Chandigarh, Sim City

Chandigarh, the city of sectors and grids. This is a place where ordering chai seems to entail getting poured a hot glass of milk and being handed a tea bag. There are no cows. The city is a geometrical world of retail and residential space (all with attached parking lots), connected by uncongested roadways that meet each other at traffic circles. There are no cows. I was stopped at a grocery store (!) to come back for my reciept, which was stamped by a guard when I got out of the door. Generic 'Liquor Wine & Beer' stores with attached 'taverns' appear every block, all part of the strip malls seperated from each other by designated green space and cycle paths. Smoking is illegal. Street lights affixed with timers and pedestrian signals are a commonality. And there are no cows.


Yes, I'm speaking of India. The background:


The concept of Chandigarh erupted in the late 50's after the state of Punjab lost its capital (Lahore) to Pakistan. Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister of India, decided to respond by building a new one. As the idea gained momentum, Chandigarh became a world renowned urban experiment enlisting a board of foreign architects from Europe to the US. Le Corbursier of Switzerland developed most of the architectural blueprints, as well as the layout for the city, both which were built on the foundation of "LIVING, WORKING, CIRCULATION and CARE OF BODY AND SPIRIT." According to the architecture musuem, his desire was for "a modest and nomadic dwelling, where dimensions conform to the human scale and arbitrariness." Ahem. The city center were defended as "[centering] around four pedestrain concourses meeting [that meet] at a central chowk...it is a pedestrian's paradise, dotted with fountains, sculptures, and groves for trees."


It boasts some architecture that seems to be the icing on the cake of austerity, including some sort of building affiliated with the high court that resembles a nuclear power plant. The hand statue pictured below is the rotating work of Le Corbusier, which he described as "open to give, and open to recieve." Located next to the 'Trench of Consideration', it seems as though a tongue-in-cheek allusion to 1984 Orwellian ideology.



Yes, it's all quite curious. The populous has become obsessively materialistic while taking the city's inane functionalism in stride. With time, villages erupted on the outskirts of the city to accomdate those migrating for work that were unable to fuel the city's skyrocketing living costs. However, the city's calculated expansion left the villages intact; presumably due to a correalation between their contained cow population and Chandigargh's relentless demand for cappucinos and White Russian's.


But there was a jewel in the heart of it all: (past the 'Rose Garden', past the man-made Sutta Lake) the Nek Chand Fantasy Rock Garden. Having worked as a road inspector during the early development of Chandigarh, Chand thought to himself "why should I not build a kingdom too?" So he began hauling the rock debris collected from a day at work to his secret gorge at the edge of the city. What resulted was a fantasy world lasting for hectors. It was discovered in 1975 by a governmental malarial research party, and surprisingly not demolished. Apparently (as defended by the city's many museums), Chandigarh supports art: "The age of personal statues is gone. The city is planned to breathe the new sublimated spirit of art. Commemoration of persons shall be confined to suitably placed bronze plaques." No fear of a counter culture defacing iconic statues in this city, yar. Just the "immortal beings of an otherworldly kingdom" (Nek Chand) in the Rock Garden.



Showing affection was also popular in the many crevasses of Chand's rock garden. Most people seemed to be on an adolescent social venture, like a trip to the rollar rink; perusing the lanes and staircases like the mundane hallways of a school. I saw my first kiss in India in the bleachers of the main hall. These radical modern youth.



Despite the parallel universe established by Chand's fantastical mind; Chandigarh left me carrying a fresh vile of cynicism, pinned tight to my otherwise western complex of missing India.


-Tara

Buried in the dust of Rajasthan

Rajasthan is the land of Kings, of desert heat, of old cities and Maharajas, Maharanas and Rajputs (and my relative misunderstanding of the differences between them.) It is of a world of tiered clay buildings, of forts on steep hills, of wearing headscarves to shade yourself from the heat. The end of the day brings the swift grace of water cutting through the dust caked on your face...


Jaipur:

Forged as the pink city, Jaipur is the gateway to the desert and the capital of Rajasthan. Considering it's a popular spot after to hit after Agra, the bazaars and rickshaws pull your scarf like a chain. Otherwise it's a charming little gem, and one where I left a few nights of fever behind.









Pushkar:

This is a holy city walking side-by-side with tourist exhaust. The story goes that Brahma (the Hindu god of creation) dropped a lotus flower on the earth and so up floated Pushkar. But its met quite the juxtaposition - a tourist bazaar causeway forms a perimeter to the lake ghats, and so the lake pilgrims wade between touts looking to con tourists into paying for puja (prayers). It is illegal to kiss, embrace, and eat meat; though drugs are frequently offered on your descent to the lake: the diffusion from an era of hippiedom. Quite the view from the top of the lone temple hill though, I must say.







Udaipur:

Called the 'Venice of the East', the old city center hovers around an ancient palace that glows purple by night. Quiet, serene, and sparkling by night - it seems quite the Indian oasis. But beyond the old city borders it is rickshaws and cows and Hindi cinemas. But at its nucleus, it is remembered like a nice bout with a valium.










Jodhpur:

While the blue painted houses of the old city once represented those of the Brahmin caste, the flavourful shade now merely hovers like a pastel jigsaw puzzle from the view from the fort above. Holding a liberal air alongside the traditional heat of Rajasthan, (with the "purs" as my Rajasthani favorites), I believe blue takes the cake over pink.





Jaisalmer:

As statistics, touts and rhetoric seem to prove; they (we) come to this collapsing sandcastle fort and the surrounding area to ride camels. And so we did. With such expectations, I was pleasantly surprised by my desert trek and the treatment of the camels: their saddles were removed every time we had a break, we stopped at troughs for water, and they were left to graze free by night. Overall, it was a graceful desert experience - the young guides delved out chai at the most epic of moments, for the camel itching her head on my leg in between her regular burps left great thanks for such rewards. We woke up after a night in the dunes to thousands of interwoven tracks, much like figure eights on an ice rink. It appears the black beetles that appeared at dusk marched on through the starry night.








Bikaner:

That city where the dust mixed with the dusk leaves you thinking you've found despair, only for it to be as refulgent by morning as the stagnant pond of sewage you passed in the autorickshaw on your way in. A large desert city slowly growing to absorb the camel safari overflow of Jaisalmer; it was our final Rajasthani jaunt before our overnight train to Delhi (actually Rewari, but that's for attempting to make late reservations on the Indian Railway system).




-Tara

Agra and the apex of the Tourist Triangle

'T' is representative for both 'Tara', and 'tourist'.
'B' is representative of both 'boy' and 'bacca' (child), one of my ten learned Hindi nouns.

B: Misses, you want picture?
T: No, no picture.
B: One picture? Yes?
T: No, no picture.
[he sits]
B: Why?
T: No picture.
B: Why?
B: Because I don't want a picture.
[long pause]
B: You have rupee?
T: No, no rupees.
B: Yes, rupees. 10 rupees.
T: No, no rupees.
B: Yes.
T: No.
B: Yes.
T: Apka naam kya hai? [What is your name?]
B: Meera naam ____ hai. Apka naam kya hai? [My name is ____. What is your name?]

I don't remember his name, nor was I armed with any other phrases to reciprocate his eagerness to indulge in Hindi yabber. I (almost) surpassed my inherent position as a tourist slot machine. Almost. Unwilling to perpetuate the bang-for-a-buck foreigner/local child relationship, I'm left eschewing the problem, snagging pictures with my meek (3.0x) zoom as I hide behind trees. Yes, in this respect, I'm very much the stereotypical tourist they've observed repeatedly and used to mold a ludicrously simple and affluent income oppurtunity.


-Tara

A note home, from India

I have seen this man in your drawing a million times in India. He, most often, is hollering madame from the street. Perhaps one time he sold beedies.

Anymore dreams of horses?

My dreams have all been fabric and bazaars and chai and masala and India, her heart: all free of good price, my shop.


Did I just pop the balloon?

I am learning to write Hindi. First the script. Writing it is smooth and intoxicating, like James when he draws.

I finished 'Running in the Family'. Sri Lanka and its dynamic elite, drunk on aristocratic local norms, a taste of the flavour of the tree that grows from the ground from which you are part.

There is a big wall between me and this India.


I am a tourist.