Ruffled Shirts and Drum Machines

I have always wanted to go as Prince for Halloween. With a few Halloween parties popping up in Bangalore this year, I toyed with the idea of making it happen, but alas, no one would get it (talk about awkward).

While this might not be the year of the Prince costume, I'm going to devote a post to him.

Prince was and is the Scarlet Pimpernel of music.

I have an odd fascination with Prince -- the music, the showmanship, the costumes, everything. He has always been spectacularly bizarre, but incredibly entertaining.

I know there are a lot of people out there that just don't get him, that probably don't get me liking him, but I think you need to watch and listen again.

Back in 1985 (the year I was born) there was no one hotter. The music was out of this world, the androgynous look was so weird it worked and the guy could dance.

For a simple change of pace -- yes, I realize this has nothing to do with India -- I give you Prince, "I would die 4 for you," live 1985. Enjoy.

Bangalore and Buffalo

I have always found it pretty funny how easily you can get a rise out of folks in the U.S. if you bring up outsourcing and Indian accents on the end of customer support lines (Mom). But to my surprise, you get the same kind of excited responses when you bring up the subject here.

Few Bangaloreans are aware President Obama is winding down the war in Iraq or that he passed healthcare reform, but they all are well aware of his position on reforming American corporate tax structure.

You might recall the line, “our current corporate tax system encourages paying lower taxes if you create a job in Bangalore, India, than if you create one in Buffalo, New York.'' It’s catchy but it has created a firestorm in India.

The President is making an official visit to Delhi on November 5 and as far as Bangalore is concerned the only state issue worth addressing is his stance on outsourcing. This is a position reflected by taxi drivers, waiters, corporate stiffs and seemingly every newspaper.

I suppose this isn’t that surprising considering outsourcing has become almost as synonymous with India as yoga. In fact, outsourcing has provided much, if not the majority, of the fuel for Bangalore’s meteoric rise over the past decade.

IT firms and call centers seem to be on every block and a trip to the outskirts of the city puts the industry’s contribution in perspective. What were once village farms five years ago are now massive IT parks that are the shiny, new homes of tens of thousands of Indian workers.

This outsourcing fiasco – and yes, I am going to call it that – is a wonderful example of the power of words. I’m a card carrying member of the Obama cult but prez you should have known better.

Considering U.S. aims in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and global issues high on the President’s agenda -- such as climate change, the relationship between the U.S. and India has never been more important. The Buffalo/ Bangalore comment should have never happened.

I find it rather depressing that hours of the President’s visit are going to be spent discussing Dell call centers when Muslim extremism in Pakistan, the Kashmir issue and U.S. India cooperation on renewable energy development await well-deserved attention.

Youngistaan

I think everyone would agree using polar bears to sell Coke was a great idea. Having Cindy Crawford take down a cold Pepsi wasn’t half bad either. I would even say Dr. Pepper’s “doctor” commercials, featuring Dr. J and Dr. Love, were solid when they first aired. But, there is a Pepsi commercial here that is simply driving me crazy.

Some ad exec came up with the brilliant idea to invent a country for Pepsi drinkers. In this land, the young and hip chill and drink Pepsi to their heart’s delight. What is the name of this place you ask? It’s Youngistaan; which literally translates to land of the young or young land.


I have a couple problems with Youngistaan.

To begin, this is certainly not the work of Don Draper. Youngistaan is the epitome of our slide into idiocracy. Why do advertisers suddenly feel compelled to event words and now countries to sell their products? Take for example recent beer slogans, “The coldest tasting beer” and “drinkability.” Holy hell Bud Light, “drinkability,” is that really the best you can do?

Youngistaan is drinkability bad. Let’s say nothing about the taste of our beverage but simply attach our label to youth and invent a country while we're at it. For all I know, this ad campaign has been massively successful in India, but if it has, it certainly doesn’t reflect well on India’s consumers.

While I could certainly continue on this critique I want to bring up another point. In an increasingly flat world I think companies have to be aware that their ads designed for one country, or a select demographic, will easily percolate into other markets.

With that in mind, I have to wonder what Bible Belt, rural or redneck America would think of Youngistaan. When Americans think about “stans” we think of Afghanistan and Pakistan – which together are commonly referred to as Jihadistan. Maybe I’m too sensitive about this or I’m reading too much into it, but I can’t help but think Pepsi could have used better word choice.

What I’m getting to is this. After watching these commercials and seeing the Youngistaan slogan literally hundreds of times, I don’t associate Pepsi with hip and youthful culture. Instead, I think about the Taliban setting up IEDs in Afghanistan or indoctrinating a new group of recruits at madrassas in Waziristan.

So, I want to hear from you. What do you think of Youngistaan? How do you think red-state America would react?

Banjo

In India there is Goa and then the rest of the country. That is to say, while modesty seems to be the rule in Bangalore, Goa’s beaches are excess in every conceivable manner. Goa was, up until the 1960s, a Portuguese colony and is probably best described as a slice of Brazil glued onto India’s western coast. But this post is not about one of Goa’s endless nights, this post is about one of Goa’s stray dogs.

Two years ago, on my first trip to India, Chetan Chandra – a brother from another mother – and I spent five days in Goa. We had a fantastic time, stayed in a hotel built on the ramparts of a 16th Century Portuguese Fort and did more riverboat gambling than I need to recount here, but an hour with a stray made the trip.

One afternoon after lunch we decided to walk back to our hotel. We had taken a taxi to the happening stretch of the beach and I don’t think either one of us had realized just how far we had gone.

As we stood outside our restaurant and gazed in the direction of the hotel, we could see a tanker washed up on the beach in the distance and figured it was a maybe a mile or two away. It was our landmark and goal.

As we started the trek, the beach began to slowly empty out and before we knew it, we were alone – except for the company of a few fishermen mending their nets and wandering packs of stray dogs. These dogs were aggressive and would at times move towards us and circle. Trying to keep our calm, we simply kept walking.

After an hour something was very wrong. The ship, that didn’t seem that far away when we started, wasn’t getting all that much closer. We found ourselves caught in an Indo-Portuguese no man’s land inhabited by rabies infested packs of dogs. Just great.

But then he appeared. Our mutt was brown and white, with alert ears and a concerned face. For the next few miles he was our guide. We named him Banjo – it just fit – and he led us forward fearlessly. He tended to stay 20 yards ahead and only slowed down to make sure we were still following. When packs of strays would approach, he would grit his teeth, growl and ward them off. He was simply incredible.

Miles later, as we finally reached the tanker, he was suddenly gone as quickly as he had come. He had drifted behind us to ward off one last pack and, I suppose, sensing we were out of danger, let us go.

This post, at Chetan’s request, is a long overdue thank you note. Banjo, you were one of a kind. I wish you nothing but bacon bits and dozens of pups.

Happy Valley

Give me some cold, cheap beer and I’m happy. Add gambling and the most spectacular horse racing venue I have ever seen and I’m ecstatic.

Four weeks ago, while in Hong Kong, my girlfriend and I spent an afternoon at Happy Valley, the city’s out of this world track.

Happy Valley Racecourse was originally built in 1845 on Hong Kong Island to amuse the city’s growing population of British sportsmen. When it was constructed the facility was isolated and surrounded by rice paddies, but today, after numerous renovations, the track lies in the middle of towering skyscrapers. Frankly, I had never seen anything like it.

We arrived at happy Valley for race six of ten of the day and promptly got a tutorial on the ins and outs of betting at the track. After having much of what was explained to me pass in one ear and out the other, I decided to place a ten Hong Kong dollar bet that horse six, a bit of an underdog, would win the race. My reasoning – six is my lucky number. I was born on March six, my Mom on May six and my grandfather wore number six when he played football at Alabama.

A pitcher of Carlsberg later, Jessie and I moved towards the fence and watched as the horses thundered out the gate. By the first turn, and much to my surprise, my horse was in the top three. By the second turn, he had moved into second and at about that point I lost all composure. The next thirty or so seconds were a blur. I vaguely remember waving my ticket in the air, jumping up and down and screaming, “come on you son of bitch,” over and over and over. Jessie was mortified, I was rabid.

But wouldn’t you know it, my horse won. As I ran around in a victory lap, Jessie just shook her head and I’m sure pretended not to know me. It was glorious. At 14 to 1 odds, my bet paid for the rest of the afternoon’s beer and gambling.

Oh happy Valley, you truly are so happy.

(Disclaimer -- These photos are Jessie's. I think she ended up liking the races more than I did. In fact, she picked two winners later in the day.)

Corporal J. Sullivan

(British soldiers in India, early 20th century)

26th of May, 1906, Bangalore, India – After four weeks of struggle, Corporal J. Sullivan of H Company, 1st Battalion, Essex Regiment, closes his eyes, squeezes the hand of the nurse who has been wiping the sweat from his forehead and finally succumbs to Enteric Fever. He is 25, a veteran of campaigns in Burma and Natal, South Africa and impossibly far from home and the people he loves.

Outside the hospital a half dozen of his friends smoke the day’s last cigarettes and wait for the news they know is coming. Some of them comb their hair to pass the time, others twist mustaches and all of them wear thousand-yard stares as they contemplate the inevitable.

The doctor finally walks towards them, delivers the news and they comfort each other as soldiers do. No one cries; they are used to death, but after a long silence they all agree to write letters home to Sullivan’s young wife and his mother, and pitch-in to purchase him a proper Granite tombstone.

Corporal J. Sullivan will be one of dozens of soldiers from the 1st Essex laid to rest between April and August of 1906 in the new, tree-lined Protestant cemetery along Hosur Road in Bangalore. After surviving skirmishes and battles, bullets and shells, these men, like so many soldiers before them, fell to tainted drinking water.

I stumbled onto this cemetery about a week ago and was overwhelmed by the scene. This solemn monument to British history in Bangalore has been repurposed for the needs of new India. In between, or at the base of, forgotten British headstones are new crosses and graves of Bangalore’s Christian Indian population. The cemetery is unkempt but still beautiful.

After my first accidental visit, I promised myself I would return with a camera and notepad and try to give this seemingly forgotten place a little bit of new life.

I returned a few days ago at dusk and picked out J. Sullivan’s grave. As I sat and scribbled down his name, and the names of a few other men, four rickshaw drivers walked behind me, smoking hash as they ended their day, and stared inquisitively in my direction. I’m sure they were thinking, “What the hell is this guy doing?”

But after a little research, a few small pieces of Sullivan’s story materialized. While his grave made no mention of his cause of death, clues from surrounding markers put things in focus. At first, I thought he may have died, with dozens of his comrades, during a small campaign in India. But, Bangalore in 1906 was a place for R&R and polo games. An online history of the Essex Regiment confirmed that the 1st Battalion did not see action that year.

One grave in Sullivan’s row gave me my best clue. At the base of Driver Edward Collin’s tombstone, of C Battery, Royal Horse Artillery, was the phrase “From Enteric Fever.”

Enteric Fever is in fact Typhoid Fever, which remains to this day a killer in India. Typhoid Fever is picked up from contaminated drinking water and kills its hosts with 104 degree Fahrenheit fevers, unrelenting diarrhea and eventual fatal dehydration. It is a slow and awful way to die.

Bangalore in 1906 was hit with a rash of Typhoid cases. If the mortality rate spiked in the British army, one can only imagine the suffering laid on the local Indian population.

This, unfortunately, is as far as I got. The scene I described at the beginning of the post is fiction but I don’t believe too far from the truth.

(Sullivan's cemetery today)

Team America

“But come on, I just need a half liter of gasoline to get the bbq going, we’re trying to make burgers.” I can’t even believe these words have come out of my mouth. The Indian gas station attendant smiles, wobbles his head and pushes the empty, plastic bottle of coke back at me.

His manager walks in, assesses the situation and says, “You need a metal bottle, which you can have for 300 rupees.” Damien, my French counterpart, quickly responds, “Do you have any smaller bottles?” The manger nods, and 150 rupees later I’m walking out of a Shell station with a half liter of gasoline that will be my “lighter fluid” for the stubborn charcoal that has been preventing me from having my first cheeseburger in an impossibly long time.

For the three weeks I have been in India I have tortured anyone who cares to listen with an exhaustive description of a true American burger. Luckily for me, I have become friends with a group of Indians and ex-pats that have a taste for beef.

While I will never be able to repay the people who have done so, so much to welcome me here, I figured firing up the grill and making a few burgers might be a start.

So there I am, standing in front of the grill, eyeing the two plates of patties that are covered in salt, pepper, Worchestire and bbq sauce, as Al Green’s “Love and Happiness,” blares over a speaker to my right. For a half a second I close my eyes, take a swig of my beer, breath in the smell of smoking charcoal and disappear home.

Damien’s laugh snaps me back to reality. He is pouring gasoline into the top of the metal bottle and in his thick French accent says, “Oh zis is going to be so Team Americaaa, no?” His arm flicks forward and the gasoline falls onto a few red embers buried in the charcoal. A miniature fireball erupts from the grill and we both let out a “wooohhhh” as Al Green whales through a broken heart. I turn to Damien and say, “America, fuck yeah!”

The Paper Route

Waking up at 5:45 in the morning to go the gym is a terrible idea. That said, I’m doing it. I have found these early mornings bearable – in large part – because of the walk there. Shaking off the stiffness of sleep in the cool and relatively clear, morning air, when most of Bangalore hasn’t yet woken up, is remarkably refreshing.

When I step out, the streets nearest to the apartment are almost completely deserted except for the neighborhood’s exceptionally faithful Muslims who have already prayed at the Mosque. They tend to wear all white, don prayer caps and have red, hennaed beards. Of that group, a select few also wear Kohl, which seems to be devotional black eyeliner. If I have taken a keen interest in their garb, I can only imagine what they think of my t-shirts, white tennis shorts, black mid-calf socks and white Adidas running shoes.

Once onto Brigade Road and past the Johnson Market, the sidewalks are generally clear except for a few sleeping beggars and stray dogs. While I had walked Brigade Road dozens of times before I started my early morning trips to the gym, I didn’t actually “see” the street until the chaos of the day’s traffic was pealed away.

Even though I’m half asleep, I find myself chuckling at wonderfully Indian signs, Jerry-rigged patches of sidewalk (usually precariously placed granite slabs covering holes) and almost unimaginable tangles of wires. Or, I shake my head in disbelief as a single rickshaw will speed by, driver honking his horn at no one but simply out of habit.

My favorite part of the walk comes just a few blocks before the gym. Outside of a Times of India newsstand, paper boys and paper men work furiously to stack and tie bundles of the day’s paper for delivery (everything in India seems to happen a little later). Perhaps it’s because I can’t see a newspaper without thinking of my father, but this moment always stops me in my tracks. It has been repeated in hundreds of thousands of villages, towns and cities the world over, every day, for time immemorial. Some things should never change.

The Meter Please

After lunch yesterday I decided to leave the dust and crowds of Commercial Street and retreat to the apartment. Satisfied from my doughnut and sauce experiment, I ducked out of the restaurant and bee-lined it for a group of idle rickshaws.

Every rickshaw in Bangalore has a meter but finding a driver willing to use his can be a challenge. Most drivers ask where I want to go, give me a good look up and down, and quote me a price for the trip that is at least five times what the metered rate would be.

I have developed a suite of techniques for identifying honest drivers and if needed, persuading the cheats to turn the meter on. Yesterday I was sure I spotted the right man for the job from a half a block away.

This driver had a traffic cop lounging in his back seat for a moment’s respite from the sun. I strolled over, asked if he was working and he immediately shot back, “where do you want to go?” It didn’t come out quite like that but bear with me.

I responded, “Richmond Town—the Johnson Market.” Without batting an eyelash, he responded, “100 rupees.” I was almost surprised by his response but I have been in India just long enough to know better.

The two and half kilometer trip over to Commercial Street from my place had cost me 24 rupees, or just over 50 cents. I laughed, peered past the driver and made eye contact with the cop. Speaking to the driver but looking at the cop, I said, “we both know it costs 25 rupees to get over there; use the meter and you have my fare.”

All I got was a shrug from the cop and an accented reply of “100 rupees from the driver.” It’s common knowledge here that the vast majority of cops are corrupt but I will give this guy the benefit of the doubt and just call him lazy. Anyway, shaking my head, I walked off, flagged down another driver and began the process anew.

My new driver was a straight shooter, a meter guy, and 15 minutes later, after we pulled up to the apartment, I gave him his 25 rupees and handed him another 20 more.

Two of the Doughnut-Looking Things

This morning I caught a motor rickshaw (called autos here) across town to Commercial Street, the home of Bangalore’s textile industry, to pick up a custom-made linen shirt and get some lunch.

After grabbing the shirt, my first garment with a Nehru collar, I wound my way through choked streets and alleys, taking time to people watch and search out the dozens of well-preserved Raj-era buildings that are a feature of the neighborhood.

My walk was relatively uneventful until I decided to stop for lunch. I have a bad habit of walking until I’m so hungry I’m completely out of energy to search for a decent place. Today was no exception. Starving, drained and dehydrated I ducked into the first restaurant I saw with a sizeable crowd.

The place was a smallish but typical Indian lunch spot with a window to the kitchen in the back, a few counters where you can stand and eat in the center, and a booth up front where you pay and place your order.

I’m still new to this system and inevitably fouled it up. I walked straight to the back, tried to order and was quickly redirected to the front. Although the guy taking orders spoke English, communication between us was poor at best.

I pointed to a stack of doughnut-looking things in the kitchen and said, "I will have two." He mumbled the name of whatever I had just ordered, asked for 20 rupees and slipped me a coupon that apparently detailed my order, even though it looked exactly like all the other coupons that had been passed out to the patrons who had ordered quite different things before me.

Back at the kitchen, I slid my coupon towards the server and -- much to my amazement -- he stacked two doughnut-looking things on a stainless-steel tray, filled up two cups with interesting looking sauces and slid it in my direction.

I began to say, “but how did you know…,” realized I was holding up the line and went on my way.

The Johnson Market

If you walk out of my apartment building, take a left onto Curley Street, walk past Alexandria and Serpentine, and head towards Aga Abdullah, you will run smack into the Johnson Market.

Walking into the market is like stepping directly into a time portal. The building, the people, animals, sites and sounds seem totally removed from the IT parks and luxury stores that have become the hallmark of new Bangalore. The Raj-era building faces busy Hosur Road and is hemmed in by a Shia mosque on one side and an unreal kabob, shawarma and roll joint called Fanoos Hotel on the other.

The market caught my attention when I visited Bangalore two years ago but I was a little hesitant to venture in on that trip. This go-around I'm a regular.

I will never forget my first expedition into the center of the market upon my arrival a few weeks back. All seemed relatively tame until I turned a corner onto the goat aisle. There, hanging from the ceiling, were three freshly killed and skinned goats twisting on their ropes. Blood was still dripping in beads into small pools on the floor. My jaw must have dropped a mile but it got better. Just a few yards away a live goat was tied up awaiting what was sure to be a similar fate. We locked eyes and I whispered to myself, "you're definitely not in Kansas anymore."

Poorly lit, dirty and a little intimidating, the Johnson Market has to be one of my favorite places in the city. It certainly seems to be the heart of the neighborhood.

Won't you be my neighbor?

I am, by own admission, not a very good photographer. I have never taken a class and my miniature Canon PowerShot often leaves me feeling like I have brought a knife to a gun fight whenever I encounter another photographer taking shots of the same site.

Luckily for me, India can make really bad photographers look pretty good. I don't want to sound this cliche but the colors here are fantastic and the people immensely interesting.

Anyway, Part 1 from a walk around the neighborhood.




My neighborhood, Richmond Town, is in large part very modern. There are gorgeous brand new apartment buildings, sparkling offices and a few really nice cafes. However, there are still some rough patches. Empty lots, piles of rubble, squatter shanties and the bit. I'm making this point because these photos are not a portrait but just a snapshot.

The Chungking Mansions

Rewind three weeks and trade Bangalore for Hong Kong. I had a fantastic stay there with visits to open-air street markets, fortune tellers and the most spectacular horse racing venue I have ever seen (more on that next week) but any talk of my time there has to begin with a portrait of the place I stayed.

(Jessie and the Hong Kong Island skyline).

If you have seen photographs of the Hong Kong skyline they probably captured Hong Kong Island–the epicenter of Hong Kong’s financial district. However, the majority of Hong Kong’s seven million residents live across Victoria Harbor on the Kowloon peninsula and in the urban sprawl that spreads from it. Kowloon, like Hong Kong Island, is also the home to an endless forest of skyscrapers but the cost of living, while still high, is more reasonable. Looking to save a few bucks, I made Kowloon my home for a nine day visit to the city.

There is a real art to picking hostels. A little research online helps, tips from Lonely Planet are a must and to really find a good deal you need some luck. My strategy for picking hostels resembles my practice of picking a bottle of wine while on a date at a restaurant that’s simply out of my pay grade. Never pick the cheapest bottle on the list but maybe the second or third.

After doing a little bit of research on hostels in Hong Kong it became clear that I was in for a rude awakening on room prices after almost three weeks in Thailand. I would be aiming not for the shittiest hostel in the city but certainly a close second. And thus, I became a resident of Chungking Mansions, a 20 story apartment building stacked with hostels, Indian and Pakistani restaurants, knock-off electronics and watch stores, and a remarkable number of money exchangers.

The place (shown to the left) is a beehive of activity at all hours. The first floor arcade is especially chaotic and jammed with folks from every corner of the former British Empire. The congestion is partly fueled by the fact that the 20 story building is serviced by eight elevators that threaten collapse at any moment. Each elevator services a different sector of the building and holds six or seven passengers per load. Ten minute waits to get on a sweaty, abysmally-slow lift are unfortunately standard.

In light of the elevator fiasco, I strategically picked a hostel on a lower floor to allow the use of the stairs. The Dragon Inn, on the third floor, was just the shoebox, easy-going kind of place my girlfriend and I could make our own. It was in fact so small, (literally nothing more than a double bed and toilet/ shower combo), that it gave us all the more reason to get out and really see Hong Kong. And so it became that my frequent trips to and from the Dragon Inn through the arcades of Chungking provided some of my fondest memories of the city.

While I’m not going to pretend to do the experience justice, let me try and introduce you to some of my favorite players on the Chungking stage.

Turning into the Chungking Mansions off of Nathan Street, I can already see my escorts awaiting my arrival. If you think we have racial profiling in the US the gangs of peddlers in Hong Kong have taken the art to a new and glorious extreme. My whiteness is a scarlet letter I cannot remove. The moment I’m spotted amongst the masses of people flowing down Hong Kong’s streets I’m swarmed with offers for massages, custom-made suits, fake Rolexes and Indian food.

It’s always the same cast of characters as I swoop into the building. Vijay and Rajkumar give me the one-two-three on why I need to buy a suit from them. I brush them off but they beg me to at least come to their stores and see their wool for myself. Unfortunately for Vijay and Rajkumar, I always keep moving.

Sanjay and the Bombay Bombers then try and lure me up to the third floor to the Taj Mahal Club for the best Tikka Masala west of Wellington Street. Their can’t-miss sales tactic is to offer potential customers VIP cards that give you ten percent off your meal. After about five days at the mansions I managed to neutralize Sanjay’s advances.

My hostel was actually across the hall from the Taj Mahal Club and on one rainy night I hit the place for some fresh naan, some of the famous tikka masala and a few King Fisher beers. My visit made Sanjay quite happy. If he had a trumpet at his disposal to herald my arrival I’m sure he would have blown it.

Following my visit, when Sanjay and I would see each other downstairs, the sales pitch was replaced with a big smile, an exclamatory “Dragon Inn” (I was of course referred to by the name of my hostel) and a high five. I have to give it to Sanjay, the tikka masala was as advertised and my VIP card has found a permanent place in my wallet.

While there are literally dozens of other characters along the trip inside Chungking to the Dragon Inn, only one other cast of players grabbed a piece of my heart. I give you the hash dealers.

Let me explain. This group of hash dealers occupies the side exit of the C block of Chungking Mansions. They are conveniently positioned with three possible escape routes: out the door into the alley, into the mess of people wandering the stalls of the first floor or up the stairs into the hostels and stores above. Their job, as far as I can figure, involves sitting in the exact same spot and whispering “hash” to anyone that passes by or knows where to find them.

Wonderfully positioned at the base of the only staircase leading to my hostel, the gang of dealers was made up of Indian or Pakistani guys in their mid twenties clad in t-shirts and jeans, playing with cell phones or strumming on beat-up guitars. While the advertisements for their product always came with a whisper, those whispers took many forms. Rather ingeniously, they turned “Hashish” into about thirty different and rather comedic abbreviations.

Apparently, they didn’t recognize me the first 20 times I dismissed their offer but our interactions in the second half of my stay took on a wonderful degree of hilarity. These were gentlemen drug dealers.

Realizing I was not buying, but no threat, they abandoned their vocal sales pitch of something like “hash” or “shish shish shish” for a finely choreographed onslaught of eyebrow raises and head nods. The words were gone but the sales pitch remained the same. Eventually, they gave up on me all together and would offer a simple “good morning,” and if I was with my girlfriend, a “hello madam.” Even in the black market, a salesman is nothing without civility.

The Chungking Mansions are certainly not for everyone, but if you find yourself in Hong Kong and have a hankering for a new suit, a fake rolex, a little tikka masala and perhaps some hash, I think you’ll know where to go.

(Looking across Victoria Harbor from Kowloon towards Hong Kong Island).

Good Morning Bangalore

A man’s voice blares in Kannada or Urdu or Tamil–I’m not sure which one–and my eyes open in startled disbelief.

What the hell is happening? Who is this guy? How is this allowed? What time is it?

I have woken up to these same four questions for the past 10 days.

Every morning before the auto rickshaws start to buzz, and even before the doves really start cooing, the Call to Prayer erupts over loudspeakers strategically placed throughout my neighborhood. The Shia mosque just a few blocks away is my very unwelcome alarm clock.

You would think I would be accustomed to the routine but unintelligible chanting at four thirty, maybe five in the morning, is simply startling. It’s still pitch black out.

While it might sound like I’m complaining, I’m not. The fact is I’m partly to blame for these early morning jolts and I have almost come to enjoy them.

I take great pleasure in sleeping with the AC off and the windows open, letting the cool, night air seep into my room after evening rainstorms. I arrived in Bangalore at the tail end of monsoon season and it seems almost every afternoon or evening the city is blessed with thunderstorms or showers to wash away the day’s grime and push back the heat.

At dusk I often stand in the living room of the apartment listening to the rain tap dance on corrugated tin awnings. I wait for the evening Call to Prayer and breath in one impossibly rich and exotic aroma after another as kitchens in neighboring buildings come alive before dinner.

While I may not understand what is being said in my early morning wake-up calls, I have decided to translate them this way.

“Conor, if you needed a reminder, welcome to India.”

Third Class to Lopburi

Before making my way to India, I spent several amazing weeks traveling with my girlfriend through Thailand and then onto Hong Kong. It was a fantastic experience and one of the things that really stuck with me were the train rides. A story from the track.


Early September:

Sometimes a good book simply won’t let go of your attention regardless of where you are or what you’re doing. A few days ago I slung my 40 pound pack onto my back and listened for the sound of an approaching train to shuttle me North from Ayutthaya to Lopburi, Thailand. As I waited on the platform, I probably should have been thinking about the majestic ruins of Ayutthaya that I had just spent the past two days wandering through or the temples and monkeys of Lopburi that awaited my arrival an hour and a half up the track, but instead I was focused on Lieutenant Mellas and the Marines from Bravo Company.

I have been engrossed in Matterhorn, a novel about the Vietnam War and I have been savoring every chance to lose myself in the story. The perpetual chaos of traveling has made the opportunities to sink my teeth into the book relatively few and far between. It’s hard to justify hunkering down in bed for a few hours to read when the ruins of lost cities lie at your doorstep.

So with this in mind, I couldn’t wait for the train. An hour and a half to sit, read and gaze out the window and place myself in the triple canopied jungles, bamboo, rice paddies and elephant grass of Vietnam and perhaps coincidentally central Thailand.


Finally, the ground began to tremble and the train barreled towards me on the track. I would be remiss if I didn’t point out that my ticket cost 14 baht or roughly 45 cents. I’m not exactly sure why I was expecting relative peace and quiet on the train but that illusion was quickly burst.

The train arrived with a cacophony of screeches and moans, and the tired exhale of steam. I think most Americans have been done a great disservice. I didn’t grow up riding trains; the DC Metro certainly doesn’t count. Trains seem romantic to me and the communal, paced journeys they deliver always seems to produce incredibly vivid memories of exotic landscapes, worn-down stockyards, forgotten sides of great cities or dot-on-a-map small towns you would have never seen if they weren’t on the track.

Standing on the platform I was instantly impressed with the construction of the train. It was solid and powerful in ways cars and planes or metro cars are not. Trains are old sturdy brick houses in the midst of a forest of drywall new construction.

My awe with the train was matched with my disappointment that each car was packed. Not only were all of the seats taken but standing room was even at a premium. I turned to my lovely girlfriend, completely overwhelmed by her own pack, and started pushing her towards the stairs of the train. Up she went and I followed close behind.

Jessie was amused by the scene, I was not. Her delicate frame seemed to perfectly mesh into the car while I stuck out like a cumbersome sore thumb. With all of the seats taken, we stood in the aisle of a car next to the bathrooms as the train hurdled forward towards the next stop. This in itself was not ideal but circumstances only got worse.

I generously list myself at about 5’ 10” 170 pounds and while that is by no stretch of the imagination large, I towered over the dozens of people sitting around me. All I wanted to do was read, sink into one of the worn wooden seats and disappear into Matterhorn but instead I spent the next hour and half dodging a continuous stream of soda, dumpling and sausage salesmen. One after another they came, giving their tired sales pitch, calling out the Thai, unenthusiastic version of “peanuts” or “Bud Light” in a sing-songy lament. Up and down they went, the same passengers never buying but the salesmen still pushing forward.

I was all frowns and perspiration, Jessie was all smiles. The movement in the train car was a ballet; Jessie pirouetted beautifully and I was a bull in a China shop. All around us were sleeping Thais. They were stretched out in the most impossibly uncomfortable positions. Mothers slept on sons, brothers on sisters and strangers on strangers. While Jessie may not admit it, taking photos of sleeping Thais has quickly become her pastime. She was loving it, I was on the verge of a breakdown.

Just as I approached my wits end, a few seats opened up and I was beckoned forward by a group of smiling Thais. My pack off my back and a bottle of water in my hand, I closed my eyes and took a long, long deep breath. Just when I needed it most, Thailand delivered in its peculiar, exceedingly friendly way. Upon opening my eyes, I was presented with a dried plantain and three glorious smiles. Where there had been frustration, I found only overwhelming gratitude.



These shots are from a quieter ride from Bangkok to Ayutthaya. A boy stares back across the aisle and a monk catches a snooze (from Jessie's collection of sleeping Thais).

A Beginning

Welcome.

This blog has been a longtime coming and I'm glad I have finally taken the first step. I have been in India for nine days now and I'm still just getting my bearings.

Bangalore, my new home for the next few months, is very much the epitome of new India. It is the country's IT capital, the subcontinent's messy and bursting Silicon Valley. The city has grown in leaps and bounds with the emergence of the tech industry. The population was roughly two million in 1990 and is estimated at six million today. Honestly, it could be much larger.

I have taken up residence in a central part of the city known as Richmond Town, an area originally part of the British cantonment. For my American readers, a cantonment is a semi-permanent or permanent military establishment. During the Raj, Bangalore was once the largest British military base in southern India. (See the map below from 1924).


However, to call it an encampment really doesn't do it justice. The cantonment was a city unto itself. At 13 sq KM, it housed barracks and parade grounds but also contained markets, busy commercial avenues, churches, and rows upon rows of exquisite Victorian and Edwardian bungalows.

For the most part, those bungalows are gone, replaced with new apartment buildings, schools, temples and mosques, but the cantonment's British influence remains thick. I live just off of Alexandria Street, next to the Baldwin Boys School. Alexandria Street runs into Wellington Street and Wellington Park which join Richmond Road. Walk further and you might find yourself on Brigade, Residency, Infantry or Museum Roads. If it weren't for the cacophony of screeching rickshaws, motorbikes and horns you might almost be able to imagine British regiments marching down tree-lined streets and officers lounging, scotches in hand, puffing on their pipes. Or, maybe even playing a little polo (note the photo at the top). Well, almost...

I'm intrigued with this place and hope to provide a glimpse at the new, vibrant city as well as the relics from its rich past. More soon.