You Really Have to Be There
I’ve struggled to make order out of everything we’ve seen, smelled, and experienced, but I’m afraid that’s well beyond my capability. Two weeks is a short time and India is a big, complex piece of geography, history and humanity. The best I can do is to share some of the impressions we take with us. They are presented here in absolute random order. That is to say I’m writing them down as I think of them which may, or may not, have anything to do with how or when they occurred. I’m writing this as we’re on the way from Paris to Houston, a ten hour daylight flight after a nine hour night time flight which departed Delhi at 1:20 am. So I ask for some...Land of Many Gods
Those of you how know me well know that I’m not exactly “traditional” on matters religious. I guess that’s what you get when you send a boy to Baylor. I tread here lightly for fear that any observation will offend, but please remember, these are only observations about something that I know little of and understand even less. The religions of India are pervasive as well as invasive. They hit you in the face by their omni-presence. They are everywhere and anywhere. From the Muslim call to prayer at 5:00 each morning to the amplified music announcing the day to the Hindu. The Sikhs are obvious by their turbans and beards, and the Krishna are annoying with...Oh Boy, the Oberoi
I’ve stayed in them all at one time or another. Virtually all of the great hotels of the world. I’m excluding here for this discussion the destination resort hotels where one goes en famille to squabble with fat families from New Jersey for deck chairs by the pool or get sand in unmentionable places while baking in the sun. I mean the hotels where people go when visiting a city for business or pleasure. The St. Regis in New York, the Alvear Palace in Buenos Aires, the Okura in Tokyo, the Four Seasons pretty much anywhere, the Dorchester and Stafford in London, the Oriental in Bangkok, and so on….you get the idea. And on this trip we’ve stayed at the...Mad Dogs In A Meathouse
S. held back as long as she could. She had been patient with seeing old palaces with guides that told us far more than we wanted to know. She had even been a good trooper on the long and harrowing car trips. But now, by god, she wanted some good ol’ fashioned shop til you drop time. She even did research…..asked other ladies in the bar of the hotel, looked at he published adverts that the hotel handed out, she even asked advice from the guide. She warned me that she wasn’t going to put up with any dithering or complaining from me, and I agreed that the day was going to be hers. I was just along for the ride. She had targeted and placed a local...