I Dream in Green
25 December 2004
The Christmas Installment: Thieving Monkeys, and an Unfortunate Buffalo
today:
a monkey stole my bag of peanuts. proceeded to reach into my backpack. throw my waterbottles aside. started to reach for my books. -HEY!!!- i'm standing up now. barefoot. a couple walks by -PLEASE! can you help me!?!-
["are you writing a story? some funny story?" --yes! i'm writing a letter to
all of my friends at home, about some things that happened here.--
"oh.."
--listen to this: today i was at the temples-- "alone?" --yes, alone.
watching the sun set. it was beautiful.....]
(yes. i am scared of the two-foot-tall monkey. he is baring his teeth and growling. and he is extremely dexterous with his little monkey hands.) "no leave out eat-ables! no eat-ables!" (the couple) -SKAT!- he pulls out a plastic bag -GET!- reaches for my hat -HEY!- three more monkeys and a goat are circling. shoes on now. waving arms. "no leave out eat-ables" (uh thanks....)
["ah hA HAhaha. next time you shouldn't go alone. _I'LL_ go with you!"]
hmm. maybe.
so much for the glorious sunset.
--
hi! i'm in mamallapuram, a sea-side, stone-carving town about 50 kilometers south of chennai. i last left you in mumbai... in the time since--
i leave bombay via taxi, passing mile after mile of slums on the way to the train station. board train, find bunk, spend 28 cramped hours heading south. arrive (finally!) kochin, kerala (land of coconuts), board up in guest house, where i share a bathroom with miss lilly and her very-catholic family (they are preparing for christmas). lilly cooks me fish curry. also in kochin: rooftop yoga, a tibetan restaurant run by a tall, bald indian man who wears shortwhiteshorts, speaks in a loud nasally voice, and plays dylan on the stereo at full blast (he was raised on american comics, he explains, MADD and the like, after an american missionary came to town when he was a boy; he proposes various business ventures involving art ranches by the seaside; gives me his card. the restaurant is below my bedroom window); lunch at an all-organic restaurant (they have brown rice!); kathakali (a keralan form of dance); a local photographer who tells me about the demise of the spice-trade in jew-town, a tiny, fading jewish ghetto... rickshaw drivers who see me drawing their "ferraris" and promise me elephants, poetry, and evenings by the ocean... and how could i forget Kashi Art Cafe?- a restaurant (owned by an american) where the coffee is black (french press no less), the art is local, and the clientelle look like they've been transplanted from the east village. the only thing missing is laptops!
ahhhh, kerala: between us is a thirteen-hour train ride--stretched to nearly fourteen because of the poor buffalo who happened to be crossing the tracks at just the wrong moment.
yup.
still to come: hairy black tongue, the search for mind, adventures in eating out, cycling in chennai, and the increasingly forward advances of the internet cafe guy!
which will pretty much bring you up to date. ¶ 10:41 AM 0 comments
a monkey stole my bag of peanuts. proceeded to reach into my backpack. throw my waterbottles aside. started to reach for my books. -HEY!!!- i'm standing up now. barefoot. a couple walks by -PLEASE! can you help me!?!-
["are you writing a story? some funny story?" --yes! i'm writing a letter to
all of my friends at home, about some things that happened here.--
"oh.."
--listen to this: today i was at the temples-- "alone?" --yes, alone.
watching the sun set. it was beautiful.....]
(yes. i am scared of the two-foot-tall monkey. he is baring his teeth and growling. and he is extremely dexterous with his little monkey hands.) "no leave out eat-ables! no eat-ables!" (the couple) -SKAT!- he pulls out a plastic bag -GET!- reaches for my hat -HEY!- three more monkeys and a goat are circling. shoes on now. waving arms. "no leave out eat-ables" (uh thanks....)
["ah hA HAhaha. next time you shouldn't go alone. _I'LL_ go with you!"]
hmm. maybe.
so much for the glorious sunset.
--
hi! i'm in mamallapuram, a sea-side, stone-carving town about 50 kilometers south of chennai. i last left you in mumbai... in the time since--
i leave bombay via taxi, passing mile after mile of slums on the way to the train station. board train, find bunk, spend 28 cramped hours heading south. arrive (finally!) kochin, kerala (land of coconuts), board up in guest house, where i share a bathroom with miss lilly and her very-catholic family (they are preparing for christmas). lilly cooks me fish curry. also in kochin: rooftop yoga, a tibetan restaurant run by a tall, bald indian man who wears shortwhiteshorts, speaks in a loud nasally voice, and plays dylan on the stereo at full blast (he was raised on american comics, he explains, MADD and the like, after an american missionary came to town when he was a boy; he proposes various business ventures involving art ranches by the seaside; gives me his card. the restaurant is below my bedroom window); lunch at an all-organic restaurant (they have brown rice!); kathakali (a keralan form of dance); a local photographer who tells me about the demise of the spice-trade in jew-town, a tiny, fading jewish ghetto... rickshaw drivers who see me drawing their "ferraris" and promise me elephants, poetry, and evenings by the ocean... and how could i forget Kashi Art Cafe?- a restaurant (owned by an american) where the coffee is black (french press no less), the art is local, and the clientelle look like they've been transplanted from the east village. the only thing missing is laptops!
ahhhh, kerala: between us is a thirteen-hour train ride--stretched to nearly fourteen because of the poor buffalo who happened to be crossing the tracks at just the wrong moment.
yup.
still to come: hairy black tongue, the search for mind, adventures in eating out, cycling in chennai, and the increasingly forward advances of the internet cafe guy!
which will pretty much bring you up to date. ¶ 10:41 AM 0 comments
14 December 2004
