Dharamshala trip: Departure

You do not even need your fat Lonely Planet to get to know about must-visit places in India. Far before I read anything about Dharamshala, Rishikesh, Pushkar, Amritsar, Jaipur, Jaisalmer etc from my Footprints I got an idea of those as major weekend destinations for Delhi trainees. Simply everyone is heading there. I myself have not been a light-feet traveler these months at all: my travelling experience in India insofar has been limited to the weeding trip in the South and another family type road trip in Uttar Pradesh.

Invited by Lajpat Nagar people (the recent wave of my former flatmates) and inspired by Kanak who has been to Dharamshala 4 times and still was joining this 5th time (even with his injured leg, what a spirit!) – me packed Friday morning so that to be leaving right after my office.

The major momentum of our nine-people group was determination to go. The latter was not backed up with any of booking or reservations though. Friday night, congested traffic in the Old Delhi nearby ISBT, 9 of us getting there from various locations in Delhi, absence of somewhat centralized information desk at the bus station….. all contributed to the nice night we ended up with in Delhi and the belated departure… Wanted to leave at 7 pm, got tickets for 11 pm….

We decided to hang out over a cup of coffee or a pint of beer… Someone naturally though of Connought place as the central-most location for such things and someone else was resourceful enough to suggest metro for getting there. The underground in Delhi deserves a special chapter to be written on… or maybe even some chapters, but for the purpose of the narrative I hope to manage with one passage. The metro covers some parts of central and northern Delhi and but still it would take some 3-4 years before the whole city would be covered. Delhi underground is referred as one of the most modern in the world and this is nothing but true. Astonishingly clean and not-crowded for Delhi, hi-tech, very (or even way too) spacious, all with marble floor that one can playfully slide on…. For 9 Rs each of us gets a sweet soviet-like plastic token to enter the metro…The concept is that you also need this token to leave the underground – u return in at the exit turnstyle…. smart way to decrease plastic waste that is more than abundant in this city. We enter the ultra-modern train and I wonder what is more striking to watch : the super-puper train itself or a crowd of crazy foreigners staring around.



Once reached CP, Oliver and Roel walked us around and showed the office of their well-known to us stone company. Cup of coffee was voted over pint of beer and we are already sitting on the fluffy sofas and taking our time which is plenty. Chatting, taking pictures… as if no Dharamshala would ever happen later this weekend…





Got back to the bus station (ISBT). Despite my expectations the latter appeared OK. Reasonably clean (does not obviously stink), reasonably priced reasonable food (eatable samosas for 3 Rs), reasonably crowded (flow goes quickly, people do not really stay for long except those who manage to sleep in the most amazing places in the most amazing positions), reasonably loud (the most certain way to figure out wherefrom your bus leaves is to listen to stentorian shout of conductors “Shimla, Shimla”, “Dharamshala, Dhramashala”…. In an all .. home sweet home is there and nothing would scare us, Russians who have already been through fire and water….



The bus was not a major surprise either. We opted for the cheapest version – 280 Rs for 12-hour night drive (I still wonder how come…in the sense not all of us were mentally prepared to take up the challenge of travelling by such a vehicle). The seats that were nothing but functionally comfortable. mournful Hindi music that tuned us for a long-long trip. Men who found it more convenient to join three-seat coach with me and Roel rather than jointing the same coach with his two friends…

However unconvincing my “I’m comfortable” sounded as a reply to those wondering… I was… reasonably comfortable… considering the settings… managed to sleep… To be more precise I was sleeping and waking up the whole night in the strive for a better position. There was not much room (literally) for improvement, but hei….

Export-rejected clothes

I’d like to sing a hymn to a phenomenon that appears to me as an ironic twist of global fashion industry.

The first clue came when once walking nearby Janpath in the Central Delhi I stopped by a market. When scrolling down the stalls I noticed some pieces of clothes with labels of “Mexx”, “Zara” and “Mango” on it. The blouses and skirts looked ethnic type but were too westernized to be made-for-India clothes The labels looked authentic, the idea of putting proper price tags on counterfeit clothes (being it so) sold in Indian open air market seemed absurd. But I obviously wondered how those pieces (being they authentic) could appear on that market.

Later on I got to share my observations with my Indian buddy Anoop and he told me about so-called “export-rejected” clothes. Not being the major, but still substantial participant of outsourced clothes production, India has become a motherland for millions of items sold under global fashion brands’ names. The patches of ready made garments to be shipped to the destinations all over the world go through quality check before. Sometimes it is minor defect in pieces, sometimes it is the wrong size on the tag, but the fact remains – quality standards have not been complied with – rejected! The dealers buy the rejected clothes in bulks and they make handsome margins by selling them cheaply (but by pieces) in retail markets. Therefore the stuff I saw with labels “Mexx”, “Zara” and “Mango” was real….

Some time later I went to a famous Sarojini Nagar market (extremely popular with young crowd in particular). Wandering around I came across a 10-m passage with stuff hung up on the high walls – just an amusing thing to watch – high walls filled in with a patchwork of blouses and skirts. It became evident very quickly that this is it – the export-rejected stuff… Max&Co, H&M, VeroModa, GAP, Esprit and many more are here. Yet, the range is somewhat limited – for a reason, though. By roaming around export-rejected stalls you can clearly see the pattern of the apparel outsourcing that India receives. These are mostly ethnic fluffy skirts embroidered with glass beads and colored threads, long-sleeve shirts with ruches, lace and embroidery too. (Dominantly not-died textiles, very “calm colors… ).

You pay 50-70 for a top and about 100 for a skirt – subject to the sophistication of the item. Prices are quoted as double as the selling ones, so one is to be prepared for hard bargaining. One can obviously go crazy and after two visits to Sarojini I caught up with my collection of clothes wisely left at home at 1/3.

And now you think…. 70 Rs (..) for a Max&Co shirt… what would be sold at ….. otherwise…. In fact, this is mind-blowing to think that the export-rejected price might be reflecting the real production cost way more precisely than the retail price of this item at Oxford street in London? What are the rest? Marketing cost? Brand premium? Have they done that nice job to enjoy such a handsome premium?

Before I wrote “The stuff was real”…. standing there nearby the export-rejected stalls, looking at the illegitimate children of the global fashion brands you really wonder what real brand means anyway…. This is by tag which is not always there you can guess the brand the piece is supposed to be sold under… What makes brand real? The tag? The store you got it from??? The considerable amount of money you pay for it? Does the fact I got my GAP top without the tag on an open-air market from a guy who barely speak any English and paid 60 Rs for it makes it less GAP??? Does it make me less satisfied? …. But mind you… I know this is GAP as they showed me the same item in different color with the tag… And this makes me happy… It’s not the same as getting NO-NAME piece of clothes… GAP has done their job nicely – even without being present it caught me… made me hunting for it, wanting it… even without the tag… If even when so close to their non-existence, export-rejected brands appear to be so powerful then what is the limit of their power?...

My flat

Sunday is a perfect time to cherish you nesting instincts. As lazy and slow-pace as the end of the week can be this time really disposes to meditative settling your nest.

Despite hanging out at Kalkaji till 3 am and very troubled sleeping (there in Kalkaji too) woke up 8-30, had quick breakfast and took auto home, which all left a whole huge Sunday in my disposal. Nice bath, time for myself, breakfast with girls… As far as we have recently got washing machine from AIECES the time has come to do the major laundry. Even though the washing machine reminds me of “Sibir” my family used to have 18 years ago, our device is proudly named Samsung and looks rather decent. But turns exactly the case when name and appearance might be so misleading. The device handling requires manual intervention it requires immense enough to question the utility of the device as such: filling the washing tank with water and draining it, loading the washed clothes in the separate compartment for spinning. To my greatest astonishment, after 12 minutes of washing and 6 minutes of rinsing the clothes appears reasonably clean (I am not sure, however, whether it was a pure merit of Samsung or Daniela who was handling clothes more prudently than the washing machine or Karoline who was keeping an eye on it through the process and performing all the manual interventions.



But the exciting laundry, we cleaned the house. Daniela and Helen took care of the kitchen and the newly obtained (NB – not newly purchased, but newly obtained as we obviously inherited it from somewhere) - fridge.

I was doing the floors – measuring the area of our apartment by my knees and wondering if we should get a cleaning lady for all that… However hard and time consuming the joint effort was… there is virtually no feeling nicer then walking bare food in your spacious, light, warm, wind --- and clean apartment, grabbing chilled dahi (yogurt) from your big fridge and watch the trembling on the wind washed clothes hung on the balcony.

House-warming dinner

Wanted to make this house-warming dinner at the first week in my new apartment. Quite timely, though, realized there is not point to reinforce the happening: house-warming is a great concept, but if everything you can offer to your guests is bare marble floors to sit on it is not a terrific idea.

After the major furniture shopping undertaken by the proud team of the flatmates our living room obtained some features of a living room.



Hence, it became inevitable – time to call friends! Only the closest ones outnumbered 20. Cooking for twenty people sounded insane to people at the market I was buying vegetables from, my neighbor who borrowed me 5 pots for cooking (including working-wonders pressure cooker), to my flatmates who wanted to be mentally prepared for this invasion. Not for me… I truly love cooking – I really fulfill myself through improvisation at the kitchen. And I believe that cooking for the friends is one of the greatest pleasures in this life. However much I am reluctant to mix different friends together (referring to the different nature of relations I would have with different people) this cooking cause becomes a place where people would mix. I would just invite all the dear people without thinking much about getting the right mix. This time I’d leave it up for the people to figure that mix out. I would be improvising with the ingredients, receiving people, setting up the table, taking care of the music. The dinner would flow on humming top principle – once it gets momentum it starts spinning and carries on by its own. I’ll get happy if people I know well will get along with each other while being very different, I’ll get excited when I hear the buzz of mixed backgrounds, languages, stories and opinions. I’ll get pleased if people enjoy my food. I’ll get happy if my friends find sweet ways to help me out without interfering. I’ll get satisfied if . …. This also teaches me some important lessons about hosting people and being a guest, about friends and people I just happened to meet. This is also by your various friends how people judge you.. so I hope I got a bit better understood by my friends who met my other friends of quite different sort…



I was so happy that Nivathee and Anoop, Vishnu, Naven and Neelima came over – so that I could at least to a small extent give something back to the astonishing hospitality of their both families. Nivanthee and Neelima were so willing to help me out in any way and I was teasing them that no way as I need to take revenge for them not letting me even lift my hand to help when I am in their houses. Vishnu drives me to the market nearby to get 50 (yes, five-zero) roties I ordered before and being so concerned he wonders if he should get water for the guests and actually gets 5-L bottle. He plays very nice classic music in the car – this drive was just those 10-15 minutes of piece I needed in between running around the kitchen and receiving arriving guests. This is what friends do for us – those small things that are not measured by the amount of effort, but rather by the amount of attention.

And… I cooked Indian stuff. I do not know now what the best praise was – complements from Indians or words from westerns saying that my food was the best Indian food they ever had in this country ;o)

Kerala by Kanak Mehra

I just want to share a piece of happiness I experienced when reading a great account written by my friend Kanak Mehra on his trip to Kerala. Kerala is a state in the south Indian, an ultimate divine as people say and increasingly growing tourist destination as statistics shows.

You might check out the text for at least two reasons, first one being loads of useful information on traveling in Kerala the account contains. However, there is the second and for me a way more sound reason to read it: the text is a way beyond any standard travelogue. This is a truly brilliant piece of writing. Concise language, rich vocabulary, great observations that many travelers could easily relate to - Kanak so easily finds the right words to describe this spirit of wandering and exploration, to describe the things and thoughts one inevitably comes across when traveling.

Enjoy! ;o).

Russian restaurant in Delhi

one exists…once told about by Kanak who did not really enjoy the services (hei, Russian restaurant, what services?) and then shown by a French friend of Anya…”Bliny” came in to the scene. Joined Anya who was seeing off some friend she was travelling with recently. Russian restaurant was picked up as a venue. Located in a somewhat posh area of Delhi, but in a somewhat strange building… “Bliny” truly stands for its Russian name. Curtains at the entrance blown by working fans, white table clothes, well washed but with spots remained here and there, salt-cellars shaped as matreshka, Russian TV-channel broadcasting, and the arrogant Russian man (chalo, chalo, order, ok? we are closing in 45 minutes.) running the place. Home – no doubts. For some reason I did not eat, but I should confess – the food looked amazing and really authentically Russian. Our friends enjoyed it and I am happy as however keen I am on cooking I’d never cook a proper Russian meal for them here – e.g., getting meat turns into a whole big issue… and what is Russian cuisine without meat?

Off-topic – but still burning. Got my first ride on motorbike in India (in my life, to be more precise). As a passenger, of course. Very scared, I atill had great faith in Tribhuvan – it was him we went on a road trip with some time ago – you should see this guy driving his jeep as if it’s a compact Smart ;o). But back to the bike - was scared in the beginning, but as soon as managed to relax – truly enjoyed. Feeling of speed and great freedom. This is akin to flying, I believe… I start getting the point of motorcycling ;o) Not in Delhi, though - insane traffic... Came home with a layer of dust in my face, hair an clothes. But with whistling wind in my ears.

Walk the line

After reading the review was rather sceptical about the movie: I am not really kin on biographies of celebrities. They are abstract people for me: no personal interaction = no room for excitement to emerge. And Johnny Cash I had really a poor clue about before I went.

Still, I watched “Walk the line”, this movie on Johnny Cash career. It’s a story about establishing yourself and coping with frustration. The other day Anya gave a marvellous definition to frustration: the latter, according to her (or whoever referred to) is a lack of love. Lack of love you are getting, lack of love you are giving, lack of love to yourself – this all give a reason for frustration to rise. That way frustration becomes truly explanatory for many things in life. It is essentially frustrated and helpless ones who are looking for the soul salvation in violence, drugs, drinking and unscrupulous life style. Strongly influenced by a childhood trauma Johnny Cash (Joaquin Phoenix) is making his way to the big stage. How he copes with whatever his popularity brings and how seemingly fragile-pretty-frivolous June Carter (Reese Witherspoon) shows greatest mental strength and courage to pull him out of the virtuous cycle of frustration.

Never watched any movie with Joaquin Phoenix. This is the man.. not one of those superficially labelled as “hot”. Yes, he appears what they call hot (= “oh, God, what a man!”) in some scenes, but at the same time you see him pitiful, sweating and ugly in this undisguised physical weakness. This does not make him less attractive, though. On the contrary, it is the ability to feel, ability to be vulnerable and ability to suffer that makes humans devilishly attractive.

The movie abounds in scenes of close-ups. Faces we see… I remember how one of my female friends was puzzled with the pictures of famous actresses. After an extensive screening she concludes that it was not the amount of clothes they had on or posture they took, but their facial expressions that made the difference. “Walk the line” is a true play of facial expressions. The range of emotions is not that of Latin dramas though. Slight movement of cheek-bones, still pupil of the eyes, number of wrinkles on the forehead – by those little changes you observe how emotion floats. This takes amazing performance by the actors which they certainly deliver. Magnetic, insane and eating-through look of Johnny Cash, begging or at times claiming look of Vivian Cash (Johnny’s wife), assumingly naïve, but just skilfully hiding all the disaster look of June Carter. Happy or squirming in pain those people are beautiful as they are able to surrender themselves to the feelings – whichever feelings those are.

Exploring my new neighbourhood

eventually took my time to explore around my new house. Already got some fragmented ideas of what the area is like and what places are there. But, no need to say, I always strive for the structured and hopefully documented understanding. So I took my camera… and… first do not even have to go out as our two great balconies can already give a great perspective on the surroundings. This is the backstreets you can see from my balcony



and these are the lanes you get to see from the balcony on the other side.



people living in the houses opposing ours are really in the immediate proximity: probably talking from balcony to balcony would be too much of a task, but watching your neighbours is still a highly possible opportunity.



however, time to get out of the flat – the sunny day is so inviting. but again, no need to go far as I can enjoy the sun on the roof terrace. It is a mixture of sacred place where tanks with water are stored (twice a day we can refill those with pushing the water button in our flat)



there you can hang your clothes to dry



or hang out yourself in the night (roof parties are so cool!) or just enjoy the notion of your house being higher than all the surrounding buildings.



No… no patience any more to stay here, let’s go out! To do so you would inevitably pass our gate.



The trick is you are to pass them when you go in too. And they close it late in the night and it’s not always I carry the key on me. So, couple of times I called up my flatmates and they were so kind to let me in, once I even made friends with the people living on the ground floor that way. Then once I climbed the gates – my friend-mountaineer Tribhuvan should be proud of me ;o) – he showed the pattern to follow ;o)

Here is our beautiful house from outside – neat and nice.



The other day when I was looking for a decent inet café I got a bit lost and found myself in a funny area. Decided to check it by day – a way more pleasant experience. Very narrow streets, unpaved roads and shops all over.



Still - traffic and people are there.



I don't mind the stares and take my time walking around and taking pictures of anything that amuses me. And those things are many.









it does not take long to make some friends...



one inquiry follows another: what is my name, where I am from, what I do in Delhi, where I stay in Delhi, where my parents are – typical set… Men (6-8) in a shop nearby try to piggyback the kid’s initiative – “Hello mam, come and sit” – but that really falls out of my intentions – therefore - bye, was nice to meet you, talk to you next time.

I see some Muslim men now and then (i.e. very few women). At times the crowd around gets pure male – many of them sitting in there shops clustering on the narrow streets…

Just a little bit further I find more spacious residential quarters with shady parks where people play games or rest or both.





Then the path brought me to a bigger road nearby my house that I regularly take – walking in circles definitely makes sense as that way you never get lost.





Once you get closer to the market the neighbourhood changes completely. Siesta-sort-of-relaxing-mood just hangs over the area: the sun is tiringly bright, very few people outside, freshly washed clothes hanging on the balconies – lazy weekend.







it gets more hectic once you get on the main road and the market itself.





I’m giving my saree for dry-cleaning, shop for some local-brand skin-care cosmetics, get a baby-size bottle of almond milk, pour it into my mouth without touching the neck of the bottle – and run home to get ready for furniture shopping.

Colorful Holi

Playing with colors was not a new concept to me: a month ago I got a decent clue during one family function at the wedding. The clue came along with my favorite bra hopelessly colored, a strange pink spot on my nose that did not go for a couple of days, and shifted concept of old-clothes-to-be-used-for-such occasions. Yet, playing was fun: bird flu was not severe at that time, so eggs were flying in the room and crashing against the heads of those trying to escape; playing with colors is fun by definition; and hassling some people on the plea of game might be a smart way of revenge.

That was a rehearsal before Holi as far as I can see now. Holi is a huge festival heavily celebrated in the North India and Nepal. However, not many people would be able to explain the rationale behind all those festivities. Notwithstanding, all the festive attributes would be there and would be fully enjoyed. Well, Wikipedia tells the story that many younger Indians fail to reproduce. A few stories, in fact. Holi is a holiday with religious background where the Lord Krishna is involved. According to some he did not like the dark color of the skin he was born with so he asked to paint him with colors. And so do people on Holy. Another more elaborate story tells us about Holika who was burn in the fire to save life of a young man. One may wonder about the relevance of the colors still. Anyway let’s see how it works in practice.

Two days beforehand people start playing. Locals do not wear nice clothes anymore as they know… actually, quite the opposite – as they do not know what to expect. Kids start throwing balloons filled with water on absent-minded pedestrians, smart teenagers pour out colored water in the open windows of busses, etc. But not to the extent it happens on the day itself.

At work we had a symbolic celebrations the day before – had some food together, some traditional Holi sweets (shaped as huge Siberian-style Russian ravioli) and put some colors on each other. Silky gulal powder of good quality is easy to remove from the clothes, but still tends to stay on fare skin ;o)





Prepared for worse I put on the crappiest clothes I was extra-careful when traveling from work that day. Many people were getting home with some colors on their clothes and faces – Holi kicked off. Nothing adventurous happened until I went to Lajpat Nagar market to buy some colors myself. I was shot with water balloons: 3 missed the target, 2 hit me. No blue spots, though. While I was buying colors some more water balloons were targeted at me, but never reached. I smiled when the second hit reached me. And men at the stall smiled back – they looked wondering if this foreign girl would be playing tomorrow.

My colleagues gave me a number of precepts. Do not go out alone that day. Do not go to the main road – no one would even hesitate to attack you. Do not drink bhan (drink that contains a small amount or marihuana) – a popular among young people swill for Holi. Well, what else to do then?. Neither of the mentioned I did – good girl. I wonder however… wonder if I’ve missed out then... Might have to get back next year to check out ;o)

A friend of ours, Kartik, brought Anya and me to his house in Noida (a city nearby Delhi). A bunch of his friends came over: I went to bed very early but people stayed till 5 am, so no wonder where were no early Holi for us next day.





Kartik’s grandmother woke us up – she appeared with all her face painted. So unserious this lady still looked very natural.



We greeted each other with putting some colors on each other’s faces. In advance, I was grieving there is no way to carry camera on me so that to document the amazing happening to come. I put my cell only ;o) in a plastic zip-lock and sighed…. As soon as Kartik himself woke up, still with hangover and very sleepy,



called up the rest of the bunch and in half an hour we were heading to the friends of the friends. Control panel in the car was covered with plastic bags, the seats – with textile covers… We hardy got into the car when someone opened a bottle of Smirnoff, mixed it with Coke and generously distributed the drink around. So, we started visiting houses of friends of friends of… with bunches of young people playing Holy. So, what does actually playing imply? Pour over people small and large amount of gulal powder, play with water pistols, spread water colors on people’s faces, pour out water on people from buckets and hoses; some people would lose their pants, some would sing and dance, some would drink hard, some would play with mud… Options are there for those who let their imagination free.

Not at least, I am simply admiring the bravado of young guys and it deserved all the attention and more. 2 of them are riding a motorbike. The one behind carries a water pistol and is pretending to shot. He is so young and so serious that you laugh for the sake of it only. Then he turns with his back to the driver and keep shooting. Another time we drive in a jeep packed with people, two guys on one side and one on the other are hanging outside (not leaning over the widow, but literally placed outside). They easily ask for a smoke and then are smoking all the way. On the hood of the car there is another one who just spread himself over there as there is nothing to even stick to or hold for him there. He is also unconstrainedly smoking and then starts dancing. On the top of all this, our energetic driver stands up and leans over the window and dances too…. We play Rang de Basanty tracks as everyone does nowadays and shoulders start shimming once you hear Punjabi beats. The road is empty and we do not drive fast, but still… Having got into the mood me and Anya played imaginary police fight – running with guns, hiding behind the cars, me wounded and splashed on a car.. Plus now and then dancing on the streets and salutation the passing by cars. Happy Holi!!!!









Noida was pretty empty as many people were done by the time we started. Otherwise, people mainly celebrated in houses, gardens and houses. Not at least, Noida has very decent residential areas – not like Lajpat Nagar market where your neighbors would kill you with water balloons. So, no activities on the road. Just now and then painted velo-rickshaws would pass through.

Many people, painted to the bones, soaking wet to the very underwear, intoxicated to the subconsciousness, tired to death, do not live long that day. Somehow it was not that hard for us not only to survive, but even go out the same night. And even have fun. Lots of fun – as much as we could grab with our still pinky hands.











It takes a while for color to go – I wonder how long this while would be – and in the meanwhile I am showing off with my pinky hair. For one time sake, truly pinky Kanak! ;o)