Welcome to Mumbai

I arrived at about 11 pm, two hours later than the scheduled time. The last hour on the train was pretty anxious as my Bangladeshi sojourners have also never been to Mumbai; vast mass of the lights would appear outside clearly signifying a major city and one of the men would exclaim, “Acha! This is Mumbai?!” Yet the station that would follow would be called X junction.. The majority of the passengers loaded off at Daddar and only a few reached the final CST.

I was supposed to stay at Bea’s, a friend of Kate working for an NGO in Mumbai. Actually, Kate herself as per the initial plan was going to come to Mumbai the day after and lots of fun could be shared by the three of us. Yet, evil police and Kate's campaign that was about to culminate in a protest by India Gate did not make it happen: I was leaving for Goa on the night Kate was flying to Mumbai.

I called Bea’s mobile and she appeared to be out downtown, so she suggested I come to the Gateway of India where she would pick me up so we could go to her’s together. I walked off the railway station and immediately sensed humidity that made me realize how much south I moved. Strangely enough, I found a typical by-railway type area outside: the exit brought me to a rather deserted street with incredibly clean, smooth and even shining in the moonlight road. Then I saw a gothic building that looked like a Boll so inappropriate it seemed in an Indian town. Newish looking buses were one of the first impressions too. After a few enquires that did not lead anywhere due to the lack of the shared medium language (on my side, assumingly English). However, I found two nice gentlemen who got me a dark-green taxi with a yellow stripe, asked the driver to bring me to the Gateway of India and told me not to pay more than 20 Rs. In a moment I was delivered to the place.

How should it feel to find yourself by the Gateway of India overlooking Arabian sea next to the grand Taj Hotel – right upon your arrival in Mumbai. It did not take long to be found and identified by Bea (in the meanwhile, I experienced some minor attacks by the hawkers and “Cheap hotel, mam” chap who got discouraged and puzzled when I explained, “I am staying here” and pointed at the Taj. Bea, a dressed up girl with long light red hair, came up, exchanged her purse for my backpack and walked me somewhere. In a few moments I found myself at an incredibly private party in an astonishingly posh bar. Bea introduced me to a couple of friends, including the Bday guy roaming around with a glass and a thick cigar who immediately promised me that “it would only get better”. And it did: I got some red wine served in a huge pot-bellied wine glass, I was sipping in to Katie Melua bizarrely singing “Lilac wine”, I was chit-chatting with the newly introduced people and they were shouting through the loud music, “Welcome to Mumbai”! I without shower for a week (fever in Kalimpong and then 2 days on the train) in my stinky cottons was around all those dressed-up people in this way-too-nice place in the very heart of Mumbai – this looked like the biggest prank ever to me.

We were gloriously driving to Bea’s in the old fashioned dark green puffed taxi… along the Marine drive (else called Queen’s necklace by the virtue of being curve-shaped motorway in the dark demarked with the twinkling lights). To your scenic drive we were discussing Delhi vs Mumbai, the girls were singing Sinatra’s “New York” changing NY for Bombei and I thought there must be a camera somewhere and we are filmed for a new Bollywood fairytale.

Kolkata II: again a set of unrelated impressions….

My second visit to the town was “same same but different”. Again: one train station, trip to the other, ferry and fish curry, tea in a clay pot for 2 Rs, morning rush of the starting a new day city.

It took my bus from Sealdah to Howra a while before it moved from the railway bus pit: sandwiched between the multidirectional flow of people and vehicles, it froze in the flow of thinnest I ever saw men carrying gigantic baskets topped with bananas and pineapples loaded in right here from a small-scale wholesaler.

We passed a shop where a musician from a wedding orchestra was putting on his bright-yellow jacket akin to a funny solder’s attire and on the fence dividing the opposite directions on the road a line of the similar jackets was hanging as a Christmas paper garland made by a schoolboy. I spotted a tiny open window leading to an empty hollow flat in the 3-4 storey building.

The waiting room for ladies at the old railway complex of Howra was deserted: wooden benches and cupboards with big mirrors made it look like a clock room in a female gymnasium. I was so glad to change back to my short-sleeve cotton kurta, cotton pants and plastic flip-flops.. when already walking on the street I felt so great that so few clothes was needed to keep me warm and so close my feet were to the ground . I could not wish any better weather after all…

I headed off to the famous Kolkatian flower market at Jagarnath Ghat to find out a totally different concept of flower selling from the one you find elsewhere in the world. Mostly, flowers here are used for devotional purposes and even when gifted to people – tend to be arranged in the sophisticated compositions. At the wholesale Jagarnath Ghat you can buy long fat snakes of marigold garlands, baskets of roses, piles of huge palm leaves and clearly more.

The bus I stopped on a flyover and a conductor who helped me in the already moving buss grabbing my waist, no sexual harassment this time though ;o)

I realized how much it matters here to be a local: as a foreigner you are in a double disadvantage here – as a non-Indian and as a non-Bengali. If some community can pride themselves on acting smart, it is Bengali. At the market they may quote 5-6 times the price for you (unspeakable in many other however touristic parts of India) and if a local enquires the price from the same chap the latter would make sure he quotes for him in Bengali (while for the rest of the communication they can use mixture of English, Hindi and Bengali, so you can make it) so that you are left wondering.. Another thing is that as a tourist you would never figure out all those run-by-day amazing food stalls unless you bother to walk around, or rather walk to the smell.

Before leaving Sudder Street, this backpackers’ area, I stopped by a lassi shop. I had a small chat with the lassi man while he was making the shake. Among the rest, I told him I was on the way to the train station, he asked when my train would depart and told me I was too early. I said you could never be sure here and it is better to provide for the contingencies. He said indifferently (I am not kidding), “What to do!”- the phrase many of my Indian co-survivors and myself jokingly used when facing peculiarities of the Indian life - and the most astonishing part was he meant it…

Leaving Sikkim

We made it back on time – the guy kept his word. I found a jeep ready to head off for Gangtok with only a back seat free. I tried to play a capricious madam and announced I would get sick if I take the back seat. The driver promised I would be there alone, so I can be comfortable. I generously agreed somewhat knowing that, as any other promises people give her, it was just an instant way to calm you down. Indeed, on the way we picked up some more people. Yet, the driver, a Tibetan man, was a sweetheart to me: he shared a clementine with me at one of the stops where among the rest he had his vegetable shopping done, and at the next stop he treated me to a sweet roll. After all, I was very ashamed of my behavior.

I got to share the journey with a Punjabi man residing in Silliguri who was very talkative and with good English, so after he got to know I had been in India for some time, he stopped his lecturing about the country and we had a meaningful discussion when I had a chance to present my views. Precious experiences with sojourners that I treasure: when I am not just an exotic creature who, wow, takes Indian food (is it not spicy for you?) and looks decent in salwar-kameez, but primary a human being. The other sojourners were a Bengali family- parents and a young couple – that was entertaining me with the yet more peculiarities of a joint family. In particular, it was amusing to watch them bargaining for clemetines, ending with a dozen each and then discussing the price for the same in Kolkata, respective price differential and more…

Needless to say, before-the-sunset views were eventually stunning and one more time I had a chance to appreciate the magnificent beauty of Sikkim…

Once at NJP I walked in to a joint, one of the of numerous eateries lined up vis-à-vis the railway station: I was desperate for some chavel and subzi. I enquired about the menu and the chap there announced he was a menu himself. I asked for chavel and subzi, enjoyed my food, and then paid 20 instead of persistently asked 30: all three totally astonished men at the dhaba took turns in shaking my hands. Tata, guys.

Changu lake

…….. I did not want to write this post until I started….. Give me a topic, I’ll do a page…….


As my strange fever in Kalimpong held me back from my ambitious plans for Sikkim, the stakes once I arrived there were incredibly high: for whatever I wanted to do in this fairytale land I had 2 days: I had an important train to catch from NJP to Kolkata and then to make it to an super-important train from Kolkata to Mumbai. As much as I hate booking transportation in advance I had to due to the high season: even 10 days beforehand I got my ticket to Mumbai with much difficulty and using a small lie. In fact, getting tickets on a short notice in India is not a big deal if you are a tourist: in most of the instances you can apply for the Tourist Quota and you normally get it. Yet, those being in India longer than 6 months are not considered to be tourists any longer and therefore are not eligible for the Quota. Logic is there, but why do you try to charge me sky-highed entry fee to the historical monuments that foreign tourists are to pay? Consistency is never there in India.

Anyway, Gangtok, however nice, does not offer much to do and see. Sallies like going to the awe-aspiring Pemayangtse monastery looked too optimistic in the given timeframe. So, we took half an hour drive to Rumtek monastery which was a great experience I must say.

Yet, no trip is good without risky plans and some thrill. So, Nele and I agreed that however much we had already liked our journey we needed a concluding sally that would possibly become a gem of our North-East adventure. As humble as that our plan was. Quite a good candidate for the role was Changu lake, a beautiful place at 3700 meters up in Himalaya. The difficulty was that as a foreigner you need one more permit (on the top of the one you got to enter Sikkim) to go there and it takes at least a day to get it issued. Moreover, as a foreigner you can go only accompanied by a guide. Therefore, any travel agency in Gangtok offers this trip (including the permit) for a small remuneration (“Just this much pounds”, as one smart chap put it). So, getting permit ready, having it reasonably priced for two of us and most importantly – getting back on time so I jump into a jeep to NJP (no taxi, no taxi, baysab, I’ll go by shared jeep) and make it to the train on time. After roaming around the town we collected three and a half scenarios of the same little trip from various tour operators and it was up to our gut instincts to decide on which one to bet. We opted for Sikkim Holidays – a bunch of young guys who organize trekking and tours in Sikkim – and I am so glad me met them.

Next day we walked up so early that could not find any hotel serving breakfast. We walked in a dhaba and to the joy of all the guests there we had some aloo-puri and chai with sweets. On the agreed time our guide showed up with all the permits ready and the cab at the door. We headed off up in the mountains. I thought it was the most cloudy day in Gangtok and after some time we could see nothing but a grey mass all over – up, down, behind, to the left and to the right. I hoped for the best and expected the worse – what a misery it would be to arrive to 3700 meters all covered by fog. Me and Nele were both silent and is if frozen in the anticipation – we were driving higher up. At some point I saw a hole in the foggy mass around us and exclaimed, gradually the mass turned from grey to white and the sun appeared to be just somewhere nearby. Soon we stopped for tea: military camps all over did not look ominous and almost merged with the brown and orange hills. I was sipping warm tea, munching frozen (even better!) cashew nut Good Day biscuits, looking at the neighboring hill – all blue with black leafless trees touched by white rime and knowing the decision to come here was all right.

It took 40 more minutes to the lake and we found it in its best – sunlight being generously poured out on its surface, colorful prayer flags flutterring in the sun rays and the snow on the hills around dazzling cheerfully. Our guides hurried us up, “Quick, lets go for a hike while the sun is there”. I never knew how disastrous my shape has been in India until this little climb… how many of those I used to do and here right after the start I could feel strong beats in my temples…Half an hour of suffering was fully rewarded on the top of the hill – we took lots of pictures at the official 4000 meters – personal record for both Nele and me by far – and could not take our eyes off the snow-covered mountains spreading all directions without limits and…. we were at par with those formidable heights. We were facing Tibet and in the valley down along the shores of a narrow river was the border. Strong wind brought the clouds back, gradually hiding the sun; when we got back to the lake we found it grey and dull. I do not know whom we shall thank – the luck, the timing, our adventurous spirit, our guides or mountain gods, but I would bow to them all. These few hours high in the mountains with the clearest possible sky were the greatest reward for us after the ten days of omnipresent fog.

Gangtok youngsters

In Gangtok I got surprised by the number of young people around. In comparison with Darjeeling and Kalimpong, full of pupils and elderly people, Gangtok was a truly youthful town. Westernized aspirations of the new generation no-how restricted by the traditional considerations (as elsewhere in India) were sufficiently fulfilled by the affordable clothes brought from so-closeby China. Jeans, sweatshirts, sneakers, ballerina shoes, boots, fancy bags were all wearable essentials for the youngsters. And there was a notable difference between the sort of clothes people wore here and the cheap quazi-Western clothes that at times you find in India when girls and boys wear these T-shirts with the print phrases bizarrely constructed of the Latin letters the Chinese designer happened to know and the jeans made of what some people think jeans fabric is. I could not help myself and pulled Nele into a shop where I jokingly tried a pair of clearly fake DKNY jeans and having discovered an amazing fit that no Levi’s would ever give me I bought them for 580 Rs (roughly 10 Euro)

Particularly, I got amazed by the young guys (all below 25 y.o.) who worked at the hostel where we were staying (very much recommended by the guidebook, yet a bit disappointing – at least off-season – Modern Central Lodge on Tiben Road). They all had this cool Western clothes (well, Chinese version of it, but so what?) and by the Delhi standard it automatically described them as upper middle, upper class (western equals rich, a rule of thumb in India). Yet here in the North East it works differently: they themselves were doing all sort of work in the hostel – cleaning, cooking, doing dishes, wiping floors, waitressing etc. The notion of a cooking man made me cry in principle. First, when he announced it was him who cooked here I thought it was a sort of bravado people demonstrate here at times (e.g., all those shop-keepers who claim they themselves make the stuff (by the way, standard for many shops) they sell). Yet, later I got to chat with him and he told me how he had been working as a porter and a cook in Darjeeling, Gangtok, Nepal etc. I cried second time when later I was eating Sikkemese soup he cooked – so yum it was… The other guys of this lot were those working in the travel agency we tied up with for our trip to Tsomgso lake. Again, the very guy who we were discussing the deal with and a friend of him were our guide and driver respectively. I was totally impressed with these chaps so concerned about being cool yet not avoiding any sort of work.

Gangtok

Gangtok welcomed me with a dopy feeling of spring after a long-long winter. Still a bit sick, wearing a scarf and a hat, I put on my huge sun-glasses and let the sun pour out its tender kisses on my face.

Gangtok welcomed me with its light-colored buildings looking like big flat rectangular chocolate bars with the huge blocks of windows dividing them into segments.

Gangtok welcomed me with greetings of the French couple that I met in Kalimpong – they told me Nele was still in town. I found the girl shortly – guessed the place she was staying at. We met as old friends – it felt as if we shared months not just a week of traveling.

Drive to Gangtok

The night before I decided - I would leave tomorrow. I woke up at six, walked down to the motor stand. The sun was smiling softly and gradually filling in the town street by street. Bakeries took the dough out from kneading trough for the new-day bread and pastry; boys started their first cricket match; shopkeepers were opening their shops. Here daylight is short-lived and therefore precious, so it is utilized at most – people have to be early birds. I bought my ticket to Gangtok, got back to the hotel for breakfast, paid my bills and left.

The drive (described as “scenic” in my guidebook – at the end of the day I hate it as much as I find it helpful.. these guidebooks and the expectations they created based on at times very dubious accounts) was actually very good. The vision was still limited: it seemed there was a light smoky blue chiffon curtain in front of the nearby hill, one more curtain in front of the next one and one more layer would add the further it goes - totally hiding the remote hills. The road went along the sunlit jungle on the slopes of the caramel-colored hills and the emerald, at times turning snow-white rash river. The state of Sikkim, as again I read in this time an official brochure, prides itself on 4500 species of flowering plants, 515 species of orchids, 36 species of rhododendron 23 species of bamboo. And even without such a detailed insight you can make out that the diversity of the flora in the area is mind-boggling.

The border with Sikkim was demarked with a colorful gate painted similar to those of Buddhist monasteries. While I was looking through the window and admiring the river, they checked my permit issued in Kolkata (as a foreigner you need to apply for a permit to enter Sikkim – being surrounded by Nepal, Butan and Tibet it is a restricted-access area), put my name in their rosters and let me in. Welcoming Sikkim border, lush greenery, colorful houses along the road and beautiful sunshine made me believe it was an ultimate spring.

I was traveling with a small girl and her grandfather. The girl was about 10 years old and looked like a typical Asian girl of her age: slanting eyes, perfect porcelain skin, short straight black hair fixed with a bright hair-slide, pink jacket and pink ballerina shoes, jeans and dark blue scarf from her school uniform – with its ends pulled back – an exemplary of sweetness and female beauty in its infancy. The sweetness and the beauty yet appeared to be an utter nightmare. She was shooting questions one after another with a horribly serious look and I felt like I was through an elaborate interview at the immigration office while applying for the Indian citizenship. She herself reported that while she attended her school in Kalimpong her parents stayed in Gangtok and she was visiting them now. Once we started off I asked her to close the window so to avoid the way too refreshing wind and she just would not cooperate. I had to explain her I just recovered from the fever and I do not fancy a relapse. So, I had to close the window myself, yet she would resist and even once I managed to close it she would find a reason to open it – clearly she had to throw (as any kid here learns from his/her parents) an empty package of chips, pakotas and candies (nutrition of the angels cannot be overlooked) all of which this little one had consumed over a short while. I am sure that the parents who get to see her only for holidays and poojas admire this little perfection… And I was thinking of the phenomenon of “little king” psychology in the Asian families towards their only kid. My troubled mind…..

Kalimpong meets

FC

That morning when came to the dining room for breakfast I found Nele chatting with a man, clearly a French one. In a very striking detail he was explaining how to make it to this and that gompa (monastery) around and why one or another destination was worth it. Nele briefed me that he comes to India every year. He was talking with the excitement of a keen traveler and the knowledge of a mature one. A few minutes later a couple came down and joined us – they appeared to be French too. He switched to French, they three engaged in a conversation. Even with my non-existent knowledge of the language I could make out the thread of the discussion. Again, he was passionately taking about the places to see up north as the couple was heading there; it was not their first time in India either, so they talked about the changes India had undergone. I am not sure if it was the language that allows such expressiveness, culture that favors one or the more mature age that changes the perspective of the observations…. however the conversation they had was so different from what you can imagine in an international backpackers environment. Instead of close-to-indifferent “oh, it was nice, ya, it was nice…” they were like “Oh my God, it was so great, so amazing, you should go there!” I enjoyed so much to listen to the people so emotionally involved with their traveling and so passionately sharing about their experiences – and the French made it sound so great, so refined…

Tea one


We were walking around the complicated network of the tiny passages between the houses densely covering the hill – finding women outside sorting out rice for the next meal, washing clothes or kitchen utensils. Almost at the main upper road we got a call from a young man standing on the balcony of a big house. He was inviting us to come up so we could enjoy the views from the balcony. We accepted the invitation so easily without thinking twice – a liberty totally unthinkable in any other region of India. But the great views we had a very nice chat with him and his friend: Nele and me were happy to ask the questions we had accumulated from the extensive observations around and they had answers ready for many of those. One boy appeared to be a Tibetan descendant and the other one was Nepali – they were childhood friends living in Kalimpong for ages. We were treated to some impressively tasty black tea with ginger and invited inside. We got to meet a sister of the Nepali guy: she was a self-taught painter. This is how a got a painting of a beautiful Nepali girl.

Tea two

In the evening we stopped by a dhaba for some tea and sweets. We got approached by a guy who looked like a major annoyance in the beginning, I should admit. Yet, word by word, he turned out to be a good fun. We kept chatting and having tea on the house.

He explained us the reason for his excitement.

-We in India like foreigners.
-Why?
-When we see you people we feel happy?
-Oh, why is that?
-See, you come here and see how we live. We cannot come to your country and see your culture. So, when we see you people here we feel happy.

And he did – we talked about him, his brother leaving in the States, us etc. He tried to guess wherefrom we were coming (he said Nele was from Russia, she protested – I burst in laugh, “Who would believe you girl, I even can say “Da, khorosho”), so we talked about Russia, Belgium and Spain (Nele is Belgian, but she is living in Barcelona).

After all he was giving us advices as of what to do in Kalimpong and Nele took out her Lonely Planet to check out. He took the book and started going through it.

-Acha, where do you get this book? - murmuring the names of the places put in bold in the chapter “Kalimpong” he was so astonished that his town is here, in this fat book called “India”, and even a map with some small details is given too.

We parted ways like ultimate friends

-If any problem in Kalimpong, come here and I’ll help you.

No one took any money from us for the tea and the sweets we came for.

Kalimpong specials

Our guest house in Kalimpong was also up the hill (generally, I think this is where good places tend to locate). Deki Lodge was one more family run guest house with a few rooms in wide price range of rooms, beautiful garden, yummy food and a very helpful family.

We made it to Kalimpong on Wednesday as I wanted to see the Haat, the local market where villagers come and sell their fruits, vegetables, spices, nuts, herbs and anything else they grow or make. We got to see brown-and-dark green balls which when open resembled unripe avocado, short fat bananas of cream color inside (called butter banana), reddish long massive bent carrots, long and thin aubergines.. and lots of things I had no idea about.

The list of the discovered peculiarities was extended the day after: when we were visiting the monasteries we discovered a ground where long thin and slightly curly tubes of rice noodles were hanging on the parallel ropes and drying. Nearby the same monastery a window we were looking in got opened and a smiling man invited us to come in. He was operating an interesting wooden press akin to a mincing machine: the man was putting some red elastic substance in it, and then was pressing a long leverage with his whole body so that long thick vermicelli was coming out. A lady was taking the vermicelli, stretching them on the table and cutting them into equally long pieces. The smell at the workshop was so familiar, yet I could not make out what it was. Next day, studying the content of the shelves in some shop I realized those were incense sticks made of sandal wood.

On a sick leave in Kalimpong

Kalimpong was a perfect place to be sick at: a little charming town surrounded by the hills, where snow never covers its banana and palm trees and the beautiful gardens with flowers; where brightly painted houses are belted with pot chrysanthemums; where people are mixture of Nepali and Tibetan descendants, willingly reciprocating the eye-contact, openly smiling, never intruding and showing all their respect to you (when they give something – they give it with the right hand supported by the left one a bit above the wrist from below); where any shop sells most essential – prayer flags and white scarves for offerings, similar looking packs of noodles and incense sticks; where you get the yummiest veg momos (unless you care for beef ones which are found without any difficulty here) for one rupee each along with hot bullion; where you dine in shop run by a woman and her daughters – around the shelves stuffed with the jars of pickles – cherry-like small Nepali mirchi (chili) and sophisticated mosaics of different roots.


…. So I fell sick. After the cold Darjeeling I felt a bit feverish, but did not take any pill, yet took shower that morning… I ended up with the temperature of 39.2 C which I had no idea how to fight… I could feel every single part of my body that I never knew to exist before. I felt like an old and hopelessly wretched vehicle. Needless to say, the misery was ultimate as my Sikkim plans had to be altered and the initial ambitions were to be cut down. All in all, I felt like dying and somehow I was. The owner of our guest house, a short anxious man, got very worried about me and started getting my rice porridge, tea, hot water, soups etc in the room. It took me a while to realize that even from a local pharmacy I can get a pill with the same composition as the one that my mom gives me in such cases, as I did not take that one in my emergency kit. The pill was found and did wonders – the fever was gone overnight, I took the next day for recovering and then headed off to Sikkim.

Darjeeling tea

What we could not miss in Darjeeling - with the fog or not - was its tea plantations. 84 gardens around the town produce one fourth of the country's tea output and Darjeeling tea prides itself in the premium quality. Tea bushes 40-50 sm high with dense and hard branches seem to grow just like that on the slopes.

So we visited Happy Tea Estate, renown not only for its tea, but also for the guided tours for the interested visitors. Quiet and deserted off-season, the place was not totally empty: a short smiling lady with the dark reddish curly hair greeted us and announced that we had got a super opportunity to learn how the good tea is grown, processed and made ready to indulge. A young Nepali boy took us around. The size of the plantation was hard to estimate: already the path we took down to the estate went along the slopes all covered by the tea bushes which continued to the right and to the left and down too... The old factory complex (arguably, from the British times), the firs with enormously high and straight stems and the tea bushes all around - all covered by fog - looked like a movie still ....

During the brief guided tour we got to know which part of the plant is picked up (3 upper leaves along with the flower added for the natural sweetness), how long the leaves are left for drying (24-48 hours), how labour is organized (women pick up the leaves and men work at the factory itself), when the best tea (1st flush) is picked (mid March-May). The people from the factory claimed that the equipment and the production process are still the ones from the British and that is what makes the tea from the Happy Valley so unique and sought after...

After the tour we were back to the lady who invited us to her house and declared her intention to make some tea for us - of course of the best tea leaves with a super-puper name "super fine tippy golden flowery orange picko one"! The father of the lady used to be in the tea business, so has been she. Originally from Nepal, she came to Darjeeling a few decades back and since that she had been working at the Happy Tea Estate. According to her she was 65 years old, yet she did not look older than 50. I asked her jokingly if the tea was the secret of her youthful look. She replied that longevity and well-being here in Darjeeling are naturally ensured by walking on the hills as a daily exercise... Plus she had been playing football for the female team of her garden (!) and even though she felt she may be quiting soon her team-mates did not want to let her go. "I am not very good, but I have got confidence", explained she. So she made us some tea: she put a handful of the tea-leaves in a pot of boiling water and after 2 seconds she poured the tea through a sieve... The tea is ready! I had no expectations indeed as at the different points of time I got to try some premium teas, yet the golden-orange in color drink we had without sugar, a "magic tea" as the lady called it, was a divine nectar indeed. Its very rich, very refreshing taste re-invented the notion of tea for me, who got so much into chai here in India. Without much doubts I got two pack of the tea leaves. Over the tea we spoke in lenghs about a fate of a Nepali woman in Darjeeling, her family, children, the developments that happened both back in Nepal and here in India over decades.. And she made us a second cup: just by pouring hot boiled water through the once used leaves. This time the taste of the magic tea was different, yet still great!..

Darjeeling: all in fog

The gentle slopes of Darjeeling appeared to be rather tough at times (and tell me what is not with a backpack getting heavier and heavier with every new station). The guesthouse (Tower View) we picked from the wide selection in the both guidebooks was up the hill: a very basic, yet a very nice place run by a Tibetan family. The reception area also serving as a dining room for the guests and behind the bar – as a kitchen to the hosts- was the oasis of warmth, hot meals, cozy Tibetan bread and enormously big pots of tea. Here would young travelers from all over get together and exchange impressions, plans and recommendations as for prospective traveling…

Once we checked in, I took a very brief and just warm enough shower and quickly ran back to my room... With a great pleasure I picked up waterproof pants, jacket and the trekking shoes that all had been sadly staying idle in my closet for ages and with such an anticipation were put in my backpack this time. So happy I was to pack myself in all this winter-time attire.

How shall I say... it was not awfully cold... But a change after the soaked in the summer India, fog all over the place... n....ya... coming winter made their presence felt. The water was so cold that you wouldn't even be able to rinse your soapy hands properly. Everything you take out of the backpack and leave in a room for even a short while becomes cold and as if wet from inside... You would actually wonder how to brush your teeth as water in your bottle burns your teeth too. In such conditions, warm clothing is essential: you feel packed, protected, like inside a nest... irrespective to any major and minor weather changes.

All covered by the fog Darjeeling looked magnetically attractive: old British buildings and the spirit reminded me of Shimla... well, in a way Darjeeling is the Shimla of the North-East and it used to be the summer capital for the Bengali government. Despite might-have-happened sunrise at the Tiger Hill and the stunning views of the world's 3rd largest mountain Kangchenjunga... which all were canceled by the fog... I was celebrating the fog - it left for us much more to discover and gave a beautiful experience with a little bit of mystery attached... There was a particular style in that: combination of the old buildings and somewhat old-fashioned spirit and the trendy people... Resembling Copenhagen....

Despite the weather I found that young people particularly stylish in Darjeeling. In fact, the town showed the kind of style totally unknown in the rest of India. Pupils proudly wear their classy uniforms - cherry or dark blue jackets and skirts for girls and sleeveless jackets and trousers for boys. The girls look so beautifully girly in their white knee-highs and black ballerina shoes with a stripe and the boys look so trendy with their cheked Burberry-style scarves wrapped around their necks and prudently polished black leather shoes. Any overcoat tends to be worn unbuttoned so not to hide the nicest part of the attire.

A bit older young people do not give up the notion of style either... Teenage girls do look like their Norwegian counterparts (another region where young people tend to dress up irrespective to the climate): converse shoes or ballerina shoes, jeans, waist-long jackets. Trench coats are also popular even with those opting for the traditional wear: they make sure that's nice high-heeled sandals are there along with the bags and trench-coats.. Astonishing!!!

People were extremely nice in Darjeeling: they really notice you and are very interested in you, yet they let you be and rarely initiate a contact with you unless welcomed. I found it a completely new experience here in India to smile to virtually anyone passing by: a slowly walking elderly man, a young lady looking after a shop, a red-cheek school girl revising her notes on the way to school in the morning, a young boy dressed-to-kill.... and they all - young and old, men and women - do smile back with a very open sincere smile... The emotional exchange was so rewarding for me that I just felt like wandering those streets for ever - giving away a bit of my cheerful mood and getting some back.

From NJP to Darjeeling

I woke up surprised… a gray day was looking at me through the window of the train… the first day without a sun for a long time… since I have arrived in India actually… NJP was as dull as the day and I rushed to the jeep stand to get a vehicle that would bring me further up to Darjeeling.

The jeep accommodated 10 people, including an American family of 3 with a girl speaking decent Hindi, a Belgium girl Nele who has become my travel partner for the North-East hill venture, a man singing religious hymns the whole way long, a big Muslim man in while kurta, green turban and a Nokia smart phone, a man who was getting sick at the curvy roads now and then, two anonymous persons and me…

The journey took us first to Silliguri, as unspectacular as NJP, but the tea plantations around it was where I first in my life saw the green neat bushes of tea. I also tried to identify the common pattern in the appearances of people living in this area and got even more confused: so many looked similar to Tibetans or Nepalis, a few had a typical Bengali face, while the rest looked like neither of those… The border areas are always interesting to visit to see how the neighboring nationalities mix….

Soon we started ascending along a winding road laid on the lush green slopes making up for a landscape completely different from that of the Western Himalaya… It may be right to visit a botanical garden to eventually find out the names of all those plants and trees found in abundance here…. Massive branches of some wild-growing cereal of a human height, the burdocks of gigantic banana leaves, firs twined round with the lianas and the bamboo trees, to name just a few I could identify... Yet for a bulk impression what mattered was that the slopes were as if dressed in a thick coat of the lush vegetation…. And the fog…this kind that does not come in the round wreaths of mist, but rather soaks out from above in layers.. it was covering the remote hills, the tops of the closeby ones and was gradually hiding the valley we left behind us. We were entering this kingdom of the numerous hills covered by the terraced tea gardens and the forests - at times deciduous at times coniferous one. The deeper we were moving the closer we could feel the embrace of the omni-present fog. Whenever you lean over the window of the jeep and look down the edge of the slope you virtually dive into the masses of fog and nothing beyond this....

Now and then we were passing small settlements with the little houses cheerfully painted in blue and green - as high as a person's height - belted with the pots of the beautiful flowers... Women were still wearing salwar-kameze, yet warmed with sweaters and pullovers..yet in many instances wearing flip-flops.. doing dishes outside the houses with the freezing-cold water - just like that...

About big cities: inspired by Kolkata

I am fascinated and invariably attracted by big cities. Every time I find myself in one I feel like embracing it all… not physically, but rather metaphorically – soak as much of its spirit as I can… And it never seems enough as the spirit often appears immense. People rushing each for his or her own matter; cars, buses, trucks and other vehicles competing for a place on the lane; lit up shops, noisy markets… vibrant life… lived by many in many ways, yet all happening according to some common logic… This is how I felt in Kolkata… the same feeling overtakes me every time I am in Moscow… Even Oslo after a cozy little Bergen looked that way… Strangely… Delhi I see differently though: in the described sense it is not a big city for me. I know its ins and outs and many of them store certain memories related to the people or moments… As this guy Pablo who lives in Barcelona himself said (I wonder if he himself remembers he did), “We make big cities smaller” as we delimit our habitat by the places we tend to hang out, work or live in…. that way I would always remain fascinated and invariably attracted by big yet-unexplored cities….

Kolkata - impressions (2)

A market…

Despite my passion for documenting things even I did not dare to take pictures.. partly remembering the episode with the villagers at the Pushkar camel fair… partly realizing that I simply do not have any right to..

By pure chance while looking for some yummy Bengali sweets to grab before I go….I walked into this market hidden in the depths of the stalls by Sealdah train station…I thought I have seen markets of this lot – with all sorts of spices, cereals, dhal and more sold loose from the shops looking like shabby treasuries and where you feel the joy of realization as of where things are coming from. This market was different, though…It was not merely a market place, but rather a habitat, one shall say… I saw a stable full of the tops of cauliflower and the peels of the onion and garlic…. I saw a man grounding cardamom, another one squeezing fresh juices and a barber working right nearby…And all the crucial life activities are carried out at the same spot alongside each other. The market was full of the tiny cubicles of shops looking more like closets where space was enough to accommodate the goods for exhibition and sale and the salesman himself sitting with his legs folded… the trade is carried out outside the shops too – dramatically looking characters with the torn and worn out clothes are sitting on the ground among the buckets with vegetables they are selling…


Overall Kolkata stands out in the crowd of the other cities I have seen in India by the virtue of being so developed and so underdeveloped at the same time. Major retail brands would share their venues with the cheap Chinese-born clothes dumped for nuts nearby; modern metro co-exists side by side with the hand-pulled rickshaws; expensive colonial-style eateries compete with the street-stalls. Well… as everywhere in India, one might say… Yet not…Cities, or at least localities in those, can be clearly positioned on the continuum “cheap-expensive”, or “poor-rich”. Kolkata does not bother to segregate either…. So you carefully walk on Park Street by night so not to step on someone sleeping on the ground… and around the same area you see a bare-bum baby sitting on the pavement and then nod your head when she approaches you with her hand stretched… And you pay 3 rs for a cup of tea served to you sitting behind the wheel of your Maruti Swift… I kind of liked my four-rupees bills in this town, yet realization that the reason for them is the outrageous poverty so many people live in here… bothers…

Kolkata: unsystemized impressions

I was beforehand scared by the scale of the city that I would not be able to handle…so huge it would be.. yet, it appeared much more welcoming and smaller than I pictured it…

Haora train station looked very busy with the flow of its daily routines… too busy to bother you… a very rare quality for a train station… I took a 4-Rs ferry crowded with the people starting a new day: during a short journey a one-legged man did his crawl asking for money, a few shoe-polishing men in doti were roaming around with their wooden boxes akin to the huge irons, tapping their wooded brushes against the boxes and searching for a pair of dusty shoes to polish. The ferry brought me to a very nice locality nearby the Stock Exchange. Once done with my tickets I consulted a policeman in a white uniform manually regulating the traffic and took a 4-rupee bus to Sealdah, the train station wherefore I was to catch my night train. The bus was quite short, had wooden seats with little carvings on the backs, the strips of wood on the floors; a conduction with a little leather bag that could be sold for a decent amount of… not rupees, dollars! at an antique auction; and very polite gentlemen who would give you your legitimate lady seat without you having to ask for it and who would not try to squeeze in the gap between you and the next sitting passenger (while the gap may be sufficient for 2 men from the North). Once done with my luggage I took another bus to Park Street, a very pleasant locality. Later on I tried the metro (again for four rupees) that looks like the brand-new one in Delhi would probably look in a decade below the line: not sterile, but still well-maintained ad habitable.

I checked out the New Market that prides itself on an enormous variety of goods from a needle to an elephant… and I got indeed amazed by the density of the shops housed by the famous red building and the diversity of the range they offer… Moreover, the whole area around Esplanade consisting of shops and street stalls and the rush around made a shocking impression on me. I got this picture of Kolkatians pursuing a hobby of obtaining things – going out to the markets, interacting, bargaining and getting things… One episode I observed was rather descriptive of that. At a non-food market a huge jeep was leaving the parking lot. Bizarrely enough, a man with two cauliflowers appeared nearby and started reaching with those to a woman sitting in the car, “Gobi, gobi! Bis ke do!... Ok, pandra, pandra rupea!”… What a spirit!...

I checked out Maidan, “possibly the largest urban park in the world” according to my guidebook. As my companion, the guy I met during my tea dispute (the chai-man wanted to charge me 5 Rs instead of usual 2-3 for a cup of tea and the guy paid both my tea and his on this clearly inflated rate – not very reasonable, but very male – this was how we met)…anyway, as he explained the park was pretty much exploited by the couples. Well, no surprise – this was the main usage of the parks in Delhi too. Yet, when I looked around I realized a critical difference between two metropolises. In Delhi the couples were represented by shameful girls in salwar-kameez and their more Westernized (in terms of clothes) boyfriends who would seat next to each other holding hands at some remote spot of a park. Here in Kolkata the couples would express their emotions more explicitly even when walking together (!) on the streets… So the parks are saved for even tenderer hugging with the full usages of the open areas, bushes, shady places and umbrellas.

Kolkata: Gastronomical capital of India

Peacefully waiting on the queue to possibly get a foreigner’s quota ticket for the train to Mumbai. I owe my peace to the most gorgeous thali that I just had for breakfast: rice, dhal, subzi, French fries and fish curry served on a banana leaf. Had it at the street nearby the Stock Exchange.. at a stall where the cooking is happening right in front of you… The much anticipated fish was divine: figuring it out with my hands, smacking my lips and slightly grunting in perfect bliss along with a few other breakfasting people sitting by my side. The pleasure was as expensive as 20 Rs (and still, I think it was too much to pay ;o)… and I could not wish any better breakfast in Kolkata. Forget fruit-salads and paranthas…

Yes, it took me some courage to stop by a stall like that…. The first one of this lot I saw nearby the train-station where rice cost 2,5 Rs and dhal cost 0,5 Rs… It was also the price that made me hesitate.. Actually, I have been having food from road-side places and dubious dhabas for long. Once I remember I found myself having tea and sweets side by side with auto-wallas and for a moment I got struck, “Is it your standard these days, my dear?”. True, I did not mind almost any place as far as vegetable meal would be concerned, yet with meat and fish I thought I should be more choosy…. Yet, in Kolkata the scope of the road-side business is mind-blowing … Neither it is secluded to the poor neighborhood and tacky railways station markets, not it equals to the low standard. I saw all sort of people having food from there…. In particular, such eateries tend to flourish nearby colleges and busy office-areas in the daytime.

As food is not secluded to the kitchens and restaurants so sweets are not a prerogative of the bakeries as they are elsewhere in India. Sweets are also available there – on the food stalls: in the plastic boxes or small trays. 2 Rs for a small juicy pancake of rasmalai that has little resemblance of the yellow idli-looking smooth round cake… and 3 Rs for a piece of an eternal burfi… Served on a tiny banana leaf plate, always on demand and hence finishing off quickly…

Following this pattern “food for everyone at any time of the day” tea is available in the similar fashion. Just like Italians who have to go for espresso en-route somewhere several times a day...irrespective….. Kolkatians would make sure they have their tea…It is cooked fresh for you anywhere… Tea-wallahs appear out of nothing and per need. So you get to see a lady with a cattle and a pile of tiny plastic cups and small clay pots… pouring out a cup for a gentleman nearby his jeep at the parking lot… or you would see some man with a cattle in a middle of a crown of some starving citizens….

As if everything is crying, “Come and indulge”…

Bengali miracle

I woke up on my upper berth and sat down. The first thing I saw was a little Bengali angel of 4-5 years old in a light-green fleece kangaroo sweatshirt and a small flower- patterned pink fleece blanket covering her legs. Her head was like a dandelion with her short dark curls looking weightless. She had this mat nicely brown skin and the eyes of Buddha. She was practicing a poem with her granddad and this respectable gentleman reminded me of someone else who would soon take up the role of a granddad.. The scene was one of the cutest I have ever seen.

Once I got down from the berth I met the whole family coming back from the holidays in Puri: both grands, mother from whom the girl got her cute face, father whom the girl was really fond of and an aunty… I was observing a vivid picture of the joint family traveling with 6 people and 14 bags.. I recalled how Piyali often says, “In Kolkata we live in a joint family” and the statement sounds so self-explanatory… Sharing of a house with no-one-knows-how-many-rooms and a huge dining table, crucial decisions and sweets after meals, holiday plans and ideas about the prospects of the youngest grandson… And division of labor authority domains and domestic routines.. This one on the train was amusing to watch… Beautificating themselves in the morning ladies in the bright and glittering salwar-kameez. Silent yet having her say grandmother in a cotton saree and carefully warped in a woolen shawl, with a big red bindi on her forehead, her hair in a big bun and the golden ear-rings shaped as inverted drops.. The granddad wearing a kurta and pants of fine white cotton and glasses in the golden frame.. not burdened with any other tasks but playing with his granddaughter or chatting with a younger co-journer.. Father in a long black kurta with extensive embroidery… sleeping long and then playing with the little girl sitting on his lap. And the girl, the joy of the whole family, who is perfectly aware of that.. She is demanding misti (sweet), persistently shaking the box where she knows they are carrying sweets from Puri… the grandma surrenders, opens the box and the whole family shares a few pieces. Great fun to watch, dubious fun to be a part of… Maybe as a little girl….

Why West Bengal?

Well... it was conveniently on the way from Orissa to Sikkim. Hm... There was much more to that indeed. From the day one in India I have been fancying the idea of visiting Kolkata, this cultural capital (and once - political) of the country, this crowded and congested place, this home of outrageous poverty too - all co-existing side by side. Then I got to work with two Bengali girls... and in particular Piyali, this little Bengali beauty, an exemplary of the ultimate sweetness was feeding me with the tales about Kolkata and she did a great job bringing the concept of Bengali people as a nation in its own right home to me. It was with her I went to watch "Bong connection" (bong is a slang word for Bengali)... with her and with many hundreds of Delhu-based Bengalies and I totally fell in love with this witty people... people who are so passionate about food and are hep to cooking fish well and makw excellent sweets. A bit... not really snobbish, but well aware of their profound intellectual heritage and their long tradition of the international exposure and priding themselves on it... Those people.. with high cheek-bones, healthy cheeks, mat nicely brown skin, deeply set eyes and the long upper eyelids making them look as the eyes of Buddha... And.... how much more reasons does anyone need?

Puri beach

The beach in Puri was a dessert sort of a destination I had in mind. Clearly realizing that the beach would have nothing to do with a typical concept of a beach people would have outside Indian I was still fairly excited about seeing some sea, walking on the sand and indulging seafood.

Due to my small temple crawl I made it to the beach right before the sunset. The embankment was stuffed with hotels, holidaying Indian families (Kolkatians in particular tend to come here), state emporiums, restaurants and food stalls. The beach itself was crowded with people just lazing around, walking, bravely playing with the waves or safely watching the brave ones; vendors who offer a camel ride, sweets and snacks, statues of Lord Jagannath again, pearls, shells, and tea cooked right on the sand - none of those minding the intense-pink disk of the sun sinking in the horizontal layers of the clouds in the distance.

While waiting for my tea I engaged in the conversation with a girl seating nearby. She invited me to join her. This is how I met these guys from Bhubaneswar who altogether work as software engineers in Infosys. They come to Puri every now and then to chill. Looking at them playing with the waves I recalled the merry bunch from Hyderabad with whom we actually did the same in Vizag in February - just driving around, having ice-cream and lassi, getting soaked wet while playing with the waves, loading in the cars, shifting the drivers, singing and dancing, while driving along the beach - so young, so so careless, so powerful, so full of thirst for life.

I parted ways with the bunch this time though to check out some machi-walas - fishermen selling fish on the shore... While looking for some I came across something I had never seen in my life before - a night market at the beach with the small stalls lit up by neons: selling all sorts of pearls (good quality, mam) jewelery, shells of any shape and size, some cheap textiles...and so on to cater to multiple interests of the holidaying people. Still keeping my seafood plan on I could not help checking out the market and ended up with some this time real (easy to tell, they are just heavy) pearls. Right after I found my machi-walas and got to eat expensive and disappointing deep fried prawns which were followed by a dirt cheap yam fish... Check out this victorious face of mine... ya come and live with aloo parathas and see for yourself shortly after.. Textiles shopping at the emporiums where I went wild again and some milk sweets Orissa is good at made it so complete that as saturated with pleasures as ever I was getting back to my hotel in Bhubaneswar...

Orissan countryside

As you move to Bhubaneswar from the border with West Bengal in the north you realize that the reality on this side of the planet exists of nothing more that endless paddy fields curiously patched into the small green, yellow and light-brown pieces. Palm trees, some short and some tiny-little, as opposed to exaggeratedly gigantic ones in Delhi, can be seen standing alone, in doubles, triples and lining up in the disciplined lines.

At times a house on an oasis of lush vegetation and blossoming trees arises from the green-n-yellow void. A house like one would picture when thinking of a typical rural area: made of mud, square or round in its foundation, with discordantly arranged red tiles or brown-n-grey dry grass set in a few dense layers. Now and then a water reservoir, or an artificial pond accumulating water for all sort of usage, can be seen in the fields - again surrounded by dense vegetation.

Yet then.. rock formations appear... signifying another possible form of existence. Covered with a thin green layer of vegetation but red inside, they look like masses of hardened carrot halwa fairly figured out by a scoop.

Rocks are followed by more fields... Fields are followed by the river valleys bridged by newish-looking solid metal constructions. Now the bridges are stretching over mostly dry river beds covered by not-completely-dry-after-the-monsoon yellow sand. Taking advantage of the timing major construction work is going on at the bridges which spans are besieged by workers akin to monkeys hanging there and operating their simple tools.

You get a glimpse of the rural life as well... You see men working in the fields (!!) - for a change from the North - guiding buffaloes that pull the plough. They wear vest-tops and doties - a piece of cloth wrapped around your waist - some are knee-long some just cover heaps and look like diapers.

It occurred to me how different living this life is from drawing your conclusions from whatever you can see through the train window. I imagined being a small boy with short and straight unruly hair... wearing just shorts and playing war in the fields, running away from the village and hiding in the high grass, hassling dragonflies, catching all sorts of worms and proudly bringing a few home. I imagined being a school girls wearing a light-blue blouse, dark-blue skirt with folds, two neat plaits tied with a narrow red ribbon and carrying a heavy rectangular backpack through the shady path framed by the palm-trees, then along the pond and then an odd hour and a half across the fields... I was thinking about the hazardous work and the basic lifestyles.. Joana asked the other day, "Are they happy?" In their ways.. despite all.. why not? ....

Driving from Bhubaneswar to the coastal areas of Orissa gives you yet a different picture. You move from one village to another, all covered in the lush vegetation - all in bright green color of over-bursting strength. You get to see the carriages for buffaloes on the backyards.. You get to see the man sitting in their wooden cubicles along the road - one-serves-all-the-purposes shop and preparing a pan. You get to see a boy walking among the palm trees along a pond... You get to see a woman carrying a bunch of banana leaves sized as she herself. You feel it is so wild, so unreal, however - clearly taking place there - outside the window.

and then... the ultimate reward appears.. On the way from Konark to Puri the sea emerges!.. Unannounced... Bay of Bengal.. With the first sight of the white crests of the waves, the greenish-blue infinity of the sea and the light-yellow clean sand... you feel relieved and very happy inside as if you got rid of something that had been bothering you for long.. as if you got your freedom back...

Anything might come later - small branchy firs managing to grow on the sandy ground, a bizarre kind of short but very spread out tree resembling a mythical octopus with leaves on its limps, shady forests with tall trees standing like pillars holding the sky... - it passes on on the same wave still lasting after the glimpse of the sea.

Spying on Orissan temples-2

Visiting ancient temples in Bhubaneswar felt like an orientation exercise when you, weaponed with a map and a compass, navigate the town and try to locate the object in question. Yet, even if you succeed, there is no guarantee you are allowed in. So, the major temple I nearly walked in without knowing cannot be visited by non-Hindus. Yet, you are allowed to take pictures from a platform and then hassled for donation. Not everyone is equal in front of god, by any money bizarrely go for his sake....

The temples appeared preserved to a varying degree - some being just a mass of bare bricks, some with untouched by time and people fine carvings; some in sort of use attended by half-naked priests, some without a deity and therefore serving as a purely touristic attraction; some well-attended and surrounded by the beautiful gardens, some abandoned at the backyard of an odd house; yet all are still visited the Indian families invariably removing their shoes at the doorstep of even empty temples and very sought after by the few in number tourists coming to Bhubaneswar. The latter, supposedly urban city (capital of Orissa) but still looking rurally relaxed with all its palm trees, men wearing doti and riding rusting bikes.. strangely incorporates the temples, disperced around the city, in the modern landscape and lifestyle.

The Sun Temple in Konark, one of world's wonders, according to Mark Twain and a piece of World Heritage, according to a sign nearby, celebrates the God of Sun and dates back to the 13th century. Its massive construction (only the porch is preserved and it rises to 39 m, the main tower used to be 60 m high) is built in the shape of a war chariot with 12 huge wheels sculptured on either side of the temple.

Yet, my visit to the Sun Temple was not particularly fortunate. A 10-minute discussion and demonstration of the relevant documents at the ticket counter did not win me a 10-rupee Indian ticket. The authorities to appeal to were not there either. I walked around the temple, taking pictures and examining the possibilities for jumping down to the temple ground. At some point the wall seemed lower (a bit more than my height) and I jumped. But was quickly spotted by 3 non-cooperative type elderly men who immediately gave me up to a watchman. I explained the matter to the chap and retold him the dialogue at the counter, trying to appeal to his pity (I am paying 100 rs for my hotel, so how on earth can I afford to pay 250 Rs for a monument). He asked what sort of certification I have got at hand. I gave him my pass... He walked me out of the gate and left socializing with women construction workers outside... Olga, Olga... 1 year in India spent in vain... Quick response and X-rupee note between the pages of the pass could have been the proof of my residence status... Expelled back to Russia!

As for Jagannath temple in Puri I knew beforehand I could not go in as a non-Hindu. Yet, I was attracted by the chance to see Puri beach and be closer to the funny trinity. So, I went... It was written in my guidebook that I can spy on the temple from a nearby library. An hour of rambling among the stalls with prasad, sweets, strings, figures of Lord Jagannath in any size and form of execution, socializing with people also waiting for the library to open (this is how I got to know that Russians are very much known here due to their particular interest in the mineral resources that Orissa is rich in... as if we do not have enough of ours... and an elderly man asked me if my father was an engineer... he-he... who was not at those times? ;o) and... eventually... pam-pam.. 10 Rs of donation bought me the access to the roof of the library.The library was a decent masterpiece itself with its old British wooden book-cases.. dusty and untouched for ages.. and two old men reading newspapers at the spacious reading room. The view over the temple did not gave any insights, but a couple of ok pictures. I was not satisfied. The elderly man I made friends with told me that I can see the statues in the Water Temple, so where I headed. 25 people got around me trying to find out the truth about the Water Temple and one of them brought me there. The trinity was there indeed, about 1.2 - 1.5 m high, but clearly no pictures... I mean - the statues are fun for me, but hei, they are deities in principle... No wonder those non-Hindus are not allowed inside... What a disrespect! Even the young handsome half-naked priest behaving too freely for his role was of no help here... On the way to this one I spotted a small sanctuary guarded by an old women in a worn-out white cotton saree without a blouse or a petticoat. Her appearance and asthmatic breathing was horrifying. My small donation yet bought me some minutes with the sweet trinity (so...carefully cherished... just like babies at the altar... you must see them...) and an eventual picture.

Spying on Orrisan temples – 1

Being a national heritage and in some instances – a still functioning sanctuary – open for public, Orrisan temples did appeared and would always remain a mystery to me. I have seen a number of those 500 temples left from the original 7000 in Bhubaneswar, the grand Sun Temple in Konark and a magnet-for-pilgrims Jagannath temple in Puri. Yet I did not get a chance to fully experience any of them.

What is an Orrisan temple like? Imagine a long hanging marigold garland…This is a main tower (deul) of an Orissan temple – as tall, as terry due to its extensive and incredibly fine carvings on the outer walls, as segmented – both horizontally and vertically – reflecting a very composite structure of the construction. A shorter rectangular-in-its-basement building in front of the tower is a porch (jagamohana). Later temples also have a dancing hall (hota mandir) and a hall of offerings (bhoga mandir). Yet, personally, I find carvings more fascinating than the geometry of the temple complex as such. Depicting gods and scenes from the epics, the carvings are astonishing in their precision and artistic contribution. One can walk rounds and rounds while discovering tine and huge figures of pot-bellied women with bare perfectly round balls of breasts, unbelievably small waist and curvy heaps covered by garlands and other decorations; intricate compositions of flowers and animals; gods with their vehicles and symbols; and impressive scenes from the immortal epics.

To be continued…

Why I decided to go to Orissa?

I picked up this not particularly conventional destination relying on my gut instincts rather than for any well-justified reason. I got inspired by the most amazing round-eyed wooden statues of Puri trinity (Lord Jagannat), first discovered by Olivier and MC and ever since coming on my way in one form or another – carved on wood or stone, made of brass, painted, woven – in the rooms of craft museums, palaces and state emporiums. Then I found colorfully painted wooden figures of animals from Orissa which I was generously gifting back home. And eventually I got to see Orissi classical dance with its fascinating concept, sophisticated choreography and the dancers looking like the carved statues on the walls of the ancient temples. Lord Jagannat, wooden animals and dance maybe a dubious momentum for traveling, yet it was more than enough to book my tickets without thinking.

Leaving Delhi in the confused state of mind

I eventually got up at 5.17 am… 13 minutes before I was supposed to leave the house and head off to the train station so to catch the train to the city which name I still cannot pronounce well… Bhubaneswar, the capital of Orissa…. I still felt that meeting the deadline was realistic. I washed my face, rammed whatever I needed in my backpack, threw whatever I did not need for that time to the upper shelf of my former wardrobe, kissed sleepy Claudia, woke up Joana and Bozo as one of them really managed to lock the door so that my key would not work, exchanged hugs with Tensin, my Tibetan monk friend who came to stay with me the day before and got a yellow string with a nodded mantra tied on my wrist and rushed downstairs...uf... On the way I realized that my previously thought as indispensable sweatshirt was still lying on the beanbag where I left it. I shouted, “Tenzin, Tenzin!” and asked him to throw it from the balcony. What he did…. Yet, the sweatshirt never reached the ground.. having been stuck among the wires at the level of the second floor. After the two seconds of shock … realizing my miserable inability to seize the desired object that was within my sight but clearly out of any reach….I waived to Tenzin, asked to take care of it in the morning and started walking towards the market..

The detachment exercise was not over with it yet.. Already in the auto it occurred to me that I forgot my charger along with the second set of the batteries for the camera in the plug in the living room… Poorly imagining the practicalities related to the absence of such crucial items… I was thinking about the possible substitutes, opportunity costs and…. Realized thinking was in vain… I got an amazing chance to practice detachment… So that to make Tenzin a bit more proud of me ;o)…..

Left for traveling

ok... i cannot promise anything, but at least the intention is there… I hope to post as I go, so hopefully you people will be regularly fed with new tales on my tour ;o) let us see….

The coming 1,5 weeks I am in Rajastan, the land of Maharajahs, proud kings and princesses, fortresses and palaces, camels and snake-charmers…. Uaa….. Enough of the tourist pamphletism...

The packing lasted for a week and resulted in a zipped and locked suitcase with 20 kgs and a stuffed upper compartment of my cupboard – to be posted, to be used, to be…. The farewell dinner resulted in the major hangover the day after and the praise of the dishes I spent on hours and hardly tried. The night before leaving was nicely spent in TC with the a few of the dearest of the remaining..

The bus journey to Jaipur started in a miserable way… I was trying to hide the sentiments between the lines of Norwegian Wood, the book by Murakami that I clearly picked up for its title. Yet…oh, my luck, the reading went so that every passage was strangely resounding in my heart, appealing to the odd memories and twists relevant for various periods of my life… I went on and on crying…. This was grieving for whatever has not happened however much I was devastated with whatever did happen. I could not explain any reason for my tears, yet I realized the reason was the abundance of reasons… I cried for everything and nothing in particular. True, I tend to arrange my trips in such a way that it is always a major bye to something or somebody, so the journey becomes a virtually cathartic experience when I first have to cry out all the tension… before I finally get occupied with the impressions, concerns and routines of the new destination.