Lice! Is this Chapter 5? I've gotten them confused...
Lice: I don't have any. This is good. Hope you weren't concerned... ; ) hehe.. (To all who weren't in contact with me around late May and early June of last year, Mendon brought back lice from Gambia as one of his presents for me. I still find this fact ridiculously funny. Mendon, thank you for letting me use this for a little prank. ; ) Watch: now, karma will see to it that I pick up a few lice while I'm here to bring back to the States.
To All:
India has provided me with an unexpected opportunity and need to communicate with those whom don't enter my thoughts on a daily basis. I am so grateful for your emails. I'm trying to be good about replying, but my efforts vary depending on the hours in which I receive the emails (ie. if you write me before I go to sleep, I generally have trouble writing back). But, rest assured, I will respond. Eventually... ; )
Slowly, she crawls out of her shell. I'm the one, there, peeking out. You can see her, like a tiny hermit crab that has been covered by a rambunctious 3-year-old's pail, and, finding herself thrown suddenly into the darkest of nights, cranes her neck away from safety to look curly-Q 3-year-old in the face.
Ahhhh! It's BIG! It's going to EAT me!
Ok, kidding. India is not going to eat me (I hope!). But, India does kind of remind me of a curly-Q 3-year-old. Not much planning, much zest for life, unimaginable amounts of honesty. A certain amount of innocence is displayed in juxtaposition with the influence which the West has controlled. It's interesting. Although, I don't have to feed it, I'm getting 8 hours of sleep, and I don't have to think twice about college tuition for curly-Q. Benefits without the costs. ALthough, I do struggle to find a good babysitter on Saturday nights.
What else? I had another "donut." I had a real donut before, but last night, I purchased a chocolate croissant. Chocolate on top, chocolate in the middle, and little silver sugary drops all over it. Oh, it is just amazing. Last night's excursion was incredible. Brian and I went out to get a firewire cable for me (didn't come with my camera!) and get some dinner. No cable, wait a few days on that one. But dinner... well. We walked up one of the main drags that is close to us and came to the Hot Breads store (where I've purchased those donuts). We didn't eat there (but Brian did buy some chocolate mousse). Instead, we walked upstairs to the Tex-Mex restaurant. Well. Weh-hell. That was interesting. We walked into a nice restaurant. Wonderful service. The waiter pulled my chair out, pushed it in for me, brought mineral water, wouldn't let us pour it. Nice. Especially for a Tex-Mex restaurant. But something was funny. Mexican, in CHENNAI? So, we look through the menu. Next to the food, there were pronunciations available (I'm assuming that Spanish is SO far removed from Tamil that fathoming how to say these words would make most Indians cry. Besides that, there probably aren't too many Mexican restaurants in India.) Taco (Tah-koh). I'm not kidding. That was my favorite. I ordered a burrito, hoping that something simple would result in something decent. Brian went out on a limb and ordered an enchilada, I think. I'm not sure that our waiter could correctly pronounce either. Regardless, my burrito was good, but very Indian. Very Indian. Not at all what I expected. Lots of chives, probably okra, of course beans-thank goodness-, onions, dash of curry? It came to the table, but it came with a tray of sauces (Remember: Indian meals often consist of rice and a myriad of sauces). So, of course, Indian Mexican comes with sauces. Salsa, right? Yes, they brought salsa, and some chile sauce, and some sour cream, among others in this small arrangement of sauces that was very traditionally Indian. But, if you're thinking about your Tex-Mex experiences, you may have noticed that I have not mentioned chips and salsa. There were no chips and salsa. NOT ON THE MENU. I was surprised. Brian, on the other hand, was outraged. He hadn't had his Mexican meal until he had his chips and salsa. Complained about it the whole time. It was amusing. What was more amusing, in my opinion, is what the Indian restaurants in Mexico must be like. Woe to the Indians that go there and have their sauces already dumped on their rice, or, worse yet, cooked with the rice! Where are my trays? My sauce cups? Why have you put a fork in my food; that's for my fingers! Your rice sucks. You can hear the thought process, can't you? At any rate, Brian and I had a good laugh, especially because this all went down just outside of "China Town." Ha. HaHA. Ha HA haha. I'll let you know what Chinese in Chennai is like.
Brian, since he arrived, has earned us white kids celebrity status. Brian, as mentioned before, is close to 6'8". Indians average 5'8". He is a giant. I love watching little kids as he walks past; they stumble over themselves and their eyes get as round as their open mouths. Since he's been here, we've had people rushing our car to wave at him and shout their "Hi"s. I'm not kidding! In the middle of traffic, people will run up to the car window, shouting and smiling. It's crazy. The extent of my attention before his arrival was a few cat calls (Hey Baby, What a beauty, etc) and people who want to try their English out on me (I'm working up to speaking back to them in Tamil).
Less of Brian. Hm. No, no, more of Brian for another moment. Now that you've all seen the picture of my "shower," I need to write on this. Just after Brian got here, we rearranged a room so we could move a desk. Fine, good. We needed to clean under the bed (years of dust has a tendency to accumulate there, rather than elsewhere in the flat.) We needed to sweep and mop. So, after sweeping, Brian asks if he can be useful. "yeah, go grab a bucket and water." You remember that green bucket in my shower picture? THat was the one he grabbed. He grabbed my SHOWER BUCKET. He used my bathtub to mop the floor. My bucket was gross enough before he did that, and now... mmmh. Sad, sad story. He was willing to use the bucket for the floor, I think, because he wasn't interested in using it for himself (too dirty, not a shower, not American, no, no, no). So, I'm without a bucket and I keep bumping my head on the faucet when I get my hair wet (it's the easiest, yet often most painful, way). AH!
Ok, enough of that.
I realized the most ridiculous thing about India and Indians. They drink hot tea for allergies (as a preventative measure). But what Indian, eating the food (spicy) that they do, would ever, ever need to worry about not having immaculately clear sinuses? Think about that.
Sitar hurts. A lot. My fingers pain quite quickly after playing and they stay that way for hours now. My left foot hurts as well. But, it's starting to sound more like a sitar now. I appreciate that.
Oh, quote: "There's only one God; He just looks at us in different ways.' That's from Sudharshan (my sitar teacher), and I'm taking it out of context, but I enjoy it that way. He was talking about all of the different deities that are worshipped in Hinduism. I'm enjoying it as a way to look at the world's religions and the different experiences of individuals.
Hm. So, not much else here. I'm getting better with my AutoRickshaw drivers, but they're still no walk in the park. The food is getting better. My sleep is getting worse; I'm reverting back to my night owl tendencies, which is just not en vogue in Chennai. Not in this heat. THe heat is getting better; they days are enjoyable every so often, but the rain is quickly approaching. Great. Just great. Brian is busy at Rahman's, but still asks a question before he does ANYTHING so long as he can. That's it. I look forward to sharing my music with you, look forward to getting some more pictures (that has taken time to get started). I look forward to hearing from you all (HINT!). Make sure that family and loved ones get this if I'm not mailing them directly (and arrange it so that I can mail them directly: send me email addresses). Hopefully soon, I will have a blog (web log - we = blog, for the "older folks") up and running at Dornbrook.com. I will send more info on that once I'm posting there. WHen that happens, I will likely cease to send out these emails and direct you all to that location. You get the picture.
PS. I think I was going to write about the ant food picture briefly. I think I had mentioned before that people leave rice sugar outside of their flats for the ants to be happy with there, in hopes that the ants will not make themselves happy inside the flats. That's what the ant food picture is: rice sugar. The rice sugar is always placed in intricate designs. This is done daily. I really like it. I plan to send more designs.
