How to quit your job and travel around the world

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Today we traveled out to a Hindu temple in Guruyavoor, 33 km from Thrissur where we are staying, by bus. We couldn't go inside as it was "Hindu only" but walking around the exterior we saw some kind of cermemony that involved men dancing and a guy drumming. Ceremony is everywhere - on our way back from Guruyavoor we passed this procession with the classically decorated elephants. We also visted elephant sanctuary 3 km outside of Guruyavoor is home to about 67 elephants who are spread out several acres. My understanding is that people own the elephants and house them here.

I suppose I am/was having a knee jerk reaction to my perception of how women function here - I think the first few days were surprising, but now that my eyes have adjusted I do see women everywhere and they are quick to give me the most beautiful smiles (at least the teenage girls). Overall, I am feeling much better about the situation - although I was reading last night in Bumiller's book about the "sati" ritual where upon a widow throws herself on the funeral pyre and burns to death. The book was written in the late 1980s and I was thinking to myself that surely the practice was so archiac by now that it didn't happen. Today when I picked up India Times newspaper, on the front page was a story about a sati that occured in the North on Friday. I don't understand most things here - all I can do is basically be a compassionate and respectful visitor. Everything, everything is different here and full of contrasts.

We took the train - 3rd class - this morning from Cochin to Thrissur, about 2 hours north. It was realtively painless, but it would be hard to travel longer than that in 3rd class. People are packed in and we didn't scramble hard enough or long enough to nab a seat, so we sat on our backpacks in the aisle. The train entry is narrow and when the train arrives people push so hard to get on that you have no choice but to also start elbowing an 80 year old woman and knocking a 14 year old around. Though we didn't get harassed/groped/stared at too badly today, we are thinking about starting to take the "ladies only" train. [The is really the first time in my life I have felt such blatant sexism (is that even the right word?) I felt in SEAsia that women were generally as much a public face as men (though in Cambodia I recall never seeing any women), but here their lives are held, for the most part, in private. I am reading Elisabeth Bumiller's "May You Have a Thousand Sons" - or something like that, which is an incredible book on the subject.]

One of my preconceptions about India, is that you basically have diarrhea from the minute you step off the plane. (And you know how much I like to talk about poop!) But I haven't been sick at all since I arrived, so preconception #1 is out. (Please knock on wood.) We have been eating at normal restaurants (lots of dal, appams - a kind of rice bread, mutton curry and sweet, milky tea) for about 40 to 60 ruppees each ($1 to $1.50). Bottled water of course. And we have to ask for spoons because everyone eats with their hands. They eat SOUP with their hands. Soup! I have to say I am trying to be culturally sensitive, but I just can't deal with the hand eating after knowing where my unwashed hand has been. And unlike Asia, the rice isn't sticky so you can't make a little platform/scoop for the food. I don't get it. One guy, who was offended with our use of fork and spoon, insisted we were missing the final - and most important - seasoning to teh food. He pointed to his cupped palm and announced, "This is where the real flavor comes from!"

Preconception #2: I would die of heat. Truth: Yes, it's very hot here, and extremely humid but as we get closer to the monsoon (our vague plan is to stay three days ahead of he monsoon aswe travel northwards) the night rain is keepign things cool-ish. Indian men wear dotis - sort of a male sari. It's a piece of white fabric worn wrapped around the waist and then attached with a loose knot. They can wear them up as a knee lengeth skirt and down full length. I imagine it's to keep them cool (and for the record, they do wear underwear underneath. At least most men do.). But all the men also seem to spend an inordinate amount of time arranging their dotis. Its up. It's down. Another Indian gyu told me that in the north they say productivity is half in the South because men spend so much time on their dotis and not on their work.

Preconception #3: English is English, so I should be able to speak with many Indians. Truth: I understand like maybe 5 percent of some conversations held in English. I have no idea what they are saying (and saying quickly) even though ostensibly written on paper we could both understand. Every region, especially in the South, has their own language and in the north they speak Hindi. Therefore English the language that Indians use amongst themselves if they are traveling. However, the pronuciation, inflection, word order, thought system - in short everything - behind the vocabulary itself - is nothing you and I can really relate to. Add to this, a slightly confusing head movement - almost a bobble - that means "Why not?" or "As you wish" - but for us looks like "No" and you can see that things get confusing.

Where to begin? India. I am in India. I have to pinch myself because it's everything and nothing at all like I was expectng. I arrrived very early Tuesday morning and fell asleep as the call to prayer rang out over the city at dawn. My overwhelming understanding within my first day of being here is that we are everything and we are nothing.

There are one billion people in India, so why I thought the airport would be desolate at 3 a.m. is my first mistake. People literally have to take turns living in shifts. The flight from Bombay to Cochin was packed and we watched a Bollywood flick and ate a mystery curry. Then from the Cochin airport I took a white cab shaped like peanut to the guest house. We are staying in Ernakalum, near the historical port of Cochin, whcih is stunnngly beautiful and full of history (we're talking pre AD historical) and once was the site of Vasco de Gama's tomb (now in Portugal.) It is an easy city to enter India by - relatively rich, beautiful, charming old town and not too crowded. If you want to see where I am in on a map - look for the state of Kerala on the SW coast and Cochin is in th emiddle on the coast.

The one thing that I wasn't prepared for - or wasn't expecting - is that you just don't see that many women out. Or rather there are groups of men everywhere - I never been in a place where there are so many men. (And they have a little game called "Grab Ass"). Though tonight we stopped by a jewlery store, where it was packed with women. Culture shock is less for me, than gender shock here. Oh, and it's a "dry" state too, so no beer unless you go to a hotel bar. (Though some westernish young Indian guys who are in IT asked to escort us for some covert G&Ts.)

There are just too many things to notice here to do justice to on a blog - and I can't load photos at this Internet cafe .... we're taknig a day trip to the Kerala Backwaters tomorrow. Will try and get pics up soon as I feel it's almost the only thing I can do to present a somewhat honest image of what it is like here.

I was at a party the other night in Hong Kong's equivalent of Williamsburg when a young Aussie declared that the US was the world's largest third world country. Well, having just been to a money exchange where the dollar is sliding fast and making each bhat/dong/ruppee that much more vaulable, it's looknig plausible. That, and the fact that they have Internet, mannicures and massages available here at the Bangkok airport for long layovers. Like, where is that service at JFK? And of course world events aren't helping either.

Waiting for my flight to Mumbai, where I then connect to Kochi to arrive at 2:45 a.m. And just got confirmed that my return flight to New York on June 15 - so brace yourselves. Unless I find a guru. And devote myself to a higher power. Which is plausible too. OH MY GOD, I am going to India! In 30 minutes! Rupees! Gurus! Banghra! Dal! Bollywood! Move over Amber!

There was a contest, which I read about in Jonathan Ames' essay collection, called "The Most Phallic Building in the World" - well here's my submission from Hong Kong. The IFC building, also currently in the top 10 of tallest buildings, looks like, well - a giant metallic dildo in my humble opinion. Here's the view from our room.