smile!

smile!, originally uploaded by piccola ala.

this was taken the last night I spent in Dheli, in Saro's room, is is the 4th from the left, netx to the Bin Laden guy, who is an italian trade man, and me, I am the second on the right, netx to Monica, sweet 3 days friend first from the right
we had some great fun that night!

Saro and my last amazing week in India.

So, I was at the point when Nico left and I spent that night awake and smoking.

The day after I was quite down, a bit because of the sleepless night, a bit because of the smoking and a lot because I was sad.
But as usually happens in my life as soon as I am alone and sad somewhere there are some angels coming to give me a hand...So it was again.

I went on the terrace of the Hotel to contemplate my miserable lonely destiny when I started to have quite a funny conversation with an italian man, my neighbour, named Saro.

Well Saro turned up to be the best company I could have imagined for my last days in Dehli!! The turning point! The big destiny's chocolate egg surprise!
First thing that impressed me about him is how handsome he was, really astoning, and the second thing was the easiness with which I managed to comunicate with him. We immediately bounded, became good friends, of one of those fresh and instant friendships that are born like they have been there forever. Saro brought me around Dehli to show me the most interesting parts of it, helping me to orientate and giving me the very usefull informations about tha town and about India. Being a guest in India since 15 years he pretty much knew his way and tought me the very best attitude to keep in Dehli not to freak out; we had pretty much a good laugh, good food and he really helped me to overcome my sadness.
I spent 4 or 5 or more days with him, as he was doing his business (trading) I followed and looked, gave a hand now and then, expecially sharing opinions. The good thing about him was that he was also a very creative person, aways busy desining new forniture, his job, and keeping a creative diary very well updated. So one day, I think the day after we met, we decided to spend an afternoon painting! So we did and I started to paint and paint and develop a lot of new ideas, most of which I am making big paintings of.
At the door of his room a little russian girl materialized and she provided us with brushes and colours and talk and dance. So here I was, in a room of Dehli painting and listening to music while Pallina, the russian girl, was dancing for me and Saro.

In the room of my charming friend, which was couzy big and sunny and looked more like a living room then like a cold hotel room, a lot of people gathered; all his friends and collegues, many italians and a bunch of very interesting and funny people. In the last days I was in Dehli I heard amazing stories of India, I met traders, photographers, travellers and all of them pretty fond of each other, like a big family, (expecially the italians) and I felt really lucky I was to meet such people in a moment of such need.

So the last week in Dehli, that was supposed to be sad and tedious was bright and interesting and I gained a loyal friend like there are not many on the planet. Ole'.

So when I left for the airport Pallina and Saro where there to say goodbye, and I confess I really cried to leave them.

the Taj

the Taj, originally uploaded by piccola ala.

the way it appears just before getting on the most known paved garden

The freeky mess we got in

The risho driver told us there was still one hour time before the train left to Dehli, so we ask him if he got commissions from shops and because he did we thought to do him a favour and let him drive us to a shop.
I took us to a jewlery shop, where the stuff was sad and expencive, we had a look and we did not want to stay any longer while what we thought was the owner asked us to have a little talk.

Informed by us stupid cows that Nico was leaving the day after he asked us if we were interested in earning a little money by doing him a little favour.
The favour was the following: due to the rising tax prices in India he asked Nico if he wanted to export his stones to France and give them to his agent in Paris. All this by risking nothing as the stones would be sent from Agra to Paris at his home address, post expences paid by the shop, and he would be present to look at the sending of the package and the owner would make a contract in which he testified and declared this and that.

It all seemed shiny and bright, no risks included plus the money promised to Nico were quite a lot, he would have hearned 1500 E more or less just by borrowing his home address.
Well I know the way I write it makes it smell fishy already, but it was not so, truely not at all.

Well we agreed on the business and the guy started to pack the precious stones ( I was hypnotized, I went bananas) while an other older man gave Nico papers and papers to sign, did get his credit card, passed through the machine and paff everything was finished.
We got out of the shop thinking that we were very lucky to meet such people willing to enrich us so generously.

Unfortunately in the train we woke up. We did and it was 100 times better to wake up with a hang over rather that waking up from frode on the only late night train to Dehli, the day before Nico had to leave!

Shit shit doubble and tripple shit! He got us, he got ME I thought, damn I never got tricked like that in any of my trips! And yes they tried before but ho no not me never they never got me and now kaboum fallen full weight into a trap! Tears, remorse, fights, blaming, its your foult, no its yours yeah alright its mine aaaargh what we do and so, for the fact that we realized so late that the snaeky bastard had passed the card on the machine and we now recalled everything, Nico also remembered the amount of money taken. round 70,000 Rupies, the limit.
Voila les jeux sont faits! Rien va plus!

On the train we thought of blocking the card and that made us feel better untill , once in Dehli, we called the bank and we found out that the card can be blocked ONLY from the moment of the phone call. Operations before remain valid. Hey u guys out there... remember this!

So we spent the night thinking about what to do, making up a bluff, take the train to Agra, not possible, too late etc. We went to bed agreeing that the morning after we would try a last desperate bluff phone call to the fraudolent man, and well in case everything went wrong I could sell my car to pay at least half of the amount of money so skillfully robbed .
The night I cried and had nightmares (I love my car!), I was happy to wake up as my consciousness never left me even when sleeping I did not forget the tragedy I was in.

I stood up and left Nico in bed, went downstairs with a very suspicious determination and called the man. Well allowed me now to self celebrate my interpretation of the tough girl because if I was playing in a movie I would have won an Oscar! (thanx Miika if you are reading this, it's all thanx to our real life acts)
I called the bastard up and asked him the amount of money he had robbed us, he answered (!!!!) 70.000 Rupies! So very quitely I asked him to stop the operation, he sayed he could not. I asked him to find a solution between the phone call and the moment we would get to the police, and told him there was a taxi waiting to take us to Agra.
HE BOUGHT IT!!
He said he would find a solution and I told him we were getting there in only the time it takes to drive to him, about 3 and half hours.
Rushed in the room, woke Nico up, felt like a dragon, told him quikly what happened and we stepped outside the room, half skeptically, half hopefully.

The taxi did not come on time, so we went off to the taxi stand, we found a man, told him 'How much to Agra". In too long time and after too much mess of people (in no time we were sorrounded by 15 taxi wallas) we were in a taxi and the driver went to the gas station next to the taxi stand.
I found out he did not speak a word of English.

I stepped out of the taxi, determined in NOT going with that man, I sensed we needed more then a taxi driver, but also a little help and support, so I looked around and my eyes stopped on a Sik man who seemed to be the boss of the all story. I looked streight and meaningfull into his eyes and told him "You have to understand that we REALLY need a driver who speaks English, its VERY important we can talk to the driver!" The man must have sensed the urgency of my request, and just asked me to wait.
So this same man that before was rushing us into the non-english speaking taxi, saying "no problem no problem" now was riding the crowds of bewildered taxi drivers heading to the only quite man of the all lot. This was the very first man we had asked for a ride, ( 'How much to Agra") and he did speak English and it was on the path of our destiny that he had to take us to Agra.
So he did.
In the taxi I finally relaxed and cried of despair, stress and distress and I looked around the landscape and it looked really ugly. I disliked everything I saw and thought it was hell.
When we arrived to Agra there were 10 pretty faces in the shop of the frode man, the precence of the taxi driver waiting for us outside made me feel safer.

After quite of a discussion the old man of the papers, the side show man, (the real boss apparently) took us to the bank where they were trying to convince us that they were stopping the operation.
We looked around, we looked at each other and in an instant we realized we did NOT trust the bank. It was just too dodgy and everybody seemed to know what was going on.

So we decided to go for the cash, we went back to the shop and we miracolously managed to get the cash money, 70.000 rupies. In an exageration of my distrust I started to check the money to verify their authenticity, but I gave up after a while, too many notes and well, thinking about t, it was quite funny, I felt too much like in a movie and I guess I was loosing grip to reality ;o)

We got out of the shop with the cash and well with our hearths back at the right spot! Plus for me I can say with a lot of adrenalyne rushing in my body. Hehehehe...!
Finally we could relax and smile and... pay attention to the taxi driver... that turned out to be a real right man! He had very well understood the situation from the beginning and he did not say a word in the Dehli Agra trip, but now on the way back he did speak, and he spoke really good.

He told us about samanas and the way he looks at life, his religious point of view, all this while I was looking at the landscape, that this time seemd beautifull and sweet to my eyes. His words were soothing and sweet and when we stopped with him for a splif (!!) I had already felt all the joy of the world again, and could start being sad for the imminent departure of Nico.

Muckesh (the taxi driver) told us he had prayed in the morning for a little money to help his family and when we got into his taxi he thought his prayers were heard by a generous god, because he also took Nico to the airport that night for a price quite high and I bet Nico left him quite of a tip.

When we went back to the hotel we could rest a little, very little, as there was the bag to make and a plane to catch and all the rest and well....I dont know why, we started to fight and I was so upset I just went away for some time.
When I was back it was time to leave and it was quite a quick good bye, Muckesh waiting to leave and put the bags here and no put them there and good bye Nico take care you too, so he went.

I spent the night smoking.

Dheli and the Taji Mahal

We spent the night on the super night bus, me a little sleeping and a little dreaming, and a little sad as the indian adventure was going towards the end, and because that ment that Nico had to leave back to France.
I had a night of a lot of thoughts and alot of them were very very sweet, some melancholic, but mostly I felt very much in good company and happy.
The reason I say this is because everytime I am actually travelling from a place to another I have moments of deep insight, when I am on a bus, or on a train, or on a plane, I manage to detach myself from the current situation to see the whole of the story and thus I realize things.
So it happened on the road between Rishikesh and Dehli.

When we arrived in town it was 4 o'clock in the morning, an hour in which I really dont want to be left alone in the middle of Dehli. But of course I was not alone and Nico knew pretty good where we needed to go. So we checked in a Guest House where a boy welcomed us and changed the bed-sheets of our room. We slept all morning and went off for breakfast on the roof top of the next guest house, where I had the first vison of Dheli, from a roof top point of view.

As we promised to Jean Jacques we organized ourselves to go to Agra and see the Taji Mahal, both skeptical about the money we had to spend to see the grave.

The day after (but here my memory really dumps me, so it could be also 2 days after, in this case I have a blank space, please not to be filled in with with drugs and sex speculations, as I had been behaving -I would remember if not...;o) - so lets forget the blank space and get back to Agra) so the day after or the day after the day after we went to Agra.

Agra is known in India for the grave the maharaja made for his beloved wife, the Taji Mahal; and from indian people it is also known for the mental hospital that lies there. The biggest in India and now, after my visit I know why.
Got on the train very early in the morning, I was having a major headhache and could not enjoy the trip but we finally got there.
The Taj was immense big round and bloody white so white it was painfull to look at it. Quite impressive. I know I had been seing it on pictures since loooong time, but I was seduced by the proportions and the balance between the empy and the full and by its perfect presence.
I avoided to make the postcard picture of myself and the Taj on the background, u can find millions of them, but I chose a different perspective and took pictures of the side buildinds mostly ignored by photographers.
Well we had to take our shoes off and it was so hot on the bloody white marble outside the grave that I cooked my already afflicted heals.
When we got in- there was not much to see that was not on the outside too, the marvellous decorations for example and a number of semi precious stones fixed in the curved marble. A hell of a job.
Inside I had a very sweet picture in front of me: an old indian couple was holding hands!
I know it must sound poor compared to the emotion it gave me, but consider that for 3 months I had not seen a single couple, not one, of indian people actually dispensing love gestures. Indian love life stroke me instead for being dry and rigid, so repressed on the emotional and sexual level, that these two, old, indians hit me right away, and I was left dreamy. I pointed them to Nico who also took my hand, (thanx Nico, very sweet indeed) and so we got into what was nothing else then a humungus GRAVE.
Hemm...mmm...
I dont know why at this point the word 'marriage' is dancing in my head ... maybe because I said we got hand in hand into what was nothing else then a humungus grave?Yeah sounds pretty much like what people do when they marry no? Hemm..I am sorry but maybe because I am a daughter of divorced and unhappy parents I do not believe in such things, but well the paragone just jumped in my head so naturally that I had to record it. ..plus both head and hands are plugged in at the moment :o)
Ok sorry for the digression, to go back to the Taj, we went around the grave for 7 times concentrating on a vow we made, having something to do with love, of course, and art, of course.
For the curious we did not promise eachother eternal love or stuff like that, hold your hungry minds you wild dudes out there!
After we walked around the outside of the building one time (enough for our cooking feet) we left pretty fast, thinking, alright, a little relax and then back to Dehli.
Yeah.
Right.
What happend to us from that moment till the day after is beyond imbaraccement, its just ohh i cant find the words to describe.

bridge of Laxman Jula

simo 082, originally uploaded by piccola ala.

on the Ganga River

rocks

rocks, originally uploaded by piccola ala.

dont ant to be boring but....

Ram

Raaaaam, originally uploaded by piccola ala.

in one of his typical expressions

ganga view

ganga view, originally uploaded by piccola ala.

this is the view from the spot I spent the most of my time in Rishikesh
notmuch of a picture i know, but the rocks were amazing seen from real and the air was pure and the water fresh!

indian mistic business man

indian mistic business man, originally uploaded by piccola ala.

vishnu, hanuman disciple, singer and yoga business man at your service

Rishikesh

Well well after such a long but not useless break I think I can start the tale of a town called Rishikesh, and this time I wrote it right, as I looked it up on google.
Well this small town, as u can read on every travel guide about India, lies at the feet of the Hymalaias and gatheres a crowd of western tourists seeking enlightment. The town and the villages around are split in two by the pure waters of the Ganga that comes down freshly from the source, only one day away from Rishikesh.
After a troubled trip on the train, as Nico was slighly sick and I was in quite of a bad mood, both of us coming down fron the wild Varanasi days, the welcome commettee was a dodgy baba trying to sell us some dodgy dope, in a dodgy garden. Of course he fell on the wrong crowd as we smelled the trick and went on to Laxman Jula, buying nothing, where we found a room quite immediately and we rested some good hours.

The place was pretty and we a had a good view over the ganga which looked quite seducing and fresh.

Our room, as we found out the morning after, was right next to the yoga hall and the little window in the wall -separating us infidel from them enlightened- made possible to the sounds of meditation to travel right to our hears, delighting us with 'inhale/exhale' mantras sang in the very early morning with the sweetest of the voices, not only waking us up at 8.00 am with no need of allarm clocks, but also keeping the rithm of our biotime, as through the day there more yoga classes and we always managed to know what part of the day it was just by paying a little attention next door. The voice of the yoga teacher is the thing I will more hardly forget of my trip in india. The forced laughing of the yoga students is the thing I most hardly try to forget nowadays. By the way...

We spent the days in the wild nature, which was quite a big change from the wildlife of Varanasi, we avoided the tourist crowded places and purified our proved spirits on the shores of the holy river, where we talked and talked and planned and planned till anxiety, and we backed off from any moving thing which seemed human, white skinned and yoga orientated.

But things went more or less in this way: every day we moved out of the little town in search of a good isolated spot on the Ganga where we could talk and laugh and argue and and fight and dance and write and draw, and everyday there was a baba approaching us.
The good thing about this was that these babas were not the freshly shaved tourist orientated yoga teacher guru wanna-be of the planty guest house-ashrams of Laxman Jula, but more of Hindu monks doing their samanas in some kind of minuscule cave, just upway from our favourite spot on the Ganga.

The first who called us was this very serious baba, he gave a sign to come up to him while Nico was tring to update his diary (he never managed since I met him though, ;o) and I was tring to read. He gave us some mats to sit on his rock and saied just nothing. Poor Nico tried to introduce a conversation but he gave up a few minutes after some stone hard silence. I quite enjoyed it, I mean the silence. I am quite sure that a real master does not try to teach stuff or instruct anybody in this life, a wise one does not look for followers or disciples. I did not look for a guru either, and I was quite sure that if I had to meet a holy man I would have just enjoyed some silence with him, as I know that the precious enlightment a saint gains in his life cannot be trasmitted by words.
So I did enjoy this moment of silence with the baba, I felt good connected with him and the environment and apart from being confused by his seriousness I quite liked him. After we went Nico was quite wonderous why the man called us, or so it seemed to me, and by talking to him I kind of empatized a little with his disappointment. My slight disappointment was more about not having seen the baba's smiling side.

We went back to the spot almost everyday and we were very carefull not to disturb the samanas, but eventually they would call us one by one day by day. One of the babas even took my hand and licked passionately before I could wake from astonishment and take it back. Samana life is something I would understand better without this episode.
But alright no big deal.

The day after we arrived we met Ram, a sadu that Nico had met somewhere in Pushka. He took us to the ashram of Vishnu, his friend, who also expressed his joy of meeting us, and expecially me, by plunging his hands in some intimate places of my body, with him I had to back off pretty strongly trying to keep a smile on my face, but if my smile could talk he would tell me its opinion about being forced in front of such a person.
Well ok ok is not as bad as it might sound, but it is normally not pleasent to be checked everywhere by man we dont know, but when the man is supposed to be a purified spirit close to the soul of the universe et cetera believe me its quite a bitter experience.

But ok, actually before he performed his hand plunging number the man was quite a laugh, he had intellingent eyes and it constally seemed he was mocking the all world around him. And probably he was, as he seemed pretty well installed, he has a ashram in a central spot of Laxman Jula, a beautifull building with Ganga view and plenty of sadus and people that seemed at his quite service, and a Nokia mobile phone that rang regularly and very loud.
II for Incredible India.

Fortunatelly on our way there came more movie charachters. One was called Shivala. He was a naga sadu, one of those who go naked around and full with ashes, but he had orange clothing for he lived next to tourists and prefered hash to ashes. Infact he provided us generously of that, and of speech. I really enjoyed him. He seemed at begininnig quite a bubble, but then eventually I liked the way he could see through people. He got kind of fond of us, he read my hand and said that I am and will stay a traveller, he reckoned I had a black spot on the left foot, and actually I always had, was born with it, and he said that's the travellers spot! I got quite impressed. He by the way understood me with the first glance and well, I appreciate these kind of people.
To Nico he told a lot of stuff I will not spread on to the internet world, but Shivala kept hinting at us like two who after this little separation (Nico would leave to France in a few days) after this separation we will meet again, and that there is a strong link between us. That was settled before we met the sadu, but its cool to meet a man able to read souls.

We also happened to get into an other ashram, more for indian souls then for tourists. There the guru was called also Vishnu, but he was a Das, so Vishnu Das, that in the samana's world is at a higher level of enlightment. The man was quite young though and I did not speak to him very much. Nico did, and fell litteraly in love with him. Apparently he had quite a good conversation that taught him a hell of loads of usefull things. Good for him. Me I was left looking after Ram, who took us there, as nobody really talked to him as he is looked upon like the bubble sadu man, smoking dope and having a good fun and searching for friends rather then enlightment.

Well I quite agree with that, and he did not seem to me like a holy man, but a good hearthed one for sure, a little depending of others recognition, but who isn't? So while Nico talked to the guru (he found one!) about getting over there for a few years and do some samana, I was trying to overcome imbarassment between the 2 sadus and Ram. Unsuccesfully. One of the sadus talked a little to me, he had a sympathetic expression and when I met him the day I was leaveing Rishikesh I realized I just adored him!!! Not as a Guru but as a man, as a human being. His eyes were pure and his smile fresh like the smile of a child. Peace inside. Ole'.

The adventures of the day went on and on even after we were back to the room, a little because of the activities next door, a little beacuse of Raju.
Mr Raju is the guy who owns the restaurant at the place where we stayed, and he was just simply unbelivable. He drove me and Nico creazy for his will of covering us with uneeded attentions, screamed our names out on the stares of the guest house, never got anything right of what we ordered to eat and loved us of most deep love, at least at begininnig, when we showed up at his restourant where NOBODY ever goes.
This man was able with his attitude to awake the most perverted fantasies in the already perverted mind of Nico's...In the end he did not love us that much anymore, the mutual sympathy was entirely gone just the day we left. Luckly, or there would have been a murder in the San Sheva Ashram...whoever was to be murdered.

One last but not at all least of the most interesting people we met was Dr Demani.
Already the exotic name makes my mind wonder in the nowhere land, where people are called with fantasy names and live a rainbow life. Yes because Demani sounds like 'domani' which in italian means 'tomorrow', this is why I want to remember him: as DR Tomorrow.

Dr Tomorrow (what a great name for a novel character, anybody intersted?) so Dr Tomorrow stopped us on the doorstep of his room and invited us in to have a look at his goodies. His room was maybe 2 mt by 2 and it reminded of the room my father could live in, if he was living in India. But you dont know my father and this last comment would not interest anyone, I know.
He called himself something like holistic healer, so said the mini micro sign outside his mini micro door of his mini micro room, and sold ( to us and to anybody else) healing stones in necklaces or bracelets, magnet back supporters, magnet neck supporters and a series of items that in his hands seemed to get alive.

He was a laugh, I mean a laugh to think about him! He was answering patiently all our questions, and all the repeated questions Nico kept asking, he had a way with it, I did not know if Nico was asking always the same questions to test the exasperation point of the man or just because he was out of his head (after a couple of months e-mailing I realized the second option is the most probable, unless he spends his life testing the limit of patience of everybody, cha cha).
By the way Dr Tomorrow had quite an afflicted expression on his face everytime we were asking him anything, even if he would go for a chai with us! He seemed to be tortured by simply everything, like he was doomed to be sourrounded by crowds of hopeless wonderers, it was so amusing just to look at him and feel sorry for him that I keep thinking of him. He gave me some colour advice, he said that wearing green helps to be determined and to make choises, and brown colours are usefull for dreamers like to me get hooked to the ground.
I follow these advices and whear often green.

The day we left Rishikesh was a sunny day. We went to shower at the water fall where (I did not mention it but I am doing it now) the day before me and Nico had an intense visionary moment:

he had it while he was under the waterfall, me on the side of it. I dont like to speak about what I saw and what I thought, nor I will repeat what Nico told me him vision was, but they were related, some things were exactly the same and that is because we were very very good connected.
When the simpathetic sadu of Vishnudas came along with his child smile and his pure eyes we were not surprised at all. Surely people like him shower in places like this. At a certain point it was the three of us under the water and it was a great moment, of playfull moods and children's laughers.
The intense moment made us decide to end our days in the holy town with a shower the day after, the day of departure, in what we called the sacred waterfall.

So we did, we met again the happy sadu, we said goodbye to Shivala and we headed to the bus station where we took the night bus to Dehli.