musings

dusty dusty town, 1 hour north of the taj mahal. supposedly they are tearing up the main drag to build a new street, but i say it's always this dusty and torn up. the brick buildings are crumbling, half broke apart and still laying as they fell, no one cleans them up. as we walk down the road we dodge cows, an endless stream of cycle rickshaws and other cars. kids carrying babies begging for money, and the on again off again smell of open sewage reeks, intermingled with incense and food smells and fresh flowers. it's 108 degrees. yes, indeed...inddddiiiaaaaaa. every extreme that you can possibly come up against seems to throw itself at you here. it's not the easiest of traveling..in fact so far it's been some of my hardest traveling. and at the same time i wouldn't change or give up the experience that i'm having. i hate the caste system here, the idea that you can be born into any random family and spend the rest of your life, say 75 years, cleaning floors at the bottom of the totem pole with no chance of bettering your situation. but then again, with 1.2 billion people here i can understand that it's necessary to have a way that things can be that they work here. and for them it's karma. you are where you are because of something that you've done in a past life, and you live now to better your karma for the next life and move closer to nirvana.

we walk down that dusty street in this one camel town, vrindaven, birthplace of krishna and take a right into the hare krishna temple that was built by the founder of the group in the 70's. it's an immaculate marble temple with different rooms and stairways and sweeping archways.and in the main area there is a kirtan that has been continuous since 1986, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. at 6:30 in the evening the director of the program, a western man who has lived here for over 20 years since he was 24, takes the reigns and begins his turn at leading the kirtan. bringing things to a crescendo for the day, as everyone is singing and dancing louder and louder. at 7, the doors to the deities swing open and men blow shells signaling the moment, and everyone gets up in excitement and frenzy for the final prayer moment to krishna .!!! it's all very exciting and amazing, watching the devotion and the colors and the music and the bliss. then we walk back outside and the streets are littered with garbage and plastic everywhere, dust is flung back in the view of headlights, we're asked 20 times in one block if we'd like a rickshaw, 'no, no, no, no, just walking, no no' and a general feeling of...'it's time to get back to the room' occurs. india is not really a place for foreigners to be out at night, in my experience.

it's this constant rollercoaster that is so amazing and so exhausting at the same time. that is invigorating and infuriating at others. that leaves me longing to be home and able to go for a walk in a neighborhood and smell the sweet spring flowers and the green leaves on trees, and people's beautiful houses and yards without garbage EVERYWHERE and pungeant smells. that leaves me wondering what it'll be like to be in a place that's....quiet. and not filled with people everywhere. that i can't be asked by rickshaw drivers who seemingly risk there lives every day in the chaotic streets. where people aren't hanging off of trains, or hopping on to buses that don't even stop...they just slow down.

oh that's right, i still have 9 more days in india before our transition vacation of bali, sweet sweet bali, before coming home middle of may. hope that everyone is doing so well, much love and appreciation for home and away.
carson