Barking up West Bengal; The Darjeeling Limited

It became clear rather quickly that I left India in Kolkata, or rather; on my last train north.

I left my "Trains at a Glance" book with a kid from Oz and his Kolkatan street dog, and consigned myself to the shared jeeps that travel beyond the train line and into the strikes that seem inherent around the West Bengal Hills.


Darjeeling

In an ode to the British Raj and their attempts to ignore India, I was off to Darjeeling, the most esteemed place to convince yourself that Orange Pekoe is superior to India's ubiquitous masala chai. As another British municipality centered around a clock tower; the mostly Nepali population makes the ghostly brick buildings that are architecturally akin to Banff about as harmonious as the reoccurring fortnight strikes protesting for an autonomous region called Gorkhaland.

Alcohol is also more accepted here.


Darjeeling is centered around Chowrasta Square; where adolescents play hacky sack as chaperoned by this statue of Tenzing Norgay - the Sherpa who surmounted Everest with Edmund Hillary in 1953. The siren of the mountain people begins.


Exclusive of drinking real chai in Chowrasta, the best thing I did in Darjeeling was take a short mooch to a monastery where this fellow was sculpting Tibetan Buddhist emblems with the mannerisms of an orchestral conductor.


This lyric rushed in: "when the conductor fucks up, you can't blame the symphony", reminding me that my iPod has gone from delivering musical therapy each and every time I summon it to using a more Russian Roulette styled approach.


And the strikes: Darjeeling's strike came after I did, which began with the closing of the government offices the day I went down to the Foreigner's Magistrate to get my Sikkim permit. Conclusively, I attempted getting one at the border (a success), to discover through trickling media that the strike escalated to unanimous shop closures, discontinued garbage collection, and then; ultimately, the asphyxiation of the roads to Sikkim.


Of course, by that time I was in Sikkim; with a week left on my Indian visa. Not getting out of Sikkim meant not getting to Siliguri; a quintessential stop en route to Nepal; Nepal being my ultimate destination in my evasion of alien status.

Eventually I made Siliguri, by a series of luck, undoubtedly. From this bridge I said goodbye to India as a naked kid pulled a dead dog by a string and sent it down the river; much like burying a hampster.


But first, Sikkim.

Kol-ka-ta-ti-ki-di-do

It took me two days, one "you are seeing Kolkata in limbo", and one newspaper headline regressing to the colonial spelling of the city ("Cowardice in Calcutta"); to realize that the reason Kolkata appeared to be in this much of a reverie, was because there was a strike.


"Oh, that's why the only Bengali restaurant that was open made me eat upstairs out of public view."

Maoists!


All the buses and trams were completely empty, rolling around on their routes.


While there is no counter (pop) culture (the unanimous love for Bollywood) in India, there is definitely a real counter-culture in West Bengal, baring the hammer and sickle and carrying hoards of the population along with it. In fear and/or support, I'm not really sure.


But after two days of the city running with as skeleton with only a few muted operations; Kolkata came back.



Beedies.


British buildings.



Box-cars.



An air of minds.


The perpetual scent of the carbon monoxide oozing from ubiquitous charcoal burners, a world painted in Bengali script, a confluence of refined colonial style and innovation Indian logic. A hyper-sense buzz.


I fancy getting a crumbling decrepid apartment, where we can hold our heads high together during the monsoon.


Yes, Kolkata - you and me, dressed in pink.


Yar.

How-RAH

Can I put Howrah before Kolkata?


How-RAH.


They did assemble themselves as such.


I simply couldn't name a better place to enter West Bengal, clocking in fifteen minutes early on the watch of the Indian Rail: 6:45 am.


A mastodon of red-brick boasting with transit, of people running to and from, to burst from a lobby to a street with a hanging humidity announcing everyone's immediate closeness with the southern, eastern, coastal part of the country.


Yellow bubbles with four wheels assembled in lines, all homogenously called "Ambassadors." Luggage hands in red. Taxis in yellow. Howrah in red. Saris in yellow.


How-RAH.


I opted not to take a taxi.


A large bridge was leaning forward into the city; a well-wrought laboured work carrying people that were laboriously carrying goods.


It was this bridge that led me into the British abated area of BBD Bagh and into a morning of smooth, quiet streets; occasional chai-wallahs amid circulating vacant trams - a befuddling morning reverie that seemed to attest that away from the Northern cities, the pace really does slow down...


It was merely a trick.

Boycotting Buddha-Bodhi-Bodhgaya

Ladies and Gentlemen (available in four languages):


"He reached enlightenment right there, to the left of the Muslim graveyard and behind the field of bubble-cloud tour buses. Behind the dust, dust, dust; behind the omnipresent beggars of Bihar swarming here not for Buddha, but for you foriegners shedding cash, cash, cash. Please partake in prostrations at the Mahabodhi temple, and cheesecake at the cafe."

Enlightenment, arre!


It started with my attempts to gain acceptance to a meditation retreat - ten days without talking or writing or reading would surely clear me of my mellon collie mind, but no - I applied too late, and instead arrived in Bodhgaya to hop between its diverse consumer offerings of internet cafes, restaurants and travel agencies. Even the monks were shopping.


I participated in intramural sports - me against the mosquitos, in my lovely chalky white-walled room. I'd say I slayed close to fifty, with the back of my Hindi notebook (now a truly branded memory of India), and protected myself from their fleeting buzzes while sleeping by covering my head with a "Ram Sita Ram" imprinted sarong. A lesson in the preventative measures against mosquito-borne illness.

Arre - I concede that being tagged as "cynical" or "sarcastic" comes in frequent regularity by those whom I tend to hit it off with in hearty discourse. But...but...here's a pretty picture:


"No, no...I like it. It's a nice change from the happy-go-lucky traveler."

I attest: fuck this; I'm going to Howrah.

गंगा / ganga

This is the river, mother ganga.


Mosquitos like water. Especially stale, dirty water that is the Ganga in Varanasi. Nothing and everything stops here. Including the boatmen, who are on strike because the government has decided to put a government tax on all boat rides, impeding the transactions from moving quickly from hand to mouth.

Varanasi / Benaras / Kashi
वारानसी / बनारस / काशी

Arguably India's holiest place for Hindu's that often pleads itself as the "Oldest Living City", pilgrims come in flocks to bathe in the Holy Ganga, or ultimately, to die.


While the translucent sky that has impeded Varanasi oriented photography for the past week makes this hard to see; this child is flying a kite. A week ago there was a kite festival. At two rupees a pop, the kite population in Varanasi (especially those dilapidated around electrical wires and strangling dead goats), is quickly exceeding that of the children.


Cricket in India. Everywhere, all of the time.


A hindu swastika (note the orientation). I will presumably refer to this very photo later for arguments regarding Hindu vs. Nazi iconography. And don't trust the painted ones - confused youth/soiled sadhus can get them wrong in their respective desires to make a mark.


Haridwar
हारिद्वार

At the headwaters where the Himalaya's give birth to the Ganga is Haridwar, where the purification element of the water is actually reflected by its physical state.


The fairgrounds by the water were a Hindu carnival. Not that Krishna's love for games and Hinduism's colourful cast of gods and goddesses would warrant anything else.



Rishikesh
रिशीकेश

Essentially the India westerners tend to love, minus the India they don't. Clean air, minimal garbage, few people, chaotic patterned cotton clothes, yoga, ashrams, pristine scenery, and restaurants where you can get brown bread. It's hard not to assume that The Beatles having come here forty years ago is the kicker.

Yeah, it was pretty. Though the notorious monkeys stole my bag of carrots on the bridge.


Ganga aarti (dusk prayers at Ma ganga) were held on a ghat where they were building a new Krishna shrine. I liked watching the crane move and drop rocks by the lotus positioned white body as the most esteemed guru of the greater Rishikesh area waled on (cd available), accompanied on each arm by two western converts.


Rishikesh: sadhus and carousels adorned by spacemen dictators with bright ideas.


This picture has: only one person, no visible litter.


Yar.

नमकिन/namkeen

Though Lays potato chips are gaining momentum with Sharukah Khan slutting himself in their name (with India's Magic Masala and India's Mint Mischief a fanciful alternative to America's Sour Cream and Onion), I am in full support of the indigenous namkeen. In a country where Red #6, Yellow #213 and standards like tartrazine and hydrogenated oil are replaced with - (!?!) - real oils and spices, I'm all for the flawlessly spiced deep fried pulses of Namkeen.


Check it:

Ingredients of Haldiram's Navrattan namkeen:

Gram pulse flour, edible vegetable oil, gram pulse, lentil, peanuts, rice flakes, potatoes, edible common salt powder, spinach, red chili powder, black salt powder, mango powder, black pepper powder, ginger powder, clove powder, mace powder, nutmeg powder, cumin powder, fenugreek seeds powder, coriander powder, bay leaves powder, mint leaves powder, salt ammoniac powder, cardamom powder, asafoetida powder and citric acid powder.

And that's the packaged stuff.

As for biskuts, I proudly select the Brittania Pista Goddam (Missasauga, God damn!) variety, a title whose etymology clearly denotes the British Raj. I think they're phasing them out alongside gradually renaming every city in India. But regardless of circumstance, the Glucose brand just isn't as appealing. That and Wimpy's high class, fast-food burger establishment.

Yar.

पानी /pani/water

Swim in it:


Don't drink it.