(I'm writing in little chunks, least a power failure reduce my many hours of writing into the black screen of death)

Okay.
I was telling you about how the stories of Stefan and Neru's practical love of the poor have thrown my excuses for "doing squat" into a mess. I mean, least you miss the craziness of what they are doing, let me make it clear. I am talking about a couple who (finding their beat up Maruti van suddenly surrounded by rupee-driven street kids)is saying "Ok guys! climb in! Let's go!" They are finding out about where these children live, what they eat, and how they survive.

Here's the second thing that totally changed my life.

[Like I mentioned in an earlier letter, Chris and I took a trip (Oct. 1-4th) into Pune for some concerts, and a visit to the red light district by request of Ruby, a woman doctor who operates a free health clinic for commerical sex workers. Ruby works mostly with the Nirvan caste of Hijras (men who have been castrated, usually at an early age, and have had breast implants) Some of the hijras we have met in the past are obviously males dressed in women's attire, and Ruby informed me that these are from the Aqwa caste, which are looked down upon by the Nirvan (obvious reasons abound) because they haven't gone through the full initiation.]

On Monday afternoon, knowing very little about Ruby or her work, I was dropped off near the red light district (along with Chris and Pete) and instantly sensed the distrust from the folks in the area. Faces stared at me darkly. The main street looked like any other I had seen in Pune; brimming with people, shops, and traffic. I was trying hard not to stand out too much, but it didn't help. I had that horrible feeling of despair, and I confess that the "What am I even doing here?" question may have settled into it's familiar home below my ribs. The truth is, I didn't even know anything about Ruby or her work, since Chris had made contact with her three years earlier; my gut was still floating around Varanasi and what had happened in the last month. I kept my eyes on the ground, avoiding piles of dung and potholes, unsmiling faces, too shy to make eye contact with anyone.

Turning the corner, we entered the street lined with the brothals, and I was shocked. Some women, obviously working the street, were greeting us enthusiastically, grabbing our hands. "Prize da Laard, Halay-luyah!" "Prize da Laard, Halay-luyah!" It was some sort of strange mantra I couldn't make out, and I was confused. Bobbing my head, I grinned, replying "Namaste! Namaste!" I followed Chris upstairs, to a small, nearly bare, third floor room. Women were putting flowers into our hands. More welcomes. There were strings of fresh marigold garlands across the windows and doors. Someone had drawn a special picture for us and made welcome signs. The beautiful thing about this visit is that I had unknowingly walked into a party as a special guest, not really realising what the deal was, before getting totally blown away. I knew that Chris and Pete were going to play bhajans (in the Krist bhakti tradition) and many women in the room were interested in learning some new bhajans, but that was about it. As Chris, Pete and a tabla player started the music, I kept my eyes closed, and sang along with the Hindi words I knew. More women arrived and joined us where we sat on the floor. Some of the women played little cymbals (manjira), keeping time. The room filled, and then overflowed into the hall. Before too long, I became overwhelmed with emotion; I was praising God in song, with my history, my mistakes, touching knees with women I hardly knew, yet there was a one-ness that I couldn't put into words. I saw myself and knew that I was often hard-hearted, that I was not more worthy of love than they, that I had many fears and unforgivenesses keeping God out of the places I needed him most. I felt like I was in the company of sisters, and a strange love, mixed with pain, welled up in me. During the break, Dr. Ruby came over to me and put her mouth close to my ear. She said something like, "Most everyone in this room is a hijra, did you know that?" I had simply assumed that I was in a room full of mostly drop dead gorgeous women. "They are losing money and missing clients to be here...because they really want to be."

During the break, we asked questions while eating samosas. (For some, this small snack food is the only thing they can afford to eat.) One woman started to teach Chris how to say some phrases in Telugu. Another taught him Kannada phrases like "Did you eat?" He practiced them on some of the women, much to their amusement. Chris became my translator once again, as they commented about my sari, and asked why I wasn't wearing a mangal sutra (the necklace a married woman wears, which is the equivalent of the western wedding ring.) Even though Chris and I had gotten married in India, we hadn't really ever invested in one, since I was already wearing the other things a married woman wears, like a bindi (red dot on the forehead), sindur(the red powder in the parting of the hair), the toe rings, and the anklets. But the women were not going to be satisfied. Suddenly one of them was instructing another to take off her necklace and give it to me. I protested. It was too much of a gift. Even after many translations of "Please, I can't accept this gift!" the woman would hear nothing of it. Ruby explained. The younger girl was the student (shishya) of the older one, who was in the role of teacher (guru). I learned that this system was very much in place within the community and that there was a hierarchy for everyone in the district. I had been witnessing it for at least an hour, without knowing that it was, in a sense, a structured thing. I sat close to the younger girl and tried to communicate (without the ability to speak Hindi) that I was totally overwhelmed and thankful. After a few minutes I pulled off the gold wedding bangles I was wearing and presented them to the guru of the girl. "These two thicker ones are for you, and the thin ones are for your shishya," I mimed, using broken Hindi. She put all of them on her wrists. I wondered if she understood.

I had the crazy desire to give away everything.

Here's the Pune story, as promised.
What's interesting about our trip to Pune, is that it almost didn't happen. Even three weeks before we left for India, Chris and I were in Toronto, having our morning cup of tea on the red sofa, wondering if we should totally forget about trying to fit in a two-day train trip into "the south." Chris was scheduled to do a show there, but we hadn't heard anything from the promoters for weeks. Our schedule by this time was beginning to look insane. We began to wonder if we should just cancel. But three years earlier, a woman in Pune who had met Chris was terribly interested in getting him to play some bhajans (devotional music) for the women she worked with in the red light district and we had committed to coming. The feeling that we couldn't let this woman down, aided by a few phone calls to the promoters, set our hearts at ease.

It so happened that we were able to connect with Stefan (who attended our Indian wedding and is a long time friend of Chris')when we first arrived in Mumbai(Bombay). Stefan lives in Delhi and works with the poor in his local area; he was recently married to Neru, a lawyer who handles a lot of human rights cases. Stefan, through some funny twist of timing, was also heading to Pune, along with another visiting musician, and the four of us talked as we continued on the last stretch of the journey via car. Something clicked in my brain as I listened to Stefan talk about how passionate both he and Neru were about justice, and compassionate treatment of the poor. I began to think back to all of the frustrating interactions I was having every time I ran into beggars on the streets of India, especially in tourist centers like Delhi or Agra. It was not unusual for me to feel angry, embarrassed, or helpless when I found myself the target of the rapid fire Hindi and hand gestures that beggars employed. I had been pinched by children for not giving any money, had my clothing grabbed, found my mode of transportation just short of being hijacked! Just thinking about leaving the house would inspire feelings of anger and dread. Faced with them, I couldn't communicate all the complicated things I felt; how I didn't want to support the professional begging trade, or the pimp who would take almost every rupee from them at the end of the day. Someone working a construction job might make half of what a beggar makes in a day, but how was I to know? I felt stuck. pissed. used. I felt compassion. I wanted to do the right thing, but what? Stefan started to blow my mind with personal stories. I began to picture him, kneeling down to a child's eye level, asking "What's your name?" and smiling. He was slowly, gently removing the relationship from "prey/predator" or "abused/abuser" and bringing it into the realm of mutual friend. He was doing that with humor, eye contact and questions; with the kind of Love that only comes when someone opens their hearts to God. The kind of love I was seeing in Stefan pours freely out through the eyes. It says: "I want to know who you are."

That's why I think stories like these are so essential. They've got this amazing way of pointing out the obvious; the deep well of fear we are drawing water from can't be the only water source. There are crazy people finding springs of life-giving water and pouring it into drinking cups!

Hey there. Wow. I just wanted to say (for the record) that I've been totally thrilled to be getting the wonderful letters and little emails that you've been sending me in the last couple weeks, especially in the last couple days. It's really an honor to be able to share these experiences of India with you, where ever you are. Hello to new friends, met in India, reading about some crazy folk-singers experience of their homeland! Hello to old friends that have been around since the very beginning when i didn't even have anything put down on tape.

Chris and I are leaving for Ranikhet (a little moutain town about 8 hours, by train, from here) tomorrow evening, and we are hoping that the bus we take to get there will have proper brakes this time. Our trip there last year gave me about 20 new grey hairs, since we were taking the mountain roads at about 40 kms an hour (down hill) and the driver was practically using his feet to break the speed. If duct tape would really hit the market here, the government buses would be made of the stuff. Fortunately, I tend not to barf going around a mountain at top speed. I'm glad my mother didn't witness my last bus ride to Ranikhet though. (PS. my bowels have been singing happily through this entire trip so far, thanks to my strict vegetarian protocol)

I owe you a lot of stories. Will try again tomorrow.
If I can find an internet cafe up there in the mountains, I'll have at least a week to catch up on some of them.
m.
peace (in Hindi, it is "shanti")

Here are some pictures taken in Lucknow.

On my first trip to India, I was constantly impressed by the tradition of artwork on the goods carriages, the transport trucks of India. Symbols of protection from “the evil eye” mix with detailed paintings of gods, implored to protect the vehicle and its driver from harm. I’ve embarked on the task of documenting as many of these as possible, over the next few trips.

The top of the cab turns into sleeping quarters for this fellow.

This driver obliged me this picture of a mother cow and calf.

The many badges of safe travel include a small picture of the truck owners god of choice, featured on top, as well as a painting of a demon at the bottom right (“Look, we already have a demon hanging out here, so if you’re a demon, looking for nice trucks, this one’s already taken…”

I've just had the happiest train ride of my life. Something has changed inside of me as a result of this trip to Pune. Fear's desperate little fingers are scrambling for a new handhold. It feels like Love has given me new feet and I am running away, laughing. I have a lot of good people to thank for this change. I want to tell you more about this, and still find the time to tell you about all those weeks in Varanasi. I was smack dab in the middle of happiness and pain, and the result was silence.

NEWS FLASH: Chris is working on a computer beside me at this Lucknow internet cafe and just
burst out laughing. Two days ago, he had whipped off a quick email to our friend, Pamela Wyn-
Shannon, a celtic folksinger from upstate NY. It said:

Pamela-
We are in India. Played in the red light district last night for a room full of transvestites
and today we are at a high security jail.

Pamela responded with the following email message, which we think may be indicating a possible
miscommunication on Chris's part. She wrote:

Are you serious?!?!?! Are you in jail???
Do you need any help???
How can i help???

Anyway, i think Chris is in the process of clearing this up.

Ok. I'm back on track, no pun intended. I've been meaning to describe at least one train trip for you. I don't know if you've ever travelled on an Indian train before, but when I traveled through India last year, I had never even set foot on any sort of train except for the local (very clean and on time)"GO" train in Toronto. Chris thought he would break me in slowly, so for that very first trip, he arranged for an air-conditioned "second class" car. This year though, we've been doing the "2nd class sleeper" cars, which come without air-conditioning. The bonus that comes with 2nd class is a steady stream of illegal passengers who might take over your berth and push you slowly off your seat. Unlike the higher class cars, which are guarded by police, you get the opportunity to be practically held hostage by the swarms of locals who'll ride the line for one stop at a time, selling eatables like boiled peanuts (known as "mumphali time pass") or pomegranates. If you want magazines, noisemakers, belts, paan masala (basically, chewing tabacco)or snack food, fear not, salesmen will appear. Children around the age of six, leading blind musicians with crudely constructed harmoniums, old women lepers with every finger missing, leg-less men on trolley carts, ancient looking Muslims reciting the Qur'an for small change...you are the captive audience.

The train station is like the train car, only bigger, with more people, more sellers and beggars, and lots of dogs, goats and cows...and monster rats.

Imagine a desperately hot afternoon. Even the crows wobbling along the tracks have their beaks open, panting like dogs. My sari blouse has been wet with sweat since nine o'clock this morning, and I look like a crumpled piece of tissue in my cotton sari, waiting beside the luggage (two home-made cloth packs, a sitar, a guitar, and one handbag with food and water) while Chris stands in line at the "Inquiry." (Our tickets give a train number and destination, as well as our car reservation and berth, but in some cases, not even the information booth knows what track to send passengers to until sometimes minutes before the train is due.) Families sleep on the floor surrounded by their belongings. I look up, and eyes that i am unable to read, stare back. Porters with red gamchas (gamchas are like thin towels usually worn by north Indian men around their necks) and village women carrying impossible loads, are running for trains. Behind them are children with stick-thin arms and legs, also carrying impossible loads. Twenty people at a time are trying to sqeeze through a door that handles two. Men are pissing against the stairs. One of them spits a giant red arc of paan masala against a sign post. The tracks are everyone's toilet. In your sticky salt encrusted clothes you are swimming in the toilet bowl along with everyone else. After ten or more train rides like this, you might get used to the invasively heavy smell of human excretement mixing with the smell of frying samosas and rust coloured walls oozing ancient paan spit. Showering after a train trip ends always leaves you with the feeling that you've been born again.

In "second class non-AC" there are usually three levels of sleeping bunks, covered in blue or green vinyl. The bottom bunk serves as a seat for everyone during the day; the middle bunk is on a hinge and forms the back rest for the bottom bunk. When the middle bunk is pulled into place, it's really not that possible to sit comfortably on the bottom bench anymore since the headroom is hardly two feet. A short diplomatic conversation in regards to the timing of "official bed-making time" usually happens around 8 or 9 o'clock, since the top bunk is the only one that no one messes with; it's welded into place. Chris has been very smart to book the top two bunks for all of our trips, since that allows us to throw the sitar and the bags up there immediately upon boarding. A lock and chain deters "snatch and run" thieves. At night, Chris crawls up into his "crow nest" while I delicately make circus moves into mine, taking great pains to keep the guys (in the bunks below) from looking up my sari. The homemade pack gets shoved all the way into the least vulnerable corner, and I position myself with my feet towards the isle. An article of clothing serves as a pillow. Not being able to stretch out doing the night is hard for me, since I'm always fighting for head space around the bulky bag, but it's better to be cramped and maintain contact with your bag than have it stolen. Chris was born to sleep on trains; he is forever content in the fetal position, curled up with his knees in his face. I use my sari end to shield my face from the lights (a few stay on all night, for safety reasons) and from the stares of any overly curious males.

I love the sway of the train at night. It's like floating in a happy current, pushed forward and pulled back, like the comforting rememberance of being an infant in a cradle. The slightly disconcerting thing is that an Indian train, unlike your childhood bed, travels at a speed of about 80 or 90 kms an hour. On my way to Varanasi, a little over a month ago, I woke up several times at night and each time thought about how I could describe this feeling. I tried to take it in for you, so I could describe it, feeling the pleasant dizziness of being high up in a train car, traveling at fast speeds through dark fields, a cool breeze bursting through the iron bars on the windows... The hope of things to come.

Like I was saying earlier. Fear is being replaced by love. And I noticed it on this last train ride, since the men on the trains, and the beggars passing through, have intimidated me, from the moment I set foot into India. I researched before I came, and the cultural rules told me that I was not to make eye contact, not to smile, not to acknowledge the presence of someone lower than me or higher than me. I was told, "You are woman, and here are your rules of conduct." I have not been able to be who I am, to express the natural curiosity welling up inside of me at every new thing. And there are so many new things.

I will write some more soon.
sending love,
m.

I haven't said a word to you for so long. My mouth is full of stories and the gush of an overflowing heart; the words get stuck.

I might only have three minutes, so all I will say is that I'm a few hours away from hopping on a train...leaving the city of Pune (near Bombay/Mumbai)to go to the North Indian city of Lucknow. Chris and I have been here for three very full days.

Today, Chris (and Pete, who was here in India for a short time) played bhajans (Indian devotional music) at a jail, while I interviewed a woman doctor who has been working in the red light district here.

We had been invited by Doctor Ruby to come and play bhajans in the clinic where she works, and this was one of the main reasons why Chris and I took the two day train trip to Pune. Ruby runs a clinic for commercial sex workers, with a focus on the very unique caste of Indian men-women, or transvestites, called Hijras. I learned from her that there are two kinds of Hijra, the Aquas (men who have not been castrated, but dress in women's clothing) and the Nirvan (those who have been castrated, often at a very young age, and have breast implants.) The Nirvan work in the street surrounding the small upper room where Ruby offers counselling and free medical service, and Chris and I were allowed to spend an entire afternoon and evening with these women. The monsoon of emotion that has flooded over me must be given space, but I have to go.

I'm hoping to have some more time to write when I hit Lucknow, or maybe Ranikhet. For now, I will tell you that I am now wearing a mangal sutra (necklace of a married woman) given to me by one of them, and two toe rings and three finger rings given by three others. One of them put a dish for holy water made of shell into my hand and another put the most beautiful white chain of scented flowers into my hair. I gave away my gold wedding bangles. There were a lot of prayers and tears and songs, sung wildly. Gifts of the rarest kind.

Sending love from the red light district, where death lives, on most days,
love miranda

Every eye is on you, pretty much all the time. (This is the 2nd class non-air conditioned train from Bombay (Mumbai) to Lucknow.)

A first happened today: i left the house on my own. I know that sounds a little odd, considering that I've been touring for almost ten years now, alone, through wierd stretches of North America. But when you lose your voice, or when you've suddenly become lame, your legs don't work, and it's like a bad dream where you can't fly high enough above the heads of an enemy. You want to scream but there are no words.

Take an artist who has focused on communicating ideas, pictures, beliefs more than anything else, then put a muzzle on their mouth, release them into a busy Indian street, full of eyes and questions and assumptions. Whoa. What will happen if I ever end up in China?! I might need to do another tour with Ember Swift, who knows some of the language!

Let me give you an example. On the third night that we were in Varanasi(Sept 3rd), while Chris was inquiring about some distilled water for our inverter, a guy walking past me spat against the back of my sari. As he disappeared into the dark of the street, I wanted to call after him and ask
"Brother, was that an accident?" Later on, when we reached Connie and Rajiv's place (my "adopted" Indian mom and dad) I pepper-sprayed them with questions, voiced frustrations, and scrubbed away the spit. They've lived in India a long time. I wish I could roll with the punches better. They amaze me. Sometimes I feel pangs of jealousy when I watch their children, Priyanka and Arjun, who will grow up with East and West curled up inside their hearts like a friend. I see this confidence in Chris, and wonder if I could ever find it in myself. Maybe if you are still here, in ten years, we can compare notes on each other, looking for the changes that make us older "in a good way." I think of each piece of snail mail you kind folks have sent me, sitting high on a top shelf in my office, every note, every letter tucked into burlap basmati rice bags. I feel blessed with what you have already shared. I'm not worthy at all.

While I'm thinking about gratefulness, i want to say thank you to the folks that have left comments connected to this blog (a feature that is currently disabled, though you can send me an email personally) For the record, I want to mention these folks by name. So.... thank you FUR, Steve, Nikkiana, Christy, and most recently Drew (who sent some helpful tips on de-bugging my Indian culinary experiences.)

At dawn, pilgrims and tourists head across the water in row boats. The water was high during monsoon season and the current required two men at the oars.

The last two nights a heavy wind has been coming off of the Ganga with such force that the massive tree behind the "school" has been shaking and groaning violently. We've been waiting anxiously for rain, which finally came today. Walking to the internet cafe, I notice that the gutters (read: open sewers, filled with plastic wrappers, various kinds of animal and human crap, vegetable peelings) are quickly starting to flood over. I dance across crumbling stones and broken brick while my BATA flip-flops (called "Chappals" here) make sucking sounds in the mud. I look for islands of dry land, holding my sari folds in one hand, and an umbrella in the other. There's a sari making factory along this gully (gully basically means a tiny alley way), and everyday, the gutter along one side runs pink or green. Today it's bright blue.

Every day, the gutters in the street near our house would run with a different shade of dye. Sari’s would be flung over the edge of the factory roof, to dry.

I walk past scrawny chickens, past the children who greet me with a "namaste" and the crowd of rick-shaw pullers at the corner. I'm looking for the dog, deeply wounded in the back from an unfortunate fight who's been dying, slowly, for the last two days. He's still semi-alive, on the side of the street, eyes glassy, fur matted and covered in flies. People on the street die this way too. Friends of ours in Delhi are walking through alleys like this one, bringing them home. The Indian dinner and concert that we held in Toronto last November went towards funding these folks. (Go check out the website, since Chris and I will be working there for one week next month. (www.delhihouse.org)

I'm leaving now, to find a tailor who'll make me a sari blouse without the pointy boobs. That's hard to find around here, trust me.

soon,
m.

I was telling you about the house, so I'll fill your eyes with more pictures.

You are opening the heavy iron gate of the compound. Step into the heaviness of the heat, the kind that leaves the clothes on your body wet with sweat and sticking to your skin. It's late afternoon, and there's the crinkled buzz of a P.A. system being brought to life, followed immediately by the Muslim call to prayer from the masjid a hundred yards away. AaaaaaaaaLaaaaaaaaaaa... It's a sad and beautiful sound, punctuated by bicycle rickshaw bells, boys yelling at the ghetto cricket match in the Shiv temple yard, and the barking of stray dogs. Like a school of fish, dragonflies shoot past as if they are polishing the sky with rasping wings, and the the paper kites, flown by children from the rooftops, dart like birds of prey after them and each other.

The local Masjid, with its brilliant green colour well-loved in the Islamic community.

Through the gate and down the tiny mud road of the compound you continue, past the hibiscus bushes covered in red flowers and rebellious vines. Tall green grasses and shrubs grow wild in a small neglected field. A hundred or so monsoons have not been kind to the buildings here. New green growth slides its roots even deeper into the crumbling carved walls of an old abandoned temple shaped like a bell, crouching in between houses that have hardly fared better. Someone is ringing a bell in another temple, to wake up their god. There's a love song, full of longing. Clouds begin to roll in, laundry is quickly gathered. Someone is cooking food, can you smell it, heavy with spice?

Chris has been playing a lot of sitar every day, and cooking food for me, since I would never eat if he didn't. I have a one track mind: get the house in order, clean, stock the spices, pull the rocks out of the garden, keep the ants from eating everything. We eat almost every meal outside, since even the tiniest crumb on the floor gathers a tribe of a hundred or more ants for a frolicking church picnic.

This monitor lizard was hiding in our landlords home, before being dispatched.

The floors of the house are semi-unfinished cement. The walls are white-washed in a fading beige, falling to the floor with the touch of a broom, like a Buffalo snow storm. We have stored most of the furniture (that was in the house when we arrived) in two of the spare rooms. In the larger room beside the bath we have pushed two single beds together and cleaned the shelving for our clothes. Twelve feet above our heads, steel beams hold up slabs of limestone which form the ceiling. Mold and termite tunnels threaten along one wall. There is one window looking out into what once was a porch with pillars, but has now been cemented in. This long "porch" room is where Chris and I spend most of our time, sitting on cushions on the floor. The kitchen is built into the far end, near the bath, and boasts a small fridge that runs on the government supply of electricity lasting from four p.m. until nine in the morning. From 9 a.m until 3 p.m., when the power is cut, an inverter (a battery thing, that stores power and then releases it for up to 4 hours or so) manages to keeps a few lights and fans running during the day if we need them.

I insist my Indian cooking to be fantastic, but preparing a meal IN India, was something all together different, and I needed help. There were new utensils and ingredients, hiding in different forms, and I felt lost. Was everything going to harbor some sort of crawling creature? Didi (the Hindi word for “older sister”) helped me survive even though communication was difficult (my Hindi needs a lot of work, and she didn’t speak English) Watching how she dealt with the tiny stones, mouse crap, and weevils that come along for the ride in the basmati rice gave me confidence in how “it should be done.” Crouched on the rough concrete floor, I learned how most of the Indian women in Varanasi made the family meals.

On the second night that we slept here, there was a huge power failure and all the surrounding streets went dark. (I remember the panic people went through during the power failures in North America several years ago. But power failures like that happen many times a day here; transformers simply blow up with no warning.) I woke up and the overhead fan was dead. It was 3:30 a.m. With the fan off, my ears were now picking up the disturbing sounds of some kind of political rally gone bad, or a street fight or some over-zealous religious meeting. I lay still. Chris was asleep.

There had been some kind of riot in the centre of town that day and police with "actual guns instead of sticks" had come in to keep the peace. A curfew was in place in that quarter. A lot of rumors were going around that a Hindu had killed a Muslim or the other way around and people were scared that there would be violence. I knew that there was a late night qawwali program taking place over the next three nights to celebrate one of the saints, a few small streets away. Was I hearing some really excited mystical folk Islamic preaching? Then a woman started yelling, and others joined in. After a few minutes i began to wonder if someone was having some kind of spirit manifestation instead. The woman began to moan, then scream. Other voices joined in. I woke Chris up.

By the time i got out of bed, threw on my sari, and told Chris I was going (with or without him) to find out what was going on, the woman's screams had turned into the kind that made my blood run totally cold. In a sleepy haze of fear we stumbled out of the house and walked along the edge of the compound to get a better idea of what was going on. The woman had stopped screaming. Two of the pundits-in-training that lived in the compound were also doing the same thing. The four of us stood in the blackness and listened. What sounded like a heated domestic fight was now all that we could hear.

Chris started to ask the two fellows some questions and they began to explain that a particular guy living near the compound came home late night after night after spending the days wage on drink. They had been awake for the last two hours, listening to the commotion. Probably the woman had had enough and spoke her mind. Probably all the folks around got into it as well. Very likely, the husband tried to silence her with some beatings.

All I knew is that I had never in my life woken up to anything as brutal as that. I wonder what really happened. I see the tensions of many people of many classes and religons trying to live in a very tight living environment. It blows my mind.

I've hardly told you anything yet, about the daily life here, but this is the worst time for power cuts, so least I lose all this writing, I am throwing this up on the site.

till the next time,
m.

At dawn, on a side street, bicycle rickshaws sit, waiting for another long difficult day of work.

Twelve days have passed since I last wrote. Yes, I know, I owe you some details, and have been tardy. But I've been on a rampage of sorts, and have only today found the strength to run screaming like a coward into this internet cafe. There's a battle going on, one of Alfred Hitchcock sized proportions, in our adopted Indian home.

I'm worried that if I tell you about the wildlife I'm finding in my dried goods you might never dare to visit this most amazing country. For those of you who have experienced India in all of it's monsoon glory (and have attempted to cook real Indian food in their kitchens) I would be open to any advice you could give on what to do when you keep finding tiny stones, beetles, weavels, grubs and other non-vegetarian items in the food stuffs. Let me move on to some other stories for a while. Right now, any thoughts about my kitchen are depressing me.

On the way home from a market trip, Chris and I were caught in a monsoon shower. I’m holding some bamboo poles we just bought (to hang mosquito netting over our bed.) There’s a real trick to riding side-saddle on the back of a bicycle. Especially when there’s so much other traffic (bullock carts, Tata trucks, pedestrians, goats, cattle, cars, bicycle rickshaws, motorcycles carrying entire families) missing your knee caps by mere inches (or less). An important phrase to emphatically project is “juga do!” (make space!)

The 1st of Sept. feels so far away that I don't know where to start. There's a happiness that wells up in me when I play back the scene of how my adopted Indian dad, Rajiv, met us at the train station. It always makes me laugh. Our eyes, blurry from a restless sleep on the overnight train, saw him walking down the train platform towards us, twirling jasmine flowers in the place where his eyes should be...crazy pin-wheels. Beside him was Jai, (another dear friend of ours)full of enthusiasm and mirth. Of the twelve or so Indian train stations I've spent time in, I don't think I've ever felt more happy.

The place that we are subleting for the month of Sept. is a ground level "cement-like" building located in a compound owned by the descendents of a certain prince whose kingdom used to be in West Bengal (which is now a communist state.) Sadly, I'm missing details on the full history of this family. My Hindi is too poor, so I'll have to get another briefing from Chris. The great-grandfather of the current owner added to some of the pre-existing structures here, located right on the banks of the Ganga(Ganges River.) Some friends of ours are renovating the building directly opposite us which they are using as a school, and on the other side of the wall, the landlord has his residence, next to the Kali temple which his family maintains. Thirty seconds away, along a dirt path, other friends have been living for about ten years, so advice is never far away. I have found a lot of comfort in these very good people. They have softened the sting of my own ignorance that follows me like a stray ghost-dog, everywhere I go.

One of the unexpected joys of our stay here has been the garden in front of the house. One of the unexpected frustrations of the garden has been the gardener (which we didn't know came with the house.) The German lady who is the actual tenant of the residence has been away in the hills of India for the last four months, and it's strange to suddenly have an "employee" who has a real lack of work ethic. I'm sure you'll hear more about this in future letters.

I spent a lot of time that month in the garden, clearing the soil of bricks and stones. It felt good to throw myself into some physical labor, even though the temperatures hit over 100 degrees Fahrenheit by 10 a.m. When the rains came, I would continue, and it was wonderful.

I'm nervous about the constant power cuts here in Varanasi, so I'll be posting this right now, and continuing immediately after, with another blog. Back in a minute.

P.S. The music here at this cafe is now pumping Indian dance music. This is a nice change from the Bollywood film song they've been playing on repeat here for the last 2 hours.

m.

Standing in the open train door, 70 miles an hour, past villages waking up...this is how I spent my second morning in India. It's 6:30 a.m. and I am wearing the sari I slept in, smelling of sweat and dirt and train. A novel could be written about the train.

It's evening now, and the task at hand is to find the vegetable market (subzi mundi) and get some odds and ends...a clothes line, candles, soap, and kitchen goods. Most of the day has been spent in cleaning and arranging the house to make it feel more like home. Little green lizards called geckos run everywhere. One of them took shelter in the lantern I picked up while cleaning this afternoon, and suddenly it was sitting on my hand. I studied its beautiful lime green skin. Both of us were surprised.

I will write more in a day or so. I'm getting a blast of Hindi film music as i write, and it's a little hard to hear my own mind. I should get used to it in a couple days, since silence never happens anywhere I go in the city. I can barely contain my excitement when I see how many paper kites are being flown from the roof-tops by the children. It's still the season for it. We are going to buy 20 of them and bring them home in our suitcase, so those are also on our shopping list. One of my more successful Hindi phrases is: "Mujhe patang bohut pasand hai!" But telling the vegetable seller "I really like kites!" won't help me get the greens I need. Emergency lessons in numbers happens shortly. As my language increases, my fear will decrease, and i will find my own footing. Right now i can only tell Chris not to blow my cover by translating everything into English for me when he has a conversation with a local.

I need a drink...something cold. They sell an orange fizzy drink in India called "Mirinda." It's my favourite.
Peace to you
M.

[ Our place in Varanasi, for the month of September. ]