I can declare that after trying the majority of the "biscuits" here in Kolkata, my official favorite is (drum roll, please...) Priya Elaichi Creme! They not only have cardamom flavored frosting and cost five rupees, but the creme is also tinted a beautifully fake green color, such as you can only find in artificial food coloring. Biscuits are really more like cheap, packaged cookies in such a variety- salty and sweet, round and square, cream filled or plain. They're best eaten during an evening stroll around the city, or an evening constitutional, as some well-worded people might call such a walk. Let me know if you want to try them, and I'll send you a package.
Another exciting snippet of information is that I am now an official member of Naga Christian Fellowship, I even filled out a form. This means that for the remainder of my Sundays in Kolkata, I get to hear special songs by boys wearing "If there isn't Bacardi in heaven, I ain't going there" t-shirts. Oh, the joy.
And finally, I rejoice in the fact that after years of searching, I have discovered a language with as much time confusion as I have. In Bengali, the word borshu means both day after tomorrow and day before yesterday.
"My India is Great!" (As the blue dump trucks say. I couldn't agree more.)
Sunday, September 30, 2007
Friday, September 28, 2007
feelings of flimsiness
Today I had a picnic in a park, all too complete with a trail of ants. My dear-hearted Lara and I picked up some bread and fruit and sweets and made some space for ourselves on a green bench.
Kolkata at night is my favorite. Perhaps because its swollen and slow-moving, having eaten too much rice for dinner. Maybe because at night you see labourers and lovers taking a slight break from the cares of the day. Maybe because cities at night make me want to wander into a small cafe and chat till morning.
I feel sort of flimsy these days. I'm overwhelmed by my own thoughts and the complexity of this woven life which in truth, I was never asked to unravel. I'm walking around in sackcloth and ashes. It's a hurting unlike what I've felt here so far. It's not acute or emotional. It's sort of numbing. I'm grieving the abandonment that has taken root in the children at Shanti Dan. I'm grieving the loss of autumn. I'm wishing I could share two things with my sister: an americano and the beauty of morning prayers to God through Our Lady, Mary. I smell like playdough and sweat. It seems like just when you find joy and contentment, it slips away. Ocean waves. Such is life. I'm going to wait with sandy, salt crusted feet. I'm here, whenever you want to wash back my way.
Kolkata at night is my favorite. Perhaps because its swollen and slow-moving, having eaten too much rice for dinner. Maybe because at night you see labourers and lovers taking a slight break from the cares of the day. Maybe because cities at night make me want to wander into a small cafe and chat till morning.
I feel sort of flimsy these days. I'm overwhelmed by my own thoughts and the complexity of this woven life which in truth, I was never asked to unravel. I'm walking around in sackcloth and ashes. It's a hurting unlike what I've felt here so far. It's not acute or emotional. It's sort of numbing. I'm grieving the abandonment that has taken root in the children at Shanti Dan. I'm grieving the loss of autumn. I'm wishing I could share two things with my sister: an americano and the beauty of morning prayers to God through Our Lady, Mary. I smell like playdough and sweat. It seems like just when you find joy and contentment, it slips away. Ocean waves. Such is life. I'm going to wait with sandy, salt crusted feet. I'm here, whenever you want to wash back my way.
Sunday, September 23, 2007
a few poems... again
Finding a Church
we don't think the same
be the same
share the same ideals
sometimes i worship theology
we don't see the same
sing the same
create the same beauty
sometimes i worship art
we don't touch the same
commune the same
seek the same poor
always i worship love
here in the noise
not of buses
but synthesizers
and parroted repeating
here in the colour
not of nature
but waxen flowers
and velvet curtains
here in the Hallelujahs
i shout to love
'ready or not,
here i come!'
Shobuj Brishtir Nice*
the last time i tripped
and fell
and scraped my knee
i cried
not from pain
but from the sight of the blood
not from seeing myself bleed
but from watching it run
Red
down my leg like vein patterns
worn on the outside
for decorative purposes
driving up the mountain
the one marked
with Tibetan prayer flags
flipping their farewells
like train station kerchiefs
waving goodbye to me
in a gesture of welcome
i knew what i must do
and with a quaking hand
i cut clean
with an old forked stick
down the ragged scar
i thought was out of sight
out of mind
i wept then
with the delight of myself
recognizable once again
as the familiar green
came instantly pounding
and singing
in rivulets of cell and chlorophyll
feet in the dirt
and a voice in its own
stream of a self
my hands a clasped clay
cup full of the liquid story
of my fluid life
i tossed it up
to hit the underbelly of the clouds
and come raining back down on me
who has found a place in the garden
just another tree
i raise my limbs to the sky
like theirs
to catch peace in our webs of leaf
and drip green together
* Under the Green Rain
we don't think the same
be the same
share the same ideals
sometimes i worship theology
we don't see the same
sing the same
create the same beauty
sometimes i worship art
we don't touch the same
commune the same
seek the same poor
always i worship love
here in the noise
not of buses
but synthesizers
and parroted repeating
here in the colour
not of nature
but waxen flowers
and velvet curtains
here in the Hallelujahs
i shout to love
'ready or not,
here i come!'
Shobuj Brishtir Nice*
the last time i tripped
and fell
and scraped my knee
i cried
not from pain
but from the sight of the blood
not from seeing myself bleed
but from watching it run
Red
down my leg like vein patterns
worn on the outside
for decorative purposes
driving up the mountain
the one marked
with Tibetan prayer flags
flipping their farewells
like train station kerchiefs
waving goodbye to me
in a gesture of welcome
i knew what i must do
and with a quaking hand
i cut clean
with an old forked stick
down the ragged scar
i thought was out of sight
out of mind
i wept then
with the delight of myself
recognizable once again
as the familiar green
came instantly pounding
and singing
in rivulets of cell and chlorophyll
feet in the dirt
and a voice in its own
stream of a self
my hands a clasped clay
cup full of the liquid story
of my fluid life
i tossed it up
to hit the underbelly of the clouds
and come raining back down on me
who has found a place in the garden
just another tree
i raise my limbs to the sky
like theirs
to catch peace in our webs of leaf
and drip green together
* Under the Green Rain
so pleased to meet you
I'm still catching the blog up on life here, so here's something from what seems like forever ago. It's just a little somethin' I wrote right after arriving...
It was raining when we arrived in Kolkata. I rolled down the taxi window anyway, if only to keep from being suffocated by the incense burning to Ganesh, stuck in the dashboard like smouldering birthday candles. It's almost my birthday, too, I tell him. Just in case he wants to throw me a surprise party. Our driver in a wet and dirty tanktop, the once-had-been white now transparent from some combination of sweat and rain. The horns are a sort of sonar it seems, like bats flitting around trying not to collide. Shush, I tell them. Let me meet the city. Introductions are sacred. Like puja, like prayer. In them you read the silent longings, the spiritual pleas. Like an old text, an ancient scroll. In this manner we greeted each other, Kolkata and I. I read boldly its crippling poverty, its burning spirituality, and its beauty which is rooted in a history older than my body plus my soul, times a thousand. In return its scalpel eyes saw my crippling selfishness, my spiritual poverty, my burning desire for love. I kneel to touch the feet of this place, and it returns the blessing with a hand on my head. As I walk away from this first impression, I am actually moving in. Moving to this place where wounds like tendons lay exposed, still pulsing with inextinguishable breath. Out of my silence then came the only word I knew to say. One that's been lying dormant and dust covered for awhile now. Mercy, I whispered like a lullabye to the men sleeping exhausted on their rickshaws. Mercy! I shouted at the marble hotels, white... oh-so-white. Everywhere the word fell it returned from, louder and shining. Mercy, the wind whispered in song as I slept. Mercy! it shouted and rained down respite life.
It was raining when we arrived in Kolkata. I rolled down the taxi window anyway, if only to keep from being suffocated by the incense burning to Ganesh, stuck in the dashboard like smouldering birthday candles. It's almost my birthday, too, I tell him. Just in case he wants to throw me a surprise party. Our driver in a wet and dirty tanktop, the once-had-been white now transparent from some combination of sweat and rain. The horns are a sort of sonar it seems, like bats flitting around trying not to collide. Shush, I tell them. Let me meet the city. Introductions are sacred. Like puja, like prayer. In them you read the silent longings, the spiritual pleas. Like an old text, an ancient scroll. In this manner we greeted each other, Kolkata and I. I read boldly its crippling poverty, its burning spirituality, and its beauty which is rooted in a history older than my body plus my soul, times a thousand. In return its scalpel eyes saw my crippling selfishness, my spiritual poverty, my burning desire for love. I kneel to touch the feet of this place, and it returns the blessing with a hand on my head. As I walk away from this first impression, I am actually moving in. Moving to this place where wounds like tendons lay exposed, still pulsing with inextinguishable breath. Out of my silence then came the only word I knew to say. One that's been lying dormant and dust covered for awhile now. Mercy, I whispered like a lullabye to the men sleeping exhausted on their rickshaws. Mercy! I shouted at the marble hotels, white... oh-so-white. Everywhere the word fell it returned from, louder and shining. Mercy, the wind whispered in song as I slept. Mercy! it shouted and rained down respite life.
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
puja season is upon us
We are entering the season of Pujas, folks. Puja means prayer, specifically prayer to the Hindu gods and godesses. It is also what the celebrations for these same dieties are called. Starting with "motor vehicle puja," which isn't its official name, of course. During motor vehicle puja, all the cars were draped with streamers and garlands of marigolds, and offerings of sweets and incense burned under their parked hoods. Pigments marked their metal forms in streaks and dots, as on the foreheads of devotees returning from the temple. Kali Puja and Durga Puja are coming up, along with the festival of lights, with prizes for the best displays. Apparentely the US isn't the only country whose celebrations have become competitions, also. I know the celebration time has come because a few days ago I woke at five am to classic Bollywood Hindi songs blaring from the site of a soon-to-be display outside my window. Overnight the braces for a huge structure have gone up several stories high, and men climb around on these like circus performers to secure the frame with rope. Bamboo structures are going up in different communities across the city. With only poles and canvas, huge replicas will be made of the Taj Mahal, the Victoria Memorial... even the White House has been known to have its very own Puja replica. Trust me, India, one White House is more than enough for all of us.
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