Boredom sets in

Haha just joking. I can’t remember how I got on the subject, but it came to me that it is probably near impossible to get bored here. I might get tired of things like car horns, giggling school boys and very-near-curry-flavored breakfasts, but I certainly will not get bored. The level of (both social and economic) activity going on is mindboggling. People watching, always a favorite activity of mine (right up there with food in my travel motivations list) has taken on a whole new form here (and typically from inside some sort of vehicle or sitting on the ground – not a whole lot of quaint Euro-style cafes around). I think the vast number of people combined with a marketplace-oriented infrastructure create a highly-observable outdoor lifestyle.

There is something else though, something like a cultural multiplier (guess who just finished macroeconomics??). Whatever you get when you subtract out the place (natural and manmade) and the people (number, diversity, food, etc) to be left with a sort of mixed bag of sum-is-greater-than-the-parts attributes.  I’d credit these unknowables with the difference between, for example, Canada and the US, Chile and Argentina, or Switzerland and Germany. The latter of each pair has a somehow amplified culture from the former – more intensity that cannot be explained by the greater number of people (in Germany and the US) or different landscape (Argentina). I have my theories on this, but I will see if I can find something to read about it before I misinform you anymore…I think you have to be there to really get a feel for it and I haven’t spent enough time anywhere to exactly know.

But anyhow, I first wanted to come to India and Sri Lanka to see the place, or the tea actually. I grew up drinking tea with my mother and grandmother, and while living in Los Angeles, my sisters Hannah, Amara (when she visited) and I had taken to spending long afternoons in a tea shop. They have some 250 teas from all around the world and my favorite was a Darjeeling. Things started to fall into place after that…the Darjeeling Limited with three brothers on a train (although they are not in the right age order, they are us three girls to a T), the NY Times article about Sri Lanka, moving to Singapore…in parallel I was beginning to take an interest in the people as mentioned in an earlier post and rediscovering the religions I had dappled with via yoga over the years. The final push was the food. While I have always loved Indian food, a small stand in the canteen by my dorm took it to near-burrito status over the past few months. And when I’m not following my eyes, my stomach gets next pick.

Now, somehow, I am sitting in the middle of it all and the cultural part is more interesting than what I originally came for. Actually, I am more the south east of it all, but I would venture to say Tamil Nadu pulls the cultural center slightly in its direction. Vasanth took me on a local’s best-of tour through Chennai on Sunday and a driver arranged by Ram drove me outside the city to a few classic tourist sites. Many of the spots, like Marina beach, that we went to on Sunday were in my Lonely Planet, but not the brand new mall that just opened last week (they were still doing construction, while we were shopping, which was as interesting a sight as the miles of brightly colored cloth in the Saree and traditional clothing section of the department store). Nothing in the book could have facilitated me driving to dinner (I think I will come back some day when I can rent a car and drive around without worrying about Vasanth’s car – it was truly exhilarating). I would not have found a place to buy Indian whiskey (apparently no women have ever been in the bar behind the wine shop and I would be no exception). And I would have been far too shy to go through the Ashtalakshmi temple on my own, but we went through its winding, narrow maze-like corridors, praying to 8 different lady-gods. The walls were all made of stone, with years and years of brightly colored paint layered upon one another, making it look almost tie-dyed. The shrines are set into the walls and the small flames of ghee candles bounce around the otherwise dark boxes, illuminating flowers, silver trays holding colored kumkum powder or offerings and the shiny parts of statues millions of people have touched as they pass by. This is not the distant experience of a church or the silence of an ashram. It is loud – there are hundreds of people around and you can hear the city outside. It is hot – except for occasional curves in the corridors with openings for the wind to blow through. It is totally engrossing – you feel the stones on your bare feet, you smell what might be whole field of jasmine hiding somewhere in the walls, you see all walks of life worshiping as they have for thousands of years. Thousands of years! Unbelievable. Afterwards you sit outside for a few minutes, but I have been spending a lot of minutes to settle back down to the real world.

On Monday I went to a series of outdoor temples carved into huge granite rocks in the 7th century. I really wasn’t sure what to do at first, and I refused initially a man offering to be my tour guide. But he was persistent and I realized I would otherwise just be wandering around, somewhat aimlessly, and probably surrounded by touts, as my driver was not particularly interested in seeing the sights with me.

Turns out I made a fantastic choice, he told me about every little carving, answered my questions about this and that and helped me ward off the sales pitches for stone carvings, postcards and sea shells. He took me into the newer temple too, as I am still a bit nervous to go on my own. I am settling in though, first with friends to learn the ropes, then with a guide, next I will be off on my own before I meet Bjorn, Amara and Sam.

The last stop of the day I considered skipping, my book didn’t say much about it but that it was good for the kids. I went though, skeptical as I began to move through first an art gallery and into a garden. I found what seemed to be an empty house and when I peered in I realized this was one of those living history museums, a la Genesee Country Museum, which was my favorite destination when Grandma would take me out as a child.

The place was empty; free of hordes of school children (no children at all in fact) and all of the employees (who are the actual craftsmen and women) were just hanging out and chatting. It was just perfect for me (I needed some time without talking to strangers) and I went into all of the 16 houses, a few from each of the southern states. More of my questions about dress and eating and religion and environment and history were answered. All at my own pace. Actually, it was also about 100F/38C and in a long skirt and button up shirt I think it was a near religious experience brought on by the vast amount I sweated. Its like living in a fully landscaped, decorated and populated sauna.