Snow Day 12/27/10

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It was a blizzard, creating havoc with people's schedule and sense of control. Weather can kind of do that. And there is a beauty in it it. It can give a key lesson of mercury in retrograde, universal snafu.

This blizzard that made the news happened and it was an AIRPORT DISASTER! WRECKING HAVOC! The global warming warning/proof. Cars abandoned, trucks jacknifed. Undriven snow in lower Manhattan! Pedestrians forced to climb over 3 foot drifts. Strong winds blowing snow everywhere! Dogs playing excitedly! People helping others with their cars getting stuck or digging out of the snow. Warm Pho after getting cold fingers a great remedy to ALL THIS WEATHER!!

Just after the holidays is a great time to have a blizzard. It's the in-between time when people don't admit it's a national holiday week, but it really is. People are away, it was mostly tourists or people acting as though they are on vacation, maybe some do live here.
I do.

Last summer, I noticed driving in from out of town on the 4th of July, even NYC for a brief time of a major holiday can get quiet on the quiet. It can be as empty and vast as the pure undriven snow. It's fun to walk like a drunk in the fresh, slippery, shimmery powder.

New Year's is another story. It will be with another entry soon.
I leave you with my cold rosy cheeks standing in the snow.
Happy Holidaze, and the living is chill.

Peace out

Seasonal Conditions...tinsel ahead

I am one of those people who have avoided the holidays for awhile.
It's too much consumerism, stress, sugar, brouhaha over nothing and blatant commercialism has driven me beyond the pale. Yeah? You too? No big news, huh?

Ok, so I did a lot of things to avoid the Thanks/Christmas/New Year's grip-mostly go away. Or go far far away, where they don't celebrate such things. But this year, I have stopped trying to 'beat the holidays' (holidaze), but still, I'm not much of a joiner. I define myself as a 'non-conformist', you could also say, 'non-joiner'. I have my groups and tendencies: yoga, knitting, clay, art/design, craft, small sub-sections of callings. That is how I will work through the holidays.....kinesthetically. If I put the winter darkness, tinsel, roving mobs addicted to shopping, over and over and overplayed seasonal music, in terms of sensory overload, enhancement  and deprivation, I think I can make it. I can take a breath and make a choice to stay centered, in the 'zone' or find a way to get back to some sense of middle ground when on the precipice.

So, there is not much daylight, consider candles, bright (colored) lights, or a sense of mystery. It's colder, knit/wear more wool, entertain at home (and maybe imbibe more alcohol). I can't begin to take on the whole Martha Stewart idea of decorating, but a tree, a small tree is a possibility. Don't want to do the 'Christmas Party' (note capital letters), it's too competitive and I'm not really Christian (or Jewish either, it's a grey area that has been a source of dismay for others and annoyance for me). But I do believe we are all God's children and to celebrate a sense of light or a birth of a child in the middle of the darkest days of the year, let's go for it! (that would be considered holiday cheer)

Keep your spirits up! God knows (as do some of us humans) the world is going to hell in a hand basket (cute phrase for cataclysmic disaster on all fronts) we all only have ourselves and each other, be nice. At least for a little while, use the excuse of the holidays to be pleasant. Do that, 'do unto others' thing. We all know we use the excuse of the holidays to get stressed. Now turn that around and go be a mensch.
Peace-out.

Spem in Alium: 40 part Motet Installation @ Rose Theatre

Spem In Alium is a choral piece by Thomas Tallis, who wrote for the Tudor monarchs posing as a Protestant, but actually a Catholic, albeit closeted. Seems the closet figures in a lot of forms in the church historically.
Anyway, he was an amazing composer and this piece is one of his best. It is a 40 part (how these singers keep it straight is amazing in itself), of a Latin phrase that in part translates, I am no good, worse than dirt under your finger nails of a grubby sloth and god I am not worthy, etc. Since it's in latin this rather depressing lyric is not oppressive.

Meanwhile the installation at the Rose Theatre, in the Time Warner building at Columbus Circle on the 5th floor, make a left after exiting the elevator is on for ONLY TODAY! (through Saturday Nov 13th 12-8)
This video I tried to upload,barely does the piece justice,and is too large to load so just trust me on this.

There are 40 speakers on individual stands placed around the edge of the room, each speaker is at adult head height and is a 'voice'. As you walk around you can hear them together or stand next to a speaker and hear the separate 'voice'.
The simplicity of this installation allows the piece to shine in an incredibly profound way.
The content defining the design or the adage of 'form follows function' gives room to have a deep musical (spiritual) experience. GO!!!!

Here is a link to a NYT article about why/how the White Light Festival was conceived, which this installation is a part.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/24/arts/music/24light.html

Morning Bounty

Today I cracked open my saggar box and looked inside. Was it like Christmas? Sort of....
I got lots of presents, but not exactly what I imagined....some better and a lot of broken fingers. That part, the broken fingers happened going into the box. What can I say? I'm a bit rough with my own stuff.

But I will say, it was fascinating to see what happened. The color, scaring and oxidation was far out! I will do this again, and I will work with something other than hands with delicate fingers....(oh the fun I will have in gluing them back on *sigh*)
I do love the SURPRISE element to this.
Talk to the hand, indeed.

Saggar who? what?

These pictures are of objects I made from porcelain, white stoneware and terra cotta or earthenware dabbed with different chemical mixes, root kill, sulfates, iron oxides, etc., and put in a clay box called a saggar. The whole point of this is the opposite of what it was devised for. Originally it was to protect the fine white of the chinese porcelain from the flames and not mar the finish. In this case you are putting it in a box in order to change the surface. Along with the ceramic things that I made I wrapped wire, masking tape, added sawdust, seaweed and shells with the great hope that these things will cause a reaction to the clay surface. All done in the hopes of a 'happy accident'. Hopefully more happy than accidental. We'll see....

I am working on a Buddha figure, Avalokiteśvara – the Buddha of infinite compassion, or Boddhisatva, literally, the lord who looks down, who is often depicted with '1000 arms and hands, and eyes to show his compassion of always watching and  reaching out to everyone and everything. He gets this reputation because he refused to go on to Nirvana until everyone was able to and he stayed incarnated so he could help everyone. What a guy, huh? Anyway, I saw a couple of statues at the Guimet museum in Paris awhile back and there was a Korean one that really moved me deeply. So I thought I'd make like 50 hands (it's not number, but effect, right?) out of different clay bodies done in this saggar firing method to represent all the different 'hands' Avalokiteśvara 'gives'. Again, we'll see...

Also, I have this idea about ladders and hands holding them....not like Jacob's ladder, different, but not sure what it is, except reaching or climbing. Enuf said...

Eggs of another color

 

I wanted to show something beautiful that was inspiring, nature made and tasty. My friends who live in Lambertville, NJ have access to a farm stand that has these wonderful local, 'cage free' domestic chickens that are different sizes, different color yokes and are miles away from the white rounded packages we see in our normal urban or suburban supermarket. (though Lambertville is not far from Flemington or even Trenton).

It is a sad testament that I write in wonder of these beautiful eggs. We understand things from their boxes, not their shells. A product or a brand, not a food coming from something that grows or breathes or is made by hands not gloved in plastic or put on a conveyor belt.

It is so easy for me to yell about this from in my Manhattan bubble, wishing for more connection to nature, wanting to participate in the locavore movement. Is this just a matter of rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic? We are sinking, and drifting further away from a world that use to work with seasons and without chemicals, without being propped up by government props that make farmers grow all the same corn and soybeans. Which in turn feeds cattle in feedlots that live lives not worth living cheek to jowl to their neighbor and then are brutally treated in their death, by workers who are also brutally treated in their morbid work to feed the people who are eating fast food, ruining their health in the process. This is because why? There is profit to be made in killing the land with chemicals, the cows by rote and us bipeds by disease, a bit more slowly than the cows....and at greater expense. 

I am ranting, I am angry and I don't let myself think about this too much, it's too upsetting. My original intent for this blog was to write about my observations when I travel. Much more benign stuff; armchair voyages for my friends and friend of friends (not a huge group). But, I took this picture a couple of months ago and had planned to write a post talking about color and design, etc., and it ended up here. Sometimes you just gotta say what's on your mind, even if it ends up being a rant. The blog takes a different turn this time. More stuff to come with art, design, color, photos and travel, but also with some indignation on the world here in my corner, in my country.

Sew what...

Craft has wrapped me around it's finger....again.....sigh
Ever since I first saw the style of Alabama Chanin incorporated in the T shirt 'uniform' of Bar Pitti (a lovely, though wildly over popular (read-hard to get in) Italian café here in Greenwich Village) I had been fascinated. How do you do that? I thought to myself. My sewing chops had been dormant for so long, I couldn't even begin to figure it out. I think that was 5+ years ago. I had acquired a T-shirt with 'Alabama' appliqued (actually reverse applique, but I just learned that a week ago), from 'Architecture for Humanity' as a donation (great org, check 'em out), because I really wanted to feel good about wanting a T shirt. (I am embarrassed to say), and see if I could understand the technique.

Well. Last week, my favorite knitting, now craft store, Purl (actually just my favorite store period) held a workshop with Natalie Chanin, the source of my fascination.
I am learning how to do it. Reverse applique, and there are other things to learn as well.
I can hardly wait. I am obsessed, I pour over the Alabama Chanin books (and website) wondering how I can take this stuff and make it mine! So far, I've embroidered 2 Purl totes and started to learn how to do this reverse applique on a tote bag kit (see photo).

All the sewing I use to do comes welling up inside me. My Mom taught me how to sew at a young age. 6 or 7, maybe sooner? I had a girl's Singer sewing machine in a bright shiny patent blue with tulips in pink and orange box. I made actual clothes on it. Really, jumpers, wrap around skirts, smocks. I still have the Singer (that weighs minimum 50 lbs) from 1977, when my Mom bought a 'real' one on a monthly payment plan. I used it for years and I haven't used in probably as many since. My Mom did my hand sewing (hems, zippers sometimes, snaps) for me back then. I had no patience. "Not yet," she would say, "later you'll enjoy it, it will be relaxing." Mom's do know.

Well, the feed and tension on the old Singer is a bit wonky, and to lug it to mid-town to get it fixed? Well, not yet. I do like the sewing by hand. All that knitting has prepared me. The sewing by hand does bring me back to a happier warm golden aspect of my childhood where my Mom and I related. I can clearly say that my Mom taught me how to sew. We didn't have Home Economics by the time I got to school age (I was robbed!), but my craftiness definitely comes from my mother's side as well as the southern part. My grandmother was amazing, whipping up evening gowns for my Mom for all the social butterfly things she attended, so my Mom told me. It was a long time ago, and the south; middle class people had events that required evening gowns.  Mother Cain taught me how to crochet, by my time she had stopped sewing. She made beautiful afghans. I have a couple and treasure them. Alabama Canin taps into that part of my life. Perhaps superficially (I am a 212 person born and raised), but this is the part of the south that is really wonderful, magical, human. It's 'To Kill a Mockingbird' not Faulkner.

So, sew, I am inspired, excited. All this possibility! 
I don't want to sound dire or be made to eat my words, but I think this is my oil spill, but in a good way. It just makes me gush with no end in sight
(not to be tasteless)

(no worries Ganesh making is going at a nice clip too)

Think Pink!

What is it about pink? A sigh of relief, a dash of hope,  a gush of emotion? Is it that it reminds us of a young thing, whether it be piglet or person? The hope of a new start? A pink that will deepen into a red, as the weather warms? I speak of the pink one sees in nature, not the pink that does not exist in nature, such as Barbie pink or Pepto Bismal pink. There is the unnatural pink that could be a bridge between the two....bubble gum pink.

Is it just a 'girl thing'. Perhaps not, in Italy, definitely in Rome, men wear pink shirts in the warm weather. It is also somewhat common in bicycle jerseys. Diana Vreeland said 'pink is the navy blue of India'. There is a lot of color there, pink can come off being neutral in comparision to all the masala colors.

What is it about pink? It's a color that is easy to love, is it as easy to dismiss? It is an emotional color, it is after all the beginning of red.

Typography, Language WTF?

 

As my trip gets further into the past, I forget the irritations (sot of) and discomfort (sort of) and remember how it was more in my Kodachrome 64 memory. The 'oh wow' parts, or the light in the afternoon in Mysore, or the aggravation with, oh so many things. Then I stop and look at something I brought back and that makes me happy. Happy to be here with this thing from there in my hand or sitting on my desk. Then I have a mental negotiation of how it was and how it is now and the mental compromise to be at peace with both. The fourth dimension of time can do that for a person.

This photo was taken in Madurai near the Meenakshi Temple, it's a metal security gate that is written in Tamil shot at an angle (distorting it more), so it's not English, but a language  (more confusing), with drop shadow for the type....then there is the stacked script of the Tamil language in the corner. I love this vernacular stuff, it's one of the things about India I really do enjoy, all the hand painted signs and wall ads, in alphabets I cannot begin to comprehend. When in Europe, I always feel I have to try to decipher. In India I don't, but I would like to know more, or so I think. Actually, probably not. Ignorance is bliss, though it can get you in the end. Or in my case, it seemed to literally bite me in the butt.

Sideways Rain

It was yet another intense weather morning in late March. Luckily, I got to stay indoors and just watch, rustle papers and sip tea. There is a small beauty in using a window as a way to show texture, versus as an invisible lense to see through. Here's a 'view from my window' offering. Any other offers?

What's my bag...

While in India, I shopped, it's something to do there. It can be fun, daunting, exotic, all of the above. During this activity in a number of locations, I collected a variety of bags, some purchased, some came with the purchase. Maybe in an alternate life, I should collect bags of the world. Actually, maybe I already do?
It seems my fascination with other cultures is the everyday object: shopping bags, calendars, street life, food (always!) I want to extend that to here, home, NYC (mostly downtown). See home with a different sense of place, a more objective (but not just about objects), more wonder (but not with the ignorance of the tourist).
Let's see how it goes....
I have my bags packed (so to speak)...

India from Afar

After a 15 hour delay, suspension, a few hours of sleep in a posh hotel that could have been anywhere, except for the south Indian breakfast and the smell of sewage from the open emergency exit door on my floor, made it quite clear where I was.....still.

Got home a few hours after my Parisian friend left my apartment, the plan is that we would be able to spend the day together. Oh well....The jet lag is loopy, making me tired at strange times, trying to steer the horse of alertness to times that make sense here.

It's a bit of a blur. I am SO GLAD TO BE HOME! Once again I appreciate the familiar, the luxury of my life in the west in New York. I think I was a bit greedy with this trip, should have quit while I was ahead with the last one in December. A lot of the time this trip, I would ask myself, 'What am I doing here?' 'What am I looking for?' 'What do I expect?' Maybe what I fell in love with before isn't quite what I can love now? Maybe it is easier to love India from afar? Other people who have lived abroad come to the conclusion that they prefer to live where they know, what is culturally familiar. There are many layers of this familiarity, all personal.

Loving India for me is best from afar, I think, fresh from the sub continent. It is a place, entity that I can carry in my heart. Much better than my intestines, at this point. Now that I've landed in the 'new world' they are behaving themselves (fyi). I have my experiences, my photos, sounds, Indian jewelry and shawls, memories, a great collection of friends. Great treasures have been taken from Mother India and I have paid in exacting ways only she could have dreamed.

There has been a sense of obligation with my driven fascination. I have been so influenced by the art, spiritual practice, etc., of India that I felt obliged to go and seek, pay hommage in some form. Do I really need to do that anymore? I can go to yoga practice 5 blocks away, take the train to the Metropolitan Museum or Asia Society or Rubin Museum and see much more Asian art in much better venues than anywhere in India. It seems the export of the art has helped the preservation of it. Yes, these may be fighting words, but I heard them originally uttered by people with Indian passports. The contract of obligation is over. If I want to go back, not completely out of the question, though for now it definitely is. My parameters are quite clear: not alone and one or two places/areas at a time, an organized pre-tested itinerary. Yeah, right....India totally blows that last one up, rolling on the floor laughing at my tears. "oh you like the challenge of India." a friend had said. Do I? Do I really? I'm not so sure.

Maybe what I really have to seek is here. I want to get on with my work–art, not building stuff, that's the 'day job'. Despite all this, I still want to keep making ganeshas, my Ganeshas, multi-armed, with trunks curved to the left, but with sneakers, iPods, handbags, cupcakes and sometimes (gasp) even female breasts. I am an infidel! I am an American! I am an Artist and the best artists steal, at least according to Pablo Picasso.  I say Si! Let's see.....

The love of travel has not left me permanently. It's just that my traveling needs a vacation. Though this blog has been used as a travel blog I may put on another kind of shoes and continue walking on with the blog, writing/picturing some different takes about things more local, or perhaps even more internal. Again, let's see....

Holy Holi

The staff (and family of staff) at Abracadabra Guest House after some 'color sharing'.
Holi is a happy holiday. It is where people walk around with bags of color and rub their friends and family with it. Or spray them with water. I read about the holiday on Wikipedia, but I don't understand exactly where the color comes in. I haven't found any one to explain it to me either, but in any case...it is very 'colorful' and it being India and a holiday, can get quite intense. Deciding against the 'intensity' I watched around the guest house and overlooking a backyard. Other places there are marauding young people, mostly men who douse people that get in their 'cross hairs' with color or water (via giant turkey baster like apparatus) or both (colored water). It's mostly very fun and light. But it being India, it can go over the top. Some people compare it to Halloween, with more emphasis on the trick versus the candy. The sweets are fruit/nut smoothies with bhang (cannabis) which after a few can get you rather wasted. So, it's all a bit of debauched behavior. It seems to be the most fun for kids, because they can dump color or water or both on their parents, or any adults with impunity. What fun! It's one reason I stayed home and watched the kids play, little kids, ones you could say 'no' to.

Dalgit, son of Mini (owner of guest house) after a Holi party.

I took in a little local color.

Will try to post again before I leave tomorrow night. A bit of running around tomorrow, last minute stuff. Delhi has been very nice and a calm part of the roller coaster ride begining and ending the trip. I don't feel like I did before, swearing that I would never come back. Besides my credibility with that is in ruin anyway. Now, I feel ok about being here, good even. But I'm also looking forward to going home, to NYC, cold & snow, Bill, the cats, my life.

Kathakali, Indian Dance & Martial Arts

The program I saw showed a pastiche of Keralan dance styles., as well as martial arts. Above is an  Indian classical dance form.

This is from the martial arts part of the program. These are actually 2 long metal poles.

This is the Kathakali style dance theatre piece. It is very visual kabuki-like performance. Katha means story and Kali means play. The stories are taken from Hindu mythology. This form originated in the early 17th century.

How Shrek gets dressed everyday...

If he lived in Kerala, that is.
This is part of the Kathkalli ritual of dance performance. They perform in elaborate costumes in operatic dramas. It reminds me of Kabuki. This being India, perhaps this is where Kabuki comes from?  OR vice-versa? The performance I saw was a group of different styles of dance with a lot of pre-recorded stuff. It was ok, but the live performance was terrific. I found it all fasicinating, beautiful, highly skilled (sometimes jaw dropping), and just a joy to behold. I understood very little of it, I knew it was different dance systems and a lot was ritualized stuff, but to me it was so good, knowing nothing didn't make me feel I didn't 'get it'. Will post some photos I took during the performance (without flash, so more 'energetic' and 'painterly'). It was a good way to end the Cochin part of the journey, left early the following AM to fly off to Delhi.

Yes we have no bananas

India is kind of like a bad boyfriend, it keeps the yearning, but plays with the emotions and its a bit of a disappointment though there can be a bit of exciting drama now and then. But every once in a while, it really is amazing and I guess I keep hanging in for those moments. I don't mean to sound cynical or bitter (moi?), but sometimes you gotta wonder...what's it all about? Why do I keep coming back. Last time I SWORE I never ever would return. Never say never.

Maybe the big lesson is that there is no big lesson or it doesn't matter where you are to get 'the big lesson'. Or there's a lesson everyday and you can be anywhere and if you listen you'll get it. And if you don't listen, eventually it will hit you over the head. You may go all the way to India to get hit over the head, and then it will be so distorted and you'll be so sick of being asked where you are from 5 times a day, being sick, and just looking for the next lime soda, that you'll blame it on the place.

Or not.

An older British woman said to me that she found it 'so refreshing to realize that we really aren't in control' and that was one of the reasons she liked to come here. Why do you go to difficult places? Or would you never do that? Yeah, I'm asking... Or do you forget that is was difficult and remember the good parts and then want to go back and have more? I think that is where I fall prey. Maybe being an optimist in memory recall doesn't serve me very well anymore?

Now arrived back in Delhi for the last 3 days, one of which is Holi which is where it is good luck to douse each other with color. I will get the story and report back the why and what for...I have been warned to stay indoors, it can get intense. (surprise). So I really have 2 days where I can 'do something'.  I had 7 hours in the Bangalore airport as a layover between flights. Another day 'lost' instead of out 'doing something'. It seems like I am being asked to slow down and just 'take rest' as they say here. It ended up being ok, not just something to endure. I met up with another traveler who had been there since 5am waiting for his 2 o'clock flight to Goa. We had more in common and knew some of the same people, to the point of 2 or 3 degrees of separation. I find that happens a lot here. He is an ashtangi (person who practices the type of yoga I do) and we did a lot of yoga gossip  (it is the missing 9th 'limb' of yogic philosophy), talking about Mysore, Patthabi Jois, Sharat, etc. The usual suspects and topics people who do this kind of stuff talk about. Anyway, it was good.

It's nice to be back here in the north. The roar of the traffic in Delhi was kind of fun. Lots of construction creating bottlenecks and being at an absolute standstill...enter vendors stage left. You can sit in traffic and have a snack, peanuts crackers, even flowers while U wait. Fellini Indian style. You have to add horns honking and exhaust fumes, but it is kind of a party atmosphere. Really.... Is it one of those 'moments'? No, cause it's always a moment about something, anything, anyway, all the time. The moment(s) of not being able to sleep because it's too hot. Hating the lack of personal space in what you think of as a 'line', or thought was a line. Looking out the window and seeing a giant truck coming right at you. Or the taste of one of those small delicate little bananas.....now that's a moment too.

Cochin-the trading of rice & beans

92 in the shade

This is a lime soda. It is about 1-2 oz of lime juice with club soda. You can get it sweet or salty, I prefer it plain, straight up, stirred with the straw they usually give you. It's very thirst quenching. The cost is between 30-40 Rs (75-90 cents). I probably spend $4-5 a day on these things. At least I do here in the south. Now in the very south, this so-called winter weather is brutal. Maybe if I was a Bikram yoga practitioner.....I think it's effecting my stomach too. Well, what doesn't effect my stomach?

The spice trade all use to be right here, but since it went online now many of the storage and trade shops/warehouses are Kashmiri 'handicraft' shops. The prices are quite steep. I went into one and bought some things. I liked the stuff and they were about 10% less than the shop I went into yesterday. The chic chi-er ones have a cafe attached (where I had this lime soda), and they have the wares artfully hung about, etc. I'm sure I paid too much. What else is new? I am a walking ATM and I am here to be ripped off. That is the way of the western tourist, or so it seems. Bitter? Maybe...nah...., it really is the way it is in these tourist towns. It's part of accepting India (or just getting real, accepting is up to the individual). They won't even bargain here, they give you a discount if you get a few things, but they decide how much. Different than what I've experienced. Anyway, I just got a few giftees and the young lady was nice, helpful, never leaving me alone for a second (unless to check on a price with her boss). Very different from the west. It's the same kind of horn blowing philosophy; of blowing the horn to 'talk' to the other vehicles, to make them aware of your presence. So there's constant honking when there's anything on the road. The goats are quieter.

Anyway, I'm over it, ready to go north. I will report with photos about the trade business here. There are rice and pulses still going on, it looks like a very traditional, perhaps antiquated, kind of charming way to do business. It seems the rest have been replaced by the Kashmiri Indian Handicrafts stores. Oh well, I enjoyed the lime soda and the view. Photos following.

Chinese fishing nets in Cochin?

What are these guys doing? They are raising the Chinese fishing net. It is a counter- balanced system that works with guys pulling the net out of the water and the balance of large stones (you can kind of see those, center top part of photo) working to drop the net into the water. It's a cool thing to watch. 

Cochin has had everybody here, it's a melting pot of cultures, Portugese, British, Spanish, all searching for spices to trade. There are also chuches, mosques and the oldest synagogue in India (how many are there anyway?). It's an interesting place: historic, scenic, charming. It's funny to be in a place in India that smells of fish. Compared to the usual scent of cow dung, exhaust fumes and burning garbage. There is the infrequent smell of jasmine, normally found in a garland hanging over a deity or in a girls hair. The other scents are more 'atmospheric'. There aren't a lot of cows wandering around either, here it's goats. There are a lot of little goats tagging behind mom, it's very cute. 

Meanwhile, I rented a bicycle and aside from getting lost and getting my bare arms nicely done to lobster red (it is seafood oriented at least), it's fun tooling around. The traffic is manageable, until I got lost and then it got a bit scary, trucks and large 4 wheel drives, versus the small Tata cars and endless rickshaws. Anyway, it's hot as hell, 90 degrees and humid as anything, it's kind of a melting pot in a bodily sense, as well as social and historical one.

 

More Glorious Ganeshas & A Nandi Bull

Ganeshas Galore & Me

Savanabelgola-Jain Temple

This temple is 650 feet up and worth every step. Luckily the cool misty morning made the climb easier. Not to mention the socks which were an inspired purchase for 20Rs (40 cents). One is only allowed to enter the temple without shoes, socks are ok (thank goodness). The view at the top of the 18 meter 10th century sculpture of the naked man, Gomateshvara is stunning. The proportion is a bit distorted, but the beauty and serenity shines. This is considered the largest free standing sculpture in India (no small thing). There were also beautiful carvings on the way up (two thirds up that is), plus the view of the surrounding landscape took the breath I had left away. (photos to follow) The socks definitely helped keep the focus on the views versus the walk.