When I last posted, I was on Kaosahn road, the most touristy spot in Bangkok, feeling absolutely ill, but super excited to see Thailand. Since then, I’ve explored a bit, but really been taking it easy and trying to spend more time with people rather than just see as many places and things as I can. I spent the first week or so staying at my cousins’ house in Bangkok. Whenever meeting distant family, you never really know what to expect, and with this new family, I was thrilled to meet a wonderful set of creative, talented, amazing people. Fay is my first cousin twice removed, or second cousin once removed, or something weird like that… who cares? She dropped out of school at 16 to pursue ballet in NYC with one of the main companies at the time. While there, she met her husband Pu, a Thai studying art and design. After a while, through Amway, they moved back to Thailand. Now Fay runs a successful dance studio in Bangkok, teaching ballet and putting on shows. Pu is one of these multi-talented, highly creative kind of guys; he is an amazing artist, has coached beauty queens, is the captain of the Thai national Kendo team, recently became a major motion picture actor, working his way up the ranks, is a great cook, sells his own brand of salad dressing, etc… They have a sweet 9 year old son, Aaron, who is obsessed with legos and all these MMOWOT (massively multiplayer online waste of time) games that some evil geniuses managed to create to suck in and destroy today’s youth. Damn you webkinz!! It had been a long time since I spent some quality time with a young kid. It can be tough but it’s definitely rewarding. I am extremely lucky to have family here and was so thankful to have a real home to stay in while I was recovering from my stomach bug. It had been 6 months since I was in someone’s home! Just being surrounded by art, by couches, having a fridge full of food, it’s something we really take for granted when we are in it and until you’ve been living out of a bag in shitty hostels for a while, it’s hard to really learn to appreciate it. So I have a lovely home base in Bangkok and some new family that I hope will stay in more of a long term relationship kind of perspective rather than just a passing through, nice-to-meet-you-thanks-bye kind of a thing, but I suppose that’s largely dependent on whether I return and spend some more time in Thailand or not. At the moment though, I’m really thinking about coming back here. Often. It’s amazing. I love the culture, the food, the people, the lifestyle, the art, everything. Thailand is such a great place to chill out, and being the privileged westerners that we are, it’s extremely accessible to come here and live a simple, beautiful, fulfilling life.
After Bangkok, I headed to Chiang Mai, a small city in the north that acts as a kind of center for tourists that are either heading north for outdoorsy kind of stuff, or heading to Cambodia/Laos. It’s got nice restaurants, pretty good bar scene, good live music scene, a university with a beautiful campus on a hill, and an endless stream of backpackers and tourists coming through. I went up to meet Andrew Potter, an old friend from McGill who was in Effusion A Cappella with me. He is teaching English in Thoen, a small village next to the highway that is otherwise the middle of nowhere. He had spent a month in Chiang Mai at the beginning of his trip so he knew the city quite well and speaks some Thai. We had a lovely weekend consisting downhill mountain biking, waterfalls, too much drinking, and lots of quality time. After Andrew left to prepare for his class the next morning, I decided to stay another night and leave the next day. Unfortunately, even though I left my motorbike outside for only a few hours, it was stolen during the night leading to a whole ordeal of trying to find it, then trying to find a new bike to replace the old one, and finally giving up and just paying. Luckily, I had a thai friend to help me through it (THANKS ANN!), it was a shitty bike, and the people were really nice about it. In the end it costed me $650 and I’m still safe and healthy and life is good. Much worse things happen to people with bikes here…
So I did manage to finally leave and head to Pai where I am staying with an amazing old british hippie guy I met on the train up to Chiang Mai named Lazer (also known as Eliezer HaLevy, Shamantrix, DJ Lazer and who knows how many other names). We had a nice chat and he invited me to come up to Pai and stay with him. He was a 60’s british rocker, a wandering traveler, a kabalist rabbi, poet, author, dancer, drummer, trance dj, founding member of the rainbow, etc. etc. etc. He is well versed in all sorts of spiritual teachings, has loads of amazing stories, and overall just has a lot of wisdom to give. Unfortunately, when I called him and said I was heading up to Pai, he informed me that he had just entered the hospital and needed some surgery. The timing turned out to be very fortunate though as he insisted I come up and use his house and bike since he wasn’t and in return could help him out a bit. After a week of too much partying and feeling a bit crazy in Chiang Mai, it was just the sort of grounding experience that I needed. I’m able to help someone that is truly in need of help and now I have made a lifelong friend and someone that I can consider as my first spiritual guide. I can also tell that it is extremely therapeutic for him to be talking so much and telling so many of his life stories. It’s one thing to sit and reflect quietly, but it’s much more effective to be forced to put everything into words, especially when someone hears them right away (as opposed to say writing in a journal). So I think I’ll save the Pai photos and a more full account for after I head south again. Now it’s time to go home, have some lunch, and try to figure out where the hell I’m heading in this amazing life that I am so fortunate to be experiencing right now. Much love to everyone.
Like I said in my last post, I really didn’t manage to take many photos in Varanasi. I think I was a bit too distracted with just being there and soaking it in to always want to take out my camera. These are the few that I did take while I was there.
After a great week with my IIT buds in Delhi, I finally was able to leave for Varanasi. It was extremely foggy at the time, and after rushing to get to the train station on time, my train didn’t actually leave for another 15 or so hours. Then the train had to go extremely slowly and stop often which caused our final arrival to be 30 hours later than expected and a total of 42 hours traveling. Combined with the terrible cold on the platforms and in the train, it was pretty awful. Luckily, I managed to find a friend on the platform which made the journey much more bearable. He was the same age as I am, from Brazil, and totally one of the sweetest people I’ve met. He was wayyyy into the Mayan prophecies, and how that all overlapped with hindu beliefs and every kind of astological, spiritual thing you could think of. My brother gave me the term which I think fits quite well of “galactic activator”. Anyway, when we finally arrived, we went to meet a friend of his (the most sadhu baba looking western guy I’ve seen yet) at a wonderful guest house called Munna house. It’s run by a really nice family, the head of whom, Munna, is really friendly and honest. Prices are super cheap (around $1.50/night for a single room) and the place is full of interesting folks from all over, mostly staying longer periods, lots of musicians, lots of dreadlocks, etc. It was the only place I had seen that was actually homey, since most of the other hotels have a restaurant in them and are always trying to sell you stuff and rip you off. This was just home…
I was completely taken by the city and it’s energy. Varanasi has to be the most psychadellic place on earth. It is if not the oldest, then one of worlds oldest living cities. The entire city is just layers and layers of amazing old architecture and layers and layers of sacred splatters of sacred cow feces. The ganga (ganges) goes through everything in the city (including your bowels). It is always full of pilgrims and worshippers who are either there to die, or have brought their dead loved ones to be cremated because the belief is that if you die or are cremated in Varanasi, then you are released from the cycle of reincarnation. So there is a giant river that runs through the city. On one side, there are many bathing stairs called ghats and all kinds of old buildings. On the other side of the river, there is a giant wasteland of nothingness. Its really creepy and its said that the souls of those who are not cremated properly are stuck over there, making the place haunted, and forcing you to spend more money on wood to properly cremate your loved ones. The river itself is completely full of sewage, burnt bodies, and all kinds of trash, and yet thousands of pilgrims all bathe every day in it. Walking along the ghats at night is one of the most beautiful sights I have seen, especially when it’s foggy. Unfortunately, I only took a few pictures of the city that I’ll get online soon, but there are tons of amazing photos online from the million other tourists with big fancy cameras that are visiting (flickr feed of varanasi). Speaking of other tourists, there were many, which means its easy to meet people, and there’s always good food and coffee accessible.
Originally I had planned on going to Varanasi for an entire month to properly study tabla, but in the end I was only there for about a week and a half. I felt a bit ridiculous even asking a tabla teacher if I could study for just a week, but I did manage to take some tabla lessons and I think my technique is better now. I definitely need some more lessons when I return home, but I think I have a solid base to work from. Also, I think I will definitely return to Varanasi for a longer period of time in the future. Once you pay for the flight, it really costs nothing to live there. Its definitely under $10 a day including a room, food, coffee, and music instruction. So really, if you can avoid paying rent and bills back at home, you can actually save money by coming to India and learning an instrument. I highly recommend it for anyone looking for a break from their normal life. You won’t regret it!
So I left Varanasi on Feb 2nd to head to Calcutta. My train was almost on time this time, and wasn’t too cold, although by the time I arrived in Calcutta, I was absolutely sick. I spent the entire day there in bed with a fever and fasting. So it was a very crappy goodbye to India, but it’s alright. The 6 months that I’ve had there have been absolutely incredible. I’m sure that I will be back, and probably somewhat soon. You meet a lot of people in India who are coming back again and again, making it a regular part of their year.
Now I’m finally in Thailand, and although I still have 2 months of traveling left and 3 months before school (AHHH!), it’s the first time that I can actually feel my trip coming towards the end. But I really shouldn’t complain, since I have a LOT ahead of me. So hello Thailand! So far, it seems much cleaner, more organized, and more friendly, or rather just more familiar, than India. I took back the more friendly because I don’t think many cultures are more friendly and warm than Indians, but it can be difficult to feel when so many people are constantly trying to rip you off and making you feel like a walking spectacle. So now in the most touristy secion of Bangkok, I ate pad thai, bought some clothes (thailand has really nice clothes! complete opposite of awful Indian fashion), and just had a 1 hour thai massage. Tomorrow, I’m meeting up with a cousin I’ve never met before and I’ll begin planning out my month. Exciting times!
Oh and my new Thai cell phone number is +66 085 156 2403
Feel free to call whenever. Really.
I appologize for how long it has been since I posted anything. It’s been a lot tougher than expected to sit down in front of a computer for longer than the length of time it takes to book a flight or check my email. However, in greeting the new year, I have had to say goodbye to my friends from IIT who have been my traveling buddies for the last month as they had to return to IIT for the second semester. Now I am officially traveling “alone” and suddenly have the urge to get back to the internet more often.
<- CLICK FOR PICTURES!
My trip around the south has been fantastic and in the month I have been moving around I feel like I've seen so much but have still had plenty of time to relax. It's been a perfect vacation after a tough push at the end of the semester and an unforgettable experience that I'm so lucky to have had. If anyone out there ever has a chance to come to India, DO IT! seriously! It's incredibly cheap to travel here, and there is so much to see and do. You do have to be willing to put up with a lot of shit, but once you submit yourself to the events as they unfold, you will have an incredible time.
So, what have I been doing you ask? Well, let me tell you. I apologize for this all being very rushed, but I'd rather just get it out now and put up my photos than wait too long. In the future I'll try to actually blog more often in the middle of things so I actually have more to say. Enjoy.
Flew into Kochi to go and meet my friends. They had already been traveling around the south in the East and in south central India. Kochi is a very touristy spot and doesn’t have much to do besides go to expensive restaurants (which are pretty nice). The problem with these touristy places is that you hate it because it’s so touristy and expensive compared to normal Indian places, but they really do know exactly what kind of stuff us westerners like so it’s hard to resist. Anyway I didn’t really do anything in Kochi besides meet up with my friends and move on. The main attraction there is called “Jew Town” (seriously) and is an old Jewish quarter surrounded by a market. I skipped it…
Allupey is also super touristy and the reason to go there is to stay on a houseboat in the “backwaters” of Kerala. It really is a beautiful place, but the houseboats are these massive floating luxury hotels. Not exactly what you imagine when you hear about the backwaters. It’s quite expensive ($20-$40/night with everything included) and apparently if you want to experience the real deal, you gotta go somewhere else and contact a local person and go on a small boat where you actually have to help the guy push through the water with poles. We were a group of 8 so we had to go with a big boat. We did turn down one boat that had leather couches, and a giant dance floor upstairs in favor of a smaller, more modest boat that was still way too nice. Anyway, you go on the boat for about 24 hours, they cook you delicious seafood and you cruise around the rivers and lounge on the sun-deck. It’s pretty great, but only after you accept the fact that what you’re on a luxury floating hotel. We picked coconuts, drank local coconut alcohol, went swimming at sunset, drank lots of rum, went swimming in the middle of the night, and did a lot of reading.
Munnar is a hillstation surrounded by tea fields. The tea fields are stunning and we rented scooters and motorcycles to go exploring in the area. Theres no better way to see the mountains than on a bike. It was probably one of the coolest things I’ve ever done. While exploring we drove into a random village and made friends with a bunch of little kids. They were super cute and gave Gabi a bouqet of fresh flowers. We also went to a tea museum and a tea tasting to taste 30 kinds of tea. At the museum, they showed a video about the tea company that made it seem like the cheeriest, happiest place to work on earth. While it does seem fairly nice now (its worker owned and the living standards seem fairly good for India) somehow I have my doubts about its rosy history.
Michael and I split off and went North on our own. We went to Kannur, a somewhat quiet coastal town that Michael had heard was nice and not too touristy. We had no idea what to expect and when we arrived, were not too happy. It seemed like a fairly crappy beach and nowhere to stay. We wandered up the beach in the dark after having dinner, hoping to find at least one hotel. The wandered up to the first place with lights on and it had a sign that looked like a hotel or something and asked if there were any hotels nearby. It was actually a homestay run by a retired Swedish man that was amazing. He said we were really lucky to stumble onto the place because he doesn’t advertise at all and it’s usually word of mouth that sends people there. We had bicycles to use, a kitchen, a BBQ, and a fairly empty clean beach, so we stayed a few days and just chilled out and read. We also went to see a south Indian temple ritual and wandered around the fishing villages. There were some other guests staying in another building next to us, another older retired swedish couple, and a traveling British couple. All very nice folks and a very relaxing place to stay. I don’t want to advertise the name here, but contact me if you’re interested.
Thrissur (BOO!)
On the way to Mysore, Michael and I stopped in a random town called Thrissur. We arrived quite late, and Michael was sick so first we headed to the hospital. When it was time to find a room, we wandered around, only to discover that every place was full because a company had booked 1000 rooms for some company event. It was terrible luck, but eventually a nice guy said a friend of his had a place with some rooms left and gave us a ride there. It was more expensive than our usual budget but it was a place to stay anyway. We tried the next morning to go see the temple in the middle of town but a sign outside said “only Hindus allowed inside the temple”. They probably meant inside the inner part of the temple, but we were tired of that place anyway so we left.
In Mysore, a bunch of companies offer these tours of the whole city. Basically for 100something rupees you see most of the sights in the city. Since I had lost our guidebook and it was pretty cheap, we went for it. It’s an all day affair (8am to 8pm) and it involves a LOT of waiting, as do most Indian things, but once you submit yourself to it and just enjoy, it was pretty good. The palace (built by the Raj fairly recently) is stunning, and we saw some things we would not have otherwise, like the zoo, an art museum, some random temples, and the end of the trip included the MUSICAL FOUNTAIN!!! WOOOO! basically a lightshow / fountain synched with terrible pop music from 1995. It was really entertaining, because the crowd there was going absolutely wild… for the entire time… It was really funny to see which little fountain tricks would make everyone get excited again. The next day, we met back up with the rest of the group to continue on to Hampi.
Hampi is a town with a huge complex of ruins and temples. As a whole, its pretty impressive, but when you actually walk up to each temple, its just a little stone room with nothing in it. It gets very old, very fast. We really weren’t in the mood when we arrived, probably because we had just been on an all night public bus trip (you don’t sleep much on these trips, and sitting in the front row, you get a good view of how close the bus comes to hitting everything around it all the time). We pretty much skipped the temple but quickly discovered that across the river is a really quiet Goa-style enclave of super-chilled-out hotels and cafes and whatnot. It’s another of these very touristy towns that is just not India, but is so comfortable and nice to stay in. You can get all the pastries, real coffee, good italian/israeli/mexican food you want, the hotels are cheap, and there are lots of nice western people around to talk to. Also there is a huge lake to go swimming in and some nice temples up on the rocks to go exploring. We rented bikes and rode around through the rice fields.
Goa: Anjouna Beach
Goa is supposed to be super crowded and expensive during the peak season, and the peak week is christmas to new years. We had already reserved a place online so we had fairly cheap accommodations so we went anyway. We stayed at the Anjouna Palms guesthouse which was really nice and run by a great family. I highly recommend it if you’re going to Anjouna. It really wasn’t that crowded and its the busiest party time of the year. It was really a let down as we were expecting a lot more people and bigger parties but it was still good enough. We did find lots of other people wandering around at night looking for parties as well though. There must be some secret raves going on that we just didn’t know about. So Anjouna is pretty nice. Its very touristy, very western, pretty expensive, but probably one of the only places in India where western girls can go swimming in bikinis without too much hassle. The market on thursdays is pretty cool, although overwhelmingly large. We quickly developed a routine of lounging on the beach, drinking all day, and then going out to party at night. Curlies and Lilliput were the only real places to go out at night and some nights they were awesome, and some totally awful. Overall the time there was nice, but it gets old pretty quick. Michael and I rented a bike and went exploring and discovered that the beaches more south were absolutely horrible and overcrowded. More north seemed quiet and very pretty.
Arambol is more north, and is a much less crowded beach full of mostly westerners. Theres lots of people staying for long periods doing yoga and meditation and the like. The touristy thing there also get old fast, but its a place I could see myself going for a long period if I had some project to work on. Life here consisted of fresh fruit salad/meusli/curd for breakfast, drinking cocktails in the middle of the day, swimming in the ocean whenever we wanted, and eating a lot of seafood. Its a rough life… We made friends with this one guy who made pina coladas inside fo fresh coconuts. I made him some signs in return for some drinks… We also quickly discovered that restaurants were very willing to let us sleep on their mats with their workers if we just had a meal there. So for the next week, we stopped paying for hotels and slept on the beach. One night we also headed further north to an even quieter beach and made a fire to sleep next to. It was really too easy to just stay there and maintain the status quo. New years was a bit of a bust though since we were hoping for at least one decent party but found none. We decided to head down to Anjouna way too late so we had to stay. The only bonus was the huge number of rich Russians who bought loads of fireworks to set off at midnight. Eventually my friends had to head north to get back to school so I stayed behind. Immediately I made friends with some really nice people and discovered the joys of traveling alone.
I headed to Mumbai on a general class train (that means realllllly crowded) but luckily had some traveling mates in some british and swedish kids who were at the station with me. The first hour and a half turned into a ridiculous sing-a-long. We had guitars and were coerced into playing for them. Thinking of songs we all knew and that some Indian people would know was kind of amusing. At one point I suggested “country roads” and a bunch of the Indian people knew the chorus. strange. Mumbai turned out to be a great city. I really like it more than Delhi since it actually feels like a city. Its much easier to get around since theres a nice metro and its just organized in a way you can actually walk around. Theres lots of nice restaurants and actually some cafes where you can just sit and relax for a while. I was lucky enough to have a friend of a friend to stay with which made my stay much cheaper and more enjoyable. I met some of her friends who are mostly Bollywood writers and really nice people.
I also met this very interesting character named Terrance Alan Bradley (youtube) who is an educated, entertaining, functional alcoholic who hates most Indian people. When we met he was totally drunk, but still managed to convince me to go on his “mind blowing real mumbai tour experience” for 2 days to go see the slums and some other “crazy” places in the “real” Mumbai. It was fun but the days ended with us both drunk and him fighting with me to tip him. I sensed he really did need the money and he was a very genuine and nice guy so I helped him out a bit. The slums were quite cool and had a really nice vibe to them. I think it’s because they are very expensive to live in so its mostly middle class people from around India who move there. The kids all go to school, and I think generally people are trying to work their way up in the world instead of just being beggars. I also got my ears pierced with 5mm gauges and bought 3 pairs of awesome glasses.
Due to my lack of planning, all the trains were booked so I had to go through Jaipur for a day. I had no guidebook and no idea of what there was to do and see in Jaipur. It makes arriving in a city very difficult since you have to just trust one of the rickshaw driver / touts who assail you at the railway station. After a few hours of walking around and being stared down so hard because of my ridiculous appearance (bright pink sweater, ridiculous glasses, pierced ears/nose, beard, jew-fro) I eventually found a place to stay. I actually just stayed in my room for the next 2 hours watching tv because I didnt want to go outside… Eventually I summoned up the strength and went exploring. Without a guidebook I just wandered around looking for the sights (or a bookshop so I could look at a guidebook). I found nothing. It was really frustrating, and while wandering around Indian cities used to be cool and exciting, I’m pretty over it by now. One nice thing though was that the kite festival was going on so the entire sky was full of kites in every direction. Eventually I was just tired so I sat down by a fountain in the middle of the old city. Then I spotted “puppet man” who I had met before in Pushkar and my friends had met before that on a previous trip to Jaipur. I pointed at him and screamed “puppet man!” He didn’t recognize me at first but soon realized who I was. We had a chai and he took me a textile shop because I mentioned I was looking for some presents. Then he took me to his house to see his collection of old puppets. He treated me to a fish dinner and some beer and was really a great host. I obliged and bought the puppet that I had previously refused in Pushkar. It’s truly beautiful but I still feel a little ridiculous that I spent so much money on a puppet. It is a piece of art though and I will have it for many years to come. Besides you could never buy something like that in the US for anywhere near what I got it for.
Back in Delhi
Now I am back in Delhi enjoying spending some time with my friends again. They now have a flat which should greatly improve the quality of their lives. I have been cooking for them a lot and besides the cold and the lack of internet, am extremely happy staying there. Now I just have to get some work done, send home a parcel of all the junk I’ve accumulated, and pay my tuition and I will move on to Varanasi to study tabla. Originally I was hoping to go for about a month and now it’s looking like it will be only 2 weeks, but it should be a cool experience either way.
I have finally finished the semester. After rushing through some final exams with a very mediocre attempt at studying, I just had one final hurdle, a semester research project. I only have to get C’s to pass here and thats usually around 40%, so really school isnt too tough and I don’t care too much about it. But for this project, I had been thinking about it for months, and really was into the topic, but had been working slowly, and hadn’t really gotten very far with it.
The project involves trying to develop a super-fast algorithm for tracking hands in images of silhouettes of people. Basically, you have an image of the outline of a person, and you want to figure out if their fingers are visible and as much about the position of the person as you can. Most of the methods to do this kind of thing seem way overly complicated and have lots of limitations. I wanted to make something realllly fast (fast enough to run in real-time in flash) and that could handle images of just hands, or hands and arms, or the top half of a person. Basically I want it to just work…. Anyway I’ll spare you the details (for now) but I had 5 days to actually finish my algorithm, make a demo, prepare a presentation and 2 more days before an 8 page technical report was due. All the while all the other exchange students were taking off to start traveling so we were also celebrating finishing the semester (or them finishing to more specific). I managed to have a breakthrough that I think led me to some significant findings in a certain task of object recognition and tracking, but I had to create a demo, presentation and a paper in a few days… I am really excited about the algorithm though and I’m fairly positive I can publish a paper on the topic. Also in the process, I think I discovered some psychovisual properties of object partitioning that I could test pretty easily and publish a nice paper on that as well. Yay academia… (slash free trips to conferences).
My sleep schedule is fucked. I haven’t been eating properly. I drank a lottttt of coffee. In the end, my demo kind of works , the presentation was awesome, and I have a paper that explains some cool ideas but is pretty crappy by my standards. Since the grades arent important, I finally turned it in at 10am this morning, knowing it wasnt really complete, but it was good enough. Anyway when I summarize my program, it actually sounds pretty funny: It answers the age old question of “How many fingers am I holding up?”. I will eventually build some neat applications with it, some websites that you control with your hands and pointing at stuff. I’ll post progress here when I make some. After all this blog is supposed to be a place to share computer science and web development related stuff as well.
Im finished! My semester is OVER! The idea is slowly settling in… In a few days, I will depart on a 5 month journey on the other side of the world. Time to sit, to read, to draw, to laugh, to play, to drum, to eat, to relax. I think I’ve struck the jackpot in the game of life. I’m so freaking lucky, and I just thank whatever forces of nature are responsible for the quantum interactions of the universe that have led to this particular instant in time (well actually right now I’m pretty tired and out of it, but in a more holistic sense).
For a week I’ll stay in Delhi, working on web development stuff for King Cow, to finish up some loose ends and hopefully make a little cash before living out of hotel rooms and trains and restaurants and all that costly stuff. I have booked a flight to Kochi (Kerala) to meet up with some other exchange students, do the whole houseboat backwater thing, and then travel around south until new years. Not exactly sure where we’ll go yet, but probably some time in Goa, lots of time at beaches, mountains, beauty, anything but the big sprawling beast that is New Delhi. After my friends head back to IIT for the spring semester (suckaaaaas!) then I’ll have a month to do as I please. Right now the plan is to go Varanasi and study tabla, and read books, and draw, and try to decompress from everything. I dont think Varanasi will be easy, but it should definitely be an experience. As much as I am excited for this portion of my trip through the south, I haven’t really planned much of it yet, since it doesn’t really require too much planning. So I can’t really say too much about it now, but hopefully along the way I’ll post some photos and stories.
Instead my procrastination hobby of late (one of them anyway) has been planning my trip for AFTER India. That requires some flights so advance planning is necessary. So for now I’m basically covering the where and when in a general sense instead of the what. This is my rough plan:
December
Delhi > Kochi > bum around the south > Goa (Christmas) > mumbai?
January
mumbai > bangalore? > Delhi -> Rishikesh? -> Varanasi (most of January)
February
Kolkata -> Bangkok (travel around Thailand for the month. No idea where yet!)
March
Bangkok -> Auckland, New Zealand (thru) -> Wellington (tour around with Matt Murphy on a motorbike for a month)
April
Auckland -> Hong Kong (just passing through on a flight, maybe stop for 2-3 days just to see…?)
Hong Kong -> San Francisco (just for a few days to visit Jascha)
San Francisco -> DC (home for a few weeks to see the rents!)
Then its back to Montreal for May & June, and finally back to MD in July to settle (for at least a few months anyway). Im excited, to say the least. I’m really not one for much planning, so I haven’t really read or researched any of these places. I prefer to just show up and let things unfold… That usually meaning tagging along with my Swiss friends who are super organized and have already planned. They used to be in the army. The swiss army. Their travel plans have corkscrews and a toothpick! So I suppose we’ll just have to see where life takes me from here on out. I’ve drawn a sketch, now its time to color outside the lines and see what happens. So, as plans are made, as dates are set, as photos are taken, as people are met, as my life drastically changes from sitting in a tiny cube eating spicy mush and thinking about polygons to traveling around in southeast asia living out of a backpack, I’ll be writing and sharing my experiences here. And if anyone out there in the ether is going to have their physical manifestations co-located within a manageable proximity to my own, please contact me and we can meet up. My plans are flexible and I’d love to see friends out here!
Much love back home to everyone. And don’t hesitate to contact me if you so feel the desire. I have skype. And now that I have free time, I would love to catch up with people. Keep on truckin’
So this is my term paper for my “Mind, Machine, and Language” course. It was basically an introductory neuroscience course with an emphasis on linguistics and language acquisition. The topic I chose was “Music Cognition”. I was inspired by the Radiolab episode called “Musical Language“. I wanted to explore the Rite of Spring riot and learn more about Jonah Lehrer’s explanation, but I didn’t really have time to find his book and read it, so instead just read a ton of journal papers. When I started writing, I was going to try to give a neurological explanation for why I like strange music, and why individual musical opinions can differ so wildly, but after writing all the background information, I had already gone over the number of required words. Also, my grades here don’t matter, so after spending a lot of time on it, I didn’t really care anymore. The result is a somewhat poorly organized, thesis-less paper, but I think it is still quite interesting and has some cool tidbits of information that you probably didn’t know. Also I’d just like to say that I kept coming across awesome papers from my university, McGill, which is always a nice feeling. Turns out McGill does do some great research in almost every field I’ve had to do serious research, especially music perception! Lastly, if you find this stuff interesting, theres a book by a McGill prof named Dan Levitin called “This is Your Brain on Music“. It was bestseller, and I’ve heard its pretty interesting, although probably not quite as deep into the science as some would like. So, I hope someone out there reads this paper, and learns something new. Enjoy!
Introduction
Music is found in all societies and an impressive amount of the cognitive skills required for understanding it develop in young children without their conscious effort (Trehub, 2001). While it is unclear whether we evolved capacities for music as an accidental byproduct of language or for some greater social purpose, it is undeniable that it is deeply engrained in our brains and is a universal part of the human experience. Even though many conventions of Western tonal music may seem like they must be universal to a Western listener, it is only through repeated exposure to this music, especially during childhood, that these conventions become so fused into our musical minds. While, it is impossible to perceive music from other cultures in the same way that natives of that culture do, some aspects of music do seem to be truly universal and have a neurobiological basis.
Even if certain aspects of music are built into our brains, the way each person experiences a piece of music is very different and as such, individual tastes vary widely, even within a single culture. This can largely be attributed to just some level of subjectivity, but what is truly fascinating, is the extent to which individual tastes in music can differ. Two people can disagree so much that one finds a piece of music deeply moving and pleasurable while the other can find it irritating to the point of refusing to refer to it as music. Why do we have such different opinions of music? The answer must be hidden somewhere in our brains.
We took a 4 day trip to Pushkar for the annual camel fair. It’s a livestock fair, and it coincides with a holy day that brings thousands of pilgrims to bathe in the Pushkar lake. What I found so amazing about this event was the eclectic mix of people. You have camel drivers and livestock traders who are really just there for business, tons of vendors hoping to make money selling their wares, religious pilgrims coming to bathe in the lake, local tourists there to enjoy in the festivities, and foreign tourists there for the spectacle. At times it was really just too crowded and could be a bit dangerous. Flavio even got his passport stolen from a zipped pocket in his pants, but luckily for him, the theif discarded it and he was able to find it on the ground later. Also the girls with us were getting really fed up with the throngs of very touchy Indian men. People are just going by too fast to really do anything.
While walking around in the part of the grounds full of camels, we met a very nice camel driver who came to the fair to buy a new camel. He was looking for a friendly camel, since he runs camel safaris. His specialty was taking people out for long periods, several weeks or a month at a time. After having soooo many people just trying to sell you things and treat you like a walking wallet, it was incredibly refreshing to have a genuine conversation with someone. We told him about our camel safari experience and about my scorpion incident. He then told us that in 30 years running camel safaris he had never been stung, but that he knew a mantra that could cure the pain. I couldn’t understand everything, but basically, I think he learned it from a sadhu, and in order to activate this power, one needs to drop 188 stones into a river one by one, saying the mantra each time. It really sounded like gibberish to me, but hey, if it cures the pain (for some people) then great! I somehow doubt it would have worked on me given my skeptic scientist nature. I’ll stick with my trusty whisky and pain killers remedy that didnt seem to work too well either…
At night, all of the activity centered around the fairground as it turned into an old school carnival. There were booths of all kinds, brightly glowing spinamatrons powered by open diesel engines, magic shows presented by unenthusiastic girls in tight clothes, and tons of people. I even saw one guy giving tattoos just on the side of the dirt road. I met 2 very nice guys at the shooting gallery. I saw them shooting a bb gun at some targets and figured I could probably shoot better than them and that they would get a kick out of it. I went over and sure enough soon had a crowd of people watching me shoot targets from 5 feet away. Afterwards, they decided we were now all best friends and dragged me on some of the carnival rides. I couldn’t really say no even though I was scared shitless. The fear was not of the ride itself, but just of the fact that it was in India and lets just say I don’t think safety standards are really same over here. We didn’t talk too much, but screaming is an international language so we had a nice little chat.
Later, I finally decided to go into one of the “magic shows”. Now there were a bunch of these but I chose this one because it seemed different. The posters had a bunch of photos of a child with varying amounts of heads in varying places. There was an announcer screaming things in Hindi and having some girls in tight clothes dance to the music. Sometimes, they would just be dancing, but sometimes, they would also have gorilla/monster masks on. There was also a puppet show next to him that had puppets dancing to the music in a very Sam Hauslohneresque style. To top it all off, in between music and girls dancing and all that, they would play a loud audio loop of a crying baby. I mean, what more could I ask for?! And that was all OUTSIDE the tent. I finally went in to see what the hell was going on inside, and discovered why the posters had the kids with lots of heads. They basically had this setup with a curtain that could be raised and lowered and behind the curtain were some carefully set up mirrors. A kid would sit next to the mirror with his head behind a black curtain and another child’s head in his lap. The effect was a headless child with two heads coming out of his stomach. The curtain would raise and lower and the position and number of heads would change. Yeah… pretty awesome. I tried to take some pictures but it was too dark.
So overall, we had a really nice trip. We took things real slow and weren’t just looking at temples and sights the whole time which was a welcome change. Pushkar in general seems like a pretty relaxed spot, although during the festival it was pretty hectic. My pushkar recommendations:
do NOT go the pink floyd hotel (too expensive and the dude is a bit of a douche). They do have sweet rooftop but the food there isnt that good and costs twice what it should
The “wood oven pizza” everywhere really isnt that good. Stick with the felafel from the place that has some spanish on the sign.
Enjoy the special lassis and cakes available all over the place.
Go to the vagabond cafe. Its in the direction of the bus station and was just opened by a guy from LA. He serves REAL coffee (I had a few arabic coffees there that were great) and its a nice atmosphere with good music.
If you go during the camel fair, bring a money belt and beware of your pockets. And if you’re a girl, cover up, walk around with a male friend, and dont be afraid to smack someone!
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Posted at 4:48 am on November 13th, 2009. Comments Off
Categories: india, photos.
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