Thanks to all my family and friends who posted on the blog (and of course to Adrienne for thinking up such a great idea), from the local fortune teller’s robot. Notice the technological sophistication of the robot’s head, which is taped onto its body with some old duck tape. For a mere ten rupees, try on a headset and listen if you dare. The sign indicates that all payments should be made before the fortune is dispensed.
Us foreigners (plus Rani, my language tutor) together for a birthday dinner. Soon after the picture was taken, a fierce hailstorm knocked out the power and threatened to blow away the restaurant. Moving clockwise from me: Chang O (Korean), Katarina (Italian), Hyo Jung (Korean), Rani (Indian), Essha (Japanese) and Theresa (German). For my birthday, Hyo Jung made me a card (written in Hindi for me to struggle over) and Chang O bought me a florid-patterned, pink and baby blue silk scarf. When I wore it the next day, I got a lot of sideways glances from locals, which affirmed my suspicion that my shawl is perhaps exclusively a female fashion.
Chang O and I at Khalsangs Tibetan Restaurant. Their cheese potato momos (dumplings) have a city-wide reputation. One funny anecdote from lunch: I ordered a Tom Yum soup for us (Thai, not Tibetan). When Chang O tried his first bite he was clearly disgusted by the lemongrass spice. But instead of having me lose face for ordering something unappetizing, he put down his spoon and said: “I am really full. I don’t think I can eat another bite!” Asian-style indirect communication in action.
A box of matches. Some deconstructionist could have a field day with the box art: a Caucasian midget wearing a prison uniform and Gandhi’s spectacles, lighting a cigarette under a traditional Hindu parasol while floating in outer space like the cosmic embryo in Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Some local Tibetan students giving a new coat of paint to the neighborhood Stupa (reliquary mound). They lashed some wood into an approximation of a scaffold, and then laid rickety window shutters over top as a platform.
This immigrant boy and his Mataji have just arrived in the Manhattan harbor on a steamer from Czechoslovakia. They will change their names from Suddha and Ashok Aggarwal to Sally and Bob Johnston, and then head straight to the election booth to vote five times for the party machine (no worry that Bob is but 11). After being awarded citizenship, they will take an apprenticeship in the paper factory.
Bhalu, or Bear. In the morning, I sit on the same green bench for four hours studying Hindi, and he will sleep on the grass besides me. If anyone comes too close, he will give a dreamy growl. In the far background you can see the chaukiedar, or watchman, in a coolie-red shirt. His job is to slingshot rocks at the monkeys, dogs, donkeys and occasional cows that stray onto church property. His salary is $50 a month. At first he was against Bhalu joining me on the church bench, but he relented after I told him in broken Hindi that I couldn’t understand his request. Still, he will look at me helplessly when Bhalu growls at the chubby Indian tourists and sends them running for sanctuary inside the church, taking refuge in whatever god is most accessible at that moment, as is the Hindu way.
The cleanest cat in all of India, on the hunt in a spice patch.
A family of monkeys perched atop the mountain canopy. I threw the mother a banana, but it missed the mark and tumbled down the mountainside. In this picture, you can see her wishing that I had better aim, and wondering if it’s worth it to attack me.
After lunch I am met on the road by Uncha Vala, or the Tall One. A few times a week he’ll come back to my apartment and sleep from mid-afternoon until seven or eight. He is nursing a wicked neck wound (on his other side, no doubt from Bhalu or some other gangster dog), and before he leaves and roams for the night I’ll disinfect it with warm soapy water. There are no veterinarians in Mussoorie, and most dogs have easily treatable but often neglected health conditions.
Papu, my cook, wearing a WWF t-shirt and chopping up bland cabbage and tasteless carrots for my Tibetan lunch (Thantuk, or flat noodles). He is 19; the other servant (“Nauker” in Hindi) is 12. They were both plucked from Bihar, a nearby state with low literacy and high criminality, and taken into the service of the Tibetan family, where they have been for three years. They are both illiterate and work long hours (7am to 10pm, 7 days a week). Their salary is $15 a month, free rent and new clothes when necessary. But through all his tribulations, which have no counterpart in the US or the developed world, he manages to be happy pretty much all the time. Unless he’s the White Tiger (written by Aravind Adiga, and winner of the Booker Prize last year – has anyone read it?), and he’s plotting to visit his master's throat with a broken whisky bottle and then start a new life in Bangalore. Sometimes it’s hard to know where one's affections should lie.
Thanks to all my family and friends who posted on the blog (and of course to Adrienne for thinking up such a great idea), from the local fortune teller’s robot. Notice the technological sophistication of the robot’s head, which is taped onto its body with some old duck tape. For a mere ten rupees, try on a headset and listen if you dare. The sign indicates that all payments should be made before the fortune is dispensed.
Us foreigners (plus Rani, my language tutor) together for a birthday dinner. Soon after the picture was taken, a fierce hailstorm knocked out the power and threatened to blow away the restaurant. Moving clockwise from me: Chang O (Korean), Katarina (Italian), Hyo Jung (Korean), Rani (Indian), Essha (Japanese) and Theresa (German). For my birthday, Hyo Jung made me a card (written in Hindi for me to struggle over) and Chang O bought me a florid-patterned, pink and baby blue silk scarf. When I wore it the next day, I got a lot of sideways glances from locals, which affirmed my suspicion that my shawl is perhaps exclusively a female fashion. 
Chang O and I at Khalsangs Tibetan Restaurant. Their cheese potato momos (dumplings) have a city-wide reputation. One funny anecdote from lunch: I ordered a Tom Yum soup for us (Thai, not Tibetan). When Chang O tried his first bite he was clearly disgusted by the lemongrass spice. But instead of having me lose face for ordering something unappetizing, he put down his spoon and said: “I am really full. I don’t think I can eat another bite!” Asian-style indirect communication in action.
A box of matches. Some deconstructionist could have a field day with the box art: a Caucasian midget wearing a prison uniform and Gandhi’s spectacles, lighting a cigarette under a traditional Hindu parasol while floating in outer space like the cosmic embryo in Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. 
Some local Tibetan students giving a new coat of paint to the neighborhood Stupa (reliquary mound). They lashed some wood into an approximation of a scaffold, and then laid rickety window shutters over top as a platform.
This immigrant boy and his Mataji have just arrived in the Manhattan harbor on a steamer from Czechoslovakia. They will change their names from Suddha and Ashok Aggarwal to Sally and Bob Johnston, and then head straight to the election booth to vote five times for the party machine (no worry that Bob is but 11). After being awarded citizenship, they will take an apprenticeship in the paper factory.
Bhalu, or Bear. In the morning, I sit on the same green bench for four hours studying Hindi, and he will sleep on the grass besides me. If anyone comes too close, he will give a dreamy growl. In the far background you can see the chaukiedar, or watchman, in a coolie-red shirt. His job is to slingshot rocks at the monkeys, dogs, donkeys and occasional cows that stray onto church property. His salary is $50 a month. At first he was against Bhalu joining me on the church bench, but he relented after I told him in broken Hindi that I couldn’t understand his request. Still, he will look at me helplessly when Bhalu growls at the chubby Indian tourists and sends them running for sanctuary inside the church, taking refuge in whatever god is most accessible at that moment, as is the Hindu way.
The cleanest cat in all of India, on the hunt in a spice patch.
A family of monkeys perched atop the mountain canopy. I threw the mother a banana, but it missed the mark and tumbled down the mountainside. In this picture, you can see her wishing that I had better aim, and wondering if it’s worth it to attack me.
After lunch I am met on the road by Uncha Vala, or the Tall One. A few times a week he’ll come back to my apartment and sleep from mid-afternoon until seven or eight. He is nursing a wicked neck wound (on his other side, no doubt from Bhalu or some other gangster dog), and before he leaves and roams for the night I’ll disinfect it with warm soapy water. There are no veterinarians in Mussoorie, and most dogs have easily treatable but often neglected health conditions.
Papu, my cook, wearing a WWF t-shirt and chopping up bland cabbage and tasteless carrots for my Tibetan lunch (Thantuk, or flat noodles). He is 19; the other servant (“Nauker” in Hindi) is 12. They were both plucked from Bihar, a nearby state with low literacy and high criminality, and taken into the service of the Tibetan family, where they have been for three years. They are both illiterate and work long hours (7am to 10pm, 7 days a week). Their salary is $15 a month, free rent and new clothes when necessary. But through all his tribulations, which have no counterpart in the US or the developed world, he manages to be happy pretty much all the time. Unless he’s the White Tiger (written by Aravind Adiga, and winner of the Booker Prize last year – has anyone read it?), and he’s plotting to visit his master's throat with a broken whisky bottle and then start a new life in Bangalore. Sometimes it’s hard to know where one's affections should lie. 
4 comments:
As always, thoroughly enjoy.
I love love love this post! Laughed a lot. I see why you and Adrienne are a pair!
What a coincidence that you have 2 Chang O's!
CONGRATS PENGUINS ! Pitts rules !
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