there's no place like home.

i'm home. i am very happy to be home. i love my home. and everyone in it.

however...

i miss my bangalore home terribly. i miss everyone in that home too.

bittersweet this is, to reunite with those i love whilst leaving the new lovely people in my life.

only 5 more sleeps

i have returned from a two-week journey into the north of india. delhi then agra then jaipur then jaisalmer then jodhpur then dharamsala. i cut my trip short by 6 days as i miss bangalore and my friends! and dharamsala is an over-priced tourist market. not my style.

i didn't get sick, and despite my jaisalmer-desert camel guide's best efforts, was NOT sold to pakistan for 25 camels. yay! so, two floods and another hospital visit later, i am back in bangalore for the next 5 days. this is amazing as i am here for my friends birthday, and i saw my landlady for the last time before she undergoes surgery.

i haven't stopped reading for 10 days. love it.

this is it!

Well, it appears the time has come. Today is the last day of my internship. 13 weeks already. And the last few days (weeks/months!) have been very busy… booking my travels for the next three weeks, preparing for my upcoming school year, housing arrangements, job hunting, finishing my projects here, filling out endless feedback forms, meetings meetings, trying to stay OUT of the bathroom, frantically trying to keep updated with news from home… writing writing writing, for the Bangalore newspaper, Janaagraha newspaper, Janaagraha blog, my blog, for the York newspaper, emails… entering photo contests, organizing conferences… trying to catch persistent mosquitos, trying to dodge traffic. I almost got hit by a bus on Monday. hahaha.aahahaha.ahahaa. I’m laughing out loud… such a cliché. It was actually two buses… hahahaaa. I dodged one bus and ran in front of another. This place is insane… This has been a vacation, but definitely not a vacation.

So, I have survived India so far… so far. 24 more sleeps to go though – perils outlined below.

Indian meanie #1: see above

Indian meanie #2: we counted on Wednesday that I have been sick (CONFINED to the bathroom) 8 times. 8 times. That’s every 1.6 weeks. That means every 11 days I am curled up on cold tile next to cold porcelain (dodging my pet cockroach and new eerie spider) in my bathroom. I’ve been hospitalized twice… (which is really just paying $5 to see a quack, who happens to practice in the hospital instead of a walk-in) for conditions not even related to the ladies room. These past few days were fun. Saturday night I chipped my two front teeth on a the-worst- beer-ever beer bottle (tiny tiny chips, but sharp boy). Monday night I ate deep fried chilis (enjoyed many times before) which, this time, almost killed me – I’m serious. Tuesday night, so tired, slipped in the shower, smacked my head, what felt like shattered my knee and foot and, like any stubborn fool, went to sleep. However, did NOT sleep… as a nasty creature had somehow entered my body at some point during the previous day or two, and felt he had had enough of me… and from midnight – 7am, made his way out. This was the 8th time.

Indian meanie # 3 – bombs. see below

Indian meanie # 4 – the heat. see below

Tomorrow morning I leave for Delhi. It is Independence Day on Sunday. Beth, the chickee I’m travelling with, is convinced we are going to be blown up.

For those who share this opinion, pleasssseee stop thinking this.

After Delhi, the Taj Mahal. 40 degrees. Then a three-city tour of the desert. The desert. Near the Pakistani border. I will not be blown up here either. Nor will I drown in floods. It’s the desert. After this, Beth leaves and I travel up north to the Himalayas with my new friend, Velu. After 6 days he leaves and I am alone in the mountains, with the Dalai Lama. I stay there until the 2nd, then I fly on the 4th and arrive on the 5th to see your smiles.

The computer techie down the hall, Satish, calls me Michael Jackson. So I guess, this is it...

Joc

where i am not...

so you may have caught the latest news on leh, in kashmir. the place i am supposed to visit in two weeks... it was hit by a cloudstorm that caused massive flooding. 150+ have died and 4000 tourists are stranded. the airport is closed and communication is down.

so...

i am not going to leh.

where am i?

my internship ends august 13.

august 14 - august 23 the northwestern state of rajasthan. this includes jaipur, jaisalmer, jodhpur. the land of kings. millennia of merchants and palaces and desert. jaisalmer is 35km from the pakistani border. i'm going to sleep in a tent in the desert. about 40 degrees. !!!!!

august 23 - september 3 the state of jammu and kashmir. this includes dharamsala and leh. yes, the kashmir we hear about in the news. however these places are not in disputed areas. they are, however, in the mountains - the himalayas actually. dharamsala is where the dalai lama lives. about 0 - -10 degrees. !!!!!

september 4/5 - toronto :)

for what joy?

It appears it has been almost another month since I’ve written. Wow.

In our pre-departure meeting, the lovely Larissa! discussed with us interns the rollercoaster (s) of emotions that we were likely to experience on this adventure. She endearingly drew little rollercoasters within larger rollercoasters, resulting in what became before me a telling picture of heartbeats within heartbeats. Having already experienced lengthy stays away from home, I “knew” about this rollercoaster and thought I was prepared… This experience, however, the emotions I feel, are quite different than my previous journey to Asia. In part, I think, because I am stationed in one city as opposed to carefree and constantly on the move. Seeing new faces, new landscapes. Encompassed in this is quite a bit: the routine we maintain at home is now transplanted to this strange place… this means waking up for work; walking the same route; shopping at the same grocery stores; eating at the same places…

My rollercoastersssss…

So what if you have some qualms about this routine? What if you haven’t wakened before 10am in two years? What if you are tired of rolling your ankles by mis-stepping on the scary sidewalks on your way to work? What if you are tired of dodging traffic? Dodging dog shit? What if you are ready to scream in the streets every time a tuktuk honks beeps honks beeps honks beeps? What if you don’t want to smell pee multiple times in a day anymore? What if you feel all of this before 10am?

So then you sit down at your desk. And look around. Enjoy your chai. Will I remember Janiki Ama, our patient and intuitive tea lady? What will happen to the groundbreaking project I am working on? How did my new friends enjoy their evening last night? I can’t wait to hear about that… What will we all do tonight? Where will we travel this weekend? What will they teach me next? When will I next be part of a rivoting debate on Indian development… with Indians? Will I forget the beauty of the monsoon rains staining roads red with Indian earth? What if all this is before lunch?

What if these questions float in and out each day? What if they are fragments of larger discourse like self-reflection, self-discovery, the past, the future, values, capacities, ideals. What if your heart is beating so fast you can’t even think? What if you need to sit down because your mind is racing?

All of this seems to be related to my travel patterns… those weekends I stay in Bangalore I struggle for Toronto. Those weekends I am in rural south India there is no place I’d rather be. Do we need to coast to feel the thrill of adventure? Do we need to roll around and get dirty before we can see the calm?

Some people think rollercoasters aren’t worth the lineup. Personally, there is no feeling quite like submitting to the all-powerful tuck-tuck-tuck-tucks of that ascent before the plummet, inside screaming ’What am I doing; I could die at any moment’…

What do I feel at this moment? Only five more weeks left on this ride. I can’t wait to wake tomorrow morning and smile as a tuktuk flies down my street honking good morning to all. I still can’t wait to think ‘I can’t wait to be terrified’.

ah man...

10 degrees in toronto right now? what i wouldn't give...

i miss my city so much. i am DISGUSTED EMBARRASSED that she is under attack by both those who are blinded by the fight, and by those who have yet to open their eyes. be just when fighting for justice. stay classy toronto.