, though they were about the same age. Responding to my questions, they told me that the maroon robes most monks were wearing indicated a novice learner, while the very few yellow robes were worn by bona fide monks. I asked how long it would take to get the yellow robe, and they both laughed – twenty years if you’re smart, fifty if you’re not.

The first guy I’d met had invited me down to the gompa (monastery where monks live) because he was (philosophically) interested in the difference between the simple past and past perfect in English, but friend was looking for him because they had to do something. Dang, missed that chance. Well, it was lunch time anyway.

Spent the early afternoon in my hotel garden, which overlooked the Himalayas with the odd stupa…er, chortan…and hotel. It was interesting to see the parade of odd birds that went through, also. My miserable Birds of India has color plates of about 1 in 40 birds, so there was no way to identify what I was seeing. But I watched anyway.

Bharat apparently thought we hadn’t used the car enough this day, so he insisted on taking me up to a lookout further up the mountain. Wimp that I am, I got in the car and we went though I was very satisified in the garden. On the way, I was happy to discover we’d pass Dal Lake, which I hadn’t realized was up that way. My book said that Dal Lake was a sacred lake, and when I saw it, it did look unusual – most way up the mountain, it’s a small, almost perfectly circular lake. Just like a lentil (dal). But it was hardly sacred. There was a fence around it, and there were garish plastic paddle boats which had been rented by screaming kids and adults. A little amusement circus sat on one shore with things like a little merry-go-round and spinning teacups. Oh…and a huge, loud traffic jam.

It was nicer further up, and though the trip wasn’t worth it, it was good to sit in a little tea patio at the overlook and feel the cool air blowing by while looking out over god-knows-how-much of a drop off. Did a few snaps there and a few on the way down, and then got read for dinner with the Brits.

I was looking forward to dinner with the group I’d met at the temple; we had so much in common and so much to talk about. In this case, Jane had also invited a couple of Tibetans from the community. One guy had just gotten a scholarship to Emerson University near Boston to do a second Master’s, this time in print media (as in news), and the other was the leading community activist for the Tibetan community in McLeod Ganj and, perhaps, in India.

What a wonderful evening! I discovered Jane is a big gardener, so we went to the garden and talked about her plants. She has two types of bamboo, one of which is getting unruly and going to have to be controlled. She also had a Himalayan passion flower in bloom on her porch railing (I told here about ours), and that got us to discuss plants and butterflies. The way monarchs strip milkweed and fritillaries strip our passion flower, there are caterpillars that chew off her nasturtiums. In the mountains, though, the nasturtiums grow back. It was a pretty good time to be there as the monsoon wasn’t far off and plants were starting their wet season greening up. She does marigolds the way we do meadows – she’ll soon fling out hands-full of seeds and let them take over the areas that look like grass right now. She said they need lots of marigolds for Diwali, when they hang marigold garlands around the house the same way we do Christmas lights. She conspiratorially confided that she’d gotten her seeds for this year from garlands that were hung at the Dalai Lama’s house the previous year (I think she’s there with some regularity).

The grad student then arrived with the cutest little baby ever. Pauline (who’d spent the day teaching English and science at a local school) had to hold the child, and we got to talk the father some. He, too, had left Tibet to come to India as a refugee. He talked about how important the baby was to him and his wife as they’d both had to leave their families; for the first time, they felt they were putting down roots. He had the simple, unassuming manner of the first novice monk I’d met earlier in the day. I also noticed that the baby had a black mark on his nose with something like ash. Tibetans do that so the child doesn’t appear too perfect (reminded me that, in Mali, you don’t praise a child’s looks because the gods might overhear you and do something bad out of jealousy).

The second guy arrived, and you could immediately see the political activist. Not only was the cellphone nonstop, but Bill was buying a load of books of his poetry to sell at Foyle’s. We talked a whole lot about human rights and refugee populations – Tibetans, Spanish Saharans, Cubans, Haitians, Palestinians and one group I wasn’t familiar with that Bill works with a lot. I was indirectly leading toward the idea that the Tibetans might just assimilate into India like the Cubans in South Florida (really, how many of them do you think are returning to Cuba when Castro dies), but as we talked, I began to change my mind on that issue. I’m not sure China will ever let Tibet out of its grip, but I could easily see a trans-national Tibetan culture emerge. When you look at the institutions and identity that Tibetans have developed here in India, you’re just not seeing the same thing as in South Florida. Interestingly, in his business-like, no-nonsense approach to things, this Tibetan guy reminded me of the second acolyte I’d met that morning. This guy, incidently, had been born in India.

Of course, it was a wonderful evening. Bill loves to cook, so we talked about food. Darren talked about his life in Wales and the other side of Himanchal Pradesh, and Pauline about teaching and their travels. I talked semiotics with the Tibetan guy, and there was LOTS of discussion of politics! And just wonderful, wonderful food. In fact, when Jane brought out the concluding pudding, it was such a big serving that the chair I was sitting in broke and I went right to the floor. I told her I’d prefer half that amount the next time, after I quit blushing in embarrassment. Everyone thought it was hilarious (me, too…if embarrassing), and only Pauline was sympathetic enough to say how bad she felt for me. It was great pudding, though.

We eventually headed back to the hotel to allow the locals some sleep, but we decided to have a nightcap in my room. Bill showed up with a bottle of Ballentines, and we sat around the coffee table in my room and carried on about politics and travel for over an hour. Evenings like this are hard to beat.

13 May 07 -- Rock-Cut Temples and Buffalo Tea with the Nomads

Off expeditioning today! Excited to get to drive around the mountains a bit, the moreso since we’re going to look for an unusual rock-cut temple complex. I’ve visited these kinds of sites in many places – here, Ethiopia, Southern France, Scotland. It’s one thing to carve out a cave or tomb, like in Europe, but the idea of having a finished building in mind and then subtracting rock to get to the structure you want…well, I’m intrigued by the imagination that plans that way. The temples at Ellora here, done in that way, are simply fantastic, as are the churches in Ethiopia. I couldn’t wait to see this site.

We drove down from McLeod in almost no traffic (here, too, nothing starts early) and back a ways along the road we’d followed yesterday. Dramatic landscape, getting dryer as we went. The man at the hotel had told us it was 70 km, but smartie me with my map said it was about half that. Smartie me was wrong, and it took us well over an hour to get to the site over winding, one-lane roads.

Of course, there was no one there, but as I was starting into the site, a taxi with four Euros drove up. I said hello and went on up to the complex. The complex was severely damaged in an earthquake in 1905, and a lot of the carved facades and even ceilings had caved in or slid off. Still, there was enough left that you could see it was a magnificent structure. There were tall, narrowing roofs over small altar areas, and you could walk though the structures and up on the roof to get a better view of the ornate carving on the tall roof combs. It looked to me like the roofs were decorated with images of the complex itself, like you sometimes see in Mayan temples. In fact, the whole place felt a bit like someplace like Palenque but a whole lot like Angkor Wat. On a smaller scale.

As I was walking around, one of the women in the other group asked me how I came be there, and so we struck up a conversation. Jane is an editor who works a lot with the Tibetan community in Dharamsala; in fact, she’s been here 20 years and involved in the Tibetan issue the entire time. What a fun, dynamic, warm woman she turned out to be. She told me where the best carvings were and pointed out that this complex, unlike any rock-cut complex I’ve ever seen, was carved out of a pretty much freestanding block, so you don’t have to stand on top of a cliff and look down to see it. She also said that the unusual representations of crowned Parvati and Shiva were significant. I liked her immediately, her openness and warmth, but not wanting to horn in on someone else’s tour, I headed off to the roof with my camera.

While I was browsing around up there, I thought I’d found the crowned heads Jane was talking about, so I shouted down to her where I was. She said she’d try to get up there (she doesn’t like heights), and as I was waiting, the older man in the party came over, Bill. Turns out Bill owns and runs Foyles Bookstore in London, and as we were chatting, I made the (joking) comment that the Khymers had clearly been influenced by this place. Surprised, he asked me if Jane had mentioned that to me. Nope, just my own observation. Turns out Jane is pitching a book about just such a connection. Soon we were all talking on the roof – Jane; Bill; his wife, Pauline; and her son, Darren.

We were like old friends. Darren studied at Dharamsala and has been coming back to India for about eight years, I think. He has a house on the other side of Himachal Pradesh, and he and his brother were friends of Jane. Jane and Pauline knew each other some way, too. Bill and Pauline were out here with Darren on a visit, and they’d just come out to the temple site on Jane’s advice. We had so much in common it was just ridiculous, and we joked and talked about Angkor and about this site.

They were going on a picnic after the site and invited me to come along. Really enjoying the company, I accepted immediately. Their goal was Pong Lake, an artificial lake created by a dam about 15 km further down the road, but we stopped for a cool drink at a little grocery on the way and Jane brought out a homemade cake! And it was really, really good – those Brits can so do cakes. When we finished, I hopped back in my Ambassador, went the wrong way, turned around, and caught them back on the right road.

The road to the lake got too bad for the Ambassador, so I moved into their car and we went the rest of the way together talking of birds and other things. When we got to the lake, it was like sitting in a bowl in an oven. The lake rises and falls a lot with the monsoon, and it was getting low, so there was a broad, flat area around it. Everything shimmered in the distance. We looked at birds while were there, and Jane pointed out a group of Gujar, nomadic herdsmen who seasonally bring their buffalo through the lowlands and the Himalayan hills. I had no idea there WERE nomadic groups in India, and I certainly never expected to see them! Apparently, they graze higher than this when things are greener and then graze here after the farmers and harvested their crops; the buffalo love the leftover rice stems. When the farmers start to use this land again, the Gujar head north.

Jane asked for me if I could photograph a family, and they agreed. In the contrasty light, it was only going to be a souvenir pic, but I shot them anyway. Handsome people. As Jane and I walked away, she said that the family was shouting to the other small groups that I’d done their photos and then shown the photo to them. They thought it was really cool.

It was way too hot for a picnic here, but intrepid Jane went off to one of their shelters to ask if we could use it. An older guy was there, and he, Jane and Darren spoke some in Hindi while the rest of us were just happy to be out of the heat. I was taken right back to the Massai when I got to the huts. Of course, there were a lot of flies. There was also a little, dried mud/dung platform in front of the two huts, almost like a patio area, and they’d built a couple of little stoves into that area. Each hut also had a little clay-lined fire bowl, probably for night time heat or even smoking away the bugs. And it was cool in the hut, which was positioned to catch every little movement of air off the lake. You could see a long tradition behind these efficient touches.

The light was beautiful in there, so I asked if I could do photos. I took pics of the old man (the red is henna…he’s muslim), of the man and his granddaughter, and of his grandson. I couldn’t communicate at all, but he was quite friendly. He soon offered us some tea, and the woman I’d photographed earlier prepared it in the two little stoves outside the hut. The old guy told us that the tea was prepared with fresh buffalo milk, so it’d be good. And he was right. We felt embarrassed about taking from these people who had so little, so Jane shared the rest of her cake with them.

Our group mustered itself eventually, and we went back to the car and off in search of place to have a picnic. They spotted the picture (and temperature) perfect place under a huge mango tree. Jane pulled out a huge wicker basked full of the makings, and we settled in.

What a totally fun dinner. There was plenty of fruit (melon, mango), a couple of to-die-for quiches, a rice and satay dish I’m going to get the recipe for…all spread out on a blue and white checked tablecloth. How totally civilized! I wish I could have contributed a bottle of cider. And conversation was as good as the food – Bill regaled us with tales of the ossified administration of Foyles he found when he moved into actively managing the store, and we talked about the Middle East (they have lots of contacts in Saudi Arabia and the UAE), China, Indonesia and refugee concerns, a field Bill is very active in. It simply couldn’t have been a better picnic.

And as if everyone hadn’t been kind enough, Jane invited me to dinner at her place the following evening. My Southern thing didn’t want to impose, but I seemed to have so much in common with everyone that I just had to accept.

Got back to the hotel (oh..forgot to mention that we were staying in the same hotel), and headed in to relax a bit.