Tag: backpacking

  • The Final Blast of Light

  • Solitude at Sunrise

    Awake well before sun rise, i shift from bed to plastic chair overlooking the pigs, an ancient gnarly tree, mango’s on the cusp of turning ripe, pigs grunting and trotting as the transition  from dark to light is aided by cigarettes, vodka and my iPod. Sitting in underwear being something i am fully appreciating as…

  • The Joy of Chopping Garlic

    The joy of chopping garlic, the smallest of slimy Indian cloves, crush and peel. My very own cooker in my first kitchen in eight months. The joy of washing plates in real detergent, not sand or a plastic bag. The pleasure of washing the most beautiful tomatoes, peppers, aubergines, arranging them in my rented fridge, in my rented kitchen with a look of the 1950’s.…

  • The Holy, Colourful, Glorious City of Nashik – India

  • A Full Circle

    The sun rose as the train pulled into central station, around the same time as my hangover. Bag on back i disembark to find a quite, dark and rather empty Mumbai – sleeping taxi drivers, people selling cigarettes and combs. Rats. Back to the same guest house i started in last September, but what is the difference? So many…

  • Sentences and Sections of Paragraphs from March

    27/3/12 Pinky, Pinky, wake up, it’s almost four AM. ” I am awake”, i reply. The sound of the train on the track is overwhelmingly loud and fast as i try to open my eyes seven, eight times before heading to the door to smoke and look out for the approaching station.  Indians stooped everywhere in deep…

  • Poopie Udupi

  • The Same

    ‘How long have we been here? Is it Wednesday or Tuesday? Excuse me sir, what day is it? – and March?.  Dhanyavad Ji!….. So we have one day left here before the Udupi train?’ Days are the same with minimal variation. Trying to find an ATM that works, a little painting, a little walking. The same…

  • Presenting India’s First… Wax Museum!!!

  • A Bubble of Love in White: ‘Amma’ – ‘The Mother of All Hugs’

    Cruising down Kerala’s backwaters heading towards Amma. After the  painful intensity that was Gokarna, boats, water and space are needed. Palms and waterways don’t quite remove the past few days from my brain but they help. I am accompanied by two great people, Mystery and Moonlight, those being their chose spiritual names for this pilgrimage. Leaving flowers on the…

  • A Tiny Snapshot of Gokarna

  • A Death Bed Dinner Party

    The veranda looks older than previously, like we all do apart from his beautiful wife, radiating youth and beauty, working away in the kitchen in oranges and yellows. Slight silent tinkles of aluminum suggesting that the meal isn’t far from ready. High on the wall an image of grandpa amongst the gods, remembered and revered daily by the powdery red dot in the lower center…