Sometimes...even KVO is at a loss for words.

My initial intention was to write a posting each day. It has taken me this long to begin to put formulate my impression's into sentences. I have been jotting down single words into my journal. I thought that would be the most spontaneous way remembering my reaction's to My experience's and first impression's. The first two and a half days in India were over-whelming and I couldn't think (and I know that even at this point in time I will not do it justice) of how to express MY reaction to India. The two words that still come first to my mind are color and sound. If color has a birthplace it has to have been in India; the color of the saris and Sikh's turbans are incredible.....I can close my eye's and see an explosion of incredible color and color combination's.....never have I seen color like this before! Sound........horns (later I will write about horns), barking dogs (whoever said "only mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the mid-day sun" should be happy to know that the dogs are obviously sleeping all day now and out barking during the night), the sound of Hindi, beautifully accented English, Urdu, - it isn't until you fall into a deep sleep that you stop hearing noise.

I think I was prepared for what I would encounter here so except for one occasion, (which I will talk about later)my only real shock was when D&K I were having ice cream on the roof of a building, over=looking Temple Road, here in McCloud Ganj when Doug said "don't be shocked but look behind you" and there was a big monkey on the railing of the balcony! Doug, Kristen and I were sitting on the balcony of my guest house room late this afternoon when three monkey's appeared on the roof across from us and earlier in the day we were at their apartment and monkey's were also on the balcony. I don't think I'll ever get use to them!
When I arrived in Delhi I was surprised to find an efficient, user-friendly airport. Indira Gandhi International Airport is old (Doug tells me that the domestic terminal is new) and well worn, albeit, not necessarily dirty ....it reminded me of LaGuardia Airport (sorry Judy). Doug was waiting for me and had a taxi waiting (actually he and the taxi waited for an hour and a half because of the flight delay - at O'Hare we were told they had to remove a passenger and then look for his/her luggage -no further explanation). Out hotel was clean and adequate. The hotel served a nice breakfast....it would have been nicer if I had known what to do with some of the food. For example: this nice man was telling me about the buffet choices and corn flakes looked like a safe, easy entry into the world of Indian cuisine (adventurous eater I am not). The next thing he showed me was, was curd and since I didn't see any milk, I put it on my cereal. When I sat down Doug looked at it and told me the milk was at the end of the buffet; out of stubbornness and not wanting the man to think I made a mistake, I ate it as
if this is what I do each day! The metro system is about two year's old, easy to use (all signs and instructions (written and oral) are in both Hindi and in English and a lot faster than battling the car/bus/ and truck traffic. Delhi is shrouded in a gray polluted haze and the number one cause of all this pollution is from gasoline motors. When you entered a metro station you had to put whatever you are carrying onto a metal detector and file into separate male/female lines to be patted down with a wand. The station is patrolled by police officer's caring automatic rifles. makes me wonder if this form of security will be coming to the New York subway or Chicago L before long.
The metro is of course crowded; at one point in time the door in our car wouldn't close...easy problem for passenger's to solve......don't get off, just shove yourself further into the car. Needless to say it was crowded as all get out (smelly too!)
That morning we visited Humayun's Tomb, he was the 16th century son of the mogul emperor Babar. From there we took a rickshaw to India Gate and then proceed to walk the two mile The Central Secretariat's. Along the way we witnessed a kind act of compassion. We saw a Bud hist monk laying on the grass, vomiting and obviously suffering from heatstroke (remember the "Mad dogs and Englishmen" saying.....well on this particular day it was a monk,Douglas and I who were out in the midday son). Two young Indian men came to the monks aid; one took his cloak, rolled up his own pants legs, took off his shoes and went into a canal running along the park and wet the cloak. He then rung it out and placed it over the monk. Doug gave the monk what was left of our water.
We spent most of that afternoon in the National Museum, had an early dinner and called it a night....talking about calling it a night, I am struggling to keep my eye's open so I will write more in the morning.....i HOPE THIS MAKES SENSE...I'm FADING FAST.h