Goodby for now!

On this our last day in India, we are managing urbanity. We left the rural areas yesterday and took the almost 4 hour drive from Pondicherry to Chennai which is some 100+ km to the north. The city lies also along the Bay of Bengal but there ends the similarities between the two. Pondicherry is a small provincial city with a strong French history while Chennai, once known as Madras, is clearly reasonably large urban India – not on the scale of Delhi or Mumbai but still very urban none the less.




Here, the traffic has a more rule obeying element to it. There is some effort to stay within the lines and on your side of the road. Many of the motorcycle and scooter crowd actually wear helmets. Red lights are honoured. Crossing the road as a pedestrian, on the other hand, is a much more treacherous effort. The pedestrian, always the lowest caste of any moving object in Indian traffic, seems to have even less importance here.

There are malls here with young Indian women presenting with a real mix of trying to look western along with those who hold onto Indian dress and some floundering somewhere in between. Frankly, the boys have the most unflattering dress here but, thank God, they have not resorted to the levels of trying to determine the lowest possible point that a pair of pants can be held onto the body. The stores here reflect the mix with many flaunting western models.

The city has its share of mildly hidden poverty and pollution surrounded by major building projects and gleaming office towers. As you cross the river, the walls of the bridge are built up so that you cannot see the pollution or the make shift shanty town that exists on the river’s edges.

It is also much noisier here with more honking being the norm.

We have met what perhaps might be the most obnoxious auto rickshaw drivers who believe that saying no to them is only opening up a whole new set of negotiations. As you wander from the hotel they assault you immediately insisting that you need them urgently to take you even for a few blocks. If that is not accepted then they are sure that you have a program lined up for later or the next days that you must book them for at rates that are astronomical. We got into one to go 2 kilometers – he nattered at us the whole way that he would wait and bring us back and then he knew just the shop we needed (of course, he had no idea that we were looking for anything in particular, but that didn’t matter). I did see a rare sight within the ranks of these drivers though – a female. This is almost exclusively a male domain and in my 3 months here I have only seen two.

Upon arriving in Chennai and booking into our hotel, I had my first hot shower in 3 months. I gave my hair the best cleaning it has seen since leaving Calgary and scrubbed layers of Auroville dust off me that had begun to look like a second skin. It was magnificent. Even so, when I dried myself more dirt came off. Now, lest I be accused of trying to turn into some ancient hippie, I did bathe daily in Auroville but I guess there is only so much that can be accomplished with a bucket of hot water (or I am just not proficient at it). So the Auroville dirt is off me but the spirit of the place travels with me.

Here in Chennai there is a more conservative dress. I have only seen two men wearing shorts and they were clearly tourists fairly fresh into the country (as judged by their white skin). The men here wear long pants at least in public. I have only seen one woman in shorts and she was quite obviously from North America.

The heat here has become more intense. It is about 37+ here today. The sun is strong and even with 3 months of sun upon me I did manage a small sunburn on one arm. As I write this, the internet tells me that Calgary is about 40 degrees colder. The thought of it!

Leaving India is difficult. It is a magical country – not without its problems. There is real poverty here; child abuse in various forms is staggeringly high; the child death rate in parts of India is greater than most places in the world – and the list could go on. Yet, there is also things that make this country fascinating, progressive and incredibly interesting at every corner. I shall miss being here.

The transition home has begun as we spend this day or so in Chennai. We are at a hotel of somewhat luxury means – hot water; a swimming pool; restaurants – but it reminds me a lot of the first hospitals I worked in - polished granite floors and rooms that look like they were either wards or staffing residences. In the early hours we leave for the airport and begin the 21 hours of flying and 6 hours of airport time (Chennai and London) that will end up dumping us out in Calgary. Fortunately, we leave having consumed a magnificent Indian dinner – our last supper so to speak!

Language

I began thinking about language when I saw the sign for the saloon. Most of us from the west would immediately think of a drinking establishment. Indeed, some of us of a certain age might think back to the Western genre of movies where the cowboy would wander in for a night of poker and whiskey. But not in India.

Here, if you wander into the saloon you will get a hair cut. Other oddities of English in India could be seen in a caption to a photo in the paper showing a truck driving through Pondicherry. The caption read that the truck was going through a zone where the law prohibited such vehicles but “the rule was observed more in the breach.” The newspaper can also engage in unintended puns. The headline read “A notable seizure” when referring to the capture of a large amount of counterfeit currency.

This is of course a pun that only makes sense if you understand English. Language here becomes a bit of a funny business when we end up with groups from around the world who struggle to find ways to communicate with each other through often rudimentary skills or translations from others who are a bit more fluent. Last night, for example, we had French, English, German, Korean, Estonian and English at our table with an Indian dialect and Italian at the other. Two people at our table in particular struggled. The Korean lady has about as many words in English as I do in Tamil. The German lady is better in English but often missed grander bits of the conversation if her husband does not translate. In essence, lack of language skills can be isolating even with well intentioned efforts by those around.

I see to be a constant source of amusement to the Tamil staff here as I try to use my half a dozen words for hello and goodbye exchanges. I can send them into wails of laughter when I mispronounce it. I fear what I might have said instead. One group of boys told me one of their names which I the n tried to pronounce. I did it so badly that they nearly fell on the ground laughing and joking with each other about this wacky guy. We ended up laughing together (or at least I hope together) and they asked me to take their picture.

In music, language takes on a different meaning that transcends verbal comprehension. Two nights ago we were invited to sit in on the final rehearsal of the amateur opera group. They have very solid conducting and many possess quite developed voices. They sang in English, French, Italian, German and Russian. It was a remarkably pleasant evening. One of many such evenings here.

This is also the end of the season for many of the long term guests. More and more we see people who are wandering through for a few nights as part of a journey through India or Indians coming for extended weekends. The guests who have been here for similar lengths as ourselves are drifting home or to other parts in the north such as Nepal, where temperatures are not as intense as they will be here in May. The language of good bye is common now – e-mails get exchanged or you are added to their Facebook. Yet, the chances of again seeing them are low and one wonders what the common ground between us is beyond this joint venture of time in Auroville. Is there are language between us that transcends this common time?

Each week now the temperatures slide up the scale and the sun feels more intense. The humidity also can feel like a blanket at times. It has become the common topic. Umbrellas come out to shield against the burning globe. A mid day nap is almost an essential and even a cold shower feels like magic (a good thing as the hot water supply has been down for several days while they try to tackle rather antiquated and quaint plumbing at the point where we fill our buckets and wander back to our bathing areas).

I am also faced with the language of coming home. Can I come back here? Almost certainly. Can I manage back in Calgary? Less so now. Returning to a city that has for a while felt less interesting feels even more so now. Can I return to the work I have been doing? That too is a question with quite an ambivalent answer. India changes you either by luring you into longer stays (allowing one suspects running away from something) or forcing you to face your own reality and its worth to you. I have met some tourists who wander India rather like going through the zoo. You look around at the characters, take pictures and the go home. But for most of the people I have met here, India has been a changing force.

It is a country in my soul now. It is such an amazing array on contrasts but, as I sit in the taxi, I revel I in the noise, the smells, the apparent chaos that is not. But, this is not my home. Tomorrow we leave for a couple of days in Chennai, formerly known as Madras. Then we begin the long journey home. I don’t head that way with joy as I have in past journeys in various parts of the world. I have in the past developed a point where my language was about being ready to head back. That is not the case now.

As I finish writing this, it is early morning. I am met with a daily language of sorts - that of firecrackers exploding in one of the nearby villages announcing a death and imminent funeral. Nary a day goes by without such an announcement. These are noisy, colourful events. The flowers will be pulled off as the entourage moves towards the cremation site.

Sweat

I have developed a new respect for sweat (or perspiration in polite company). It constitutes an essential for survival in hot, humid climates – no – hot climates. Despite being not terribly far from the equator, not all days are humid throughout the day. Humidity can wax and wane. There are days when you sweat just sitting still. These are the humid ones.

There are days like today when the heat is fairly intense but there is little sweat arising from humidity. You can ride along on the motor bike and feel the dry heat like sand paper.

Either way, hydration is a constant demand which you cannot judge by how much you urinate. Too much is lost through sweat. You just need to keep drinking water – 3 liters a day is a minimum. Sounds easy but you can get involved in doing things and not realize that you haven’t had any water for an hour or more. Not good.

The other challenge here is dust – a red dust that arises from the roads like a fine grit that covers everything. When you go to wash, you discover that the tan on your feet wipes away – it was just a coating of the dust.

Between the dust and sweat, clothes need to be changed and washed quite regularly. It is not unreasonable to go through two sets of clothes in a day.

The dust is insidious. Even though the computer has never been away from our room or the courtyard which is nowhere near the roads, the screen gets covered in the red dust. Your eyes need to be cleaned each morning and you can imagine that there is really no orifice spared.

Those who have travelled in warms climes will know that heat also sucks energy. What you might get done in a day in a more northerly climate may take 2-3 days here. Working hours are different which is typical of hot climates – early morning starts; siestas and working more into the evening as the day’s heat lessens.

Last night, after a concert of India Ragas, we drove the scooters into town around 8:30 p.m. The temperature had dropped to the mid 20’s. It is hard to believe that I was actually chilled while driving along. It is a temperature back home that would be most comfortable.

We have been rather lucky with most taxi drivers although we have found a good one, Chakripani, and have stuck with him. They often work strange hours. For example, most planes in and out of Chennai (the nearest major airport) come and go from offshore between midnight and 6 a.m. The ride is some 3 hours away. Thus, taxi drivers are often up at night taking people to and from Chennai. They then grab a few hours and are on the road for day trips. Our driver manages to get sleep whenever possible. Here, in this photo, he is catching a couple of hours while we visit a heritage park.

Friends (newly and temporarily acquired during travels) found themselves stuck with a driver whose view of safety bears no resemblance to anything we might consider in North America. He had driven them to a town some 2.5 hours away on a day trip flat rate. When he found out what time they would be heading back, he then accepted another trip departing from back here – the only problem was when he needed to be here. He did the trip back in 1.5 hours venturing through towns at speeds, passing with narrow holes and generally causing our friends to fear for their lives. Frequent pleas to slow down were given cursory and fleeting attention. They were sweating for reasons other than heat. They were unnerved even the next day.

The taxi game here is a crap shoot. Short hauls are one thing but when faced with a long haul, it requires nerves of steel at times.

Rocks, caves, meditation and food

The day did not start out as hoped for. A water pipe behind unit where we stay burst at 4 a.m. This waking occurred on a day when sleep was desired having spent the previous day travelling up to Mammalpuram and DakshinaCitra some 2.5 hours north of here. It has been a long day but alas sleep was not to be had and we were again heading off for a similar day’s drive and tour to Tiruvannamali which is an ashram and temple city inland from here.


Mammalapuram is a seaside town that serves as a fishing village, home to some rather amazing ruins from around 640 a.d. and a beach tourist town. We had been here for a few days during our last visit to India but were introducing our friends to the area. Upon arrival, we headed straight to Namaste restaurant. It had only recently been renamed from the German Bakery (India is littered with small restaurants with the latter name). We presumed the name change was prompted by the recent bombing of a so named restaurant in Pune.

None the less, Namaste is run by the same Nepalese family who make everything from scratch. Anything that you order hot is made to order so a degree of patience is required. We enjoyed a fresh bread croissant while awaiting what must be the best rice pudding available in a restaurant anywhere in the world. It is rich, creamy, hot and mixed with cardamom, nuts and raisins. The latte was also hot, tasty and arrived with a touch of spice. The pineapple juice was the joyous product of a freshly juiced fruit with nothing but the fresh juice resulting in a taste that we in the west forget with our various packaged juices that rob the liquid of the real taste of the fruit.

Mammalapuram is suffering from beach loss that we have seen in various parts of the Bay of Bengal around here. It seems to be a longer term result of the tsunami 6 years ago. This is also resulting in salination problems beginning to emerge along the coast with no apparent solutions. The impact for the farmers, fisherman and families living along the coast may be quite dramatic. Already in a community near where we are staying, one of the drinking wells is contaminated.

Mammalapuram benefits from tourists who wander here reasonable numbers during the high season from December to mid March. Although one can tell that this has not been as generous a season as they have seen in the past. It is now coming to an end and the shops are still full of goods. We have noticed that while there have been lots of tourists wandering about, less is being bought in the stores versus what we have seen in the past. In addition, while India has been historically a destination for the backpacker crowd, they seem to be representing a larger percentage of the travelling population in this area. For merchants that is not the best news as they tend to spend less seeking to eat in cheaper places and sleep in down market beds.

The ruins in Mammalapuram are wonderous to see. There are alters literally carved into the large rock faces. How some of these rocks got here is a bit of a mystery. Consider Krishn’a Ball seen below. You get a sense of scale by looking at the two goats on their hind legs to the lower left.

The details in these carvings are also amazingly intricate.

This was an intensely hot day. Moving about the ruins was thankfully also met with a breeze from the ocean. There is a fair amount of up and down on the rocks to see the various carvings. One of the more curious ones what we call Noah’s Ark. This very large rock with a housing complex carving on the top has no explanatory detail but….

With all this walking, a nourishing meal was needed – a tourist like an army marches on the stomach. This being a fishing village, Moonrakers restaurant serves fish that they go down the block to the fisherman to buy. Very fresh! This was grilled coated with a masala spicey sauce that left you picking through the bones for the last bit of flesh. Nothing goes to waste here – the head was then given to a street lady who took it away probably to make soup with.

Our second day trip was over to Tiruvanammeli which is the ashram capital of Tamil Nadu. Here seekers of a higher consciousness converge for the season. Satsangs, teachings, meditations and all of the related activities take place in intense numbers for the 4 months between the end of the Monsoon and the beginning of the summer heat.

One of the biggest ashrams in the area is that of Sri Raman who lived in a cave for the most part up the sacred mountain of Arunachala. Thus, a climb up to the cave to meditate seems an essential part of the experience. April and I have been up there before.

PHOTO OF CLIMB

The best time to be in the cave is at daybreak when it is opened and there is chanting in this small but wonderous space. That would have required us to be up at 2 a.m. to get here in time – something none of us were prepared to do – my – I must be getting soft. The price for not doing so was climbing in heat that was in the mid 30s. The heat inside the cave was even higher reaching around 37-38 degrees. Sweat formed on your body just sitting there. As you meditated, rivulets of sweat began falling down your trunk like a collection of bugs running about inside your clothes. The places on my pants where I placed my hands ended up totally soaked.

Later we meditated at the ashram in a much cooler place. That meditation was abruptly interrupted by a man letting loose with a loud, sonorous burp that was so forceful it must have emanated from his toes. I literally jumped when he let forth.

Tiruvanammeli is also the home to a very large Hindu temple.

In front of the temple is a market full of spices, pots and cooking utensils as well as fresh foods. I am attracted to markets so wandering through them is a joy. You are met with sounds and smells that assault the senses without let up. Each turn results in a different experience. I managed to greatly amuse a couple of merchants when I didn’t know that the long strips of semi-dried plant were tobacco and the neatly laid out leaves were fresh tobacco for chewing.

Near the temple, there was a large crowd of police officers causing one to wonder if some politician were coming or there was yet another bomb threat. It turns out neither. Instead, a slum across the road was being demolished with a lone store owner who was an obvious holdout being forced from his premises. The developer was busy giving interviews to the press no doubt telling all what a marvelous person he was for giving the neighbourhood some new wonderous whatever. One has to question the whereabouts of the former occupants.

Inside the temple is a series of altars, courtyards and devotional spaces. I was greeted at one point by this group of school girls from 10th form who are 15 years old. They wanted to speak English and learn where I was from. These are girls with dreams – wanting to be a police officer, a pilot, a nurse (April said she should become an Auyrvedic doctor instead of a nurse and the girl rushed up to hug April). A group of boys nearby mocked them for these dreams. They showed me their report cards and talked with pride about the dreams. You could only encourage them in a land where women a still struggling for the freedom to pursue these dreams.

This is Fort Gingee which sits atop the hills in this area of Tamil Nadu. It dates from the 9th centiry Chola Dynasty.

No day's trip is without its share of people watching. This seems to be the old and new of the spiritual seekers

The fields are also looking beautiful at this time of year. Plants are growing rapidly in the spring time and lush greens are observable in this agricultural area. It is not a rich area for sure and signs of poverty are there if you are willing to look. But also there are daily signs everywhere of hard working people who are finding ways to live, bring up their children - but there are social problems. One town that we went through, about the size of Bragg Creek had 5 liquor outlets within a block.

Photography is a challenge here. There are many places that are either a distance away or too dangerous on the roads to go to by scooter so you rely on taxis. This tends to get you to lots of places when the sunlight is intense making it hard to get contrast and color in pictures. Early mornings remain the best time as is often the case in many parts of the world here. The sun here bleaches so much from a picture even with the right filter on the camera. This is a land with so many features and the people so fascinating that you could just sit and take pictures all day and never move from the spot you have chosen. Even so, you cannot impart through a picture the sounds, smells and the movement that looks more like chaos but, in reality, works. A marvelous land India!

On the street corner

As one stands on the corner of the old French provincial capital of Pondicherry the complexity of society passes before your eyes. It starts with the obvious features of skin colour. There is the sea of Indians mixed with various white tourists who stand out like a strange coloured flower in the blossoms. You can pick out the new arrivals as their whiteness glistens without even hints of tans. They also tend to stand out either by the newness of locally bought clothes in attempts to somehow fit in or by their complete lack of sensitivity to local modesty by continuing to wear western clothes that act as something of an affront to this culture. This lady wandered the streets with her friends in awe of the interesting city around here oblivious to the stares that followed her.

We had seen a similar experience some weeks back down on the beach of the city at the edge of the Bay of Bengal. Here was a western woman sauntering along with a sheer wrap tossed over her string bikini. Three young men sitting next to us in the 24 hour latte store (naturally I found it) sprung to action with their cell phone cameras and paid the bill faster than could be recorded. They hopped over the wall in front of the café and headed down the beach to follow her.

The next aspect of society that one sees passing on the street is official India. This comes in the form of the policeman standing on the corner wearing a uniform reminiscent of French days. I have observed he and fellow officers on corners throughout the city. I am mystified as to exactly what they do. A young lady visiting from Bangalore observed that there is something of a lawlessness about the traffic here with nobody wearing helmets (as they are apparently required to do where she lives) nobody paying attention to the rules of the road (my first hint that they actually exist in any formal way) and everyone on cell phones. Certainly we had a taxi driver for 5.5 hours yesterday who managed to be on his cell phone (hanging from his ear in some small consolation to safety) for the entire trip.

Official India is also seen in military and police personnel zipping by on motorcycles or more likely in SUVs. I have never yet seen a policeman perform any type of official duty so I am unsure what they do but there are plenty of them with a few large training facilities nearby. Official India also includes government officers being driven to and from places with an urgency that suggests some great plan of action is about to befall the city – or they are late getting home. Many are chauffeur driven in their air conditioned SUVs that zip by suggesting that they are somehow above the hoi polloi that the rest of us wander within.

The street is also alive with various religious dress. There are Catholic nuns wandering by in traditional habits rarely seen now in North America. There are nuns from the order founded by Mother Theresa as well as several other orders with operations in the city. I have seen them out helping the poor in the city as well as doing their daily shopping. I watched a monk buy cloth so that he could have a new habit made.

There being a large Muslim population there are also clothing of that religious faith as well as those who profess to live some form of ascetic life. There are also uniforms of children attending religious schools as well as the day to day uniforms of school children seen throughout the city as they move in great numbers to and from school.

The streets are also alive with various modes of transport ranging from the ever present sea of motorcycles through to push bikes, push and auto rickshaws, peddle delivery carts, cars and SUVs possessing ear piercing horns. Then there are the busses on major streets that, along with the trucks, are kings of the road.

Yesterday we also wandered into the countryside where a different series of images presents themselves. Yes there remain the motorcycles (driven by children as young as about 12) and the trucks, busses and cars. But there are also the many villages living quite traditional lives with evidence of some eking out an existence in hovels that provide only the barest of life’s essentials.

The fields are lush with corn, rice and sugar cane growing. Cows and goats wander by with their newest additions as spring brings the newborns.

Infrastructure out here is limited and often in poor condition. A road that we had traveled on some weeks earlier was no longer passable by taxi as the washout from the previous monsoon had not been repaired instead disintegrating into rubble that only a larger vehicle or a motorcycle could manage.

There are frequent power outages now that the heat is building and demand on the power grid grows. My favourite chai shop has been closed three times this week as a result. This might seem a minor inconvenience to me but it sucks the life blood from the family that runs it. The tourist season here is coming to an end in a matter of weeks. Business will drop here in big numbers. Taxi drivers leave for the hill stations where tourists and westerns who live in India run to avoiding the heat. Restaurants close for April and May here and the Kashmiri bandits who run the small clothing and trinket stores head off to find flocks of tourists elsewhere ripe for the picking. Thus, for the family who runs the chai shop, these last few weeks matter and each day they close due to power losses hurt.

In Pondicherry yesterday there were no evident outages. Thus, lest you feel sorry for me missing my daily chai, I did get one from my now favourite street vendor in the city (we are about 7 km away from the city). This street vendor delivers a warm sweet spicy tea that bears some resemblance to what I imagine they serve in Heaven.

Various random thoughts

Early morning in the humid mist

I suppose that wandering in the early morning humidity causes one to reflect upon the place you are in. During this walk, I refelcted upon the myriad of experiences that we have had in Auroville. I remain impressed with the individual persistence that many have here to make a positive impact upon the world thruogh their actions and meditations. There is no perfect place on earth. Man has altered the world virtually everywhere. We are an imperfect species and that is reflected in our actions.

Last night I joined  a small tour into a pebble gardern. Here was a husband and wife who have found ways to transform an ancient river bed, full of the pebbles one would expect and a virtual desert, into a lush space with a productive garden. They have done it with innovation creating their own soil. Nothing has been brought in to enhance the natural transformation. This barren space has become what you see below:

This man and his wife are quite dedicated but they are not the only people working the land that we have met here. There is Sadahana Forest where one is being built along with water preservation and the building of the wtaer table. There is Solitude where there is permaculture being developed. There is a plant medicinal garden near Auroville as well.

There is also a wide variety of healing practices here that we have participated in. We have also done a lot of meditation. This has included time in the inner chamber at the Matrimandir as well as Sunday mornings for 3 hours with a small Vipassana group.

Last night we saw our fourth concert since coming here. It was a capella of 16th century liturgical music. Quite maginificent. The choir is amateurs from Auroville while the conducter is a gentle talented professional from Flemish Belgium. He also led a smaller choir in Gregorian Chant - an also wonderful evening. We previously attended a jazz pianist, Hartmut von Lieres - a delightful evening as well. You can check him out at http://von-lieres.com/albums.html  The fourth concert was a jazz evening that was not so pleasant. It included an electric violin which I think is a direct invention of Lucifer himself. When I heard it, I thought the nerves were being pulled from my spine - one by one.

The point here is that there are many opportunities for a large variety of experiences that help one look inward. It has been said (although by whom I am unsure) that one comes to India either to find oneself or lose oneself (or perhaps both). I think it is impossible to spend any significant amount of time here without an effect.

While I do not consider myself an expert on Sri Aurbindo, the founder of the ashram in Pondicherry and a person who had a magnificent and powerful effect on Auroville, I have been reading a banned book while here titled The Lives of Sri Aurobindo. It has been published in the US but there is presently a court order here prohibiting its publication. Underground copies are circulating. It was written by a man who has been at the Aurbindio Ashram for many years. It is exceedingly controversial. It strikes me as odd though, that the book's opponents have sought to silence the author by having the book banned and, I am told, even tried to have his visa revoked so that he could no longer stay in India - a country that has been his home for a long time. I am also told that there have been death threats against him.

This alll strikes me as rather ironic. The British attempted to silence Aurbindo when he was a political figure opposing their rule of India. They talked about having him "transported" - i.e. shipped out of India. The parallels between what the British tried to do to Aurobindo and what some are trying to do to the book's author are interesting indeed.

I am reminded of the words attributed to Voltaire - "I may not agree with what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it." (According to answers.com the source of that quote is actually "Evelyn Beatrice Hall, writing under the pseudonym of Stephen G Tallentyre in "The Friends of Voltaire" (1906), as a summation of Voltaire's beliefs on freedom of thought and expression.")

I have read some of the criticism of the book - valid I suppose. At times though, I find them almost hystrionic. For example, one suggested that the author hinted at Aurobindo having a mental disorder and that it might be related to the inspiratiosn that Aurobindo had. Having read those sections of the book carefully, I cannot agree that he has made that suggestion but rather reviewed the idea raised by others.

The criticisms may, in the balance be fair. Heehs has published 8 other books. I believe that commentary on books is valid and impotrant but attempting to silence a voice is a dangerous path that we have seen countries pass along with disasterous consequences. I am sad to see a democracy such as India anywhere on that path.

There will be no doubt those that think I have this terrribly wrong and really don't know what I am talking about. They may be right and I accept their right to voice that opinion but in so doing - they must accept other voices as well.

Rain?

Upon wakening, the sound of water dropping was evident. Being orginially from the west coast of Canada, it is a sound that one associates with rain. Those clear drops of water falling outside the window. To conclude it is rain is to reach an erroneous conclusion. Standing up and looking out the window, I saw what appeared to be a fog which I took to be smoke from the garbage fires. I would again be wrong. What instead I saw was the thick mist of a near 100% humidity morning. The sounds that I had been hearing were water droplets formed on the plants from the humidity and then dropping off.

Temperatures have hit the mid 30s this week. You can really feel the intensity of the sun immediately upon entering its rays. Sweat forms on your skin while sitting and you quickly come to realize that you will be wet throughout the day.

Midday activity is slow. Those who are wise about the weather, being the locals, seek a quiet corner at midday and then curl up for a snooze - a practice common in hot countries. Those of us from further up in the northern hemisphere don't tend to do this naturally. Silly fools that we are.

Life returns to a busier pace mid afternoon with dinner not coming until later - 7 p.m. or afterwards.The mid day is not to be a period of activity but I do see many a westerner insisting on keeping active in teh hot hours. We have learned that exercise, like a walk, is best done very early in the morning.

I had a rather fascinating conversation with a taxi driver yesterday. He observed that come May, most westerners will have left this part of India going home or to the hill stations around India where temperatures are lower. Many taxi drivers leave this area and go over to the hill station regions where they can again find work. A few stay here. One told me that he prefers to be here, even with little work, so that he can be with his family. Many drivers dislike chaing the business as it takes them away from family.

Yesterday's drover proudly told me that his oldest, a daughter now 20, is  a teacher. The next , a boy, is at post secondary taking some engineering program while the youngest is still in high school. School is impotrant for his children and he is proud that they are getting an education which he did not get. In various ways, I have heard this story from many drivers who are anxious that their children exprience a better quality of life than they have had. This is a somewhat universal parental theme. These parents are working hard for it to happen.

As one looks around at the markets, the people working, the families, the children - it is easy to see that there is much more that unites us as a human race than divides us. Indeed, it is the themes of politics, nationalism and greed that seem to be the ones that pull us apart.

The beauty parlour reception room

Today, I wandered up to the reception room at Lakme Salon in Pondicherry to pick up April who was having her hair done as well as a manicure / pedicure. I was early and had a chance to observe Indian society unfolding before me.

There were two teenagers who had come together. At first sight, one would hardly believe that they came together. The more savvy one was wearing tight jeans, a bad boy tight t-shirt, make up and had her hair done in a modernized, western fashion. Her friend, on the other hand, was wearing a trdaitional churida and had her hair also done in a traditrional fashion. She had been brought to get a modernized look.

Shortly thereafter, a mother arrived with her adult daughter - both dressed traditionally. The daughter had the henna decorations on her hands. She was coming for preparation of marraige.

There was also the other teenager who had both feet in traditional and modern worlds. A tunic over her jeans.

Then there was the wife sitting next to me who was dressed in a way that would have made her fit in whether she was in Pondicherry or Calgary or London.

Yesterday, having become a bit lost on our motorbikes, we wandered into a very rural village where we saw quite basic huts for living and a very rural way of life that would have nothing in common with anybody that I saw in the waiting room.

This is a country under such change - there is the completely westernized at one end and the rural family whose only exposure to the west is when people wander in or the children get some lesson in school. There is not a single day here that is not fascinating and forever challenging you to unravel contradictions. That may be one reason why I really like this place!