Sunny Skies...Cup of Masala Chai...Fiber in the Hand

Of course I wish the skies were grey, but masala chai (spiced tea where the milk is boiled in the pan with the tea) is wonderful and I've found new fiber to drool over, even if it IS already made into a finished product - see Khadi below. There are so many great things about India, but with my Summer S.A.D. condition, I think I maxed out in heat tolerance at about the 4-week point and today we're at week seven. Not to say that I'm not still learning and having fun - it just is a bit like swimming upstream. I'm REALLY ready for cold grey weather.

Apologies for the lapse of days in posting. Sometimes I can maintain a connection and sometimes not. It's been several not-ing days now and even if I were to leave the comfort of our room and bed and get completely redressed (ugh) there's no guarantee I wouldn't find the same situation in the lobby even though it has a stronger signal. Rats! In fact, I've been abruptly booted off several times already so this will be relatively short for me. More apologies to anyone who is having a tough time getting pictures to come up. I know it's a very picture-heavy blog during my travel phase - so I'll go back to using the smaller sized pictures - just double-click on them to see them larger in a separate window. As for being Queen of the run-on sentence - that cure may take time.....lots of time....

PDAs

Hah! You thought I meant Personal Data Assistants like Blackberries, didn't you! Nope - I mean Public Displays of Affection, which are very much frowned on in India, and no less in Pondicherry, which in spite of having some unusual people and organizations here (Sri Aurobindo Ashram and Auroville - more on them later) is a pretty traditional town. Dear Reader Ar asked why the women can't hang on to the men on the back of the motorcycles and this is why. No opposite sex public touching is the rule of the day except with children - pretty much EVERYone wants to pick up, hug, kiss and pinch the cheeks of all of the children available. Same sex affection is very much okay, so you will often see men holding hands, walking with arms around each other, lying with their heads in each others' laps, etc. Even though I dress as modestly as Indian women albeit in mostly American clothing, I have been ogled and the equivalent of "Hey Baby"ed by several groups of two or three guys holding hands as they walked by. It's truly not a gay thing, it's just not encouraged in America. Women also can be very affectionate in public but typically are much more reserved than the men. Most gays (in Pondy at least) live in a separate community and are transvestites. They are both scorned and feared for the evil they might bring, but also sought out to perform at weddings and a few other events to give their blessing and ensure fertility - for which they negotiate a hefty price with the families putting on the wedding. Sounds a bit like a protection racket in a way. Some of them are Eunuchs, but only a percentage. Parents of children who show any leaning toward what they think of as gay tendencies often take the child to the transvestite community and give them up at a young age. I don't know about lesbian culture in Indian life but it seems very underground compared to gay men. I was curious about prostitution as well as it seems to be in all big cities - regardless of how forbidden it is by religion. A non-Indian friend here in Pondy (the only one I dared bring it up with) said that you can only tell who is a "sex worker" (as the press calls them) by the fact that the woman will return a man's stare and hold it, and by where they live - for instance together in a brothel on the outskirts of town. There is no way you would know by style of dress and it is exactly the same salwar suits and saris. It must be a terribly difficult life for them - especially as many of them start out very young.

Fiber Breakthrough

Turns out I'm a lousy researcher Dear Readers because at dinner with David's coworkers the other night, one of the women told me about Khadi cloth and I had no clue what it was. This is well-known facet of the India textile scene due to Gandhi-Ji's stressing the importance during his life of spinning and weaving in all villages as a cottage industry and part of the freedom movement, and encouraging people to be independent by making and selling their own cloth. Khadi is basically any cloth that is hand spun and hand loomed - usually cotton or wool, but also cotton combined with silk. This site offers a fascinating glimpse into the spinning of different textiles in India. Why couldn't I find it in my many Googlings pre-trip? It just took the right word - which I didn't have. The fabric I bought has a more hand-loomed appearance like Tussah silk - in fact some of it looks JUST like silk - see the picture below. Some of the Indian designers are using Khadi currently in their collections. The Mace Windu character played by Samuel Jackson in the last Star Wars prequel is wearing a tunic of Khadi cloth. He do look good, don't he? Here is some of my new stash....




Needless to say I have beat feat several times since to the Khadi emporium to make purchases. DH's luggage alarm is on overload now and I have to iron the little extra frown lines out of his forehead before he goes to sleep at night.

Here is a picture of the weaving and this is obviously not in a village but still individually woven. I'm confused about the hand spun aspect - when I see the pictures, it is spun on an 8-spindle charka. One of the sites above says that this non-motorized charka can spin and fill 8 spindles at a time. Is it so that they don't have to waste time getting up for another batch to spin? I used to joke about getting catheterized at work so I wouldn't have to ache for hours and hours when I was just too swamped to get up and run for a pee. I figured if they gave me a wheelchair (since I wouldn't need to use my legs) and the catheter I could also fulfill their disability quotas and everyone would be happy! It's no joke though when you are tied to any machine for hours and hours without letup - and it doesn't matter if the machine is motorized or not. They speak on the same sight about how easy it would be to mechanize the entire process but that would take away employment.

A few more pictures and I'm off before I get booted Dear Readers - will actually show what I've been making while I'm here next post.

I haven't seen the cows in the streets decorated for Pongal so I'll show you a very cute statue with a fresh garland offering. The pictures on the link from the last post will have to do.



And around town...

The Cobbler:



The Fast Food Counter:



Da Fuzz:



The Florist:



The Sweet Shop:



The Girlie Girl Shop:



The Velvet-lined Taxi:



The Sari Shop:



Somebody stop meeeeee......

and the Laundry