Grinding On

11 a.m., Wednesday March 23rd, 2009
New Delhi


The Marwari opium seller of Meherangarh Fort

Can’t say these have been the most inspiring of days. (Though there’s been a few moments.) I quasi-tweaked my back in Jaipur—just one of those funny movements where I felt a sheath of muscle in my mid/upper back suddenly tense and contract and serve notice that any more bad moves would likely result in a number of days of supinity.

I’ve managed OK since then, but the other day it kept reminding me it was still here, waiting to go on strike and this encouraging me into a more relaxed pace than is my usual here in the Delhi grind pit. A steady diet of ibuprofen has also been on the menu—and where’s that opium-dishing Marwari guard when I need him? Understandably righteous ideology notwithstanding, there’s a time and place for painkillers, it turns out. I’m not quite there, but I think I’m within sight.

Anyway, it’s all moving in slow motion, and allowing myself liberal time to take rest in my AC room here at the Abracadabra guest house (downstairs room 7, for those keeping score at home) seems to be an integral part of sanity.

On the other hand, the prospect of hitting the streets in search of Green Tara, old statuary and maybe a harmonium, is keeping my head in the game…


Mrs. Sharma supervising the cutting of a vintage Gudri blanket into its new life: a one-of-a-kind party jacket

Au Revoir, Rajasthan. Bon Soir, Delhi!

Midnight, Monday morning March 23rd, 2009
Freshly arrived back in New Delhi

Every nerve in my body is so vacant and numb,
I can’t even remember what it was I came here to get away from.
Don’t even hear the murmur of a prayer
It’s not dark yet, but it’s getting there.
Bob Dylan

Can’t say I’ve been looking forward to the return to Delhi. I actually really enjoy many elements here—mostly, the people I work with and my little circuit in town. But man, the air, and the noise.

I remember my first visit here: 1998, before they switched the massive bus fleet and many of the little motor rickshaws over to CNG—the largest compressed natural gas fleet in the world, or so it is proclaimed. The air was demonstrably worse then, amazingly—but still, it’s heinous today. Landing here a few (impossibly long) weeks ago, I got clobbered pronto by the assault. I hope I’m more acclimated now. (Hm, or do I?) Time will shortly tell.

For now, though, I’m just happy to be alive, after running the gauntlet of the Jaipur-Delhi highway. Phew. One tiny little sardine can car with no apparent shock absorption, a driver kept waiting too long by my day running late, the sunset rush out through the canyons between the Jal Mahal and the Amber Fort and the starkly bloated carcass of a massive water buffalo, an after dark tire blowout remedied by pausing in full traffic along the far lane on the Highway of Doom to change to a tire with wire mesh showing through it’s last shreds of rubber: stir and swallow whole, no chaser.

So, it’s good to be here, in one fleshy piece!

I heard the news today. Oh, boy.

Sunday 1 a.m., March 22nd, 2009

Fires in Jodhpur. The other day I posted a photo of a cow ambling through the Sardar Market in Jodhpur; 2 days later a fire raged through that old market and destroyed 40—50 market stalls—a good portion of the area. Also, same day another fire destroyed at least one old furniture warehouse; I called to check with Mahendra and Gopal ji and confirmed that none of my people were hurt, but still—bad news for the Jodhpuris.

The Ides of March were unkind to those folks.

Dhrupad Festival of Classical Indian Music

Wednesday 2:05 p.m., March 18th, 2009
Jaipur Rajasthan

At last night’s Dhrupad Festival of classical Indian music, I was blessed to hear some outstanding pakhawaj drumming by two excellent players: Mohan Sharma (the teacher of my friends Vasant and Tulsi), and Devaki Nandan, a man Shyamdas described as possibly the finest pakhawaj player in all of India (which is to say, the world). I recorded it, and did a little bit of wide open snaffling on video as well, which I’ll post either to the blog (if the generally atrocious upload experience ever improves) or on the Dharma site later after my return to the land of clean air. Great stuff!

Interestingly, the instruments most associated with Indian music in the west, tabla and sitar (and more recently harmonium), are considered modern devices and not suitable for a classical music event like I just attended. So here it was more about the sarod, sarangi, pakhawaj, the veena—some of these instruments have so many strings in so many places, I’m not sure I could ever even learn to tune them! But man, they sound amazing, trance-inducing in their magnificence…

(still no pics uploading, sigh)

Escape from Sun City

Tuesday 8:45 a.m., March 17th, 2009
Back in Jaipur Rajasthan

(still no photos uploading...)

Groggily awakening from the warehouse-cruising stupor of recent days, and recovering from last night’s hair-raising ride down what passes for the Jodhpur-Jaipur highway.

I’ve generally appreciated my driver Ram’s acumen behind the wheel, and yesterday’s 5:30 p.m. departure started well—making good time, safely. But come darkness, I have to say I had my first ever sense in India that I’d rather be behind the wheel myself—which is a sort of deathwish. But Ram had this habit of gunning the accelerator and then slamming down on the brakes just milliseconds before whatever speed bump or cow or vehicle was coming our way—a couple of times it through me off the back seat; I had to remain sort of tensed and at the ready to stiff-arm the seat in front of me to avoid losing my teeth on any given sudden jerk. Man, after a few hours, I wanted out.

But on to better things.

These next couple days Jaipur is hosting a Dhrupad Festival of classical Indian music; Shyamdas and Tulsi arrived last night, Vasant is here with his pakhawaj teacher Sri Mohan Sharma ji. It should be a fun break from the buying action.

I have much work left to do in Jaipur, but I’m hoping I can both get it done and relax with friends here for a few days…

Garlands

Fresh garland flowers abound in the Govind Devji realm...


Garland wala at entrance to Govind Devji temple, Jaipur



Load of garland flowers freshly delivered to the garland makers



The author, fresh from darshan

More Holi Photos, Jaipur

7:30 a.m. March 12th, 2009
Jaipur

I leave in minutes to Jodhpur. Here are a few more shots from Holi yesterday in Jaipur, caption-free because I'm almost out the door to catch darshan at Sri Govind Devji temple before hitting the big road.

A Few Holi Photos

9 p.m. Tuesday March 10th, 2009
Holi in Jaipur

Well, this afternoon I finally took Rob down to the Govind Devji temple complex; we missed darshan but we did catch a little arti at a small temple nearby, and wandered around the outskirts a little bit and soaked up a bit of early Holi energy. Not tons of colors, but saw a couple of rowdy moments on the street and a bunch of friendly faces.

Here’s a few photos to enjoy...

Happy Holi!

Devotees at Govind Dev ji temple in Jaipur (2008)

March 10th, 2009
Jaipur

OK, today begins Holi, the spring festival of color. Beautiful when organic and soulful, boundary-busting and edgy unto dangerous when frolicked in as an excuse for alcohol and violent carousing, this festival goes way back to the time of Lord Krishna and beyond. I've tasted Holi while flying low over the festival fires burning every few blocks in Mumbai, and at homes and ancient temples in Rajasthan, over several years. It's a trip--America's got nothing like this--although I suppose Hallowe'en captures a small bit of its zany spirit.

I'm not sure how much I'll get out today into the madness--but in the meantime, here’s a shot from last year’s Holi time at the radiant Shree Govind Dev ji temple in the center of the Pink City…

Also, I found this blog through Varun responding to my own; a little rap and a couple funky pics about this crazy Holi color festival here in India:

http://varunwithu.blogspot.com/2009/02/holi-phagwa-doljatra-2009.html

Happy Holi!

Dreams and Textiles

LOVE this pattern on an old Gudri blanket from Bengal


5:35 a.m. Tuesday March 10th, 2009
Jaipur
Awoke suddenly a few moments ago from a stark and all too realistic feeling nightmare: I was traveling far from home (though not here in India) and I’d been temporarily abducted at gunpoint, along with several others, and forced inside a house to a back room where I was forced to kneel face down in front of some honcho to face my fate. I instantly realized I must prepare to die immediately. I prayed for calm and courage and sought the stillest, smallest place inside of me to orient around love, forgiveness and presence, and was in a flash ordered to sit up and show my face to my captor/fate decider. I did and he seemed a bit disappointed and said something like, ‘that’s not him’ and then they said I could go, bingo. The others all remained as hostages though, and as I walked out on my own volition to take up a semi-safe station outdoors maybe 100-150 feet from the building in a gas station next door, word filtered out that about two dozen others, foreigners like me, were being held inside at gunpoint. They even sent a captor woman out with two guns to the small group of random people who comprised the folks around me, which ended uneventfully. We were mostly plotting various ways of slipping out of there back to safety. After a while I realized that it was strangely safe to either commandeer a car and drive or otherwise simply walk away and that I needed to get the hell out of there and not linger, and that seemed like it was about to happen even as more details were coming out and it was clear that whatever police and government were now involved in the process… and then I awoke to utter darkness, feeling very nervous and it all seeming very real for a while. The birds starting chirping with gusto, and the pre-dawn call to prayer started being piped over the local neighborhood sound systems, and I gradually came back. Sobering, and weird.

On the upside: it was all a dream, and I did in fact enjoy a nice day yesterday. Went to the wonderful Govind Dev ji temple in the morning with my soul brother Raju, and caught up with him a bit before climbing into work mode. Picked a sofa frame which I plan to upholster with one of these fantastic Suzani pieces, got a couple other quotes and then doubled back with my friend Robert to finish our respective buys at the textile house where we’d discovered these pieces the day or two before.

Robert’s been an unexpected find these last days—an actual friendly, open and communicative fellow westerner (of sorts, he’s from the northern tip of Australia, which is pretty far from my “west”) who’s been fun to kick around with on our hunt for cool old textiles. He had a day or so of unplanned down time which I’d overheard him mention when we were both at the same place working with one of my favorite suppliers whom he was working with for the very first time. I asked him if he had any interest in great old textiles, as I was planning to spend the next day checking out one or two of Jaipur’s best wholesale sources of same; he jumped at it even though it’s not his usual gig, work-wise, and we came to enjoy each other’s company as we ate dust and sifted through hundreds of old Gudri and Suzani and other amazing, weird, and curious items.

I came home and took a nap and then Rob and I went out to grab dinner for one of my too-rare nights out here. Talked business, margin formulas, export shop, family, life and love and have generally enjoyed a little unexpected good company on our respective journeys far from home.

Rob seems to do a pretty nice business in a range of eco-friendly items, furniture and cool lifestyle items, including working with hotels across Asia to outfit their places with various great gear. If you ever need to outfit your hotel in Asia, give a shout and I’ll hook you up with him—he knows his stuff and I’ve been impressed by his professionalism and knowledge of and sensitivity to his own business and its impact on the planet, and just his plain old decency. With so many of my friends in India here for more devotional reasons (as am I at heart), it’s also been really nice to be able to talk shop and relate about some of the other crazy and amazing reasons why he and I are both here, working.

OK, time to try and go back to bed and take some rest before the sun comes up into the cacophony of dawn birdsong.



One of the Afghan Suzani pieces I just found-soon to be an amazing custom upholstered sofa?



Jai Shree Krishna!

And Happy Holi everyone!

Happy Hunting

In my element, awash in history


11:14 p.m., Sunday March 8, 2009

Today is my father Edward’s birthday—#79. Just spoke with him by phone a bit ago, wishing him well in Concord New Hampshire during his morning and my evening of the same day.

Today was a grand adventure through two nice warehouse showrooms of textiles young and old. One I’ve been to a number of times, the other was a gem offered by our driver Surjeet, with whose car service I intend to travel to both Vrindavan and Jodhpur, in whichever order unfolds.

I went initially in search of old Gudri blankets, wonderful textiles with a marvelous variety of form and color represented in their patterns, sometimes manically different from front to back. Some I want to use for a small upholstery project, some for making some one-of-a-kind, uber-special party jackets, and some for simply bringing home to enjoy as is.

Lo and behold, the first stop even had a stack of enormous hand-embroidered vintage Afghan Suzani pieces, quite like the ones I scouted out myself last year in Afghanistan for me and some friends in New York. (Though I paid about half this asking price when I was in Afghanistan, no doubt. This year, it doesn’t feel worth the risk to travel there again.)

I picked a few out, sent some pics to a couple of clients to see if they were of interest, and picked a few that were nice enough to want to keep for sure, even though my budget didn’t include a Suzani score. That’s why God made credit cards, right? And scored almost twenty sweet Gudri pieces along the way, too. I’m having those cleaned and delivered to my guest house tomorrow—nice!


A splendid Afghan piece from the day's exploits


Got textiles?

Back to Rajasthan

Sun rising through the smog leaving Delhi en route to Jaipur

8:18 p.m. Saturday March 7th, 2009
Jaipur, Rajasthan

Finally, dear Delhi departed—huzzah! Not a moment too soon, I swear. I hopped a pre-dawn ride with my friend Raju’s driver Mukesh, who was returning to Jaipur at 6 a.m.—worth waking up early to grab that easy flow. Groggy as I was, it felt great to enter incredible and evocative Rajasthan again, leaving Delhi far behind.

Mukesh and I are old pals of sorts, if language-free ones—he ferried me about quite a bit on my first true Dharma sourcing mission here several years ago. Always interesting to spend time with someone when verbal language is largely missing from the communication equation. He knows about as much English and I do Hindi: “photo, tea/coffee, thank you sir, coming (as in ‘Jaipur is coming’), midway” (though that’s cheating because it’s the name of the main Delhi-Jaipur highway stopping point of food dhabas and chai walas).

Actually, I know much more Sanskrit than Hindi; all that time learning yoga asanas and chanting kirtan has paid off in kind. What Hindi do I know? Not much! And I’ll prove it here, by brevity, spelling and translation: Danyawad (thank you), nahin or nayee/nay (no), thik hain (OK, or something close to it) and my old standby, acha, which means something like “ah” or “I see” or “yep.” Pretty weak conversational tea, believe me—so here for me, it’s all about the twinkly eye contact and the heart’s intention! Lucky for me, India is about nothing if not twinkly eye contact. I fall in love at least several times a day with passing strangers and rikshaw walas and our shared moments of eye connection, nods and smiles, all in recognition of some deeper soul connection that America has managed to largely bleed out of its daily social interactivity. Our loss, in a sad and big way.

So, Mukesh and I shared a ride unpunctuated by any need to catch up on the latest news or blues to keep us amused. Still, we shared warm smiles and a hug upon me meeting him in front of Delhi’s Imperial Hotel as we had planned through Raju the evening before. In fact, we shared one of those blessed moments of twinklyness on the phone, when Raju had me on the cell and Mukesh on the landline, and was brokering the details of the meet. When I said, “oh, is that Mukesh who used to be Induji’s driver?” it all came back to Raju that of course we’d met many times, and he then shared with Mukesh that I was the passenger and we all laughed in a friendly round of “Jai Sri Krishna!”

Sometimes a little Sanskrit goes a long way.





Enjoying a 50 cent shave