Wire hangers sold in the street as sculptures of Calder.
The juicy sugar cane squeezed in front of you on every street corner.
This long house in the middle of a "bazaar" that the pediment was occupied by two griffins back to back enclosing a medallion celebrating the Golden Jubilee of 1853.
The bribe to enter ten yards left over in the gardens of the "Marble Palace ".
I’ve been neglecting reflection to observe the city, being led by its current pace; first crossing the public and private golf and cricket fields, then searching for an invisible fort of the eighteenth century and finally wandering through the "Indian museum".
This was an interesting experience of a livelihood intact attempt of Western culture in India.
Only extraordinary material, and if not, the daily in extraordinary dimension, much like when trying to impress the children. Thus we can see flies and mosquitoes magnified a hundred times or the respiratory system of a cobra ripped in formalin, but also a stuffed penguin, kangaroos or ostriches, a black swan and the skeleton of his chick still in the egg, as a chameleon in a jar once filled with formalin. "It lost its tail in some accident" also announced the legend of a stuffed skate ray!
I've visited some auction houses in search of "vestiges of a past that no longer is". "The things talk to us if we know how to listen to them, "said Barbara, but now flowered velvet sofas had little to say to me and suddenly a small "Cubist" shelf was perhaps telling a story to this mahogany console upside down in a corner.
I closed my eyes in a truck filled with cattle and had reopened in a leper colony from the Middle Ages. On all sides could be heard endless deep coughing. By adding a few complaints of several litanies beggars, those 'cay' vendors, crying children and the table was full. The return to India was a bit difficult. I stayed three days with only one breakfast and four bananas in the stomach, thinking desperately I had ordered a meal which never arrived. After such a disastrous trip, Calcutta seemed to me magnificent. Something of Nice in ruins, and finally heat! My two selected cheap hotels with terrace have proved to be complete, so I followed a guide to dozens of other pensions as complete as each other to finally accept a room in a hovel. Then I changed my mind, went looking for the bag that I had left and there was a mouse in the process of smelling it. I left alone that time to find another room and I decided for one three times more expensive than I could count, normal, there were three beds. It is the room "11"! I swear I did not mean it, "11" really has a meaning in my life, I learned on the top that it is the number of creativity and of femininity with tarot cards (well, well!). Anyway, if 11 would mean something, the 69 of my sixty-ninth day of travel doesn’t! No carnal excitement today! My room is large with a floor covered with mosaics and dilapidated furniture from the 30’s. In addition, there is a bathroom! When there is no balcony, the room must be pleasant otherwise there is no place to rest.
Already in Varanasi, I made the acquisition of an Indian film music that proved to be full of all the latest musical hits either in India or Nepal. Hear these catchy tunes all day long had aroused my curiosity about the contents of such a film, and of course it is not in the "free movie show" of Kathmandu that I could satisfy it. While I was still in the taxi that took me from the station to my hotel, I noticed a monumental movie theather playing it that I memorized the name immediately before I would forget: "Metro". As soon as my housing concerns were resolved, I set out to conquer the Indian delights. I did not care about the quality of my neighborhood and asked for a "bad place" at the first raw. I obtained one on the second raw,…, of the balcony (in English "circle", I know now). To buy a movie ticket may be a sporting event in India, especially where I had experienced it in Jaipur, where there was a queue by category (five), each subdivided into men and women. The tourists are entitled to some exceptions under the rules - otherwise no way of knowing where to buy a ticket without all the Indians pushing and passing before you or worse, that the window closes under your nose. So I was fortunate enough to have a ticket of any kind and the "chosen" audience of my neighbors allowed me to have a few comments in English on the major surprises, although I was not among the whistling people which struck hands in the middle of the action. The film in itself was a bit annoying with such spread luxury for the destitute. The action was taking place successively in London, Zurich, then in an Indian palace. The hero, a macho man seen driving a Ferrari, a Porsche, a Mercedes, a Golf - all in convertibles with leather matching to the exterior paint - falls for a girl that you see as a hitchhiker, a peasant or a waitress; she refuses, she succumbs, her parents intervene, a little blood when the lover and the suitor chosen by the parents meet, some tears, but finally "Happy End! If the film was not a work of art, the cinema was a marvel of the thirty’s architecture restored in the fifties, just as if The Rex, in Paris, had not been altered since 1953. We think too often of New York for the “cliché” of a movie theater, and then it could resemble the "Metro", a monumental Art Deco building in Calcutta, and a very moving ruin!
I had, indeed, a miracle achieved by getting my entire luggage in three bags, but a new miracle was needed to carry them. The size and weight of all those unnecessary purchases are incredible. The problem lies in the superfluous. Does "Le CLAC" really need all the efforts that require its supporting sale? I am compelled to send part of the "support fund" by the Post with the dilemma of quadrupling the cost per plane, or simply double it by boat, not being sure of getting it on my return back home.
In my train to Calcutta, I can finally recover from the little too violent shock returning to Indian daily life. After missing the train that had supposedly been reserved, I could finally leave after paying few bribes.
A "Second Class Sleeper" is a sort of cattle truck with platforms all around which serve as beds. The classic double-compartment has two times three bunks, with the middle one cleverly used as a back to the lower bench, when put down, during the day trip. I exchanged my berth N° 13 in the middle against the N° 11 above, much quieter. We may also prefer to be beautiful and rich than ugly and poor.
The windows of Indian trains have bars. It was like being in a prison that I could witness the supernatural of this sunset. After the mountainous and cloudy landscape of the Himalayas, the sky seemed too bright and too flat plain. The depth of the infinite horizon, the shades of orange extension beyond the normal surprised me by their unreality. I leaned out the window and the Indian leaned too, trying to see the landscape so interesting that was mine, but they could not see the same palm trees, the same rice fields and the same colors as seen in "Apocalypse Now" which recalled my memory.
The departure of Kathmandu as if I had been informed the day before, all in a rush. Going here, being back there, and finally getting a haircut, as another way to close up the stay in Kathmandu. The goodbyes to almost everyone except Didi, she will forgive me. I was pretty well accustomed to this world where policemen are holding hands, where the mountain bikes have only one speed and where the rockers mask themselves with polyester Hermes scarves. The unknown world, I’m leaving to, seems a little less accessible!
The sari is the traditional dress of Indian and Nepalese women. It's a little more than a tradition, it's almost an obligation. The exceptions to this rule are very modern and independent girls, dressed in Western style, but also sporty one who have an alternative, in a sari material, but composed of very narrow pants, a long tunic and a matching scarf. The others have only one piece of silky and smooth fabric, five-half meters by one meter ten. In general - wearing the sari varies according to each region - women roll from right to left from the waist (reinforced part), make a few folds, turn once, cover the chest and hang down the differently printed end of the sari over the left shoulder as a "scarf" - which may be attached to an "edge" of about ten to fifteen centimeters - which gives the final touch of elegance to the whole. Just as our air hostesses, restaurant or shop assistants may have to wear a uniform in our western countries, their Nepalese or Indian equivalents wear sari to the colors of their company. I had already seen many small groups of women walking together and wearing the same uniform, but one was coming back more often than others. Its material, caramel cotton brown chiffon, contrasted with his broken folds to the sparkling of silk saris or other "substitute". As I made my way to the Alliance Française - to print a new part of my journal before leaving Kathmandu - the presence of these uniforms became increasingly numerous and eventually occupy the entire space. I was surrounded by women in caramel saris! I stopped to watch them wander in the garden of a mansion of classical order - as one can see many examples in former colonies - where everything was written in Nepali. After asking what this institute was, I learned that it was a college for women. Thus, if school girls had to be satisfied with an "English" style uniform, the most educated could wear already an adult woman outfit!
Only extraordinary material, and if not, the daily in extraordinary dimension, much like when trying to impress the children. Thus we can see flies and mosquitoes magnified a hundred times or the respiratory system of a cobra ripped in formalin, but also a stuffed penguin, kangaroos or ostriches, a black swan and the skeleton of his chick still in the egg, as a chameleon in a jar once filled with formalin. "It lost its tail in some accident" also announced the legend of a stuffed skate ray!
The departure of Kathmandu as if I had been informed the day before, all in a rush. Going here, being back there, and finally getting a haircut, as another way to close up the stay in Kathmandu. The goodbyes to almost everyone except Didi, she will forgive me. I was pretty well accustomed to this world where policemen are holding hands, where the mountain bikes have only one speed and where the rockers mask themselves with polyester Hermes scarves. The unknown world, I’m leaving to, seems a little less accessible!
The sari is the traditional dress of Indian and Nepalese women. It's a little more than a tradition, it's almost an obligation. The exceptions to this rule are very modern and independent girls, dressed in Western style, but also sporty one who have an alternative, in a sari material, but composed of very narrow pants, a long tunic and a matching scarf. The others have only one piece of silky and smooth fabric, five-half meters by one meter ten. In general - wearing the sari varies according to each region - women roll from right to left from the waist (reinforced part), make a few folds, turn once, cover the chest and hang down the differently printed end of the sari over the left shoulder as a "scarf" - which may be attached to an "edge" of about ten to fifteen centimeters - which gives the final touch of elegance to the whole. Just as our air hostesses, restaurant or shop assistants may have to wear a uniform in our western countries, their Nepalese or Indian equivalents wear sari to the colors of their company. I had already seen many small groups of women walking together and wearing the same uniform, but one was coming back more often than others. Its material, caramel cotton brown chiffon, contrasted with his broken folds to the sparkling of silk saris or other "substitute". As I made my way to the Alliance Française - to print a new part of my journal before leaving Kathmandu - the presence of these uniforms became increasingly numerous and eventually occupy the entire space. I was surrounded by women in caramel saris! I stopped to watch them wander in the garden of a mansion of classical order - as one can see many examples in former colonies - where everything was written in Nepali. After asking what this institute was, I learned that it was a college for women. Thus, if school girls had to be satisfied with an "English" style uniform, the most educated could wear already an adult woman outfit!
