|
Kathleen's Journal |
|
Categories
Recent Entries
* Kathakali Dancers
* The Beach * Tibetan Medical Clinic * Puja and Monks and Nuns * To India's Tibet * Bangalore Priests and A Modeling Job with a Nepali Friend * Touring Hyderabad * The Medical Camp * To Kothur * Saree Shopping and the Wedding Reception * Getting to Hyderabad * Ajanta Caves * Missed Trains, Stares, Cockroaches and Hot Showers * Business in Agra * Back to India * Udaipur * The Blue City of Jodhpur * Jaiselmer's Camels * The Rat Temple * Puja
Archives
|
January 31, 2005Kathakali DancersKathakali dancers on the beach hut stage made up each others faces with natural paints creating clown-like drag queens. The group, reminiscent of an acting truope from Shakespear’s time, was all men, the shorter and more feminine of them playing...Read this update January 26, 2005The BeachThe old bus rattled and jostled us for five and a half hours to Mangalore. We climbed narrow winding roads to the pass through the foothills and then back down the other side. We were uncomfortable. Some of us were...Read this update January 24, 2005Tibetan Medical ClinicDaniel sat at his desk-like table in the consultation room that was bright with daylight. A relic of a physiology poster hung on the far wall. Bethany and I were in chairs at his side. The first patient was an...Read this update Puja and Monks and NunsMonks in maroon robes were sitting cross-legged in rows on maroon cloth covered cushions in the new puja hall that resembled an ornate ballroom. It was large with high ceilings and eight rows of five pillars that were painted bright...Read this update January 20, 2005To India's TibetCoolies in tattered red shirts with armbands carried our five 70 pound bags on their heads – even the large rolling one. They took them up two flights of stairs, across the footbridge over six sets of tracks, and down...Read this update January 17, 2005Bangalore Priests and A Modeling Job with a Nepali FriendTara, a Nepali friend, met us at the train station in Bangalore. He looked good, fresh and sweet. He stayed with us for two days, missing one day of his college classes in Dharmapuri two hours away. He had arranged...Read this update Touring HyderabadOur first day back in the city was a much needed down day. We caught up on emails and journaling and relaxed, trying to absorb our collective experiences. We found Pizza Hut for a taste of home and downloaded digital...Read this update January 16, 2005The Medical CampI was teary eyed at the opening ceremony. So was Alex. It was the parade that led us by tribal drums down the dirt road to the brightly arranged tents, all those government officials with their incomprehensible Telugu speeches of...Read this update January 15, 2005To KothurThe little white hatchback car pulled into the drive with bright red and orange flowers taped all over it. There was a nice bouquet on the hood and individual flowers placed around on the doors, fenders and roof like bulky...Read this update Saree Shopping and the Wedding ReceptionRoa's wife, Baranthi, took us saree shopping in the afternoon. It was great to have someone to guide us. I've tried to buy sarees before. I found out that the salesman like to grope the foreign ladies when they show...Read this update January 14, 2005Getting to HyderabadOur tickets to Hyderabad were waitlist status. I had been told by some well meaning people that so long as the waitlist number was less than fifty we would be fine and have no trouble getting confirmed seats on the...Read this update Ajanta CavesThe Ajanta caves are in a row, a semi-circle of hollowed out rooms inside the giant rock face of the cliff. They are ancient - built, carved, and painted by Buddhist monks centuries ago. It would have been a safe...Read this update January 13, 2005Missed Trains, Stares, Cockroaches and Hot ShowersGore told me we were in trouble with my plans to visit the Ajanta caves. There would be no transportation and it was farther than I thought from the train stop. Much easier, he said, to get off at Manmad...Read this update Business in AgraI never thought I would see the Taj Mahal a second time. I was wrong. And it was so soon. This time I was with friends. I had the joy of experiencing it again through their eyes. There is something...Read this update January 08, 2005Back to IndiaOne year later I am headed back to India. Patti, a nursing friend I met on a medical trip to Nepal, had read my journal entries and agreed that an Indian medical camp was a great idea. A coworker of...Read this update January 03, 2005UdaipurOn the night flight to Udaipur I gazed out the darkened window and reflected on my journey through India from low caste rail car to high caste plane. I had wanted to be a traveler, living and breathing the country,...Read this update The Blue City of JodhpurAfter free, quick, cold showers compliments of Pradeep, the owner, and one last plate of Italian food at the Desert Boys Guest House, we joined the Germans and the Brazilian for a beer on a rooftop at a café with...Read this update Jaiselmer's CamelsThe taxi arrived in Jaiselmer after dark. We had wanted to get there before then as its easier to find a place to stay in the daylight. But it worked out better, I think. We could see the lights of...Read this update The Rat TempleBikaner was a blur, a rapid detour before Jaiselmer. We took the “deluxe” bus again – the 2 x 2 seater – and were told we would arrive in the city at six o’clock in the morning. We didn’t. It...Read this update PujaPushkar was enchanting so Steve and I opted to stay a few more days. We found the most elegant place on the idyllic holy lake, the Pushkar Palace, formerly owned by the maharaja now made into a Heritage Home Hotel....Read this update The MelaThe Pushkar Fair, half the world away, felt comfortable. It was like our county fairs. There were people from all the local countryside and nearby villages becoming crowds of smiling excited faces, eyes wide, taking in all the action of...Read this update PushkarOur arrival into Pushkar was memorable. As we neared the small village we passed more and more camels going the opposite direction, some pulling wooden carts, some ridden by Rajasthan men in brightly colored turbans, and some strung together single...Read this update Posted by Kathleen on January 3, 2005 01:17 AM
Category: JaipurSteve and I took the "deluxe" bus to Jaipur. Only two seats were left to be assigned by the vendor - last row in the middle of the aisle and the one to its right. It made for a long...Read this update Taj MahalThe Taj Mahal was more magnificent than I imagined. I have never seen a photograph that speaks justice for the mausoleum, that captures the feel of the place. Built by the Emperor Shah Jahan for his thirty-nine year old wife,...Read this update Un-attachedThe Shabati Express was the fast two hour tourist train to Agra and the Taj Mahal. It boarded from Platform One, an area without the crowds of beggars and lower caste people that I had mingled with previously on the...Read this update Steve's WelcomeThis time I took the train first class on the way back to Delhi from Varanasi. For a while I had the four-bed cabin to myself. Along the way a dignified elderly gentleman in the white Punjabi of a Brahman,...Read this update The Ganges RiverAt dawn we were at the banks of the Ganges River. The wake-up call the tour operators must have arranged to be sure the group was awake early enough had come at 4:25 am. I picked up the receiver and...Read this update TouchedOur first excursion in Varanasi was to a part of the city known as Sarnath. I considered not joining the crowd that day after such an exhausting bus ride, but something made me go. And I was so glad that...Read this update CompassionMaybe I didn’t feel quite so blessed the next day. Well, I did, but the day was miserable anyway. We got up at five in the morning for breakfast and boarded the bus at six for what was supposed to...Read this update BlessedIn the morning we boarded the tour buses once again so that we could go just outside Bodhgaya to see more holy sites. The first, twenty minutes away, was the main Bodhi tree, or rather a descendent of that first...Read this update BodhgayaSo I joined the pilgrimage and we all boarded a train towards Bodhgaya. This time my train experience was completely different. The first time, by myself, I was trying to be inconspicuous, not touristy, more the disheveled backpacking traveler type...Read this update His HolinessThe taxi ride to the farm to see the high lama seemed endless. The Sakya Monastery had bought a nice house with some land at the outskirts of Delhi and that was where we were headed. We stopped along the...Read this update Karma TashiMy seat was number twenty-three. The characters were difficult to find, painted on the back, half scratched off. The bus was full. Three beautiful brown children were crowded into two seats - one of them mine. But the travelers at...Read this update Physicians"There are three types of physicians: unsurpassed, expert, and ordinary. The category of "unsurpassed physician" refers to the Medicine Buddha alone, because he is the Supreme Physician who dispels the afflictions of the three poisons of attachment, hatred, and delusion,...Read this update January 02, 2005The Austrian and VipassanaI ate breakfast with the Austrian. Short wild blonde hair that looked like it hadn’t been washed in a week or two, T-shirt, dark socks with brown shoes and the most brilliant warm blue blue blue eyes I have ever...Read this update Venerable TenzinThe 30 year old Venerable Jamyang Tenzin, the lama astrologer, chose to become a monk at the age of 14 and began studying Tibetan astrology while still living that life in Tibet. Astrology is a special art that must be...Read this update Medicine and AstrologyI was sitting crossed legged at a table in a pseudo-Japanese restaurant in McLeod Ganj. I was exhausted and a little disappointed. I had just hiked back up the four kilometers from Dharamsala. The trip up may have been strenuous,...Read this update TsuglagkhangTsuglagkhang is the most famous Buddhist temple outside of Llasa, Tibet. It was not at all what I expected. Crude signs pointed the way simply in white letters on small wooden red boards – “Temple” - with an arrow. I...Read this update McLeod GanjAt last at McLeod Ganj, a place I expected to be a comfortable haven after the India I had just experienced. The bus stopped just short of the goal, right outside an archway over the road that proclaimed McLeod Ganj,...Read this update The BusI don’t know how, but I awoke as the train rolled into Panthakot station. I actually did sleep – fitfully and with full bladder because the thought of facing more of a crowd of Indian men staring at me as...Read this update The TrainAt the New Delhi Train Station I found my way to platform #9. It was full – crowded with people like the rest of Delhi and everyone trying to squeeze into the shade. The train rolled in just on time...Read this update Welcome to IndiaThe flight was very long - eight hours from Chicago to London where I had a dull two hour layover and then ten hours to Delhi. We landed at two am local time. For an international airport the place seemed...Read this update |
Latest Comments
|