Click here to view our Picture GalleryIndia - Saturday
Excerpts from journal entries:
I have never noticed colors as much as I have in India. A woman walked in swoops under a tree. Her dress was long and draping and green. The green dress matched so exactly the color of the tree leaves above that it was as though the scene were staged. I like how colors intermingle here. I find myself searching for landscapes -like the buckets and singular flip flop slipper layed out on the cement sidewalk below the balcony. And, then surveying the colors -like the first and second bucket are orange, the third is aqua, and the flip flop is orange. And, then waiting for someone to walk by so I can see how their colors add to and change the scene. It makes me feel a bit covert -as though I am setting a trap.
And so, the trap was set: three buckets, one flip flop slipper, and cement ground: orange, aqua, gray. And so approached the victim: a middle-aged man in a bright orange shirt, his hair jet-black, his expression tired with wrinkles around the corner of his eyes, his trouser's gray.
I hold my breath in anticipation -what will he do to the landscape? How will it change?
He steps boldly between the buckets, circumventing the flip flop. The scene is stunning. His orange shirt draws out the orange in the buckets and flip flop. The absence of any more blue and the infusion of orange, makes the aqua bucket appear lonely and at the same time bold. The man's pants blend with the gray of the cement and so it appears his torso is floating.
And, perhaps I appear this way as well as I lean against the balcony staring down with a certain intensity. My trance is broken by the observation of silence all around me in place of the usual Hindi chatter and Beatles playing on the radio. I look up. Everyone is staring at me -wondering why I am staring down at the sidewalk below their balcony.
* * *
Things become so familar. Scenes of travel: dusty back alley bus stations, women beggars, motorcycles with drivers that look you up and down at the intersection, lizards, sweat all over your face due to the heat, etc. Much of its all the same product just different brands. This early morning, the brand is India and the bus has AC which is hugely impressive. Hindi music echoes off the window in a trailing majesty of whines, bells, and catchy beats. The dress code appears to be long skirts or saris/female suits, long pants and button shirts/polos. The stylish accessory is to have a tinge of red dye in your hair -for females the color often matches the bindi on the forehead. The smell options appear to be perfume or alcohol. Eye glasses are "in". Short skirts are "out" (or more accurately never were "in"...except at the airline stewardess academy in Delhi where micro-minis are like Hollywood's new black). Outside it is hazy and smokey -like dragon's breath. There is a monk (in the garb I always picture the Dalai Lama wearing) two seats back from me on the bus. People dot the city landscape out the window. As we drive ahead the city turns to country to village to town to city again. We are going toward Dehradun. I'd like to write more...but it is far too bumpy and I am having trouble even re-reading what I just wrote!
* * *
I was looking at a painting in the National Modern Art Museum in Delhi when my eyes found the window. The window was to the left of the painting. It had a boldly thick burgundy colored frame and outside was India. The juxtaposition of the framed painting and framed window struck me as ironic. Here I was gazing at a painted India when the real thing was right outside. So instead I shifted to the window. Through the panes I watched India continually re-paint itself. Women in brightly colored saris and men in suits shifted from frame to frame of the window panes. Cars, cows, autos, and buses scurried in and out of the painting. Green tree leaves and orange flowers rustled in slow movements -seeming to hint at the saturating heat outside.
Jessica :)
I have never noticed colors as much as I have in India. A woman walked in swoops under a tree. Her dress was long and draping and green. The green dress matched so exactly the color of the tree leaves above that it was as though the scene were staged. I like how colors intermingle here. I find myself searching for landscapes -like the buckets and singular flip flop slipper layed out on the cement sidewalk below the balcony. And, then surveying the colors -like the first and second bucket are orange, the third is aqua, and the flip flop is orange. And, then waiting for someone to walk by so I can see how their colors add to and change the scene. It makes me feel a bit covert -as though I am setting a trap.
And so, the trap was set: three buckets, one flip flop slipper, and cement ground: orange, aqua, gray. And so approached the victim: a middle-aged man in a bright orange shirt, his hair jet-black, his expression tired with wrinkles around the corner of his eyes, his trouser's gray.
I hold my breath in anticipation -what will he do to the landscape? How will it change?
He steps boldly between the buckets, circumventing the flip flop. The scene is stunning. His orange shirt draws out the orange in the buckets and flip flop. The absence of any more blue and the infusion of orange, makes the aqua bucket appear lonely and at the same time bold. The man's pants blend with the gray of the cement and so it appears his torso is floating.
And, perhaps I appear this way as well as I lean against the balcony staring down with a certain intensity. My trance is broken by the observation of silence all around me in place of the usual Hindi chatter and Beatles playing on the radio. I look up. Everyone is staring at me -wondering why I am staring down at the sidewalk below their balcony.
* * *
Things become so familar. Scenes of travel: dusty back alley bus stations, women beggars, motorcycles with drivers that look you up and down at the intersection, lizards, sweat all over your face due to the heat, etc. Much of its all the same product just different brands. This early morning, the brand is India and the bus has AC which is hugely impressive. Hindi music echoes off the window in a trailing majesty of whines, bells, and catchy beats. The dress code appears to be long skirts or saris/female suits, long pants and button shirts/polos. The stylish accessory is to have a tinge of red dye in your hair -for females the color often matches the bindi on the forehead. The smell options appear to be perfume or alcohol. Eye glasses are "in". Short skirts are "out" (or more accurately never were "in"...except at the airline stewardess academy in Delhi where micro-minis are like Hollywood's new black). Outside it is hazy and smokey -like dragon's breath. There is a monk (in the garb I always picture the Dalai Lama wearing) two seats back from me on the bus. People dot the city landscape out the window. As we drive ahead the city turns to country to village to town to city again. We are going toward Dehradun. I'd like to write more...but it is far too bumpy and I am having trouble even re-reading what I just wrote!
* * *
I was looking at a painting in the National Modern Art Museum in Delhi when my eyes found the window. The window was to the left of the painting. It had a boldly thick burgundy colored frame and outside was India. The juxtaposition of the framed painting and framed window struck me as ironic. Here I was gazing at a painted India when the real thing was right outside. So instead I shifted to the window. Through the panes I watched India continually re-paint itself. Women in brightly colored saris and men in suits shifted from frame to frame of the window panes. Cars, cows, autos, and buses scurried in and out of the painting. Green tree leaves and orange flowers rustled in slow movements -seeming to hint at the saturating heat outside.
Jessica :)
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