On Christmas Eve

In the absence of cards, carols, and my mother's cranberry bread, I decided I had to have a Christmas tree in Arambol this year. For some reason, my Muslim friends got really excited about the possibility.

"Yes!" they said. "You can put it in our shop!"

To prevent incurring the wrath of Allah, I suggested we call it an Eid Shrub. They agreed.

We took a taxi to nearby Mapusa, where vendors sell tiny lights, tinsel, garlands, and cheap plastic ornaments. I stocked up on all of the above and then looked around in vain for a Christmas tree lot. "What do the Indians hang this stuff on?" I wondered.

A few stalls sold fake trees, but I have to carry all my possessions on my back for the next three months. I was hesitant to invest in something I'd have trouble getting rid of.



I carried my lights and garlands back to the source of all my Indian cultural knowledge, the steps of the Blue Fin Guesthouse, and asked my Goan friends for ideas.

"There are pine trees down the beach, towards Mandrem," the guesthouse manager told me. "Go there on Christmas Eve and cut a branch for a tree."

Perfect.

This morning, I did my yoga by Christmas lights (strung up on my window until I got a tree) and headed to the steps with a giant papaya under my arm. My plan: share the papaya in exchange for borrowing some sort of saw/axe implement to aid my hunt for the tree.

I got downstairs and the Blue Fin roomboy looked at me sternly and said, "No papaya this morning!"

I knew he was joking because last night, when they'd seen me carrying the fruit up to my room, all the boys had begged me to stop and cut it open right then. I laughed and asked for a knife and a plate.

"No papaya," he said again. And then he told me why: the old man died last night.

Blue Fin has its own ghost - an old, old German tourist who looks too thin to live and rarely emerges from his room. When he does, he doesn't speak and usually just sits staring quietly at the sea. We've all joked uneasily, more than once, that it's like he came here to die. Last night, he did.

The roomboy found his body this morning. The old man had left his door open, as if he'd known someone should come look in on him.

I took the papaya back upstairs and we all sat on the steps, staring at the sea while policemen in beige uniforms loitered nearby and yelled ineffectually at the beggars on the beach.

When it was clear there was nothing I could do, I decided to look for a tree anyway. I didn't want to trouble anyone for a saw, so I just got up quietly. I edged down the alley, past a black jeep with white letters reading "Hearst-Van."

I found the pine grove about a quarter-mile down the beach. Most of the branches were far too high for me to touch. The few I could reach were spindly and lop-sided. I felt guilty about breaking even one branch off a tree, especially since I doubted these feathery Indian evergreen branches would even stand up straight by themselves. But the sun was hot and I was rapidly losing the reachable options to better-prepared locals with ladders and axes, so I finally grabbed a branch about as wide as my thumb and started pulling.

Christmas or no, the tree did not want me to have this branch. The wood squeaked and splintered, but wouldn't break. I twisted the limb and received a needly slap in the face. I yanked and cursed in a decidedly un-Christian manner as sweat poured down my forehead. Finally, the branch came loose.

I held it up for a proper examination and it listed immediately to one side. It was weak and sparse, evoking nothing so much as Charlie Brown's tiny mishapen Christmas tree. Whatever. It was mine.

I carried it back across the sand to the steps of the Blue Fin. My Muslim friends, my Christmas tree/Eid shrub champions, were nowhere in sight. The Blue Fin manager, who's been celebrating Christmas all his life, stared skeptically at my prize.

"You didn't get a big one?" he said finally.

"I was really limited by what I could reach or break with my bare hands," I said defensively.

"Why didn't you get someone to cut one for you?" he asked, as if the village was crawling with lumberjacks for hire.

I shrugged. He asked me where I intended to put it.

"Right here," I said, pointing to the storefront place of honor we'd already chosen for the Eid/Christmas tree/shrub.

He shook his head. "Maybe you could put it by your room instead," he suggested. (My room is on the third floor, next to the toilet.)



I took the hint and carried my rejected tree upstairs, past the open door of the old man's now-empty room, which reeked of antiseptic.

The roomboy filled a bucket with sand and stuck the spindly little branch inside. It immediately slumped over. He ran to get a bucket of water and made the sand wet. No good. The tree refused to stay up. Undaunted, he lifted it on top of the balcony railing and tied it upright to the building's support post.

"OK?" he asked, looking at me for approval.

"Wonderful," I said. He left and I got out my tinsel and tiny plastic balls and decorated the tree as best I could. The tinsel kept flying off in the wind and the branches couldn't handle more than one ornament and there was nowhere to plug in the lights, but eventually I got it done.

I took pictures of my creation, but the branches were so thin, there was no way to obscure my neighbor's underwear drying on the clothesline behind the tree. As I tried new photographic angles with limited success, the glue gave way on an ornament and the silver ball bounced away onto the roof below.



I put the camera down. This was, without a doubt, the most meager tree I had ever, ever seen.

"Merry Christmas!" a man's voice called out behind me. My European neighbor was grinning shyly at my tree as he walked to his room.

"Merry Christmas!" I called back, waving with a ridiculous amount of enthusiasm, trying to catch the tinsel as it blew off the tree again. Yes, I thought. It's the spirit of the tree that matters! I looked at my humble tree with new, loving eyes and thought about how lucky I am to be decorating any sort of tree on a balcony overlooking the Arabian Sea.

I felt warm in the certainty that Christmas is all about what's inside us, and therefore, I can carry it anywhere I go! The glow of this revelation lasted about five minutes, until my friends began quizzing me about whether I would be dressed properly for midnight mass tonight.

"Yes, yes," I said. "I have a new salwaar kameez I bought special."

My Goan friends looked skeptical. "Better shoes?" they asked. "What about makeup?"

"Um, I have lip gloss?"

They shook their heads. "First the tree and now this," their expressions said. "What is wrong with America?"

"She doesn't need makeup!" my Kashmiri friend defended me. "She's a simple girl!"

Of course, being Muslim and having never attended a midnight mass, his opinion was rapidly discounted.

"Make-up," they repeated decisively.

And there you have it, or rather, me. A simple girl, with a humble tree, who is rapidly learning there is no place like home for the holidays.

I wish you the best and brightest of the Christmas season and a wonderful New Year.

Nothing says merry like an armed police presence

I recently returned to my beloved Arambol beach, after a brief experiment in ashram living in Mysore, to discover the Grinch is trying to steal Christmas in Goa! Fearing further terrorist attacks, the state government has banned all beach parties between now and January 5. No Christmas celebrations. No New Year's countdown. No fireworks. Earlier this week, police even broke up the open-mic nights at local bars in the village, sending everyone home to bed by 8:30 p.m.

I read an editorial in the local newspaper today that said, "If the terrorists' goal was to spread fear and keep us from exercising our freedom, they certainly got their way."

Yesterday, a little fort-like structure made of sandbags appeared in the middle of the beach. I peered into it, wondering at its purpose. Was it a barrier to launch fireworks from? A makeshift DJ booth?

A Kashmiri friend indentified it immediately. "It's a banker," he said.

"A banker?" I echoed, picturing a professional-looking man in a suit approving home loans.

"Yes, a military banker." Oh, a bunker. For soldiers. With guns.

I wasn't sure what was more sad: that Arambol beach would need a banker/bunker or that my Kashmiri friends, who marvel at unfamiliar sights like the fashion models in my magazines or airplanes in the night sky, were so familiar with the appearance of military intervention.

Factor in continuing economic despair, the sabre rattling between India and Pakistan, and a head cold that's on its second week of residency in my sinuses, and it's tempting to feel a bit "Bah Humbug" about everything. At times like this, I try to take a lesson from the Whos of Whoville and remember that it doesn't matter if the Grinch hordes all your presents and parties in his cave, the holidays live inside us.

So, I walk around humming Christmas carols. I eat too many sweets. (One tradition that's easy to observe in any country!) I'm going to midnight mass on Christmas Eve at the chapel in the village. And I'm wishing you all a merry little Christmas.

Luck is a form of faith

Last night, there was a Hindu religious festival on nearby Mandrem beach. Due to my poor grasp of Hindi, I can't tell you the name or the significance of the event. Even my Hindu friends seemed vague on the details.

It was close to 11 p.m. when my friends decided to check it out. This seemed a bit late for church to me, but they assured me it would go on all night and reminded me to bring extra money "for gambling."

"Gambling?" I said, fearing I'd misunderstood the invitation. "Where are we going? A casino party?"

"No, no, religious festival. You know, Hindu."

"With gambling?" I asked again.

"Of course," they said, shrugging.

I was sure I'd lost something in translation, but I packed a few extra rupees and we headed out across the sand.

Soon, a giant tent appeared on the horizon, its pyramid peek flashing white lights against the night sky. Shrieks and cacophonous drum rolls rushed towards us in the dark. When we reached the tent, an epic drama was taking place inside. A shirtless actor in a feathered headdress, his chest smeared with paint and his eyes bulging from his fiery face, yelled to the heavens in Hindi. A sleepy two-man band - one organ player and one drummer - occasionally roused themselves to punctuate his assertions with startling musical interludes. An equally drowsy crowd of about 50 men and women sat on the floor, watching through heavy-lidded eyes.

My friends paid polite attention to this production for about 15 seconds before pushing me out the back of the tent to a nearby field. There, I was surprised to find a crowd about four times the size of the one in the tent. Everyone crouched in small circles around lanterns placed at intervals on the ground. When we got closer, I saw they were all playing card games on blankets.

We gathered around a blanket which had 10 playing cards sewn to its surface. My friends dropped 50-rupee notes on their favorites - Queen of Hearts, eight of diamonds - and then waited anxiously as a grizzled dealer split his deck of cards one by one into two piles. If the card my friends bet on landed in the left pile, they won money. If it landed in the right pile, they lost. They urged me to play, but being the only non-Indian and the only woman in the field, I felt too shy.

Nehi, nehi, mai achi lardki hei, I told them in my fledgling Hindi. "No, no, I'm a good girl."

They laughed and kept on until they ran out of money. (Just like in America, the house always wins, even when "the house" is just a blanket in a field.)

The next day, I tried again to understand the marriage of gambling and religion.

"Is there always gambling at Hindu religious festivals?" I asked.

"Oh, always," my friends assured me.

"But isn't that weird?" I pressed. "Isn't gambling considered a vice in most cultures?"

"Sure," they agreed, "but if they didn't have gambling at the religious festivals, no one would go."

Bangalore Fried Chicken

I've been vegetarian for almost 20 years, so it's hard to remember the last time I dined at Kentucky Fried Chicken. Oh wait, it was yesterday.

I stumbled across this KFC in Bangalore while waiting for my sleeper bus to Goa. I could not believe how happy I felt to see something familiar, even if it was a fast food restaurant I never even visit at home. I paused to wave at the Colonel, and that's when I saw the banner in the window advertising vegetarian chicken. Whaaa?

I ran inside, feeling a little guilty for being seduced by corporate culture, and ordered up some veg chicken sticks and French fries.



Then I sat at my little table with my hands folded and watched the smartly dressed waiters - Indian KFC has table service - hustle around, accompanied by a Muzak version of Madonna's greatest hits. The comfort factor was overwhelming.

The veg chicken was sort of like fish sticks - rectangular, unnaturally white and uniformly processed - with an occasional pea or carrot chunk for texture. It wouldn't win any culinary prizes, but the appeal of salty batter never fades. The fries were like heaven and, as a bonus, my tray liner included this intriguing game.




It's a maze with a bucket of chicken at the starting point. The directions read, "Try coming out of its taste." Hmmm...

So if KFC is mass-producing vegetarian options for India, why don't we have them in the U.S.? I know there's less interest in vegetarian dining in America, but how hard would it be to throw a pack of these Bangalorian veg sticks in the freezer?

Look into that, would you Mr. Chicken?

Drive-by Santa

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas in Mangalore:

Wishing you a Cafe Coffee Day!

Most backpackers I've met are way too cool for Cafe Coffee Day. These coffee shops are nowhere near as ubiquitous as Starbucks back home, but they are a Western-style chain operation, and thus ripe for ridicule from the adventure club.

Well, I guess they'll have to revoke my membership, because I nearly wept with joy when I saw this waiting for me!



My first brownie in at least two months! Praise be!

In fact, I completely scrapped my plans today as soon as I found both a bookstore and a Cafe Coffee Day on the same street as my hotel in Mangalore. My entire daily budget was blown before 10 a.m. on books, magazines, newspapers and a mocha. A girl's gotta have her priorities.

Animatronic Jesus loves you

Yesterday, a Goan friend of mine invited me to Old Goa for the novenas of St. Francis Xavier. Every November, for nine days, Catholic pilgrims come from all over India to attend a truly massive mass at the Basilica Bom Jesus and to gaze upon the actual corpse of St. Francis!



SFX's corpse is legendarily known as "the incorruptible body of Francis Xavier" because it has resisted decay for hundreds of years. Until recently, they hauled it out every year in a glass coffin for everyone to touch and kiss (the coffin, not the body). Lately there are rumors that the miracle may be over, because the body is starting to fall apart. My friend wasn't entirely sure they'd bring it out this year, but I was crossing my fingers.

When we got to the Basilica, there was a huge tent outside with thousands of chairs set up for the mass. A glittery sign said "St. Francis Xavier spreads the Jesus Glow" in English and Konkani (the regional language of Goa). Next to this was a long maze of ropes, like you'd see in front of a ride at Disneyland. Luckily there were only a few hundred people in line because it was day 7 of the feast. (All the locals go before day 9, when things really get crazy.)

Every single person there was dressed in their nicest party clothes, except me. Foolishly, I'd worn khakis and a T-shirt. I looked as if I'd just spent an hour riding a scooter through the dusty countryside. The fact that I really had was small consolation amidst the gold jewelry and sequined dresses of Catholic pageantry.

We shuffled into the church and past the altar and before I knew it, we'd reached the body of SFX! The church had compromised on the decay issue and displayed him in an ornate wooden coffin with glass windows on a platform above our heads. He was very clearly in there, but you could really only see his brown shriveled hands, feet and profile. The pilgrims touched and kissed the base of the platform and dropped marigold flower leis into baskets placed at regular intervals. I touched the platform too, but I wasn't really sure what to say/think/pray.

No matter, the tide of bodies quickly shuffled us out the door and into seats for mass.



The whole sermon was in Konkani, so I just stood up and sat down when everyone else did. At one point, the priest yelled out "Money! Mobile! Motorcycle!" and I knew he must be warning against the growing materialism of the younger generations. The rest of the time, I just let the unfamiliar words wash over me and prayed silent Tiny Tim prayers.

"God bless us every one!"

After mass, we headed to a nearby museum where Portuguese colonists had stashed all the "heathen" Hindu statues they'd removed when they were building Christian churches. Then we hit the carnival midway for lunch, beer, and popsicles. I contemplated riding my first Indian Ferris wheel, but I never saw anyone else on it the whole time I was there. If the Indians - who shun seat belts and helmets and maximum capacity laws - don't trust their carnivals rides, I sure as heck won't.

I didn't think the day could get much better, but my friend had saved the best surprise for last. We went back to the Basilica and walked through a courtyard where hundreds of pilgrims were camped out for the duration of the novenas, and we got in line for something called "The Sound and Light Gallery, A Pilgrimmage of the Heart."

We had to wait 15 minutes for an English-language version, for which we were the only audience. It turned out to be an animatronic Chuck E. Cheese-style show on the life of Jesus!

I was strictly forbidden to take photos - even of the sign outside - so you'll have to take my word for how awesome it was. We walked from room to room watching robotic John the Baptists and Pontius Pilates acting out the familiar story, simultaneously aided and hindered by our thickly accented tour guide.

"Behold chew slum!"
What did she say? Oh! Jerusalem!

When Jesus was transformed on the mount, Indian pop music started playing and a strobe light went off over his head. Then multi-colored disco lights turned on over OUR heads, to demonstrate God's love reaching us through Jesus. (And that God's love is very like a Bombay nightclub!)

At one point, we entered a small fiberglass cave with a life-sized Jesus sitting lotus-style in one corner. "Pray with Jesus!" our guide commanded. My friend and I bowed our heads obediently, but started fidgeting after a few minutes.

It was a relief when the guide led us away, even though we were obviously headed to the crucifixion. I never thought anything could top seeing the possibly miraculous corpse of a saint, but when the animatronic Jesus died on the cross, the room went dark and the floor literally shook under our feet! I sincerely wish I could have teleported every one of you there with me.

Don't worry, I'd send you back home before I get on the 12-hour bus to Mangalore tomorrow. I'll be in an ashram in Mysore doing yoga from December 8 through the 15, with some long bus rides before and after, so my blogging time might be limited for awhile. May the awesome disco strobe-light of God's love sustain you until we meet again.

Holy f%^-ing shit! (and happy Thanksgiving)

First, for all of you who have written to me after hearing about the insane situation currently happening in Mumbai, yes, I am fine. Thank you so much for thinking of me. Secondly, holy fucking shit!

I woke up here on Thanksgiving Day on my beautiful Arambol beach (hundreds of kilometers from Mumbai, thank God) to hear some Belgian tourists complaining that all flights to Mumbai had been canceled. I grabbed a newspaper over my veg hakka noodle brunch at the Rice Bowl and I could not believe what I was reading. 30 shot dead in the train station where India and Becca had their staring contest, tourists held hostage at the Taj Hotel where I ogled fancy dresses in glamorous shop windows, a grenade attack at the movie theater where I saw "Hellboy 2", a boatload of explosives at the Gateway to India where I first spied the moon from this country. All told, there have been five bomb blasts so far. There are already 60 dead and 200 injured in the tourist district where I was just trying to book a hotel for my mom's visit to Mumbai in January!

The terrorists are still free in the hotels and the train station. No one is yet sure why this is happening. The army has descended on the city and police are being sent from all areas.

I feel physically safe on the remote beach where I'm staying, but I can't help but wonder what planet I'm on over here. I knew there were bomb blasts and terrorist activity in India, but I had comforted myself in thinking they were all confined to areas of unrest in specific northern states I never planned to visit. Now, the worst one to date, with bombs and guns and grenades and no end in sight yet, has happened in the glorious, modern, enlightened south.

Mumbai is not a political city. It's the city of Bollywood movies and nightlife and romance, a city where West and East mingle on dance floors and in clean, upscale boutiques. Like our own Los Angeles, it is dirty and crowded, but it is the land where dreams are made. This is a strike on India's heart and its imagination and its port of entry for the Western world.

I am so sad for the people of the city, and also for India, whose tourist economy was already declining in the wake of global financial meltdown. My shopkeeper friends in Arambol sat with their heads in their hands this morning, in despair. Business has been almost nothing this year, as the number of tourists in Goa has declined drastically since Europeans and Americans are all tightening their belts and forgoing vacations. My friends here work 14-hour days at their shops, seven days a week, and most days this year have yielded only a few hundred rupees ($20-$30 U.S.). The last few weeks, our conversations on the guesthouse steps have centered on how they are going to pay their rent, and how they can possibly encourage more sales from the few budget-conscious tourists who are still daring to travel these days. I've tried to do my part, buying extra dresses and unnecessary ice cream cones with my increasingly more valuable dollars, but I'm just one girl.

The great hope for financial salvation here in Goa has been the upcoming Christmas season. Tourism peaks in Goa at the end of December and everyone's been crossing their fingers that a pack of rich travelers will descend on the beaches and spend enough in a couple drunken weeks to offset the rest of the season's losses. In Arambol, where I live, there are no direct charter flights. The tourists who come here usually come down from Mumbai. Now, no one is coming to Mumbai.

God will provide, my friends say. This is the comfort they share, ignoring the fact that - as two Muslim jewelers, one Christian ice cream merchant, two Hindu clothiers, and one American tourist religious mutt - we all believe in different Gods. Here in Arambol, as we watch the sea advance and retreat on the guesthouse steps, we instinctively know what the terrorists have yet to understand: that our theological and political differences are infinitely less important than our friendship, our mutual prosperity, and our desire to live together in peace.

May this wisdom spread throughout India - and the world - before another life is lost.

God willing.
Insh'allah.
Om Shanti.

I hope you are all well and happy on this Thanksgiving Day. (I'm sorry for the drastic subject matter.) I am thankful for the love and humor and support each of you brings to my life. Stay safe and warm and kiss your family and eat an extra helping of mashed potatoes for me.

When is a cow sacred?

I'm walking through Arambol village with my new yoga mat under my arm when I see a large cow approach a produce stand. With no hesitation, it plucks an apple from the middle of a huge pyramid of fruit with its fuzzy cow lips. More apples tumble to the ground as the cow noisily crunches down its stolen goods and leans in for more.

Normally, I would try to save the apples, but this is India and I'm not sure about the rules. In some places cows are sacred, and I don't want to go to jail for swatting someone's deity with a yoga mat. Then again, I think, Goa is largely a Christian state, so cows are probably just livestock here. But Jesus would have probably shared his apples with a cow, so...

I am shaken out of this dubious theological debate by the sound of a woman's angry voice. She's sitting in a chair across the street shouting at the cow, who completely ignores her while decimating her streetside display.

Then she turns and fixes me with a stare that can only mean, "You dumb foreigner. Why are you letting that cow eat all my apples? Do something!"

I swing my yoga mat at the cow's yearning lips and it lazily saunters away. I, on the other hand, move away at lightning speed, just in case the Hindu deities are watching.

Sneaky monkeys

My favorite adventure in Hampi was my trek from the Uma Shankar guesthouse

by the river, through villages and fields, to the monkey temple about an hour's walk away. Hampi is the birthplace of the Hindu god Hanuman (the monkey god) and his temple is located at the top of this huge cliff. It's a tiny white building waiting at the end of a long, zig-zaggy staircase cut into the mountainside.



Climbing this staircase was like suddenly finding myself in advanced aerobics, when I'd meant to sign up for the beginners' class. I huffed and puffed and sweated my way to the top, pausing often under the guise of admiring the amazing view. It feels like you can see every temple, banana field and mountain in Karnataka from these stairs. It's an incredible vantage point.



All along the stairs, monkeys watched my progress while chattering and pointing and scrutinizing my bag for possible bananas. (The already challenging steps of the monkey temple are made even more so by the presence of banana peels everywhere. It's slapstick comedy waiting to happen.)



Once at the top, I went inside the tiny cave-like temple and did my best to look like I belonged. I knelt before the altar, covered with marigolds, incense sticks, bowls of sugar, fruit, and prayers scribbled out on scraps of paper. I dropped a few rupees on the altar and mumbled a general prayer of thanksgiving - not least of all for making it to the top of the stairs without passing out.

Then a monk came over and gestured to a tiny brass bowl at our feet. I shrugged, not understanding, and he picked it up and painted a red line down my forehead. I felt included, but still clueless.

When I re-emerged, the sunlight was almost blinding. I blinked to clear my vision, and saw a monkey run past me with a shoe in his mouth.

Everyone has to leave their shoes outside the temple, so there are a pile of them at the top of the steps. This monkey had ignored all the cheap flip-flops and made off with a quality man's loafer. He'd climbed a small hill and was just about to disappear over the cliff face when I shouted at him to stop.




Having lost three pairs of shoes in India already, I know what a drag it is to be without footwear in this country. The owner of the loafers was nowhere in sight, but I felt an obligation to help. The monkey turned and looked at me, chewing meditatively on the heel. Deciding that, as a foreigner and non-Hindu, I had absolutely no authority, he dismissed me and scurried further away.

I heard a shout behind me. An Indian man ran towards me, telling me not to worry, he would help save my shoe. He walked as close as possible to the monkey and softly said, "Give shoe, baba."

The monkey seemed to consider this. The man held out his water bottle. "Take water, give shoe."

The monkey took the shoe out of his mouth and stared at the bottle. "Come on," the man coaxed, "give shoe."

The monkey dropped the shoe and backed away.

I applauded and the man gallantly handed the shoe to me. Then I had to explain, rather anti-climactically, that the shoe wasn't even mine. We both laughed and then dropped it back in the general shoe pile outside the temple door, where the same monkey was already chewing on someone else's sneakers.

We tried to shoo him away (no pun intended) but ultimately had to concede that you can't save everyone's shoes. Sometimes not even your own. This is one of the many lessons of India.

Then the man offered me a ride back to the guesthouse on his tiny motorbike, with his girlfriend. (That's three adults on a vehicle about the size of my moped, with no helmets.) I refused repeatedly, but they insisted. They even followed me down the road on their bike, calling for me to get on. So I climbed onto the very back, hanging onto the tiny metal bar you'd bungee your backpack to, and rode home in true Hampi style.

Shukriya, Hanuman!

The best thing that happened (except for the other best things)

I'm standing alone on a muddy riverbank, studying the boat that will take me across the Tungabhadra River to Hampi Bazaar. What my guidebook optimistically calls a "ferry" is actually a tiny wooden dinghy captained by a teenage boy sporting slickly oiled hair, polyester slacks, and no shoes. His co-worker is an authoritative child who collects the passengers’ fares in a dusty canvas shoulder bag: five rupees for locals, 10 for white people, and 15 for backpacker know-it-alls who insist on haggling.

These boys will not drive across the river to meet me until they deem it worth their while. In other words, not until they’ve gathered enough passengers to effectively sink the boat.

"Scoot down! Scoot down!"

I can hear the child yelling from all the way across the river. Adults four times his age stumble over rotted holes in the boat’s floorboards in their haste to obtain a seat. When the passengers are seated thigh to thigh; when a mound of rucksacks, vegetables, livestock and children fills the middle of the boat; when the creaking craft rides so low in the water that passing fish could hitch a ride; the child signals a man with a motorcycle to ride his hog onto the prow and balance there like Evil Knievel, pre-stunt. Then he yells at his teenage skipper, who yanks the cord on the boat’s aging outboard motor. The whole show inches away from the riverbank in a cloud of two-stroke engine oil.

The river is no wider than a Los Angeles freeway, but the overloaded ferry drags slower than rush hour traffic. I sit down on the bank to wait. I’m hunting in my tote bag for my sunglasses, when a family of Indian women and children surrounds me on all sides like a clutch of paparazzi who’ve forgotten their cameras. They wear bright clothes, gleaming bracelets, and identical crescent-moon grins.



"Hi!" they say in unison.

"Hi!" I say, equally charmed and alarmed. When Indians approach me in tourist areas like this one, it’s often to sell me something or to demand an explanation for George W. Bush’s entire administration. I’ve grown accustomed to disappointing people.

"Hindi?" a teenaged girl asks.

"No, only English," I say.

"Only English," she repeats, visibly disappointed.

We've exhausted our entire common vocabulary. We are silent.

A toddler wobbles forward. She stares down my shyness with bottomless kohl-rimmed eyes, before extending one bangled wrist and saying, "Hi!"

"Hi!" I say again, shaking her hand.

Now everyone wants a handshake.

"Hi!" "Hi! "Hi!"

We are all laughing.

"Hi!" "Hi!" "Hi!"

Young mothers put their infants' hands in mine. "Hiiiiii...." I coo at tiny babies. I shake everyone's hand, more than once. Eventually, it becomes obvious to all of us–even the babies—that we've greeted each other as much as any group of sane people waiting for an impossibly slow ferry ever could. Silence descends again.

We look for the ferry. It's nowhere near the bank. We stare downriver. We stare at our sandals. We stare at each other. The teenaged girl gets an idea.

"Song!" she says, pointing at me.

Faces light up. A chant begins.

"Song! Song! Song!" they say.

"No, no, no," I say.

"Song! Song! Song!" they say.

"Nehi, nehi, nehi," I say in fledgling Hindi, shaking my head with the exaggerated movements of a woman desperate to be understood.

"Song! Song! Song!"

They are relentless. I am Judy Garland on the third encore of the last show of my career. Their cheering attracts more onlookers—rickshaw drivers, chai wallahs, women with baskets on their heads—all of whom quickly take up the chant.

"Song! Song! Song!"

I look frantically toward the river. The ferry is practically moving backwards at this point. Perhaps it will sink, I think, just like my dignity. I have only two options: run and hide in the hills or stand up and sing.

"OK!" I say.

They silence immediately and look at me expectantly. My mind fails. It is as if I have never heard music in my life. Song? What's a song?

"Song!" the toddler says.

"Song! Song! Song!" they say.

I close my eyes. I open my mouth. These words come out:

"Wise men say
only fools rush in,
but I can't help
falling in love with you..."

It's Elvis, ladies and gentleman. Always alive where you least expect him.

When I finish the chorus, there are cheers. The ferry arrives. I am escorted down the bank like royalty and delicately handed into the decaying rowboat. As we slowly sputter towards the opposite shore, children compete to hold my hand and touch my feet.

It is way too much. It is unbearably embarrassing, and it is possibly the best thing that has ever happened to me.

May we all be so appreciated for our stumbling endeavors.

A load of bull

Today I hiked to the giant bull statue at the end of Hampi Bazaar. Thus, I offer you:

Monolithic Bull

Monolithic Balls

Mini-lithic Bull

Thank you, America!

I just wanted to thank you all for electing Barack Obama president. I am so thrilled that I am literally crying in this internet cafe in Hampi.

I faxed in my ballot weeks ago from a sandy, old fax machine at the Om Ganesh grocery store in Arambol and I've been crossing my fingers ever since. Yesterday was Tuesday, November 4, but since India is 13 and a half hours ahead, I went to bed uncertain of the results. I just logged into the internet and found out!

I am so happy for our country! I'm also relieved that I won't have to explain to my many new Indian friends why we're still supporting the policies of George Bush when no one seems to like him. This is a question I've gotten repeatedly and I always babble about red states and blue states and fear and patriotism and how money controls politics and how it's hard to know what to do when you're just one person and then I end up shrugging in hopelessness.

So thank you. Really. From me and the entire world.

Shoeless in Hampi

I arrived in Hampi yesterday. It's a World Heritage site in the middle of the Indian state of Karnataka, famous with tourists for its many temples



and awesome bouldering opportunities.



I'm utterly exhausted after a bumpy, wild overnight bus ride on a "luxury sleeper" that was neither luxurious nor sleepable. I spent the whole night clinging to a tiny ledge just big enough for my body, with my knees strategically wedged wherever possible to keep from falling to the floor when the bus turned a corner.

There's a huge three-day festival here now, the annual Hampi Utsav. I've got a guesthouse across the river from the action and I'm laying low. I can hear the bands and see the fireworks from my couch swing, though.



(Yes, my room comes with its own outdoor swing in the garden. Awesome. I've been laying there reading "Shantaram" - which I highly recommend - all day.)

During the festival, there are lights trained on all the temples at night. That takes an ancient structure like the Virupaksha Temple here



and turns it into the aesthetic equivalent of my dear friend Rachel's vintage aluminum Christmas tree.

Now it's purple!

Now it's orange! (And super blurry.)

Now it's purple again!

Last night, I was planning to head out to the Utsav when two British girls burst into the restaurant where I was having dinner and announced the river ferry had capsized because there were so many people crammed on it. No one was hurt, but everyone was wet. That was pretty discouraging, since I needed the ferry to get there. Then I left the restaurant to discover someone had stolen my sandals while I was eating. Clear signs that it was time for bed.

For those of you keeping score on Becca vs. India, this would be the third pair of sandals India has claimed from me in a month - two pairs broken and one pair absconded with. In fact, every single time I change locations, the first thing I have to do is buy shoes again. I guess that's on the agenda for tomorrow, after a barefoot breakfast.

Day labor

One thing I've learned on this extended vacation is that it's really hard to be idle every day. I'm not really of any use to anyone in India and it doesn't matter if I get anything done. That was a relief for the first couple weeks, but now it's gotten kind of old.

So when the Exotic Arts jewelry store in Arambol needed painting, I pretty much begged to be allowed to help.

At first my Indian friends who own it were like, "Oh no, no. You're on holiday." Eventually they got tired of my pleading. They found me an extra brush and we got to work.



Of course, having a day laborer from America is a novelty around these parts. I'm not sure anyone in Goa has ever seen an American do anything that looks like physical labor. Other merchants began to gather around. Flashbulbs went off as I painted.



"Look at our worker! From America!" my friends called out, in a tone that said, "Can you believe how ridiculous this is?"

"America, eh?" the other men would laugh. "How much, she paint my guesthouse?"

"100 rupees, whole day! See, Becca? We find you job!"

I went to bed tired and continued to find tiny blue-paint freckles on my body for days afterward.

Bat-frog returns!

This morning, I went to lock my guestroom door and discovered a pair of eyes peering out at me from the bolt hole.



I didn't know what I was looking at. A frog? A lizard? A snake? Whatever it was, I couldn't lock my door until it moved. And it did not want to move.

I called to it. I banged on the wall. I sang to it. I pretended to close the door to fake it out. The creature was having none of it.



I finally resorted to prying it out with an unlit stick of incense, while simultaneously praying it was not actually venomous. One aromatic prod spurred a flying leap to the door.



Could this be the mysterious bat-frog?



Before I could ask, it jumped back inside my room! I was too hungry to bother chasing it around, so I locked it in and went down the hill for breakfast.

When I returned hours later for an afternoon nap, I found I had company.



The frog was already tucked in, so I carefully climbed into the other side of my bed and fell asleep. Frog and Becca are friends.

Miss Manners visits Goa

Now that I've been here a whole week, I'm sure I am qualified (ha!) to offer some advice to would-be visitors of Goa. Thus, I humbly offer my handy guide to beach etiquette.



For the men: I completely understand why you don't use the bathrooms at the bars here. Pit toilets are hard enough to negotiate when you're sober. So by all means, head out to the beach to pee. Just remember to head waaaaaaaay out. Those bar lights are much brighter than you think they are. I saw three of you draining your geckos during one seaside dining experience, which was hardly the oceanfront ambiance I was seeking.

Also, I think we can blame Survivor for this trend, but I must tell you that - unless you are competing for $1 million on American television using only your wits - boxer briefs are not bathing suits. Seriously, all that thin, saggy, wet fabric is doing your package no favors. I can't believe I am saying this, but even a Speedo would be more flattering. Invest in some board shorts and watch your life change.

Now ladies: On busy afternoons, I know it looks like the parking lot of a Phish concert out here, so it's easy to get confused, but please remember you are in India. Conservative India. When Indian women go swimming, notice how they are wearing knee-length shorts and long-sleeved shirts. The Goans are kind enough to tolerate our less-modest Western dress on their beaches, but there's really no reason to strip off all your clothes and go running down the sand screaming 'Wooooooo!' with everything your mama gave you bouncing in the breeze. We get it. You're on vacation. You're a free spirit. But you're making the entire Western world look like a den of sin, so go put on a T-shirt.

For the barkeeps: Enough with "Hotel California." Even if we go along with the popular assumption that most people like the Eagles (which I personally find hard to believe), there is no more depressing song to play for travelers far from home in a neo-Bohemian environment.

Seriously, can you think of one? What's that? Pink Floyd's "Hey You." You're right. Pull that one from your playlist too, please.

And thank you.

Amateur yoga hour

In Arambol, the beaches are riddled with Western tourists doing athletic shoulder stands and serene triangle poses. They all look calm and fulfilled, as if God personally called them halfway around the world to perform a divine downward dog.

I still don't have the faintest idea why I'm here, and I guess it's starting to eat at me. Watching all these Yoga Journal cover models, it occurred to me that yoga might help me connect to some kind of inner guidance. At the very least, I could work out the backpacker kinks in my shoulders.

Yoga and I don't hang out together very often these days, but I can still pull off a sun salutation from memory. So the last two mornings, I got up early and attempted some yoga poses on the sand amidst scuttling crabs and sniffing beach dogs.

The first day, I felt so calm afterward. I lay on the sand, listening to the surf and taking deep breaths in time with the waves. "Nothing can ruffle me now," I thought.

Just then, two beggars - a woman and a little girl wrapped in faded shawls - came up to my blanket with their hands out. I didn't have any money on me, just my blanket and my shoes. I shook my head no. They kept their hands out, both less than a foot away from me, reaching and reaching.

I said, "No, I'm sorry."

I tried to ignore them. They just stood there, calling, "Hello! Hello!"

Every time I looked up, they held out their hands and fixed me with these pitiful stares. I stood up. I said no again. I mimed having no pockets, no money.

"Where would I be hiding money?" I asked, exasperated.

They just continued calling, "Hello! Hello! Hello! Hello!" This went on for five minutes. I walked down the beach. They followed me. I started a conversation with someone else. They waited. I walked halfway back to my room before they eventually faded away and, by then, I was really, truly ruffled.

On the second morning, I went to a different beach. About a half hour into my solo routine, a young man appeared out of nowhere. He was wearing only plaid cotton boxer shorts and aviator sunglasses. He crouched right next to me and peered into my upside-down face.

"Yoga!" he said, with a huge smile.

"Yup!" I gasped, somewhat embarrassed in downward dog. He just kept sitting there, looking at me.

I dropped my pose and asked, "What's up?"

Through a series of gestures and many words I didn't understand, he communicated that he was from Russia, he didn't speak English, and he wanted me to go swimming.

I was not going swimming. I was wearing pants and a shirt, for one, and I didn't want to leave my bag alone on the beach. Plus, I was in the middle of yoga!

"Damn it," I thought. "I'm trying to be a disciplined, healthy bad-ass, so why won't India let me finish a single yoga practice?"

The man just kept talking in Russian. Every time I broke a pose and looked at him, he would make a motion like he was dancing The Swim, point at the ocean and give me a thumbs up. "Good, OK?"

"No," I said, over and over. "No. No."

"I don't have a swimming suit," I'd say, pointing to my pants. "I don't understand what you're saying. I'm doing yoga now. Please go."

"Yoga? Good!" Thumbs up. Then more swimming motions.

I couldn't get him to leave and I couldn't just keep doing yoga with him watching and chattering. "Screw it," I thought.

I jumped up and ran into the ocean with my clothes on. He laughed and followed and we both got clobbered by the waves. My waterlogged yoga pants kept pulling me down and it was hard to swim. Still, I swam way out towards the horizon, much further than he did, and floated for awhile.

When I came back to the shore, he followed me out. "Good," he said. "Yoga! Bye, OK?"

He waved, still laughing, and walked off the beach without a backward glance.

Clearly, the lessons of yoga extend far beyond the mat in India. I'm still not sure I understand, but I can't wait to see what happens tomorrow.

The disappearing bat-frog

Whatever you do, don't look under your bed. I'm not sure yet whether this advice applies to all of India or just Goa.

Last night, I was getting ready for bed by flashlight when I heard a wet sort of splat behind me. I turned and saw a fist-sized shape on the floor that was clearly an animal. I couldn't tell if it was a bat or a frog or a ???, so I walked carefully across the room and flicked on the big light.

There was nothing on the floor anymore.

Well, I couldn't just crawl into bed after that, so I picked up my headlamp and shined it in all the corners. The frog/bat/what-have-you was gone. However, I could see some big ol' insect legs wrapped around one of the legs of my bed. Big ones. A spider? A roach?

I wouldn't be able to tell until I moved my bed and, once I did, I had no idea what else would come out of there. I was not brave enough to continue this investigation at night, so I turned off the light and went to sleep with my mosquito net tucked in extra tight.

In the fortifying light of day, I dared to look again. The legs were gone, but some other thing, some crawly wormish, centipedish, snakish thing is wriggling around under there even now as I type. I am not looking under my bed anymore. Hopefully the invisible bat-frog will take care of all of them.

Travels with Lonely

I am still in Goa. I've been staying at a guesthouse overlooking the ocean at Arambol, which is a kind of international hippie gathering place. With all the dreadlocks, Bob Marley music, dayglo mushroom decorations and Che Guevara T-shirts, the main street in the village seems less like India and more like my freshman year in the dorms at U.C. Santa Cruz.

To get from my room to write to you, I have to hike down a hillside trail frequented by cows and then walk past many clothing stands, and then duck down a set of stairs behind the Eyes of Buddha restaurant, kick off my flip-flops and wade across a small stream, walk along the shoreline - usually getting hit by a wave and wetted from the knees down - and then cut across the beach and up a road lined with motor scooters and plenty of "Taxi, madam?" calls, and peer into shop windows until I find a vacancy at one of a half-dozen internet cafes.



I'm starting to feel like a part of the community as I become witness to the rhythms of life in this seaside town: the man who dances down the beach with his ipod every morning, the students from the nearby yoga school practicing their asanas on sandy blankets, the restaurateurs putting out plates of rice for the beach dogs, the fisherman who are always up before me, the too-cool Euro tourists with their endless chatter and cigarettes, the lizard who crawls alongside my bed eating bugs every morning, the cows heading past my door into the misty morning hills. Needless to say, I really love it here.

But that hasn't always been the case. Once I got out of Mumbai and survival mode, it hit me that I am way the ^*£$& out here on the other side of the world with no local friends. Intellectually, I knew I was surrounded by stunning ocean views and mind-expanding culture and exotic food, but my spacious seaside room at Sunny Guesthouse suddenly felt like it was down at the end of Lonely Street.

I moped around, barely noticing the sunlight on the waves or the little boys flying homemade kites or the women in saris balancing big baskets of fruit on their heads. I was too busy listening to the monologue in my head about how I should be better at making friends and why aren't I more outgoing and I'm too old for this kind of travel and no one's going to talk to me and blah, blah, blah, blah.

After two days of crying into my ginger tea and wondering why I came, I decided to implement some of that Eastern wisdom everyone's hunting for over here and see if I could meditate my way out of my depression. I went down to the beach by myself and just sat with my loneliness, like a grumpy friend who refused to be cheered. We sat there all day, feeling blue, passing the sunscreen and taking small comfort in each others' company.

After awhile, being with lonely stopped hurting so much and just felt normal. And then, it occurred to me: Loneliness is just a feeling. It's not going to kill me. It's not even as dangerous as that paneer I ate last week that gave me indigestion. Loneliness is not even a problem I have to do something about. It just comes and goes whether I want it to or not. In the meantime, I'm in India! And I can spend my whole trip wishing for different feelings or better company, or I can just get out there and make the most of it, no matter how I feel.

Loneliness seemed skeptical about my breakthrough, but I felt light and happy. I took us out for vegetarian thali at the Blue Sea Horse bar, where they show movies every night. That night, it was I am Legend. Nothing like a movie about the last man on earth to put loneliness in perspective. The bar was pretty crowded, but my table still had a seat open. A few minutes into the movie, a waiter sat someone at my table, who leaned over and asked, "So why is everyone on earth dead?"

"They made a cure for cancer, but it backfired," I explained, and within a few minutes, I had my first Arambol friend.

Becca vs. India Rematch

Becca vs. India: Sleeper Car Endurance

The Darjeeling Limited gave me some romantic notions about train travel in India, but when I board the train to Goa, I balk at my sleeper car bunk. This tiny blue platform near the ceiling of the train car has it all: dirt, a faint urine smell, and cockroaches.

"Suck it up, Becca!" I tell myself as I make a bulky pillow out of my backpack. I settle in for what I assume will be another sleepless night. 15 minutes later, I am dead to the world, lulled into a restful sleep by the gentle rocking of the train car.

I wake to the smell of hot samosas. I dig out 12 rupees change for two, flag down the vendor and have breakfast in bed.

Challenge winner: Becca (or Wes Anderson)

Becca vs. India: Haggling

I am totally afraid of haggling, so I've avoided buying anything so far. I'm the kind of person who darts down supermarket aisles to avoid potentially helpful salesclerks, so I positively wilt under the high-pressure exchange of bargaining. Am I getting ripped off? Am I being too aggressive? How much does this brass Ganesh statue really cost? Isn't it sacrilegious to haggle over the price of a deity? I don't know what my best price is! I was just looking for bottled water! Aggghhhh! [Cue frantic sprint away from puzzled merchant.]

I would happily travel the entire six months without buying anything but food and train tickets, but it turns out my clothes are too hot for India. I've been sweating through my days in khakis and T-shirts that suddenly feel like thermals, swiping at my constantly dripping forehead with an endless array of wadded up tissues. At the very least, I need to purchase some handkerchiefs.

I decide to brave the weekly Wednesday flea market at Goa's Anjuna beach. I cautiously approach a sarong stand, hold up a black elephant-print number, and ask about the price. A stunning woman with beautiful gold jewelry in her ears and nose names the customary "way too high" starting price and then asks me to name mine.

I know I don't want to pay more than 100 rupees for the sarong, but my voice just sticks in my throat. "I don't know," I say. "I should go."

I turn to leave but she grabs my hand. "How much?" she asks.

She starts reducing the price and begging me to name my price. I'm not trying to pull any "pretending to leave" strategy here. I'm really just trying to leave, but she won't let go. I get more flustered and keep giggling like a schoolgirl. I don't know what to say, I can't name a price and I can't get away.

"Fine!" she says, "100 rupees!" The elephant-covered sarong is mine.

Somehow, my utter inability to function as a haggler or even speak at all has landed me a decent price. I have a strategy I don't even know I have: shrugging, giggling, and saying things like "I have no idea!" and "I'm not good at this!" and "That's OK, I really don't need it."

I move down the row and do the same thing (with a little more self-awareness this time) and score a dress and a skirt for cheap.

Haggling challenge winner: Becca

As you can see, Becca vs. India is going to be a tight race. A winner probably won't emerge until much later in the trip. Although, I have to say my favorite moments are when Becca and India cooperate--like when I swim into India's oceans and her waves carry me back to shore, or when I forget to bring my headlamp to dinner and India tosses up a full moon to light my way home on the beach, or when the stray dog that randomly adopted my guesthouse porch also functions as security. So far, my only visitors are gently mooing cattle, but it's still a lovely gesture.

Becca vs. India Challenge #2

Becca vs. India: Distance Walking

My right flip-flop breaks apart as I am crossing a busy intersection in Mumbai. I dodge a cab and hobble on the hot asphalt, shoe foot/bare foot/shoe foot/bare foot for a couple of blocks until I find a sandal vendor.

Now, the best way to haggle for something is to act like you don't really need it, but I am literally hopping towards this man with a broken shoe in my hand, so that strategy is blown. It takes the chappal wallah quite awhile to unearth a pair of sandals large enough for my huge Western feet. As he digs through his stock, he keeps remarking on how big my feet are. His co-worker just stares at my toes and laughs.




The man's stall is filled with delicate, bejeweled ladies' sandals. The only pair that fits me are the sort of wide, straw-bottomed flip-flops generally sold at American flea markets for a dollar. As soon as I step into them, the vendor demands $10 U.S.

I try to bargain, but the asphalt is sizzling and he's already thrown away my other shoes. When I refuse to pay so much, he pontificates at length about how, since my feet are SO LARGE, it's taken him much more material to construct these shoes. (As if he personally handcrafted these "made in china" specials.) His co-worker continues to giggle helplessly at the sight of my feet. I pay $8 to escape humiliation.

Distance walking challenge winner: India again

Becca on Theoretical Smackdown!

My friend Jason Adair informs me that my trip is now part of his new blog, Theoretical Smackdown. It's a place where people can vote on who will win various battles - like "Eric Clapton vs. a fist-sized rock" or "Jim Jones vs. zombie." Becca Costello Vs. Six Months in India is now challenge number 4.

Before I got Jason's e-mail about this, I hadn't really been thinking of my trip to India in competitive terms, but ever since I heard about it, I've started keeping score in my head. I promise to tally the last couple of days for you, so you can make an informed decision. Here's the first challenge:

Becca vs. India: Staring Contest

I arrive at Chatrapati Shivaji Terminus in Mumbai two hours early to catch my midnight train to Goa. CST is a giant, giant train station. It looks like three huge mansions all strung together and decorated with stone lions and gargoyles. You would think a king lives there, but in fact it's just the place where more than a million people catch a train every day.



I'm wearing non-descript black yoga pants and a T-shirt, but I'm strapped to an orange backpack approximately half my height. India (in the form of several thousand people sitting on the floor and every available chair) starts staring. Hard. Unwaveringly.

I look for a seat. Nothing. Nowhere. The floor is an option, but a filthy, filthy one, and I have to wear these clothes for the next 14 hours. Every time I look at anyone, they are looking at me. Always. It's unnerving.

I circle the station over and over. The pack cuts into my shoulders and I start muttering things about how, if Mumbai is going to consider itself a cosmopolitan city, then people need to stop gawking at every single visitor who looks different. India doesn't blink.

Finally, I spy three empty seats in a row! One for me, one for my bag, and one for that comfortable American social distance! I hustle over and immediately see why no one has sat there. On the floor is a man who is not moving. His limbs are rigid. His eyes and mouth are wide open. He does not blink. Flies buzz on his tongue. He is maybe dead. Dead.

No one is paying any attention to him. Not even the people sitting nearby. Everyone is too busy looking at the amazing spectacle of a foreign traveler... with luggage ... in a train station... in a major international city. I consider calling 911 until I realize there is no such thing here. I run upstairs and crash the "upper class" lounge, figuring my American sense of entitlement would qualify me if my ticket wouldn't, and hide behind a book.

Staring contest winner: clearly India.