Headed "Home"

Five minutes talking to me and you'll roll your eyes like I am some hippie in love with a strange dirty land with hordes of people, or you'll learn to love India a little bit too. I can't help the gleam in my eye and the spring in my step. After nearly 4 months away from India (7 out of the US) I am headed back to India for the remaining 5 months of the year.

In this post I described the discrepant feelings India brings up- on one hand, the consummate fascination of an unbelievably new place, the feeling of love so strong, so pervasive, you nearly cry walking down the street and on the other, a disgust (for myself, mostly) and confusion tantamount to a night in an upside-down restaurant run by cats. Or tales of a bench-pressing snowman (that is a This American Life reference). It gives me the opposite of jamais vu (there must be a name for this, a false knowing), because I feel so intensely at home, but I know, of course, I am an utter fool. I have no more closeness to the life and world within those borders than that girl you went to college with has with Buddhism after buying a single book at a garage sale. However, I still can not explain this pull, this dream, this excitement. I love it, but I get to go home.

Maybe the name for it is maya, illusion, or delusion, in some accounts. Maya, in Hinduism and Buddhism, is worldly things- sometimes described as lust, sex, power, money, material possessions. Or as the feelings, screen, attachment, or delusion we have when relating to these things. The illusion shields us from enlightenment and true happiness.

Never mind me, here is some clear evidence of the beauty of India:

Food! I never tired of the endless varieties of curries and daal, breads and fresh juices.




Dancing children. I'll only be the 6,874th silly tourist to say this (today), but you only need to see such sites as this to know the true beauty of the world and put your own "miseries" into perspective.


Cities! What views! Camel carts, no big deal. Monkeys stealing your fruit, so what. Miles of packed whitewashed bungalows, common.




Oh, the colors! I've mentioned this before, but that place is vibrant like none other I've seen. Intense saris and turbans, flowers and spices, bangles and the odd clothed goat...


Mobile merchants! You're always being educated in India. Every moment, whether you're leaving your lunch in the loo for the fourth go, or riding a bumpy road for 7 hours in a bus that would have been discarded in the West 35 years ago... Along the way you'll meet the happy sellers of brillo pads, fried things, hair brushes, plastic buckets, and everything in between. Including scorpions!




Rickshaw drivers are among the hardest working in India. However, hard working people doesn't mean the same thing as the people you or I generally know. You could make a month out of days wandering via rickshaw, and never be disappointed (just agree on your fare before you embark!).


Oh, the markets! Bustling, exciting, sometimes depressing, always a sight.



Brothers. And sisters. And their families and old grandfathers that give you pocket-sized photos as mementos. Uncles that try and set you up with their nephew, and Aunties that want you to eat more. Family is everything in India, and god help a guest, for he is lucky.




Wild Animals! Monkeys and dinosaurs and cows and water buffalos. The smells and laughs- how bizarre to see these animals live their lives so entwined with ours, and not turn heads.


Children, did I mention them? Homeless and begging or clean and so clearly loved, they all shine and wake you from a life of dark cynicism.


Coming very soon: a "How To" guide; the long journey back...