Fatehpur Sikri

A deserted city. Built by Mughal Emperor Akbar in 1571. It was the Mughal capital city for 14 years after which it was abandoned, due to lack of water apparently. It stands on a hill looking out over the planes. Its beautifully preserved, like it was abandoned only recently.



Flickr photostream of Fatehpur Sikri.

Unformed Thoughts

We're seeing people with next to nothing, living in tiny rooms, businesses that are little more than a stall, perhaps they are selling mouth freshener or have a grinder and fix things, families all together, washing in the river or a pump on the corner of the road. We have so much - the space and luxuries that we take totally forgranted. Bathrooms, fresh water, hot water, a whole house to ourselves, more food than we can eat, in fact waste food.

There are some things that are hard to get used to. Like... Every question answered is worth a few rupees. Every helpful gesture is tippable. Looking after shoes at the temple is worth 5 rupees, 1 day tip for driver 120. Like... Every price is negotiable. Shopping is fraught with pressure. We tire of bargaining quite quickly and instead prefer not to go into shops. Its difficult largely because we aren't sure whats acceptable or what costs are (as yet).

Children tug at my sister's heartstrings. There are children younger than her eldest (who is 4 and a half) looking after babies. They are ages at which British kids are toddling round and learning to speak. Can't imagine my neice having to look after her brother - keep him safe, feed him. I think they would be in grave danger. Here its different.

Trendy young Indian men wear high cut jeans tigher at the top and flared at the bottom with skinny fitting shirts - similar to 70s man. I've grown so used to men with low slung trousers, hipsters or positively hanging off that wearing trousers high seems strange.

Taj Mahal

While I could take it or leave it, Amy's one must-see for the trip was the Taj. I was unprepared for the actual beauty of the building in real life - its such a famous image, exploited for all its symbolism by Diana, Princess of Wales. It was almost as though it didn't need looking at because it is already so well known.

However, it is a truly beautiful tomb. The whitest marble, opaqly translucent inlaid with semi-precious stones in floral designs remarkable in their realism and recognisable as particular species - lillies, poppies, lotus flowers and honeysuckle.




The site was being visited by many Indian tourists - visiting the north from the south (its cooler there - but its all relative when its 43 degrees). A family wanted to have their picture taken with us. Strange to be so strange.

Flickr photo stream - more pictures or to have a closer look.

Varanasi to Agra

Train journey. 3rd class night train. 3 bunks, narrower than 2nd class. More tourists. Well prepared Germans with sleeping sheets, chains and padlocks to lock up their rucksacks, torches on headbands for reading in bed.

Chimneys from brick making. Pits where the clay has been dug from the earth. Piles of bricks stacked up neatly after firing.

Small groups of buildings close togehter with old men sleeping outside on strung beds under the shade of trees. Cow sheds, children, goats, chickens. People washing at water pumps.

As light fades we pass a shrine on the side of the road, a candle burning. 3 cows graze nearby and a man in pale blue robes walks away.

In the morning agricultural land slips past the window. People integral to the landscape.




Flickr photo stream here

The Ganges

There's a sign on the wall that reads, "The Ganga is the life blood of India". Also referred to as the Great Mother. In the travel agent in Delhi a seasoned India-traveller asked where we were going. Varanasi was her second favourite place in India (used to be her first but she subsequently went to Kashmir and that has taken 1st place now). Very spiritual, she said. She spoke like she'd smoked too much dope - sort of slowly, with consideration.

At 5.30am we walked through the tight knots of streets down to the Ghats sitting on the Ganga's edge. Down the steps to the river, where we picked up a river boat that took us along the riverside - looking at the riverside temples, people bathing and washing their clothes, cremation pires at the far reaches tended by men with long poles, umbrellas, flags. Sun rose. Yogi's instruct their followers sitting cross legged on concrete platforms. Tourists survey the scene from rowing boats.




Much later we found ourselves back on the boat, watching prayers at one of the river side ghats, lights against water, monks wafting insense smoke and pots of fire, people pushing banana leaf bowls with tea lights inside into the water. The prayer leader's singing chants waft out across the water combined with bells clanging and drums.



For a closer look or to see more pictures of Varanasi click here.

Varanasi

Arriving at the train station was like being in the set of The Jewel in the Crown - dust covered platform full of people - beggars, travelling farmers and business men, huge families with cases and food supplies waiting to board, chai sellers with steel teapots and a bucket full of unglazed terracotta handleless cups, porters in red robes, handpulled carts, bicycles, tourists, taxi drivers with handscrawled names on paper. Very old fashioned, poor and people with missing limbs, deformities and injuries. Arrivals feeling rather overwhelming.

Night Train to Varanasi

On a cockroach infested train, in a couchette thats very hot (especially with the curtains shut) Amy and I are pretending we're in Some Like it Hot (heads popping through the gap in the curtains). She wants to be the double bass player, then the trombone. Do wab do wab. Then I was upset to discover that I haven't got a sneer so my Elvis impersonating days are over - I've mastered the hair but haven't got a good upper lip sneer on either side.

Standing looking out of the open train door in the morning it passes through agricultural fields full of women cutting grain crops, people carrying water and goods on their heads. Talking to a Seikh who said he was once in California in a village and there was nobody in the landscape which he found really strange. Here the landscape is full of people, and dotted with ramshackle buildings full of cows, goats, and people washing, cooking, eating.

The train stopped and a fight broke out on a path outside - a man was on the ground being beaten, kicked, punched, stamped on the head and stoned. Set upon by 10 others. The gaggle of men watching from the train door decided he was a pick pocket who had been chased off he train and was getting his just desserts.

Snapshot of Delhi

Culture shock, fear, arranged the trip. Sightseeing in 43 degrees - driven round in a taxi by a lovely driver with a variety of tour guides (in the loosest possible sense - sometimes felt they were more like chaparones becuase they could barely tell us more about the places than a name).





Flickr photo stream - if you want to take a closer look.

Delhi

We arrived middle of the night. While it didn't go quite according to plan its OK, sort of. We're staying in a different hotel, going to places we didn't know about. Its really really hot and dirty. But the driver we have has been very nice.

Can't quite decide whether we are being taken for a ride totally, even though the people who are doing so are very nice about it. I've been bitten by mosquitoes terribly - everyone keeps asking me whats wrong with me (I look like I have a terrible disease or something).

Seen some stuff, been made to wear a fabric bag over my skirt into the Jama Masjid Mosque - much to the amusement of the locals. Indians like to be in love, I believe. All the public gardens are full of couples. Canoodling in the shade from the heat of the day.

Amy has been keeping an animal count which I think amuses the driver - its all so ordinary for them - cows in the street (big white ones), ox (which big humps on their backs), monkeys, parrots, eagles, hooded crows, and circus elephants (not performing just standing around the big top, thought it best not to think too hard about it).. All of which hopefully will seem ordinary to us once we've been on safari (cross your fingers for tigers).

Jetting Off

I'm off to India for two weeks. Going to a wedding in Jaipur. Flying into Delhi tonight. Other than that we have no plans! Its all to be decided on arrival. So, I'll blog sporadically if I find a connection!

See you when I get back.

"How to" "Hoxton Fin"

Now while this searcher is unlikely to have actually found the answer this time, I do believe that collectively we could provide a very good answer to how to hoxton fin. For those of you not in the know, a hoxton fin is a haircut for men, not some kind of whacky ballroom dance.

I think there are two ways to get the look, although only one of them is truely effective. You can either get gel (one of the new less sticky but strong ones) and use the flats of both your hands to press the middle of your hair together in the middle, or, preferrably you need to go to a fancy hairdressers or trendy barbers for a proper asymmetrical haircut which is longer in the middle of the head. They will give you the benefit of their hair advice as to how is best to get that all desirable central uplift.

Beware though, this haircut is well and truely over. Nobody but children's tv presenters and second-rate boybanders wear their hair this way anymore. So I ask you, do you really want to hoxton fin?

White Dogs

As we said good evening on the steps of the old library we looked out over Bermondsey Spa Gardens and for the second time that day all the dogs in the park were white. Any size, any shape, any type, any colour as long as its white. Perhaps there's a local rule or something.

Garden

My new garden has a well established lawn and not a lot else. Last weekend I planted a tree and a magnolia. They are both in bloom (not masses because they are both rather twigging at present, but in bloom non the less).




The tree is a Prunus x yedoensis 'Shidare-Yoshino'. Which is quite exciting. No idea when I bought it that it would have autumn colour.

Lidl's Finsbury Park

So a long time ago there used to be a pram shop. On the corner of the park sort of next to the 12 Pins. It recently opened up as Lidls. One of my fellow ceramics students goes there to pick up bulk buys of bottled water. He talks about it, so our tutor has started popping in to see what's available as the special purchase of the week. The only time I stopped by it was cherry trees. One week it was golf clubs (shame that Ally Pally golf course has now shut). Last week it was horse's jackets (can't imagine how relieved the residents of Finsbury Park were when upon popping into Lidl's they found they could pick up that one difficult thing left on the bottom of their shopping list). This week, apparently it was unicycles. £24.99. Bargain.

Ceramics Class



So the 10 minute tea set turned out like this. Despite lavishing gold oxide onto the edges, it has turned out more like pewter. Still they're quite funny and seeing as it was the last class we ate easter eggs and drank Leffe out of them (one cup takes approximately one sip, after about 3 refills each we had managed to finish oh easily a quarter of the bottle). Still they are water tight (apart from one which leaks!). Also finally got back the porcelain vase and glazed that so its something to look forward to next term.

flickr ceramics class set

Men's Shoes

On a rack outside a shop in Bruce Grove. Sign says buy one get one free. Does that mean buy a right one and get the left one free or does it mean buy one pair and get a second free?

Office

New. Open plan. New building. Memory of PC stolen at some point during unplugging and arriving at new place. Irritated other workers on the new desk-island. Bad start to new work surroundings.

9.55am. Not too bad so far. I'm using a spare PC. Its awfully quiet. I've just had to go into the stairwell to talking on the mobile phone.

11.52am. Right now there is far too much chatting and giggling going on and not much work. There's two in the meeting area. Out island-colleagues are talking with colleagues from anther island - talking about babies. The cataloguing librarians are chatting and tearing off sellotape - chatting in a sort over-the-fence-gossiping way.

16.05pm. Full compliment of colleagues on the opposite island. Boy can they chat. Two people are going round in coats complaining of cold. I on the other hand am baking and would really like to open some windows. My cheeks are red - I can feel them. We've just had a brief blast of Boney M's Brown Girl in the Ring from the cataloguers. Much full room discussion of singing the song in the school playground, or the fact of being far too young to remember such things. I'm almost at the stage of putting my fingers in my ears and going lalala I can't hear you.

16.34pm. There's a great talking bum (clad in tweed) using a guillotine next to my desk. Its talking to a colleague who sits next to me who has wandered off without the guillotine-user realising.

5.30pm. End of the day. Sure I'll get used to it in time.

Sparrows vs Tits

(Not quite West Side Story, and actually more sparrows vs tit, singular). There's a gang of sparrows about 11 strong. They hang out in this mass of matted branch, stem stuff at the back of next door's neighbour's. The stuff overhangs next door's shed. Sparrows flit from matted stuff to shed roof edge and onto a feeder hanging in a small tree on my boundary with next door. Dominating the back of the gardens. Much too-ing and fro-ing. Tit gets the front of the garden. From the fucia (I hate fucias), holly bush and tall rose to the house eaves and across to the feeder in a tree closer to the houses. On rare occassions tit makes at attempt at the sparrows feeder. Then everybody abandons everything when next door's cat arches his back lazily on the roof of the shed at the back of the opposite garden.

1000th Post

And this is my 1000th post (so I'm making it a really boring one!) It seems like some kind of milestone. It feels it has taken me quite a long time to get here I have to say!

Spring Forward

Why I'm actually doing awake at this hour (when I haven't been out and am not dancing the night away somewhere) I'm not sure. However I am now in that limboland that the changing clocks besets us with. Its not quite so upsetting in Autumn when you get an extra hour but I suddenly noticed that the time on the laptop had moved to 2.00am when I was certain it had only been 12.40 very recently. I had to check the BBC website to see if it was tonight that the clocks were going forward. Normally you hear it on the news. I can never quite get my head around where the extra hour comes from or where it disappears to in Autumn. But it certainly upsets my body clock considerably. For about a week. So it doesn't help that I am awake noticing it happen.