Kuch photos

Heather weaving:



Temple post bulldozer:



Night bugs:



Ganga View:

Tycoon

Heather's been offered a job as sole USA agent for a giant, established silk company. The Queen of Morocco, Scarlett Johanssen, and David Mulford, the US Ambassador to India, all shop there. Their website needs work but can give you an idea (check out the "About - Weaving" section for photos of the crazy looms). Mehta Silk

More to the point, on Tuesday, Heather begins teaching at least 5 Indians (maybe 7) French. They are paying her well. 3 hours per week provides enough to cover all living expenses. Why go home? Oh, yeah, beef jerky.

Allergies in India....

On Tuesday, I discovered that I really am allergic to nuts--

Walking along the ghats after a lovely meal, I start to feel weak. A tingling runs across my skin. My palms and forearms and face become an interesting blotchy red and white. Pounding and heat in my ears. My breathing is compromised. I break out in hives on my wrists, elbow pits, armpits, all pits. I pop two Benadryl and John and I head for the hospital.

In the hospital, a mild and large man informs me that I should keep calm--"one, two days of medicine, you will be okay." There is a sign on the wall in bold stating that all females patients must have complete breast and pelvic exams to be admitted. John and I make eye contact in a silent "my god, what are we in for, anyway?"

To make a long story short--I got to bypass the breast and pelvic exam, was shuttled to a lovely private room (just like a hotel room!), but I never did see a doctor. We were there for over an hour. I was vomiting in the bathroom by the time anyone began to fill out any paperwork. By then, I was feeling better--so we walked out, went down the street, bought a bottle of liquid antihistamines for 85 cents, and walked home. And I did not use my epi-pen, but--I will say that I am so glad that I have it.....

Practice

It's beginning to feel like my day-to-day life has become a strange dichotomy of either preparing for tabla practice (eating as much as possible while resting my arms) or tabla practice itself. And I'm only practicing a few hours per day. Honda, one of my fellow students or gurubhai (lit. guru-brother (you know I feel uncomfortable saying "disciple" with any seriousness)), is from Japan and is in his second year of study with Lacchuji. The first "year" he was only here for lessons for 2 months. So he's essentially in his 4th month of study now and Guruji has him practicing 7 hours per day. He lives in a guesthouse and so must put sound-stifling towels over his drums for the first few hours because his practice starts before dawn. 7 hours. He drinks a lot of coffee and smokes cigarettes. My body is in serious revolt after only 3 hours.

An example of a portion of my practice from last week: Play this 7-second phrase (my second kayada) repeatedly for 90 minutes. This ends up being more of a practice in meditation and focus than anything else. After that of course I'm thrilled to get to the second part of practice because the phrase I have to repeat for 90 minutes is more than 2 minutes long, aaah. See how they getcha!