Feelings, its nothing more than feelings

Its time for me to look back at my trip and I was trying to find the right words. I realized that my trip probably cannot be a sum of words but more of a sum of feelings.

I felt longing to land in the country of my birth.
I felt joyous to spend a few days at home.
I looked forward to a trip of discovering the south.
I basked in the warmth especially coming from a cold place.
I felt frustrated by the sheer inefficiencies at different places.
I felt helpless when you don't have the power to change anything.
I felt angry that the politicians and the police rule as if they are above the constitution of the country.
I couldn't surmount the challenges of trying to converse in a language alien to me in a country which was my own.
I mastered a sort of sign language to assist conversation.
I loved the feeling of a light breeze while enjoying the 4 o'clock cup of tea on a terrace.
I still have an insatiable appetite to try out the different cuisines available here.
I had pangs of guilt when a man almost twice my age called me sir.
I grew sick of the pollution and the bad traffic.
I am going to be cautious stepping out incase people decide to celebrate holi a day early.
I feel lucky that the bomb at the German Bakery in Pune wasn't set for the day before.
I am glad that in spite of the time I have spent out of this country, I don't feel like an outsider.
I feel amazed that the poorest of the poor still have a smile on their face at the end of the day.

There has just been one main feeling to sum up my past 6 weeks here, I've felt alive.

The barbershop

It was time for me to head towards one of India's favorite weekend hangout, the barbershop. Its funny how the different spectrum of people that the barbershop attracts.

You will always have the kid who is generally jumping off the wall, but as soon as he sits on that chair its like he might as well be in a coma. The fear of the scissors is all pervasive. You will also have the balding man hanging on to his old sense of self. Sure enough, in he walks asking the owner if his hair has grown enough to require a haircut which is obviously met with a resounding yes.

I sat down for a haircut, a shave and a good dose of tel maalish (oil massage). The burning aftershave did have me reminiscing the couple of layers of skin that I lost to the shave though. Ofcourse the tel maalish did wonders and I'll really miss that part till I can visit a barbershop in India again.

Pune Week 3

Monday Lunch - Back to North Indian food at the norther frontier. Had kehwa for the first time and I can say I'm not a big fan of the tea served in the mountains up north.
Monday Dinner - Went to Bounty Sizzlers. Its been a while since I've had sizzlers and the food was scrumptious.

Tuesday Lunch - After passing by Burger Barn on numerous occasions, I finally tried the veggie burger with desi options and I can honestly say it was one of the best veggie burgers I've had.
Tuesday Dinner - Tried out italian at one of the places at the ABC farms. The pizza wasn't all that terrible.

Wednesday Lunch - Went to casanova for a multi cuisine lunch. Make your own pasta had its charm and the buffet was generally good.
Wednesday Dinner - Didnt want to head out for dinner as I was engrossed in the cricket game and Mike was gracious enough to grab me a McVeggie from McDee's.

Thursday Lunch - One last trip to Kathi Cottage to have a couple of kathi rolls. I'm going to miss this place the most.
Thursday Dinner - After a lot of searching we finally found the hidden Hard Rock Cafe. The food was so so but I can see the attraction for those who miss America. It was great to see Raju breeze past the security checks with utter disdain though we werent as lucky.

Friday Lunch - The last day of the pune leg of my trip saw us at the Great Punjab at Koregaon park. The food was amazing and the title seems well deserved.

Pune Week 2

Mon afternoon - Checked out Sanjeev Kapoor's yellow chili at koregaon park, the food was bland and quite disappointing.

Mon night - Headed out of the City to the Rajasthani place called Choker Dani. The place is more like a theme park with a rajasthani theme. I am not a big fan of rajasthani cuisine but the entertainment value was pretty good. I actually had my hand read by an astrologer for the first time and all in all it was a good experience.

Tue afternoon - Lived across from Kalyani Veg and hadn't tried it till now. Went for some dosas and the place lived up to its high expectations.

Tue night - Went to zafron in the IBM building. It has a nice rooftop deck with a great view of Kalyani nagar, food being quite ok.

Wed afternoon - After a break of a few days, headed back to Kathi crossing for a kathi roll. Stuck with the spicy aloo kathi roll, fantastic as usual.

Wed night - Tried out barbecue at the barbecue nation and was quite impressed by their selection.

Thu afternoon - Spent the day at the Synechron office in Hinjewadi and had lunch at the Marriot. The buffet food was excellent.

Thu night - Stayed back at the hotel and had dinner at the Pizza hut. Tried out their new pizza (masala chilly or something), pretty tasty.

Fri afternoon - Went to a place called Polka Dots which seemed to have food from all cuisines. Tried my luck with enchilladas and finally came across a place which seemed to still retain the mexican touch without the regular over dose of indian masalas.

Fri night - Had a club sandwich at our hotel (The Royal Orchid Central), not too bad but the street sandwiches definitely are one up on it.

Pune Week 1

1 week in Pune and going strong. It's not as hectic as Mumbai, but it has its moments especially with its food choices.

Came in last sunday and stayed back in Kalyani Nagar to eat some pizza at the local Pizza Hut. I actually like the tandoori paneer pizza that they had to offer.

Monday Lunch - Tried out a place called Little Italy. It actually had mexican on its menu, though wasn't too impressed with it as the enchilladas had a distinct indian flavor

Monday Dinner - Had some really tasty kathi rolls at the kathi cottage in Koregaon Park followed by dinner at the Blue Nile. The veg pulav at the Blue Nile wasn't too bad

Tuesday Lunch - Tried out a panini at Witches and Dog (Koregaon Park) which wasn't too filling so topped it out with a Kathi roll (I can probably have 1 every single day)

Tuesday Dinner - Went to Arthur's theme. The menu didnt make much sense as the dishes seem styled after medieval english characters but the food wasn't as bad as we half expected it to be. Tried out the pasta and glad that it tasted italian instead of indian.

Wednesday Lunch - Went to 7 (Koregaon Park) which had both middle eastern and indian-chinese on its menu. Went with the Hakka noodles and veg manchurian and the chinese definitely hit the mark

Wednesday Dinner - Definitely a more low key dinner having a McDonald's veggie burger in my room.

Thursday Breakfast - Tried out some omlette at the German Bakery and it was pretty good.

Thursday Lunch - Had some really tasty Hyderabi food at Koyla.

Thursday Dinner - Had dinner at the hotel's cafe, pretty passable food.

Friday Breakfast - Headed back to the German Bakery for some cake, juice and other goodies.

Friday Lunch - Another trip to Kathi cottage for some sumptuous kathi rolls.

Friday Dinner - Went to St. Lauren at Hinjewadi. The buffet was pretty good.

Saturday Morning- Drove to Sinhagad and trekked up the mountain. The trek took a good hour and a half to two hours, but it wasn't as easy as I expected and did have its tough moments. The view from the fort was well worth it along with some kanda bhajji and masala tak (buttermilk)

Saturday Afternoon - Headed to the Poona Club to practice cricket with the Maharashtra A boys. Was nice to get to bowl and bat in the nets after years of not playing cricket.

Saturday Dinner - Headed over for some excellent food at the Deccan Harvest at Magarpatta, pune. Interesting concept of having paneer barbecued on your table followed by a good buffet.

During dinner, German Bakery went boom and got called from all concerned about our safety. After eating there for the last couple of days, I guess it was good that we skipped the location today. I do hate it that the terrorists have seriously impeded my eating plans in Pune as that was definitely on my menu for the next couple of weeks.

Drove to Mumbai today (Sunday) to get away from Pune for a while and show everyone what a real city should look like. Stopped by Dharavi for some leather products and then took the Bandra-Worli sea link. Havent been on that bridge after it opened and the views were definitely worth the toll. Drove down Marine Drive and had lunch at 'Not just jazz by the bay'. Went down to the Gateway of India and my first visit to the Taj after the Mumbai attacks. Things at the Oberoi-Trident and Taj are still under construction but it was really nice to see major crowds around the Gateway and Cafe Leopold.

Thats been week 1, hopefully the security doesnt get worse in Pune so hope to enjoy the rest of my stay.

The old and the new

On this trip I have been exposed to both the newer side and the old side of India.

I had to make a trip to Punjab National Bank (PNB) for some minor work for my dad. After standing in line for 45 minutes just to get an updated account information, I shot off a letter to the management and stuck it in the suggestion box. I didn't really expect anything to be done from it, but a few days later on I got a letter from the bank manager saying that they have actually taken the suggestion and all future work of that nature will be done in a much quicker time. I was pleasantly surprised on how private companies are actually willing to work on customer complaints.

I had another pending task of trying to get some transcripts from University of Mumbai. Not having my originals, the university seems to have implemented rules to slowly suck the life of the applicant before providing some copies. Since the University requires a First Information Report (FIR) to be filed with the local police station, I made a trip to Vashi Police station in Navi mumbai. Of course the police are never co-operative and they made me go to Turbhe Police station to file the FIR who promptly sent me back to Vashi. After I made an affidavit, the police registered a FIR only after demanding a bribe of Rs 200. Funny how the very implementors of the government's drive against corruption are the major perpetrators.

Somethings probably never change but there is a stark difference between the old and the new

Dakshin Bharat

Just came back from a short south india trip covering Kochi (Ernakulam), Munnar, Guruvayur, Madurai, Trichy, Tanjavur and Bangalore.

The last time I visited Kerala was about 15 years ago and I seem to have forgotten how beautiful it was. One of the lasting images of kerala is the relative well-to-do-ness of the local population. This is amply evident by the fresh coats of paints on most houses as well as the lack of slums near most urban areas. The breath taking beauty of the backwaters was amazing and taking boat/ferry's around kochi harbor and the backwaters is highly recommended.

Took a day trip to Guruvayur to visit one of hinduism's holiest temples. It was nice to see that the temple priests still stick to tradition, though I did have to buy a dhoti to be allowed in.

Continued with my love affair with the hill stations of India and took a trip to Munnar. Munnar is famous for its tea plantations and it was no surprise that all the hills in and around Munnar were covered with tea estates. The relative cool weather was a welcome relief from the heat of the plains as well.

After Munnar we slipped over the border to the temple city of Madurai. It was sad to see the meenakshi temple becoming a place of commercial activity with shops being allowed to be set up right within the temple complex, but atleast non hindus were allowed into most of the temple complex unlike guruvayur temple which was for hindus only.

We moved on Trichy and stopped over for a couple of hours just to see their temple built upon a hill. It was another disappointing experience of a temple being converted to a place of commercial activity and so we left to go towards Tanjavur.

Tanjavur still has the old town feel to it and its temple complex has been the best kept of the ones visited in my trip. Its open for everyone and is big and clean. The architecture is typical of the great cholan empire and is one of the best preserved monuments from that time.

Ofcourse both kerala and tamil nadu dont seem to have made much progress in learning any of the other indian languages. For some reason they seem stubbornly stuck on speaking the local language and hindi and english are not spoken for the most part. Inspite of the problems of communication, its been a great adventure.

Nataraja's dance

I see blood, a lot of blood - on my legs, on my hands and on my face. All this blood is mine and there are the usual suspects - mosquitoes. Mosquitoes, why does it have to be mosquitoes.

I arrived in India to blazing sunshine which was a welcome relief from the cold of Chicago. But I had forgotten about Mumbai's problem with mosquitoes. In the past it was usual to expect mosquitoes after the monsoon's but recently they seem to have become a year round phenomenon.

After spending a few days scratching and slapping myself silly, I decided to take a more proactive solution. I cam across these badminton sized plastic electric rackets which can be used for killing those annoying creatures.

So now you see me doing Shiva's dance of death every evening. A frenzied look passes my face every time a mosquito passes my view accompanied by wild swings of the racket. Any of my neighbors peeking in from their balcony will probably see a man not quite in his senses, wielding a badminton racket and a crazed look on his face lighting up every time there is an electric shorting on contact with a mosquito. Shiva crushed the demon of ignorance, my foe is the mosquito.

The price for information

The Right to Information (RTI) act has been one of the better acts implemented by the government in recent times and has been primarily responsible in more open government.

Satish Shetty a social activist who's been responsible for exposing multiple land scams through RTI unfortunately paid the ultimate price. Fearing an attack on his life, Satish asked the police for protection, but apparently the police delayed his request. Like the fate suffered by Satyendra Dubey and S. Manjunath before him, his whistle blowing irked the wrong kind of people and Satish Shetty was killed on his morning walk.

India has successfully transformed itself to a land ruled by the goon. It's nice having the right to information but the right to life apparently is not guaranteed.

Bravo US Airways, Bravo

Talk about an expensive flight on US Airways. Good thing I'm using a no limit credit card

Parochial hatred

Bal Thackerey, the lunatic running the Shiv Sena, has now started a vitriolic campaign against Sachin Tendulkar just because he had the audacity to say that he was a proud Maharashtrian but he is an Indian first.

It's surprising how offensive that line was to the man who once had ambitions to be the Prime Minister of the country, but I'm sure if there was a position for Prime Minister of Maharashtra he would have gladly chosen the latter.

I wonder when the shiv sainiks were busy protecting the "local population" from the big bad muslims during the mumbai riots of 1993; they actually enquired of the people being killed on whether they were maharashtrians or not. Maybe he is trying to score points over his nephew's MNS party to be the sole voice of the "proud maharashtrian". Well, when the MNS started their anti-south indian stance in mumbai a few months back, I'm sure they didnt bother finding out as well that the person that was burnt alive in nashik was actually a maharashtrian.

The MNS and Shiv Sena are unfortunately two sides of the same bad coin. They can attack anyone they wish without any concern for the law of the land as they know that the "true Maharashtrians" in the police, judiciary and executive will protect them. The rot is endemic and you don't have to search far to find the main protagonist.

The old and the new

On the 25th anniversary of Indira Gandhi's assassination, her daughter in law and congress party leader Sonia Gandhi tried to remind the party of how she still embodies the spirit of the late leader.

Apparently Sonia Gandhi still visits the former prime minister's residence and occasionally prepares her bed. I'm not quite sure if the current congress leader suffers some sort of delusional psychotic bouts, but if all she wants to do convince the party's base that she is the right leader, she has nothing to worry.

• The congress party still endorses sycophancy with the inner decision making group filled with yes-men.

• The congress party continues to practice dynastic politics where the current leadership's only claim to fame lie with their illustrious parents.

• The current congress party has no interest in providing justice for the victims of godhra just as the old congress party had no interest to wash the blood off their hands.

• The congress party still apparently fights for the rights of minorities even though they view them as nothing but a big cattle herd of a vote bank.

So Mrs. Gandhi, do not worry. Indira has not been forgotten, the old congress party is alive and well.

Jump with Me

Jumped off a plane, Watch here

Peace on earth

One of the most interesting news that last week brought us was President Obama being conferred the Nobel Peace Prize.

Now the Nobel awards have always been suspect considering Mahatma Gandhi (the face of non-violence) never won the peace prize even though he was nominated for five years. The committee continued the hard to understand selection process considering that President Obama might have served for just a couple of weeks as President when the nominations for this year's prize were due.

The noble committee did clarify that the award wasn't meant for past achievements but more for future aspirations. I'm not sure if they made the announcement right before or after the White House refused to meet this century's face of non-violence, the Dalai Lama. I guess future peace efforts should be encouraged as long as they do not offend the holders of your government's treasury bonds.

Why not me?

Yesterday was India's Independence day and most of us got up to the news of Shah Rukh Khan (a slightly effiminate indian film actor) being detained for 2 hours at Newark airport as his last name came up on a special watch list. Ironically he is promoting a movie based on racial profiling.

Considering he is the second big wig to be flagged by security in recent times (the first being former president APJ Abdul Kalam Azad), the media back home is going all berserk on how innocent indians are being profiled everywhere and how India should adopt the "brazilian model" that is subject US citizens similarly to the treatment received by Indians. All this sounds great and I do hope india does adopts the policy of reciprocity, but I've been troubled and one question still haunts.

"Why wasn't it me?"

Now this may sound like an absurd question, but this might have been the most important moment of my life. I see myself as an armchair critic, prefering the comfort of my couch to register protest instead of actually putting plans into action. And that is why that question keeps resonating in my mind ... why wasn't it me. I could have played the racial card to the tee, thrown my hands up in disgust and turned my back to the US.

Maybe I'm not brown enough (I attest to the fact that I'm definitely on the darker side of the brown scale), maybe not muslim enough (well cant really do much there, I find too many faults in that religion to want to convert) or maybe not gay enough. Is the dont ask dont tell policy working against me?

Maybe if someone with any sort of power reads this blog, please put my name in the list of people of "special interest". I want to feel angry, dont rob me of my outrage!

Life goes on

The last few weeks, I've been going back and forth on the real importance of a person. How much effect does a person really have on another, and how easily life goes on with or without that person in their lives.

Around the time I started blogging, we had two major incidents in the indian political scene regarding the killings of Satyendra Dubey and Manjunath Shanmugam (linky). There was a big hue and cry at the time, the media covering it 24/7 and all sorts of online petitions to ask for justice. Its been about 4 years since then and precious little has been achieved.

Indians have generally a myopic vision of life, constantly trumpeting about how Pakistan is a failed state, even though the trifecta of judiciary, politicians and the police have all but failed the people. The fourth estate, the media, has all but forgotten the incident. After all we wont have too many advertisers keen on sponsoring shows which keep harping on the past.

So in the end maybe nothing really matters. Except for a select few, no one really matters.

The words of Mark Knopfler from Brothers in Arms

These mist covered mountains

Are a home now for me

But my home is the lowlands

And always will be

Some day youll return to

Your valleys and your farms

And youll no longer burn

To be brothers in arms

Through these fields of destruction

Baptisms of fire

Ive watched all your suffering

As the battles raged higher

And though they did hurt me so bad

In the fear and alarm

You did not desert me

My brothers in arms

Theres so many different worlds

So many differents suns

And we have just one world

But we live in different ones

Now the suns gone to hell

And the moons riding high

Let me bid you farewell

Every man has to die

But its written in the starlight

And every line on your palm

Were fools to make war

On our brothers in arms

A long way to go

India took steps this weekend to be the 127th country in the world to decriminalize gay sex. As expected the ruling hasn't gone down well with the muslim groups and right wing hindu groups.

Considering the debate here in America has been about legality of gay marriage, it shows how much road we have to travel to reach the stage of being a mature society. At the very least it gives the law enforcement much lesser sweeping power to police what goes inside a bedroom and treat homosexuals to a different level of personal rights. The law though might not change the current indian society's perception to homosexuality anytime soon.

Islam does look down on homosexuality (to my knowledge), but I'm not really sure on Hinduism's view on it. Hindu mythology has quite of few characters of the "third gender", so the very act of being homosexual has been observed from centuries. It will be interesting to see if now the real debates do start and whether the indian communities will be more welcoming of people unlike themselves instead of ostracizing them.

Another one joins the race

Today threw a few more surprises in the lok sabha election run-up. Varun Gandhi was found guilty of inciting communal hatred and Sashi Tharoor put his hat in the race.

Every election, we have a few surprises where celebrities jostle with the 30 or so convicted criminals representing the indian masses. What real policies have Govinda, Jayapradha, Vinod Khanna or Navjot Singh Siddhu implemented.

How desperate are we for new leaders that now Md. Azharuddin, Sanjay Dutt and Amisha Patel are also considered front runners in their respective constituencies. Has the indian middle class completely turned its back on the election cycle that we have to rely on a convicted match fixer, an actor having overt ties to the underworld and an actress who wasn't good at her main profession.

Unfortunately with leaders like Md. Shahabuddin, Varun Gandi, Narendra Modi and the unsufferable Thackerey's these new wannabes, with no real desire to work for the very people they might end up representing, might still be the better choice

Do No Evil

2009 January, USA: MSN money released a list of most recommended stocks for 2009. Monsanto, an american based multinational company concentrating in agricultural and biotechnology fields, topped some of the lists to beat the market.

2009 January, Vidarbha, India: 12 more farmers committed suicide unable to cope with debt and crop failures bringing the count to over 2000 in the last couple of years.

The number of farmers having a failed crop isn't new to an agriculture bases country like India. However the cases in the central india have grown exponentially after the entry of this huge multinational company to India.

Monsanto promised the launch of genetically modified cotton to ease a lot of agricultural problems. After the introduction of BT cotton, monsanto has monopolized trade practices forcing farmers to buy this genetically modified cotton which is unfit to be regrown from the seeds of the current crop as well as being twice or more as expensive as the previous versions of cotton being grown.

With the american anti trade practicses supporting the dumping of heavily government subsidized american cotton on the world trade market, the price of cotton has plummetted. This has trapped poor farmers in the cyclical debt ridden cycle of buying expensive BT cotton seeds annually from monsanto's various affiliations in India as well as forcing farmers to stop using the older organic fertilizers.

It's nice living by the motto of 'Do No Evil', but it is also nice not to profit from Evil.

A thousand cuts

A few weeks ago we were having a spirited discussion on schizm entering indian lives seperating out hindus and muslims with respect to riots and terror attacks in India. There was a widespread viewpoint on the number of lives lost as collateral damage and the one argument that was pretty prevalent was that the hindus have been subjugated for over 800 years and this was bound to happen.

Sadly this view has been shared by well educated people and anyone objecting to the viewpoint is labelled a "secularist" almost as if thats a curse word. Justice for any oppressed group has no place in the current scenario.

Now my city of bombay has been attacked (again) and I'm sure as more news of the islamic groups being behind it come out, that viewpoint will be further reinforced. While my city is knocked down again (I dont know if it still has the ability to come back up), the terrorists might have finally succeeded in completely alienating the hindu and muslim population. India has been cut and now left to bleed to death.

The long road travelled

I've been in london the past couple of nights and its been at its cold rainy and dreary best, reminding me of chicago another place that I really really dont want to go back to. The last time I was in london, I had covered the major touristy places and I wanted to do something else this time around.

Considering I walked around all european cities that I've visited in this trip without taking any of the local public transportation, I decided to walk around london as well. I headed towards lords cricket stadium to check it out (take that mihir) and then walked towards central london after it. Heading down Baker street past the fictional residence of the great detective living on the street, I found out that there is a real museum dedicated towards the fictional person.

Giving the weather on this island, soon enough it started to drizzle and considering I was near the British Museum, thought of spending the afternoon at the museum. Being free added to its allure and I spent the next few hours walking around the massive museum.

Headed out of the museum in the early evening, noticed that the rain hadn't stopped and only increased. Since this was my last night in europe, I decided that the cold rain shouldn't stop me and spent the next couple of hours roaming around the streets of london. Finally being cold and tired, I headed back to my hostel.

Its time for me to bid goodbye to europe. The cold and rainy weather in london is probably not the best send off and I really hope I never have to visit this city again, though I would love to visit mainland europe again. The old body is a little tired with the constant travelling and the about 10 hour daily walking sessions, so though I really dont feel like heading towards the cold in chicago, it will be nice to have a few days of relative quiet and restfulness of home.

My favorite mistake

On my final travelling day on the continent I headed to Pisa from Roma. Unfortunately there were no direct trains around the time I needed to travel so I had to take a round about way via Firenze and reached pisa at around 2 in the afternoon. Now there isn't much too see in Pisa other than the leaning tower.

Its funny how the architect's biggest mistake is the sole reason the town is on the tourist map. Checked out the tower and headed back to the train station to find a train to milan. For future trips to pisa, I wouldn't give the city more than a couple of hours. I headed up to genova via cinque terre. Ideally I wanted to stop at one of the villages of cinque terre for a hike, but I didnt have the time and anyways it gets dark pretty early in this part of the world.

The final train journey was filled with delays. We were more than an hour delayed getting into genova and then further delays going up to milan. Finally reached milan around 11 at night and now all set to fly out of milan and out to london.

Forgive me Father

I was partying with some friends from my hostel last night, when one of them mentioned that the pope is giving a papal audience today. Considering we were up pretty late last night, wasn't sure I would be able to get up on time to see it.

Luckily my hostel is walking distance from the vatican and I ended up seeing the holy frigging pope in the frigging vatican. I guess this probably happens on a weekly basis on wednesdays but another thing to be noted in the old life history - seeing the holy frigging father.

Bella Roma

If there was one word to describe rome, it would be spectacular. All the adages about the glory of Rome are true, its one of the most amazing cities on earth. I can imagine why rome evoked such feelings amongst the roman empire.

I was also surprised by how big the city is, with a monument at almost every piazza. Ive been roaming the city for a couple of days and still haven't covered everything, reason for me to return to this city I guess.

When to the musei vaticani (Vatican Museum) to check out Michaelangelo's and Raphael's works. The museum is amazingly large and ornately decorated. Do make sure to keep aside at least 3 hours if you want to visit the museum.

Firenze

Firenze(Florence) was at the fore point of the renaissance period. The main attraction still in firenze is the statue of david in the galleria del accademia. I have been studiously avoiding going to any museums in this tour and saving on the admission fees, but if you do visit firenze checking out the wonderful sculpture of david should definitely be on tour.

Obviously everyone has the same idea as well and the long lines do generally take hours to gain entrance. I decided to beat the crowd and go early around 9 am and walked right in the museum (well there is nothing more to watch there other than the statue so using the term museum loosely). The fabulously sculpted statue of David looking on into the horizon after his victory over goliath definitely lives up to the hype around it.

Firenze doesnt have too many other things to check out, so took the evening train to Roma

A Nice place to go

I took the overnight train from paris to Nice on Cote d'Azur (french riviera). The next morning the train had reached the Mediterranean Sea and the train journey from a little before Cannes all the way to Nice was spectacular to say the least. Infact the entire train journey from about Cannes all the way past the Italian city of Ventimiglia might well be on the most scenic train journeys.

Reached Nice and walked towards the sea. I needed to make a few phone calls and passed by a few pay phones. Now payphones like street signs are almost impossible to use in france. These payphones dont take coins/cash and inserting your credit card any which way causes the payphone to show WARNING - put back the receiver as if the phone booth might explode or blast off into space (without having the border guards having their one last hurrah on checking your travel documents). Cursing the lack of user friendliness of the payphones, I continued towards the sea and on reaching it, you are met with a sea of people sunning, running, walking on the mediterranean sea.

Well considering that sunbathing wasn't my cup of tea and I couldnt really run with a heavy backpack on your shoulders, I decided to walk up and down the riviera. It really is a pretty place to be and I can imagine why the rest of the europeans head down here to enjoy the warmth and probably the beautiful bodies on view.

I decided to take the train towards Ventimiglia south of the border in Italy. On the train station I met this Indian family heading towards Monaco. The gentleman had an interesting story and was part of the generation kicked out of Uganda by Idi Amin and immigrated to the UK (a fact that most people dont know is that most of the Indians in UK are Ugandan in origin). Its also nice meeting someone who identifies himself as Indian irrespective of the country they might live in currently.

The train continued its amazingly scenice journey along the Mediterranean Sea past Monaco and into Italy finishing up in Ventimiglia. You can see that you are italy and not in france/monaco when you hardly see any tourists, the village looks like a sleepy village town and things look a little more run down. So someone wanting the same scenary as the french riviera but are more than happy to avoid the tourists and high prices, might want to consider the italian part of the Cote D'Azur.

The old and the new

I reached paris close to midnight and was wondering on whether to roam around the city all night or find a place to crash. The signs around paris are utterly useless made even more confusing when the street names (for the same straight street) keep changing after every intersection.

So I took out my trusty map and tried to get my bearings straight when an elder parisian comes along and offers help and shows me directions. This was completely surprising considering the image I had of parisians was that they werent welcoming of tourists (and they do get a lot) and more like fuck you tourist, go home.

Well I was roaming around the streets of paris when I came across a budget hostel and no surprise it was all booked up. Resolving myself to a night on the streets (time to get my rouge and lipstick out) and I came across this run down inn which had a small room by the stairs. Gladly taking the room I crashed for the night.

Getting up late the next morning, I put on the backpack and continued my walking europe tour. My camera was dying on me, so I figured I'll go to the opposite end of the city towards the Eiffel tower. An hour later, I finally reached the eiffel tower in all its splendid glory. The first thing that you notice about it is how massive it looks from close by.

Continued from the tower to the Arc d'triomphe and down the Avenue des Champes Elysees towards the Louvre.

One problem of covering a lot of european cities at one go is that you've feel that once you've seen one palace you've seen them all and wont be too impressed with the newer ones. France has more of the greco-roman architecture which is funny as the Louis' and napolean where neither greek nor roman.

Now Paris has lots of major train stations and my train out of paris was a little distance away. So walking towards the train station via Notre Dame du Paris, Panthenon and the Sorbonne, I reached the station a couple of hours before my train. Having time to kill I noticed the bibiliotheque du france not too far from this station and decided to walk over to see if I could get some free internet (emphasis on free).

Walking for about half an hour and I still couldn't locate the stupid library when I came across this mayan looking pyramid structure having wooden steps all acroos the pyramid heading to the top. Now since I had the time and there was this pyramid looking thing to be conquered I decided to climb to the top. On reaching the top I started walking to the center and I was stunned by the architecture on show.
Right at the center of the pyramid was a forest surrounded on four sides by the walls of the library heading into the earth. Unfortunately the library was closed so I had to admire it from the outside, but I like the direction france is going mixing the old style of architecture with the new.

Well time for me to head back to get my train to Nice.

Africa calling

The Thalys fast train from Amsterdam to Paris takes about 4 hours. I was overbooked on the train (considering my last minute booking) and was pleased that the conductor let me stay on the train and even more pleased that I was sitting across this very amazing french girl.

We got talking soon after and I was very surprised that Yohana actually had an amazing story about herself. She is currently doing her PhD in economics as well as working with the World Bank but her background was what captivated me about her.

She grew up in Africa spending most of her growing up time in Burkina Faso, Senegal, Haiti and Gabon. She eventually moved back to France for her education but has been back to a few developing countries to work in her field.

One of my favorite topics is the mix of western and eastern culture and the study of environments where races and religions mix.

When you talk to white south Africans/Zimbabweans they always consider themselves Afrikaans first.
However its not quite the same when the mix is between a colonizing country and the colony. Most of northern Africa was a french colony till recently and the scars still run deep - something which came out during the Paris riots a couple of years ago. People who immigrated to France from the former colonies still don't have the same rights and opportunities as the locals (a prevailing theme across most of Europe) and when you travel through their localities, it feels like the economic boom has completely skipped that part of town.

A person's identity is strongly tied to their roots which gets more confusing the longer you stay away from home. Hers would be the opposite story to an immigrant to a western country and I can imagine the confusions she might be facing growing up in a different continent during her growing up years. These would be now heightened now that she is out of the environment, however her thoughts might still be connected to Africa.

Considering this, its really amazing coming across a person who hasn't yet forgotten her roots and trying to make an impact. Its not easy making a difference in this world but every little effort goes a long way. Wishing her the very best in life

The miracle of Amsterdam

Reached Amsterdam early morning and started walking towards dam square. It was a cold and rainy day and after about half an hour of getting drenched, I thought I was done with Amsterdam and couldn't wait to get out of the city. Took some time off to have coffee at one of the numerous coffee shops across Amsterdam (as numerous as most of Europe) and after the rains had stopped decided to give the city another try. Walking around the city when I saw someone holding a post saying 'free tour of old Amsterdam'.

Now when an Indian sees a sign that says free, he/she is automatically attracted to it. There is a strange sort of magnetism and its difficult to break free. Apparently this group (Sandeman's europe tours) holds free walking tours across most major european cities and the volunteers carrying out the tours work solely on tips.

We started the tour through the red light district (a huge letdown as the windows are family friendly during the day), pass the numerous "coffee shops (serving not just coffee)" and past most of the old city and the stories associated with the city. We finally ended up at the Anne Frank house a sober reminder of europe's violent history as well as a great reminder of the secular nature of this amazing city. The 3 hour tour is highly recommended and I presume the tours of the other cities should be just as good.

By evening I had changed my mind about the city and wanted to see if I could spend the night in the city. Wandering around the city was a much more enjoyable experience wink wink, however eventually found out that most hostels/hotels in my budget were all booked up for the weekend.

Eventually I ended up at the train station again and bought the last fast train to paris. Goodbye Amsterdam, I'll be back again.

The Munich connection

The same night I headed out of Salzburg and took the overnight train to Amsterdam. I didn't notice it at first but I kind of kept things tight having to catch another train at Munich with a 10 minute difference between my arrival and the departure of the next train. To make things worse the train arrived 15 minutes late in Salzburg, which made it pretty inconvenient.

To having to stop thinking of finding alternatives in Munich incase I missed my train, I started talking to this older gentleman in my train. Turned out he was with the british army liasoned to work with the german army and try to convince them to take a more active role in the operations in afghanistan. Our conversations moved from muktada al-sadr, Al Zarkawi, the indian army expectations in afghanistan, how to prevent the envitable failed state of pakistan etc. Soon we started talking about the american elections and I was surprised to hear him say that having McCain as president would be disastrous. I knew all of europe was pro-obama, guess have to put in most of the british army as well in that category.

Anyways our train eventually arrived in munich (at a different platform than was expected) and I took my backpack and started running towards the other platform. Half way down I realized that the train that I needed to take was actually on the other side of the same platform. Now the thing about european trains is that most bogeys end up in different cities so the entire train doesnt go where you need it to go. So having confirmed the amsterdam bogey was at the other end of the train (no surprise), ran back up the platform and made it to the train with seconds to spare.

The hills are alive

Early next morning (if you call a 8.30 am start early), I headed back towards the train center and caught a train to Salzburg. Coming from Innsbruck and Vienna in Austria, Salzburg is a slight disappointment. In my opinion half a day is more than enough to cover most sights in the city.

I headed over towards the castle and trekked up the hill (with my backpack in tow) to check out the famous Salzburg castle. Now everything in europe has an admission price attached to it, which I have studiously avoided paying. Now that I trekked up the hill with my heavy backpack, I figured I might as well pay the 7 euros to get into the castle. The view from the castle is pretty good and definitely worth the trip if you have time to kill. There are some mildly interesting stuff to see in the castle along with the stories of the archbishops who used to hold the religious and political throne of salzburg.

Ofcourse the reason d'etre of Salzburg is the sound of music shot in the city, which you are painfully reminded at every turn. So if you do consider adding the sound of music tour to your itinerary consider staying the extra day and you can prance about singing 'The hills are alive with the sound of music', something all intelligent adults seem to do on reaching salzburg.

Unfortunately the urge to sing doesnt seem to be restricted to the hills around the city. I did meet a couple of american tourists happily singing the song and then giving a stupid grin, which I still havent figured out if they expect a compliment on their singing skills or me to join them. I would recommend turning away with a look of disgust (ofcourse this still wont stop them singing)

Innsbruck delight

I started on the longest phase of my train travel by taking an early morning train from milan to innsbruck. I was travelling with this delightful 85 year great grandmom and she was telling me her story. She was born and brought up in Vienna where she continues to live till now. She was telling me her sons and grandsons all live together in the same house. Now joint families are dying out in India and I was pleasantly surprised to find it alive in europe. My stop soon arrived so I bid her goodbye and pleasant journey for her remaining leg to vienna.

Innsbruck has been an apt choice for two winter olympics, straddled right in between the alps with wonderful mountains looking down on the valley where innsbruck resides.

Once landing in Innsbruck, I set about searching for a place for the night. Apparently most of the hostels are open for reservations from 5-9 pm only, which was pretty inconvenient consider I was hauling a heavy backpack. Eventually I did come across one which was open and a short distance away from the centre which was made to look further away with the steep walks. Dumped my backpack and I headed back to the city center.

The center is pretty quaint, with one of the Hapsburg palaces in the city (of the Vienna fame) and can be covered in about half a day of walking. Headed back to the hostel to freshen up when I met an australian guy sharing the dorm.

Oh isnt it fun meeting the australians just after a test that India won. We were talking about various stuff when I steered the conversation to cricket and wondered if he followed the game - Not at the moment mate was the reply. Well I did let him have a few words on the future of the game and let him take solace that ponting will eventually overtake tendulkar's record.

I had heard about hiking trails around innsbruck and headed back up the mountain past the alpen zoo. An hour of hiking and came across a clearing where you could see the entire city of Innsbruck in all its glory and one of the most beautiful sights of the trip. If you do enjoy hiking I would recommend staying in innsbruck for another day and hike around the mountains (the trails go on forever).

Eventually headed back down on fading light and feel to sleep early due to exhaustion.

Whya this a happeninga

On my way to como, I decided to give the self service machines a try to avoid standing in line for tickets. When I finally figured out on how to use the machine, I put in 10euros for my trip when the machine suddenly crashed with no sign of my ticket or my money.

Now depriving an indian of his "hard earned money" is a crime and an embarrassing one when its done by a machine. So I set about trying to find the right person to complain to, which is hard enough with the language problem. Tried the police but they seemed clueless on the words coming out of my mouth, so I wandered around till I found a person attending another self service machine. I dragged him back to the offending machine and tried my best to explain the gross injustice that happened, but he shrugged his shoulders and said not his problem, try the ticket office.

As it is I had to book another ticket and as I didnt trust another machine, got it from the ticketing office, after which I tried to explain the problem to him. To my irritation I got the same response saying not his problem and I was supposed to go to another station somewhere else. Now I realize dealing with italian officials is pretty much like dealing with the indian burueacracy with almost no chance of getting anything done, but I wasn't done without a last stance.

I decided to miss my train to como and stood in the long line at customer service. Figured I probably need to connect to him at a more deeper level so I tried my best italian impression. Now imagine the following scenes with exaggerated shoulder shrugging and gesticulated hand movement. I also figured adding an a or o to every word would pass me off as the orphaned italian child that no one wanted, but italian nonetheless.
Whya thisa happeninga? Whya doa I needa to goto garibaldi (station) whena the machine at centrale (milan central) atea my money? Whya no one helpinga?

I dont know if the wonderful italian accent or his irritation, but he finally got it cleared from his supervisor and gave me a form to send to trenitalia for my money refund. Luckily I was allowed to board the next train to como as well so my gambit of skipping the train wasn't too monetarily painful.

Its been a week now since, I've had the form. I still dont understand what it expects from me (as it is in italian), but the hope still exists that one day before I leave, I will fill the form and miraculously get back my 10 euros. Why all this fight for 10 euros u ask? Well my friends, considering the devaluing dollar, soon I will be able to retire on my 10 euros - Welcome to the life of the rich and famous.

Como again

I decided to take a day trip to Lake Como which is situated right at the border of Italy and Switzerland. If you do have some time to kill, its not bad to spend a few hours. I decided on taking an hour boat ride on the lake. Like America's five great lakes this is another giant lake, we seriously need to come up with another terminology for lakes of this size. Lake's are meant to be smaller, something to swim across and not something to drown in while trying to reach half way through.

On the way back, I had some time to kill and was wandering around on the platform when I heard hindi being spoken. Needing no further prodding to find out the source of this familiar language, I came across Ehsaan (a pakistani maintaining a pizza place at Como station) and Sanjay (a textile salesman/representative from calcutta) sharing a few laughs. Now sanjay makes a trip to europe pretty regularly while ehsaan has been in como for a few years and it was nice talking random stuff with the two, including on how to make trips to switzerland without bothering the guards (might be useful when you feel the need to smuggle swiss cheese out)

Skip the Gondola

Venice like Vienna is a wonderful city to walk around. Now the one thing that comes to mind when people think about Venice are the gondola rides. They kinda seem romantic if you are willing to shell out 80-100 euros per hour. Venice might be the city of canals but it has an amazing architecture to be discovered while on walking tours.

You can cover pretty much the entire city in less than a day (be prepared for long walks). Its still a living city so you might end up in someone's backyard, but the locals seem to ignore tourists for the most part. The high point of the city is piazza san marco and is definitely not to be missed on any visits to venice, however as everyone is heading there early mornings and late evenings are the best times to be at the piazza.

The italian

All my wonders and joys of travelling in second class were rudely extinguished while spending an uncomfortable night on a seat. To pass the time I started talking with frederico an italian kid in my cabin. Its nice meeting the next generation of italians who can speak english and it was even more refreshing that they are very well politically aware, a trait sadly lacking in my american contempories.

Strangely our conversation veered towards Russel Peters the canadian-indian comic. His 'Indian0 - no Indiano and what the fuck' sketches seem to be very popular and its amazing how many cultural borders comics can cross - not to mention give us a common talking point.

Hopefully frederico checks out the blog and sends me his email address. Wishing him the best of luck and hopefully he does travel to india sometime.

The case of the curious case

Well I had taken a friend's camera for my tour and her exact words were do what you want but bring the camera case home, which is strangely possessive about a camera case. So I have been taking extra care of my camera case and obviously not so much about my other things, which ended up on me losing my eurail pass.

This obviously inconvenient loss was noticed while drinking coffee at one of Wien's oldest kaffehaus. Since with the pass I lost my train ticket to munich, I d0ecided to head direct to the station to try to figure out a way out of wien. Now obviously the counter lady couldn't help me much (even though I had a confirmed reservation to munich under my name), but there was an overnight train to venice in 15 minutes. Not willing to spend an extra night in Wien, I decided on taking the train to venice and purchased a second class seat on the train.

Losing the pass hasn't been such a bad deal because I'm really not used to travel in first class luxury. Its time I travel with my folks in the second class. Also its been strangely liberating. So now 1 pass down 1 camera case to go

Singh is King

Wien might be a beautiful city but its pretty confusing on getting around for the first time after you arrive at the city. So I got talking to this australian girl, Kim, and she agreed to take me to the city center.

We took the underground and kim actually showed me how to avoid paying the required fare for the train. This minor act of truancy was exciting as well as depressing that this little girl from australia was the one teaching me and not the other way around.

Anyways soon the topic changed to cricket and we were talking about australia's current tour to india, when kim remarked how irritating she finds harbhajan singh. Now we all can agree that harbhajan isn't the most well behaved cricketer around and he definitely has its flaws but then complaining about him to another indian is definitely not the right way forward.

Well sorry on yer mate (assuming this is unisexual), but guess who is primarily responsible for australia losing this test match and going down in the series, hopefully helping india win the border-gavaskar trophy. You dis the turbanator at your own peril.

A full circle

I've got this great friend of mine who has these weird notions that things are not over till you complete the entire circle of association. Maybe her words were true as I've been meaning to go to Wien for the last 10 years or so.

This sounds strange but my first real notion of train travel was association with the movie 'before sunrise'. Since watching the movie in my teenage years, I've always wanted to travel around europe by train and especially visit vienna.

So no surprise that the first trip I take after landing in mainland europe was the overnight train from milano to wien. Wien was everything that I wanted it to be and a litle bit more. Its baroque buildings and streets are a walker's paradise and walking through this historic city has been one of the most unique experiences so far.

Now that the circle is complete, its probably time for me to move on to the next stage in life.

Poor Idy

I had taken a couchette from Milano (Milan) to Wien (Vienna) and a few stops from milan, Idy got on the train.

Idy was a Senegalese political refugee and we got talking about his journey and his life. He was curious on my life story as well and we were gladly exchanging notes. Soon our talk changed to Barack Obama. Well no surprise that most if not all of europe wants Obama to win the election and idy was no different. He was curious on what I thought of the election process. I was of the opinion that even though obama was well ahead in the polls and in any other kind of election that would be a significant advantage to the leader this election was different. Given that economic issues will be a big part of the election but when it comes down to voting time, race is going to be the key factor on the next president.

Idy agreed with that opinion and he recounted a few of his stories in italy and how irrespective of the 10 years he has spent in the country he still wont be treated as an equal in terms of work or other aspects of life. He was pretty impressed that race is not an issue in terms of jobs in most parts of the US.

Our conversation covered a whole gamut of topics from mugabe to the state of europe and finally we decided to call it a night so that I could enjoy the next day in Wien while he could visit his brother. Somewhere in the middle of the night we crossed the Austrian border and the austrian authorities came on board to check our documents. While checking idy's documents, they noticed that he didnt have a passport issued by italy but just a receipt of his applying and his work/stay permit. Idy tried to reason with them that he had taken permission with the italian police before travelling but they refused and ordered him off the train.

The last words idy told me were that, you cant fight them - this is their country. I hope all they did was send idy back to italy while I looked helplessly on

The stranded traveller

After my trip across the atlantic taking from chicago - london - zurich - milan, I was looking around to see what bus to take from milan malpense to central milan. Trying to find someone who talks english is a challenge in milan and I came across another soul having the same problems.

My new friend Atif from islamabad (not of the atif aslam fame as that thought crossed my mind too) had just flown in from paris and was on his way to rome to take in the sights. We took the bus to centrale and got chatting on the way. Apparently atif spent 15 years in chicago before heading back to islamabad which was surprising because he looked more to be in the late 20's instead of the late 30's.

My plan was originally to spend the night at my friend's parents place at milan before planning my itinerary but his offer to join him that night sounded quite tempting. We decided that once in milan central, I'll go ahead and drop off my bag, freshen up and head back to centrale in a couple of hours to catch the 11.30 train to rome.

However after taking a shower and nice meal, fatigue suddenly hit me and without realizing it, I was done for the night. Hopefully atif had a fun time in rome and didnt wait up for me.

The bangladeshi problem

On my landing in Italy, I was greeted by a lot of south asians on the streets of milan and other places in italy. This was surprising as I didnt realize that italy is amongst the favorite destinations for my brothers.

On closer inspection I found most, if not all to be bangladeshi. They were particularly friendly with me and didnt seem to be mind indians for the most part, to the extent that they pass themselves off as indians to the locals here.

This adds to the puzzle that is bangladeshi. Back home they seem to espouse a virulent hate towards indian and all things that are indian. This is even more surprising as India was the only reason why bangladesh is a country and not continue as East Pakistan. I can assume we would be hated if the Indian army arrived as an occupying force, but once the bangladeshi government had been established, the indian army packed up and left.

I still dont understand the dual faced nature of the country. Right now they are so downtrodden economically that they have migrated enmasse into India, to the extent that the local population in quite a few of the north east states have been termed as minorities. A lot of the terrorist activities in India for the past few years have arisen out of bangladesh and dhaka. They still spew hate towards India. They seem to be almost as ungrateful as the kashmiris.

Yet once outside the sub continent why pass of yourselves as Indian. I dont understand the bangladeshi's.

Friendly neighbourhood hero

Now its no secret that my dressing sense is ridiculed by all friends and not so friends. Be it my lack of ironing or mismatched clothes, but my choices don't seem to please anyone.

Now European men are supposed to have an excellent sense in clothing (though why they tend to keep up their offensive smoking habits beats me), so I thought maybe I'll pick up some tips along the way.

I was flying from london to milan with a stop over at zurich. So at zurich I saw a very nicely dressed italian man get on the plane. The gentleman looked to be in his 30's and a very nicely tailored suit with excellently matched dress pants and shoes. Now indians have an innate ability to stare at someone, maybe its our innate curiousity on trying to figure out how someone is not indian and yet seems to be entirely functional. So I decided to put it to use and tried to observe the guy closely to try to get some sort of matching tips. His grumpy look throughout the flight and the balding hair all seem to fit in the distinguished European look.

On alighting in milan and in our bus towards the terminal, I stood next to our subject matter and concluded that this look is the one for me, all I need is the same color combination and my clothing ridicules will be at an end. At the terminus our italian gentleman turned around to get down and hung on his shoulder was a pack with the words Spectacular Spiderman with the web crawler strutting out his prowess in all his glory. So close.... or maybe there is no such thing as 'good dressing sense'

euro trip - 2009

I'm on a trip around europe and though it may not be as exciting as the movie of the same name, it might be an interesting enough trip to blog about.

These would be interesting highlights of the tour.

Time to stop the bleeding

India entered its 61st year of independence while the recent land row agitation is entering its 6th week.

The current kashmir issue started when the government of jammu and kashmir allocated about 40 hectares of forest land to the amarnath yatra trust to dedicate towards the yearly pilgrimage of hindus to amarnath in kashmir. Kashmiri's saw this as an attempt by hindu fundamentalist to steal muslim lands and started protesting against the land transfer. When the government revoked the land transfer, jammu hindus saw it as a final straw of the intolerance of the muslim community and started their counter agitation blocking off the main highway to kashmir and preventing all supplies leading to kashmir.

The facade of hindu-kashmir brotherhood in jammu and kashmir has finally come down. The religious intolerance has been responsible for multiple lives being lost. The early 90's saw around 1200 kashmiri pandits (hindus) being killed by the insurgency leading to the mass exodus of about 5 million pandits from the valley towards jammu and other parts of India (with most of them never coming back). The resulting government crackdown and the high handed response of the military forces resulted in about 3000 deaths and further fuelling the insurgency *.

So we've reached a situation when the kashmir valley (with the current population of over 95% muslim) has never considered itself Indian with most prefering azadi or merger with pakistan while the other parts of jammu and kashmir (jammu and ladakh) prefering to be part of india. The indian government has pumped in billions of dollars and countless lives lost in the insurgency and the local population of kashmir being still ungrateful.

Haven't we now reached a stage where we should no longer force our will on a people who never associated their future as part of a whole (called india). Its time to cut our losses and stop the bleeding. Let the kashmiri's make their own future (their success and failures should be their own doing) and let them go.

* The figures in the post are unverified and obtained through a google search

Protest Away

A splinter group of the fascist Shiv Sena party in bombay starts a state wide anti-migrant rally restarting their original claim to fame campaign about migrants stealing jobs from the local marathi-manoos (sons of the soil)

The gujjar community in rajasthan started a statewide protest movement demanding tribal status to the community so that they can avail of the reservations in education and jobs.

The sikh community creates a stir after a bollywood movie 'Singh is King' is claimed to hurt the religious sentiment of sikhs.

The hindu community in the US and India protest against the new movie 'The love guru' claiming it hurts the religious sentiments of hindus and casts indians in a very poor light.

The anti-migrant rally in bombay and maharastra takes a violent turn, driving out migrants by the tens of thousands and invertently claiming the life of a marathi manoos (the very community that was supposed to be protected). In another incident, supporters of one of the ruling start congress minister (a former shiv sena minister himself) attack an editor of a marathi daily who wrote about the wasteful spending of the current government and their ludicrous attempt to spend crores erecting a statue of Shivaji.

The gujjar protest caused cancellation of hundreds of trains, thousands of crores of damages and a few deaths over the past year.

The sikh protest over movie and an mtv ad resulting in vandalism of the mtv office in mumbai, resulted in the arrest of over 70 people.

Love guru is deemed to reinforce negative stereotypes regarding the hindu community and there have been efforts to have the movie banned or have an adult certificate attached to the movie.

Are indians born with absence of reason or do we enjoy protesting so much that we dont really evaluate issues worth fighting for.

would a million lives be enough for the paranoia to end

Everyone's following the cyclone which hit Myanmar (formerly called burma) a few days back. According to latest estimates there have been 100,000 people dead and a million and half more at risk.

The military junta ruling Myanmar has always shared a tenuous relationship with the outside world. Aung san suu kyi's democratic movement and her nobel peace prize did not help reduce the suspicion with which the junta viewed everyone else.

However the natural disaster which hit myanmar hasn't reduced the mistrust. American, British and Indian aid ships are docked off myanmar still awaiting permission to dock. The relief dropped by the UN airplanes has been confiscated by the military prompting the UN to cancel any further relief operations. The smell of death and rot hasn't yet gone away but the aid hasn't yet reached the people most affected.

Agreed most of the wars fought in our lifetimes have been completely unnecessary and done more evil than intended good, but is the world going to look on and wait for a million people to die before taking action. Whats more important, pleasing the paranoid junta of an oil-bereft nation or take action before hundreds and thousands more people die.

Travelogue - Foreword

When I first planned my currently ongoing trip to India, I thought of keeping a travel journal in the tradition of megasthenes, tavernier or nunez/paes. Unfortunately due to a combination of laziness and lack of time I havent been able to maintain one, but thought it might be a good idea to identify the main protagonists of my journey. The following entries are dedicated to them.

Travelogue: The scribbler

I had written europe off as an obscenely expensive place to travel, filled tourists who the locals doing particularly enjoy hosting (or maybe its just the french). On my way to india I had a stop over in milan for a few hours. The airport reminded me of the dysfunctional state transport bus terminals in India in all their glory.

During a bath room break in one of the stalls at the airport, I noticed it to be full of hateful writing against muslims (european and north african). There were a lot of reference towards nazism or neo nazism which has been gaining popularity in europe, and a lot of direct and indirect connections were made between the jews during the middle of the last century and their fate being repeated on the muslims.

Maybe the race riots in paris were not an insular event and europe might be internally in strife. But now europe is definitely a place to visit, if not for the sights but to analyze the growing disconnect amongst various race/religion groups.

Travelogue: The starer

This is something that I probably never noticed while growing up in India but I came across something which is distinctly observable during my last few trips around the country. If you are passing through a touristy area, a market place or any busy througfare you will come across a gentleman who will unabashly follow your every movement till you are of no further interest to him.

While passing through the ridge area of shimla (one of the most heavily visited tourist area), I happened to come across a person who kept following me stroll through the area. For some reason I seem to be a curiosity to him (possibly in a manner of how children look at jokers) and on making eye contact there seemed to be no change his nature or stare. After satisfying his curiousity, he settled on other more interesting subjects to monitor. I passed through the area a few times over the next few hours and our starer barely moved a few meters from his original position. This was quite intriguing as I wonder how he actually brings in the paycheck at the end of the month if all he does is stand at one location and watch people move around.

I put this down as maybe people of shimla dont really have anything to do in life and this is the best way to count down the days. This time around I came across a bunch of such people in busy market places and tourist places, so apparently this wasnt a one off incident. So apparently there are people out there who dont really have anything to do in life other than while away their entire life watching and observing the behaviour of others.

Travelogue: The talker

Bangladesh is a small country to the east of India and for most of their existence they seem to hate India. I havent yet found out the reason for their hate, especially since India is the reason for which the country of bangladesh exist instead of still being called east pakistan. Bangladesh also has another reason to be on India's radar, the maximum number of illegal humans (as opposed to aliens) to come into India come from Bangladesh, so much so that bengali and islam has now become the majority in quite a few places which wasnt the case a few years ago.

Bombay receives quite a few of these illegals most of whom work either in construction or household maids (bai's). One of them currently works as a household maid in my place and apparently her ignorance of hindi or any other local language does not stand in her way of securing or carrying out her job. Somehow my mother and her seem to communicate with each other quite fine, but my father has a real hard time communicating with her.

The other day I came across one such attempt at communication. Our bai really wanted to get something across to my father and she tried her best communicating in bengali. My father not understanding a word for some reason kept asking her to repeat herself which she dutifully did - in bengali. Maybe out of desperation, my dad finally resorted to answering her back in kannada. I guess my loud laughter didn't really help the situation, but that might be the first and last conversation ever done in bengali and kannada.

Travelogue: The speller

India has become a wannabe nation which has its advantages and disadvantages. It looks favorable on the western world and is probably the only major nation on the world which has almost a 70+% approval rating of america and G.W. Bush (no idea why it cant just get on the 'Hate America' bandwagon like the rest of the world). Part of this wannabe culture has led to an outgrowth of sign advertisements in english, though comprehending them is becoming a task. I thought of listing the general signs and their actual meanings.
Side Sing : Site Seeing
Pijjha: Pizza
Pidja: Pizza
Foto: Photo
Buty Parler : Beauty Parlour

1984

The ayatollah issued fatwa against Salman Rushdie for insulting the prophet and Islam in his book 'The Satanic Verses', marked one of the first battles against extremist and literary figures. The indian born author's works were pulled off the shelves in India by the government in all its wordly wisdom. Since then Salman Rushdie has had to live a life of a refugee largely underground in europe. His recent knighthood by Britain raised several protests, some resulting in loss of life and property in the non western world.
I've wanted to find out what the fuss was about regarding his works and got hold of a copy of the satanic verses. The book was uneventful for the most part and actually rambled on making it difficult to keep up with, IMO. A poorly written book, should be no excuse for the author to have to live in constant fear of life.
His case was recently repeated again. Taslima Nasreen wrote about the persecution of Hindus in Muslim majority Bangladesh - a book which was very well written IMHO. Fleeing from bangladesh after the issuance of a fatwa on her head, she first took refuge in europe before coming to India. She's repeatedly expressed an interest in staying permanently in India, but the government well versed in playing vote bank politics has repeatedly denied her application.
Ms. Nasreen recently published her autobiography which didn't go down with a minority section of the population. The protests forced her to move out of Kolkata, with the government of West Bengal failing to have the will to protect freedom of speech and expression.
As a foot note of Orweillein injustice, Ms. Nasreen withdrew the "objectionable" elements of her autobiography, so that she could continue living in Kolkata and India. The government in its usual attempt to sweep things under the carpet has now called for all parties to forget this minor misunderstanding amongst all parties.
Unfortunately the Indian government has certified its position of not standing up for its citizens or for truth and right.

Shout out to my Peeps

Came across two news articles that brought back old memories

* A kid found out that he liked walking on his hands when he was about three or four years old. And now for the past decade has decided to walk on his hands as his main mode of transportation.

* There was a recent discovery of a cow with three eyes. The cow has received instant celebrity status and is now being worshiped as a holy cow. People have been queuing up to have darshan (holy audience) with the cow.

Borrowing a line from an old song - 'This happens only in India'. All sarcasm aside, I haven't felt prouder to be an Indian. A lot of us are trying to find themselves in this world.

Saw the movie 'Darjeeling Limited', where three American brothers go to India to find their spiritual selves. The movie revolves around their train journey in the desert state of rajasthan (unlike what the title suggest as Darjeeling is a snow covered hill station in the Himalayas).

The brothers traveled half way across the world to find their identity, without realizing that maybe their identities lie back home as mine is with my brothers - the hand walking, three eyed cow worshiping people. Word!

March for freedom

In an event, largely ignored by the american media, thousands of monks have marched out in protest against the ruling military junta. The monks joined by thousands of locals marching for freedom from the oppressive army which has ruled burma with tacit support from china. Aung san su kyi, the nobel peace prize winner from 94 has been held under house arrest and led the last pro democracy movement before it was crushed.

On reports of several people being killed, the UN security council in all its toothless glory, has urged restraint instead of putting pressure on china to stop the gross human rights movement. The victors of WWII who currently sit on the security council continue the unequal treatment of the rest of the world's population based on the interest of its sitting members while hundreds of people who actually want freedom are killed. It would be interesting if the ideas of freedom propounded by the iraq invadors would be applied to a country with no specific monetory or political gains.

The freedom that a person deserves is probably measured in his weight in oil.

Profit at a price

International trade has been a regular part of the history of mankind from the days of the silk route to china or the Arab routes to India for spices. Places like Constantinople which were the center of the trade routes were regularly fought over for control of the trade. The Europeans brought a new front in international trade by taking over most of the sources of international trade by taking control of countries.

Over time as independence spread through the world, international trade thrived by the major powers creating power vacuum's and fostering civil wars. The US, UK, France and Russia kept up profit margins by propping up friendly governments and dictatorships by the constant supply of armaments, ammunitions and have the local economies have an unhealthy dependence on foreign supplies.

The Asian tiger economies of China and now to an extent India seem to have followed this "business model" of achieving trade and profit without addressing any local concerns. Sudan's economy has a significant dependence on Chinese trade. The Chinese could have pressurized Sudan to stop the massacre in Darfur much earlier, but they have chosen to ignore the issue while hundreds of thousands of people die in the region. Similarly the military junta in Myanmar which has kept the 1994 nobel peace prize winner Aung San Su Kyi under house arrest for the past decade, is propped by mainly by Chinese assistance.

India unfortunately with an eye on the Chinese growth has also started trading with Myanmar without taking any principled stand on the gross human right violitions. India which has historical ties with Iran is also inking new agreements with the state for its natural gas reserves, irrespective of Iran's quest for nuclear weapons and putting the entire middle east in more turmoil.

The Asian economies are now treading on the same paths that the western economies took to grow. This blind quest for power and money will end up with more of the current unequal distribution of wealth while the poor grow poorer. At what price can the profit generated can be justified.

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

"Guns", thunders National Rifle Association (NRA) president Charlton Heston while speaking at a NRA meeting and adding that the only way his gun can be parted from him is if it is taken from his cold dead hands.

Guns have always been part of american culture being ingrained in the constitution as a fundamental right. The NRA promotes the use of guns and their intense lobbying has resulted with guns being commonly available rivalling the afghan-pakistan border. As an often unfortunate result, people like the Virginia Tech shooter have an unusually easy access to buying guns.

In 2004 there were 16,907 gun related suicides in America with thousands more dying from other gun related incidents much much more than what happened during 9/11 (Ref: wikipedia).

Unfortunately even after having these statistics being repeated every year, I'm really surprised on the lack of debate on banning individual gun ownership and tackling the problem of the ease in obtaining a gun. The time of Westerns and fighting 'indians' are long gone, maybe a 200 year old constitution now needs a change.

Minority no more

Through centuries, India has always struggled to find a common ground amongst its myriad of religions and castes. Inspite of the 'Unity in Diversity' theme propounded by some of the earlier congress governments, the various religions have not seen eye to eye on most issues.

In one of the apparent attempts to bridge the gap and treat everyone on the same scale; one of the courts in Uttar Pradesh (the most populous state) passed a judgement to remove muslims as a minority group - based on the 2001 census. Minorities have significant benefits and also have a tendency to vote en bloc in elections. Sensing losing an important vote bank, the state government challenged the ruling in the High Court and have the original ruling suspended.

The minority status ruling now looks to be heading the same way as the Uniform Civil Code - a quick and painless death. We will always be United in Diversity, as long as the important issues are swept under the carpet.

Pound of flesh measured in diamonds

Saw Blood Diamond yesterday and I would personally recommend it being one of the best movies of the year till now.

I'm glad some of the more recent movies coming out of Hollywood put a face to the crisis faced by some of the more unfortunate sections of the world. Blood diamond, shows a lot of truth wrapped up in an immensely intense and fast paced film. The film is losely based on De Beers which controls the supply and demand of diamonds in the market thus artificially maintaining the high prices and allure of diamonds. I wouldn't go so far as accussing De Beers of knowingly participating in the trade of Conflict or blood diamonds without proof (to my knowledge), but it does raise the question of how the west with its insatiable demand for precious stones is costing the lives of so many.

Blood diamonds are diamonds mined from conflict zones in Africa whose trade fuels the raging civil war through a lot of these nations. In recent times, across Iraq through Africa, I have come across arguments about why the west should be concerned about barbarians hell bent on killing each other. Unfortunately through the history of recent civilizations, it has been the western countries and companies which prop up friendly dictators, pump in huge amount of money to fuel insurgents against unfriendly governments, actively engage in trade of blood diamonds and other natural resources for profit. Its a fact that almost all weapons used in conflicts and war come from the western hemisphere. So who really are the barbarians?

Tale of two Hussein's

Hussein: Arabic for Good or Handsome

Two prominent Hussein's are leading markedly different lives at the moment. Saddam Hussein, has been sentenced to death for his role in mass murder. Meanwhile in the country which overthrew Saddam Hussein's regime, Barack Hussein Obama is leading a life of messianic promise.
Barack Obama hasn't yet confirmed his intent to run for the President of the United States, but his popularity rivals that of a rock band like the Rolling Stones (incidentally formed during the cometh of the last messiah). His multicultural background, the son of an immigrant Kenyan black man and a white kansas woman, his harvard background and his charm rivalling the late JFK seems to have America caught up in the Obama fever. Irrespective of the lack of political work and breakthroughs shown in his brief stint as a senator, Obama is dangerously coming close to fulfilling the role of a saviour to take America out of its political and economic gaffe's and put it back on an even keel on the world stage. If Barack Obama does decide to enter his hat in the ring (and not just endorse the chicago bears to win the superbowl); it will be an interesting race to observe if America, in its vote for the best man or woman, chooses to ignore its past of never electing a woman or a minority as President.

The end of one Hussein's legacy may mark the beginning of another's.

Religion and State

I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God.

Keith Ellison, the first ever Muslim to be elected to the US Congress has caused a sort of a stir in political circles by refusing to take oath on the Bible and instead choosing the Koran for his oath. Unfortunately the debate has now focussed to the use of religion in matters dealing with the state instead of the more pertinent discussion of seperation of religion and state. One of my friends gave the example of Saudi Arabia (amazing how often saudi arabia crops in a conversation related to religion) where all its citizens are expected to be muslims and follow the muslim way of life, including for government matters.

I'm actually glad that America is not following the Saudi Arabia model. Infact americans should move as away from religious intolerance as possible, and not follow the example of Glenn Beck (a particularly hawkish anchor on CNN) who actually asked Keith Ellison to "prove that he is not working with the enemy"- I dont see that question being asked to any of the other non muslim Congress Representatives on the Glenn Beck show.

My two cents on the matter is, since Congressmen are asked to serve and protect the constitution, the oath should be taken on the constitution and not a religious book. Its high time we have a seperation of State and Religion and ne'er the twain shall meet.

Failing the Tibetan people

When China invaded Tibet, the Dalai Lama fled to India expecting refuge. The then Prime Minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, thought very highly of the chinese and his policies reflected a distinctive pro-sino shift. He famously talked to the Dalai Lama about the importance of India's relation with China remarking 'I will educate your children, but I will not give you political support'. Nehru's expectations from the chinese all came crashing down when China invaded India in 1962 and to current date still holds a part of Indian territory in Aksai Chin.

The communist party of India which has always been a part of the ruling coalition headed by the Congress party, has always ensured that the Indian government takes a soft approach to China. In 1987-1988 along with the student protests in china, there were quite a few atrocities on the tibetan people, but India has failed to voice a protest. Emboldened china has always sought to keep the disputes between India and Pakistan simmering by arming and providing other necessary assistance to the Pakistani Army, in return getting a foothold in the Arabian Sea and Persian Gulf by having a significant presence managing the Gwadar Port which is at the tip of the Persian Gulf.

Inspite of history teaching a different lesson, India seems to be repeating some of its past mistakes. On the eve of America's historic passing of the India-US Nuclear bill and making India the de-facto sixth nuclear power in the world, the Chinese President Hu Jintao is making a stop over in India on his way to Pakistan to provide the same deal to Pakistan according to rumors.

India trying to impress their host, has taken the highly undemocratic move of restricting the movement of Tenzin Tsundue a prominent pro-Tibetan independence. This is inshort saying that you may be born here, but your status is still a refugee and you have to do what we say. This unusual step of bending over backwards for a neighbour which has rarely acted in the best neighbourly interests is quite surprising and reeks of a decision influenced by the Communist Party of India.

Maybe its time for the ruling parties to have a look at history, for often History Repeats Itself.

Successful common civil code

India for years has been trying to pass a common civil code to homogenize laws between all the religious communities, but has been largely unsuccessful. Netherland took a tentative first step towards a common code amongst its citizens by banning the burqa. As is expected, this has raised a hue and cry amongst the minority muslim community about religious persecution and intolerance.

There is a saying "When in Rome, do as the Romans" or its oft misrepresented 'when in rome, do the romans' but thats a different topic completely, so coming back to the point. Whenever people visit the ultra conservative state of Saudi Arabia, all women irrespective of their religious beliefs do have to cover their heads or even wear the burqa. So I personally dont see why anyone going to Holland, shouldnt observe the customs practised over there. One's religion is a very personal thing and should always be practised in the confines of one's home. Out amongst others, no one should receive different treatment based on their religious beliefs.

Whatever be the real reason behind passing the burqa ban in holland, I'm very supportive of inclusive legislation and I believe this ban would lead to more homogenization of their culture.

Who's my bitch now

A recent picture showing Tony Blair in an almost sub-servient position while talking to George Bush epitomizing Britain's relations with the United States.

The current American administration deals with foreign policy in clear black and white terms. An historical American ally, Pakistan, found out recently when they had to choose between siding with "the coalition of the willing" to fight the Taleban and Al-Qaeda or be refuse and be termed as an enemy.

Against this backdrop India has been steadily leaning away from its traditional stand of Non Alliance (NAM) which it co-founded with Yugoslavia and Egypt during the Cold War and increasing its ties with the US Government.

The Indian government has been pushing the Civilian Nuclear Agreement which would ensure that the civilian nuclear plants would come under IAEA supervision and in return India would get raw materials and technical know how to improve its nuclear power generation. In return India has already made some tough foreign policy changes based on "American persuasion".

One of its first changes was voting against Iran in the United Nations. Iran has traditionally been an ally for the Indians and the change in stand didnt go down well for bi-lateral ties. In the meanwhile India put forward Shashi Tharoor, the current Undersecretary General of the UN, as its candidate for the Secretary General's position. Its been rumored that America used its secret veto power to reject the candidate.

Recently President Bush called on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh trying to "persuade" India to vote against, fellow NAM member, Venezuela's bid for a non permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. In trying to get the civilian nuclear agreement through, India may end up in the same situation as Britain. America may end up having options to the question, Who's my bitch now?

It's been a good month for the dictators

"It is not power that corrupts but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it."

Aung San Suu Kyi started her "Freedom from Fear" speech with these words. Her party won the Myanmar (formerly Burma) general elections in 1990, however the ruling military junta annulled the elections. Aung San has been under house arrest since 1989 in her quest to bring democracy to her country (reminiscent of Mahatma Gandhi's and Nelson Mandela's struggles), however the world has turned their back on her and her non-oil rich country (hence not fit for democracy).

Thailand - the military staged a coup when the Prime Minister attended the UN General Assembly in New York. This isn't Thailand's first coup and it remains to be seen if Aung San's words come true.

Pakistan - President General Pervez Musharraf is on a state sponsored official tour of the United States cum book promotion tour. Its nice that the general gets to go on the Daily Show with John Stewart with the state sponsoring the expenses. Aung San's words have come true in this case as the General was supposed to call general elections three years after seizing power, maybe the millions earned in book sales would ensure a healthy retirement fund.

History is written by the victors

Been a bit caught up with life, so thought I'll get in a post in September before the month is past.

There is a general school of thought that power begets respect. Like it or not America is at the centrestage of the world power game. There will be no government in the world which would be fooling enough to pick a war with American nor try to execute an American citizen. On the other end of the spectrum, India is being bled in Kashmir where tens of thousands of its citizens have been killed, terrorists have attacked the seat of power of the country by attacking its parliament, an aircraft was hijacked to Afghanistan forcing the Foreign minister to make a trip with goodies and release of a few more terrorists who are plotting the next string of attacks; while the government has been powerless to protect its interests.

I love this country and its people, maybe there is a lesson to be learnt from here. After all, history is written by the victors.

How ugly is too ugly

I have been reading the travel diaries of an American who travelled in India during the middle of the last century. Amongst his observations, one which particularly got my attention was his remark on 'How ugly Indian women are'.

Now, our traveller must be really disappointed and frustrated about the lack of quality in an Indian women's beauty to make such a statement. Taking the statement with all seriousness (that it no doubt deserves), there must be a scientific reason behind such a natural phenomenon. In defence of the Indian woman's ugliness, the men aren't really at the top of the social ladder either, so this malady affects the entire indian population.

In my opinion, the blame lies fair and square on the Indian tradition of arranged marriages.

Here in the Western world, the ugly women (or men for that matter) end up alone and lonely. Since the family line is not continued, the ugly gene dies right there leaving the beautiful people to repopulate and spread the beauty gene - as is their right. It's basically evolution working to make this world a better and more beautiful world.

Due to the prevalence of arranged marriage in India, even ugly people get a chance to marry and carry forward the ugly gene. Hence, unfortunately evolution hasn't yet had an oppurtunity to clean up the apparent ugliness so rampant in the Indian population. The Indian government must hence abolish arranged marriages to boost tourism, so that future travellers are always greeted with beautiful people.

On a side note, President Bush must take note too so as not to back intelligent creation over evolution, as how can God commit such a mistake as creating ugly people. After all if evolution doesn't run its due course, America will also suffer the same misfortunes plaguing India currently.

Once an outcast always an outcast

The Indian government acting on either vested interests or bureaucratic bungling failed to renew Taslima Nasreen’s visa (author of “Lajja: Shame”). As a cruel joke, they issued a tourist visa valid for 6 months.

Ms. Nasreen fled her home in Bangladesh due to a fatwa issued against her life by an Islamic cleric. Even after repeatedly expressing her desire to settle down permanently in India, the government has effectively denied her citizenship. They have decided to play into the hands of fundamental extremists and put her life in danger.

The myopic government stand has negated traditional Indian hospitality extended to political and humanitarian refugees like the Dalai Lama and condemned Taslima Nasreen to the life lived by Salman Rushdie – always on the lookout for the next extremist to take her life.

The war has come home

America has always fought its wars away so that they dont have to fight it at home, this is now coming to an end.

The western world got up today morning with the news of a new terror plot, based out of britain, being foiled. 9/11 came as a shock, the train bombings in madrid, london and bombay served as a warning and the latest news brings in a realization of, not if there will be a new attack but when.
The war being fought in a small area is slowly spreading into a global one.

President Bush stated that the fight against Islamic fascists will continue and irrespective of sentimentalities, this war is slowly and surely being polarized between muslims and the rest. After today, all airlines have rightly banned all carry on items as each side tries to identify future areas of concern. The battle for control of a mind will continue.

Sooner or later this war had to come home.