Dharamshala, si no fuera por los budistas, que habria de dharma en esta parada?

Aunque no sea nada nuevo, y ya estoy en EEUU, subo este trozo de texto de hace unas semanas por si a alguien le interesa.
Se me pasa todo entre los dias sin internet aqui y el curso de yoga que estoy haciendo aquí en Dharamshala, que queda en la faldita de las Himalayas (a 2,500 metros). Suficiente altitud para que me cueste subir (jadeando!) los 350 escalones rotos de piedra desde la escuela de yoga hasta la “main road”, una de las 3 calles en el pueblo de Mcleod Ganj, y donde hay que ir si quieres comprar fruta, comida, comer en un restaurante o café, etc!! Suffice it to say, voy a definir los musculos en las piernas en este pueblito este mes! Porque hay que subir todos los días, no (a no ser que pasas de comer para ahorrar los escalones)? Y desde luego que todo el pueblo y los alrededores están en cuesta bastante inclinada, pero esto ni se nota después de los escalones.
El lugar es muy bucólico - mongoose, cabras y vacas en los caminos de tierra, se ve todo el valle abajo, el amanecer es una pasada....ver el sol subir entre las montanyas. Hay mas especies de pájaro y insecto que descubro todos los días, aunque la verdad es que preferiría no descubrir mas cada dia en el pisito que estoy alquilando. Vamos, es peor que una acampada porque la fauna aquí tiene pinta salvaje, tropical, de montanya desconocida. No son los bichos que se puede encontrar en montanya en EEUU o Europa. He tenido que matar cosas en casa (gracias a dios, no eran cucarachas) con mas color y con pelos mas largos que llevaría una modernilla en Berlin. Ahora que lo pienso, no tengo ni idea de lo que seria la moda ahora en Europa, aunque sospecho que es la misma vaina de ochenterismo de antes (que me he ahorrado 6 meses de ver!). Siempre procuro atrapar y soltar lo que se puede desde mi balcón (con banderitas tibetanas y vistas de valle abajo) pero si el insecto tiene mas color que el mostrador de maquillaje de MAC no acerco la mano con el vaso para atraparlo y espero que mi karma de 32 anios de vida me lo compensa y se hace un balance.

India in Numbers

13 – highest number of mosquitoes I squished on my body in one single yoga practice in Goa
20 – drops of sweat counted falling off my head during one inhalation and exhalation in a handstand
315 –old, broken, muddy, stone steps needed to be climbed daily from the place I practice yoga in Dharamshala to the main road (where food can be bought)
200,000 too many people in the Old Delhi Railway Station
3 ½ hours – average length of my yoga practice in Goa
0 – number of temples I visited while in Goa
46 degrees Celsius – high temperature one day I was in Amritsar
246 rupees (about 5 bucks) – price of a sleeper class 12-hour train journey at night (sheets not included, snoring Indians included)
850 rupees (about 18 bucks) – price of a 2nd AC class 12-hour train journey at night (sheets included)
20 rupees (40 cents) – price of the best breakfast I had in Punjab
3 - # of times I’ve seen Indians get motion sickness on modes of transport I’ve taken
16 – the number of us that were stuffed into a shared taxi from Ellora to Aurangabad! That’s right! The average is usually a dozen Indians, but we got 16 of us in there, and keep in mind my non-petite frame! Plus there was a totally obese Indian man in the front seat!
700 rupees (about 14 bucks) – price you have to pay to share a mattress with someone you’ve never seen before on a sleeper bus while being transported 100s of kilometers
2 - # of times guys guessed I was 22 years old
11- # of days I have left here
3 – number of times I was scolded by Sharath in one single practice - “No, no! Not like that!”
63 – number of times I had to cover my face and run (a la fleeing the paparazzi) from the Indian men taking pictures of me with their cell phones (I hate this!)
7 – number of babies that were handed over to me so that they could take my picture with the baby (I love this!)
9:10 Ratio of girl births to boy births in 2010, suggesting more female babies are being aborted than males
47 – number of times I circumambulated (fast!) the rolling mantra wheel next to the Dalai Lama’s Kalachakra Temple, at the nun’s invitation. (She was the only other person in the room doing it and I understand why seeing how dizzy I was when I left the room – what’s better? Keep the gaze on the spinning wheel or keep the gaze on the painted Avalokiteshvaras on the wall that’s spinning around you?).
2 – number of times Indians asked me if I spoke Spanish
2 – number of times Indians tried to hold a conversation in Catalan with me
1 – number of times I was told I resemble Hannah Montana (ok, a child said it, but come on!)
333 - # of times I’ve fantasized about taking a shower with my mouth open
1 – number of times a yoga teacher kissed me (don’t worry – it was Rolf and on the cheek – but I hadn’t felt so much love in a long while!)

List of Firsts

I know I promised in January that I wouldn’t make endless lists of things on the blog but this has been a month of firsts (and the month’s not over yet, baby) so it’s quite unprecedented, as first times always are. These are primarily gustatory but may wander over to other areas of life.
First time I eat spicy dal curry on a beach, time 3 pm, temperature 100 degrees, humidity somewhere above 60%. It never even occurred to me that palak paneer or tarka dal could be beach food; all these years taking salads, cold couscous and fruit and sandwiches to the beach! What a fool I was!
First time I eat corn on the cob in India, also on the beach. No butter rub but even better for the blazing heat: the cob has lime juice squeezed all over it and a heavy sprinkling of masala chili and black salt. For the uninitiated, it’s an understatement to say that the acid of lemon/lime bring out the burn of chili powder. If you’ve never experienced this, it makes you sweat instantly (as well as making bacteria instantly die), and since it was searingly hot out and the corn had just been pulled off the fire and could hardly be held, the temperature plus the chili meant streams of sweat poured down my back like the Ganges in the first big melt of spring. My lips were the burnt-est part of it all, swollen and red from all that chili and lime by the time I gave up and gave the cob to the menacing and encroaching bull with horns who had decided he was finishing my corn.
First time I drank the fresh-squeezed sugar cane juice they press through those archaic machines that look like the printing press my mother has in the family room. This is what the guidebooks always warn you never to drink since the cups are reused and they could add water. Blah blah blah. Yeah, they did pour the juice over ice (and I know where they get the ice, who cuts it on the plastic tarp floor with bare feet and the dirty sharp killer knife in a shack with 8 people, because I saw huge chunks being cut and sold in a market in Calcutta). Four stalks of sugar cane equals four full cups of juice for thirsty people. No one ever mentioned the part that they squeeze lime juice in and add fresh ginger to your liking. I thought it was great, just sweet enough (not as sweet as soda) and fresh and green tasting. I just discovered a new use for that printing press when I get home.
First time I ever eat a whole mango on the beach. Some lady came over with 1000 fruits balanced on her head like Carmen Miranda and I couldn’t resist the mango for my list of firsts (of course I’ve eaten mango before but never on the beach). Yeah, she overcharged me but she was the one holding the knife (to cut the fruit).
First time I ever get my fruit salted. It was a fruit salad selection of the usual, watermelon, cantaloupe, orange, etc and I ate it how the Indians like it, with black salt. Hmmm, I’ll stick to my way. I like my fruit with nothing on it, not even ice cream.
First guava of the season. Divine! I may have to revise my list of favorite fruits; I think real fresh guava just beat out jackfruit and mango, so we’ve got a new number one. The new order of favorites is 1.) guava 2.) watermelon (necessary for rehydration in a place with almost no coconuts/very expensive coconuts) 3.) papaya (amazingly, this never made the list before and never appealed to me in Mysore or other parts of the world. Here, it’s incredible!)
First time I drink that nasty salty mountain tea, this time Kashmiri (also famous in Tibet and god knows where else!). Who ever thought of ruining a nice cuppa black tea with milk by adding wretched salt so that instead of being pleasant, it makes you want to gag? I’m sorry but this is the only thing on my list I hope never to repeat. That’s just disgusting and makes you thirstier than you were to start. What’s up with these mountain people? I’m not game. If that’s the taste of the Himalayas, no wonder the Tibetan monks come running fast and ask for refugee status in India. I would too.
First time I do a handstand. For real. In my life. First time my homework is “go home and do handstands in the afternoon to build strength”. (!!)
First time a teacher compliments some (any, please!) aspect of my yoga practice this year. I’ve been told the biggest compliment to my yoga practice is that Marci hasn’t tied me up in belts and propped up blocks and strapped me into one of her torture devices.
First time I have a croissant this year, spread with bitter orange marmalade and dipped in my cappuccino, thank you very much. You don’t think this is special, but you would if you’d been living in India for 4 months.
First time I get a new yoga pose since last September. Sigh. As always, life was easier without it.
First time I look with honest-to-god real fear into the yoga pose ahead of me, and first time Rolf (figuratively) holds my hand to help me over the dark parts.
First time I live in a place with dirt paths as roads. First time I live in a place with no paved roads. As a city girl, I think I can’t reiterate this enough.
First time I wear French lingerie out in public and ironically, it would be an Indian public. I don’t even take such liberties in liberal Europe or “free”-as-could-be US of A. But it’s also not so insanely hot anywhere else, and if the Indian ladies wear tank tops, I’ve got to one-up them somehow. Did I mention it’s fricking hot here? I do recall having worn this black slip as a skirt when I’d go to summer parties in Madrid when I was 21 but I’d never donned the Etam blue embroidered loungewear top beyond the doors of my own house (I remember even scandalizing a Wisconsinite roommate once by wearing it in my own living room). I finally understand why these summer months are low season and cheaper in Goa – because it’s so fricking hot, you’d have to pay most people to come here. Thank god I brought this stuff to sleep in, but of course it’s too hot at night to sleep in anything, and even the mosquito netting far overhead cuts off any drafts of fresh air.
First time I sweat more at night in my birthday suit than most people would in a Bikram yoga class.

Ode to Sarasvati

This is late in coming but I’ve found it rather difficult to do any sort of personal writing these last few months. Many discoveries I’ve made and things I’ve learned (and there have been many) haven’t been for public consumption. I do however want to make public my gratitude toward Saraswati Rangaswamy, who, more than most others, has shown her tireless strength in continuously giving to her students. Despite her age (approx. 70), she is constantly getting up and down off the floor six to eight hours a day, sitting cross-legged, giving students tight and hard adjustments, doing serious backbend work daily with hundreds of students, even doing the students that Sharath and the assistants pussy out of doing, and doing it without complaining about her sore back, which students, assistants and people half her age do. And let’s face it, we know she has a sore back, because even you do as you’re comfortably reading this while seated, and you’re probably not 70. How can the woman so continuously, day in and day out, be “at work” already at 5.15 am and still not finish the afternoon the shift til after 5 or sometimes 6 pm? If you’ve ever practiced in the shala, you’re probably familiar with the feeling of exhaustion, but can you imagine working with literally 100s of students every day, year after year after year, with those hours, and at least six and often seven days a week (her students still come on Saturday, the day that Sharath gets off)? And she never complains of familial duties and responsibilities like Sharath does, which she obviously has and had in abundance, raising a larger family in a previous era in India with much less wealth and fewer conveniences than Sharath’s family enjoys now.
I know she had a lot of the responsibility and care for Guruji before he died, having two complete years of sleepless nights, attending him and sleeping on the floor by his bedside in case he needed anything in the night. And then she’d get up in the morning after little or no sleep and get cleaned up and do her chants and by 5.15, the woman would be doing adjustments and backbends in the hundreds. My first trip to Mysore, when there were about 350 people who had come for Guruji’s last birthday, I remember counting the number of people’s backbends she would do and Sharath would do in the same amount of time, and being astonished by the woman. And this was after her sleepless, aching nights.
This winter, one rough Sunday morning led class, I remember being tired, or maybe just not quite awake (although I had been fully awake at 3.15 am when I woke up, I’d gotten sleepy again by 5.30 or 6 am) and I, in a down dog, I looked up and back into Saraswati’s office where she was doing her morning chants from her prayer book as she starts the day every morning, and she was fast asleep on her arms and book on the desk, just as an elementary or middle school kid falls asleep on his books (I’m very familiar with this pose). The poor woman really needed a break and a rest, but there she was at 5.30, doing her prayers before having to do Sharath’s second led class of the day. Later she woke up and continued her recitations. I realized my momentary tiredness was nothing like this woman’s exhaustion and the load she bears every day, and which she does willingly and with never a negative word or showing her tiredness ever. She does it because it’s the fortune she was given and the tradition and family she was lucky enough to be born into and be part of (and she knows it) and she does it out of love for yoga and her father. She embodies yoga and has so much of Guruji.
She is so underappreciated but she is the one who has carried the torch all along, and continued the line from her father. Fittingly, the goddess Sarasvati, the goddess of worldly knowledge, is named for the flow and fluidity which she embodies (Saras + vati = “the one with flow/having flow” in Sanskrit). This flow includes the flow of knowledge from teacher to student and the flow of knowledge from one generation to the next, so there is no stagnation or blockage in the flow and in learning, creating knowledge by destroying ignorance. The goddess Sarasvati ensures that knowledge is transmitted from one generation to the next, something which the worldly woman Saraswati Rangaswamy does every day of her life (and which is primarily a motherly role and responsibility anyway).
This woman is the rock of Gibraltar and you know what? I just want to tell you that, until reaching Rolf’s studio here in Goa, she is the yoga teacher who has believed in me and my abilities more than any other teacher has except Nick Evans. She had faith in me the whole time and from day one, and had faith in my abilities even when I had lost faith in what I could do and was feeling so small and feeble (Feb. and part of March). This is a strong woman. When I was totally lost and had given up on myself (although I may have still looked externally strong, as well as sweaty), she was standing in front of me saying, “You do! You can!!” And I realized this woman’s strength (of mind and will as well as physical) and that she was transmitting it as only the best yoga teachers do, but that she wasn’t doing it through fancy language or subtle tricks to convince the mind of the student before her. From that day I’ve been regaining faith in myself and my abilities and have decided “there’s no more saying no”, no more “not today”, no holds barred in life, yoga and the pursuit of everything.
Did you think this was going to be about Hindu mythology? I’m sorry. I can’t express my gratitude to this lady enough.

A lil' edification

In an aim to write about more than just yoga, here are a few bits of information which some of you may not have known.

Everyone's familiar with paisley (estampado de cachemira), the print that proper dandies have on their cravats (or any old British fop would wear) and which had a boom in the 80s. Not everyone is aware that the pattern was really Indian in origin, although the name in Spanish suggests something of the sort (cachemira, Kashmir). I'm hoping Prince William will sport some in his upcoming royal wedding gear (maybe a nice silk pocket hanky), not to demonstrate and assert his role as Britain's military leader or the British Empire's superiority over Indians, but rather as a nod to the Indians' influence in fashion today.
http://www.indian-heritage.org/artcraft/designs/mango.html
Oh, I forgot to mention the most important part. The paisley pattern does not feature a "paisley". It features everybody's favorite fruit, the mango. This image and pattern can be found all over India (like on kitchen bowls or bordering a temple's awning/gables). Yes, it is a repeated expression of the Indian's love for mango, which I and most sane people share.

Speaking of paisley, what's today's fashion accessory which most frequently bears the paisley pattern? That's right - gangsters' bandanas (AKA handkerchief AKA panuelo). Did gangs invent the bandana? I don't think so. Who did, you ask? You may have guessed right. The Indians did. And if you've done any yoga, the word bandana may sound familiar to you. Really, it's bandhana (related to tying, like bandhas - inner locks/ties). Bandha is where we get the word bound and bind in English, which is what you do with your bandana if you are a gangster - bind it around your head or wrist or ankle if you want to be cool or whatever. You could also stick it in your pocket to be associated with some gangs, but to me that seems more like you want to be associated with British royalty and aristocracy, except in the cotton sort of way (for animal rights' activists who don't use silk because of the silkworms killed in the silk-making process). If you were gay and had a dog, you could also tie the bandana around your dog's neck, thus associating him/her with some gang or other. Remember, silk paisley print material is upper class wear, for right fops, and cotton bandanas are working class gear, to keep your hair back and the sweat from getting in your eyes. Generally nowadays, you don't see too many working class Indians wearing bandanas, because they'll tie any old rag they can get their hands on around their heads to keep the sweat from pouring into their eyes as they labor and toil under the blazing Indian sun They'll even tie an old wool sweater which will make even more sweat pour into their eyes than if they didn't have anything at all tied around their heads. Remember, you're making a fashion statement when you accesorize - it's not only about functionality.
http://www.fotosearch.com/photos-images/bandana.html
That brings me to the last item of the day: indigo. (The reference to India should be obvious here at least).
I could be talking about a range in the electromagnetic spectrum somewhere from 446 and 464 nanometers per wavelength, as we perceive it in visible light. Sir Isaac Newton considered indigo to be one of seven colors in the spectrum. Many later scientists reject his idea, since possibly he defined seven colors so that waves of visible light (color) could be equated to the seven notes (wavelengths of sound) in a musical scale and to seven days in a week. These later scientists say that indigo and violet are both hues of blue, meaning colors in the spectrum aren't equated to anything, neither sound nor time, which is rather boring and scientific. :(
Besides color and light, indigo was the Greek name for dye (indikon), suggesting that in the past, everybody (or at least the Ancient Greeks) only wore blue clothes and had blue sheets, as that was the color the Indians dyed their fabric. This also indirectly implies that Indians were the ancient world's dyers and technological leaders in this textile industry, which is most assuredly truer than my last declaration. An even more correct statement would be that Indians were the world's dyers for the ancient world (as it is encompassed in the purely Western-centric system), only to be surpassed in time by the Dutch, Flemish, Netherlandish and Brabantine (ok, let's just say the Low Countries) in the medieval era, basically dyeing all of Europe's cloth. To recap, in a western-based perspective, Indians dyed the ancient world's cloth and the Low Country-ers dyed the medieval world's cloth. And of course, we use the word indigo for the color because of the Indians' influence.
This was for all of you who think that India is only great because of Gandhi, having inspired a few Beatles' songs, and palak paneer.

How I see it

Whenever I go to Shaivite temples, I always think of the “Hindu” concept of darshan (viewing/vision). The idea is that when you go to temple to worship, among the sensations of incense burning, flowers, incantations, contrasts of light with deep darkness in corners, bell-ringing, anvil pounding, gold and brass shining, the “high point” of a temple visit is seeing the main murti (idol figure/representation of god which is worshipped). The murti is not always on view; oftentimes it is covered by a curtain or completely closed off under metal blinds, or even encased in what seems to be a golden safe just like the royal jewels. Contact with a Brahmin priest in a temple is your opportunity to get closer to the murti, view it, and, as the idea goes, this is when the murti (or really god, working through the medium of the statue) sees you. Traditionally, when going to temple, viewing of the murti should only be for a few minutes and from far away (at least some distance/separation). At times the figure may leave the temple and be used in processions, but this is not the norm. It is believed that the power of the effigy dissipates with time. Part of the priests’ role using Vedic chants is to bring back some of the power/aura which has been dispersed through repeated viewings by so many people. This is also why the effigy is kept closed up at night and many times during the day in the dark, dark, sanctum sanctorum in the center deep in the temple.
I am attracted to the idea of the idol figure’s power becoming more diffused with time upon viewing, like you’re really wearing out the divinity/holiness in the effigy with your eyes, unless rituals are performed to retain this aura. (I also love the way the murtis are fanned by Brahmin priests to cool them off after so many flames in ghee lamps are waved before them over and over, but this is irrelevant when considering darshan.)
The idea of the god viewing you as you view it (through an artistic or at least manmade representation, also generally made in man’s image) is the most interesting point here. In the same way that a woman’s gaze might meet yours in a painting, establishing contact, intimacy and even affinity or mutual understanding between you and the painting’s subject, the darshan of when the god sees the temple-visitor is really a main reason for which Hindus visit important temples (which have murti with a strong aura) instead of simply worshipping at home, with their various home altars, shrines and pooja rooms. Hindus don’t go to temple only to get a glimpse of God, they go to temple because they want God to see them. Really, it is a mutual viewing, making eye contact and establishing connection/union under the steady gaze of the Godhead.
The idea of darshan (view, vision, perspective, teachings) also includes different ways of seeing and understanding the world within Indian philosophy, of which there are many schools, as well as the darshan (wisdom/advice) that a swami or religious leader could offer to you upon seeing you. He offers his perspective/view on you when you go to see/view him.
The whole idea of viewing and understanding things is taken up a notch when one considers that in many darshans of Indian philosophy, there is no duality. God or a divine spirit is everywhere, in everyone, in you, in every bit of matter. There is no objectivity, no subject versus object, no “you versus them” – it’s all one. That’s all fine, but it becomes a subtler idea when you have a reciprocal gaze, as when viewing deities in temples. You have the privilege of looking at them and they are looking at you, and following from the tat tvam asi concept (“you are that”), it’s all one anyway (not that you’re looking at yourself but rather that there is no division between the observer and the observed). In the same way that some mutual understanding and intimacy is established between you and the figure in a Degas portrait, the understanding of each other’s presence and the intimacy which a reciprocal gaze between god and you implies make use of the physical sense of sight to more readily establish your connection and unity with God. Humans understand the world, universe and everything through the senses, later processed by the mind, so we will better understand our link to god and participation in non-duality through visual stimulus (sight is a mode of transmitting information or “truth” which we humans are particularly disposed to understanding).
For me the puzzling part is when you go to a Shiva temple, as I mentioned at the beginning. Shiva is not traditionally represented with a doll or effigy taking on human form in temple. Normally you can find a shivalingam (or many!), representing the union of feminine and masculine elements, among other things (as does yin/yang). This is not an anthropomorphic form, although the symbolic representation of female and male reproductive organs could be loosely considered to be some human representation. Nine times out of ten, Shiva temples are filled with shivalingams. Occasionally they’ll have a head or a gold mask, or may have his whole body as a murti, but this is the exception, not the rule. Very occasionally, a lingam stone (or other stones of worship representing god) are given two painted eyes (nothing could be stranger, if the shivalingam is the combined symbol of genitalia, than to have two eyes!), giving the shivalingam the ability to see you! Shivalingam with eyes are few and far between, leaving the temple-goer with a different experience than when he goes to Vishnu or Ganesh temples, for example. Generally, the aura of magic, darkness and sometimes creepy bareness and silence (instead of bright gold/Vishnu) pervade in Shiva temples, and the power and energy of the lingam seem to float in the air all over the temple. The Shiva temple-goer’s experience is mystical, heavy, dank, and dark (he is the destroyer, after all) but the air is pregnant with energy, and sharply contrasts the experience of a Lakshmi/Vishnu temple, replete with shiny gold, flowers in exuberant abundance, images of prosperity and good fortune everywhere you look.
So my doubt is (the part where I don’t see clearly, or, I’m in the dark): Does “Shiva” or the Godhead really view you as you view it/him through the lingam? If it has a few brushstrokes of paint (as eyes), then it does, as some village deities have eyes painted on stone, although they may lack an anthropomorphic form. And if the lingam doesn’t have eyes? Does the same rule apply? Is the lingam also the vehicle through which god sees you, like other murtis? Ironically, Shiva is the god with above average number of eyes to start with. His third eye (tryambakam) wouldn’t have been used to view you, though; its purpose was to burn away desire into ashes (Shiva eyes in stones such as agate are a common iconographic image found across India). Regardless, the lingam form is an abstraction and anyway, should the external form really matter when it’s just a medium for the content and energy which is underlying. So the part that still leaves me wondering almost uncomfortably (is he watching? is he not? These aren’t the right questions, but it’s hard to put into words) is of little import. It would be impossible to understand the perspective or vision which the god’s side has of it (or of us) and besides, in a system of non-duality, it is pointless to consider any perspective or viewpoint of an “other”, as there is no “other” or “otherness”.
What’s your view on it?

And Now for Something Completely Different...

I don't want to get too ponderous on the yoga because there's so much more to India. I also don't want to bore with details from my daily private Sanskrit classes with a true whiz, a man with a brilliant mind, although, like all things Indian, he teaches some things backwards (not a problem for a yogi like me). I feel truly privileged to be his student ( as I also have with my other Sanskrit teachers), plus I'm lucky that he's also patient (with my sluggish western writing skills in Sanskrit and my stilted knowledge of the language). As a surprise bonus, when we're chanting the noun declensions (24 for each word, thank you very much), I try to do as much as possible memorized and eyes closed, and when it's flowing well, I get to this strange trance-like state which I've almost only previously achieved through meditation or watching strange contemporary video art pieces; the curious part is that this normally happens when I turn my brain off, but when I'm chanting the nouns (which still requires me to use much of my limited cerebral resources), I can get to the same state. Very nice. Then it weirds me out that I'm sitting on the living room floor on a cushion with this petite-framed intense brahmin with a beard and hair pulled back in a bun, gold shiny sandalwood paste smudged across his forehead, all decked out in his finest gold-trimmed pure white bed sheets, chanting one word a million ways. Even stranger, when we chant the word cow, it really sounds like my teacher is "mooing"; the word totally sounds like a cow bellowing and mooing. And when we chant the word river, the words ribbon up and down, flowing and ebbing, and there are parts where I can even see the waters bubbling up, and rushing back. It's much more lilting when he chants this one (I don't know if he's aware of this). Same thing, we chant the word earth, and it really seems to emanate and arise out of nothing (the word earth in Sanskrit, bhu, means something that came to be), this time pulsing in waves. Now you think I'm crazy. There is a sonoral expressiveness in this language which is much more obvious and sensatory than with most languages.
So, the "now for something completely different" was really to tell of my attendance of school performance day at the school where Ratna's girls, Bhoomi and Megha, go. Really, the show was performed in the city center in the Jaganmohan Palace (beautiful, Muslim-influenced architectonic backdrop for such an event). I was expecting a nice sedate show of traditional Indian dance and song, folk songs, Karnatic dance, etc. Which it was.
I wasn't expecting the 12 huge speakers and sub-woofers pumping out music as loud as in any music festival, which was reverberating back and forth in the all wood auditorium like a wicked disco with twisted acoustics. There were traditional dances, one with the smallest children with a shirtless fat boy dressed as Ganesh with a long trunk nose and all the little children dancing around. There were also classic Bollywood numbers of crazy modern dance music (we know how much Indians love wild Bollywood drumming and fast beats) and I can't figure it out, but 2 of the medleys ended with gabber!!! No joke!!! There was even a pseudo-breakdancing number with the oldest teenage boys dressed as Americans which I found particularly amusing. Everyone knows I'm not a fan of bad dance music but with the Indian rhythms and scales, it's much much better. This video is very poor in quality (my camera is a photo camera and I didn't realize til too late that I could have gone into the orchestra pit to record) but maybe you can get a sense of the dance which starred Megha (9 years) as lead dancer. This was a traditional folk dance but still had crazy loud music. The quality of the video is dismal at best (I wasn't expecting it to start and couldn't change the quality once I'd started), so I recommend just turning the music up loud.