Beginnings to a new beginning

January, 2009 Goa

A fresh water lake is next to the ocean.

All things happen for a reason and one way to test this hypothesis is simply look back.

Why did I take myself off prozac? Because I knew what the problem was and prozac wasn’t going to fix it. Had I stayed on for the benefit of others I could have ended up in worse shape than a divorce.

desire and suffering

Two people marry and they ought to have never married. They agreed it was a mismatch yet remained together because of committed vows to their faith and family.

The Bible is wrong or the interpretations are wrong because it is unfathomable to accept God is going to hold two people, who should not have married if it wasn’t meant to be, accountable. How many people do I know who remain in a marriage forever miserable but faithfully loyal? That is just not right. We didn’t believe in such things as inerrancy anymore and found canonical loopholes to justify the end so we could move on with our lives.

Find a girlfriend, take yourself out of the game

Stop getting involved in other people’s lives.

Stop connecting the dots and stay focused

Who’s a puritan? The children of those who were alive before Elvis, Hitler, and credit cards? Who’s the back seat psychologist? I’m not to blame for a miserable marriage completely though I did ask, pushed down to my knee by forces of fear and insecurity.

The Shiva Restaurant next to the Sweetwater Lake is busy, a plate of Kadai chicken, garlic butter naan which wasn’t very good and a masala chai that was good but in fatigue I knocked half of it over and headed back to the hotel. ‘I’m sorry, there is none.’ I pulled out my camera to catch a kingfisher diving for fish below its perch on a wire, Russians and Israelis scattered thinking I was going to catch them in the act of sunbathing.

EVERYTHING HAPPENS FOR A REASON

I asked the fella at the Anjuna Villa for some Goan chill. He returned with a Kings pilsner and said something incoherently. I was the only one dining and the rave music irritated. The tall man of 20 said he needed to get a key to unlock the CD machine. ‘everything’s going to be alright’ fills the air and it’s a nice light beauty, a change of pace and a calm of influence. A geeky euro and his female companion look back at me because she came in first, hesitated, and discussed eating instead of what they were going to do originally. Bob Marley is still distrusted music in Goa, its relationship with marijuana undeniably linked, but it beats the rave many listen to here when they need some serious escape and believe their end will come sooner than ours.

It seems so silly to censor anything until it is understood that we remember all perceptible images. Peel away those inhibitory circuits and see for yourself.

FUNDAMENTALISM

EXTREMISM

BE CRAZY AND SUBDUE

In the restaurant a sign hangs for everyone to see:

“DON’T SMOKE CANNABIS HERE”

My opinion of reggae has changed from what I hear is simply a repetition of the same chords to something quieter and more therapeutic. Can you relax and enjoy Bob Marley and not smoke cannabis? Surely yes.

“let’s get together and we’ll be alright” A group of Semitic fellas come in. A few more couples come in. Relaxing music attracts young and old people to this restaurant.

‘it’s the words that made Dylan great’

no, it’s the music, the melody, connect the dots together they are inseparable.

john: you like rave music?

francis: no, I don’t listen to it.

john: well there was no one here and you were playing it. Do you

know who likes that music?

francis: yes, europeans.

john: and the israelis?

francis: yes, they love this music. they are a problem but they

have money so we welcome them.

The Israelis who came in weren’t aware that I requested a change in the music. Three gals, one in the pool I found refuge in earlier in the day and I get emotional and I know uh oh, I am coming above the radar and you know what?

inspire

THERE’S NO REASON TO CRASH INTO OTHER PEOPLE’S LIVES UNLESS YOU HAVE TO…

(2)

I am still on earth.

OM MANI PADME HOM. The Tibetan part of that chant is after the Om. Indian Hindus have no idea what the latter part means. I bought two CD’s for 300Rs and I gave my $300 pair of Ray bans with a scratch on the left lens to the man who sold me the music. Walking around in the big Wednesday Anjuna flea market I couldn’t find anyone who wanted to trade the glasses with relative value for a cheap $5 pair and remembered the theory of relativity at work.

I asked one of the managers if the cannabis sign was for sale and I told him I’d buy it for a $100 and put the crisp three year old bill with a concerned Benjamin Franklin upright on the table, held by the salt and pepper shaker. An older couple from Italy looked back to see what I had just offered. “I am testing a hypothesis”, which was to demonstrate that in all things value is relative.

conflict-deficit

It is sad to sleep another night alone, but what gives, I didn’t meet anyone today.

Mohandas Gandhi said the differences between the faiths were semantic.  All faiths are the same at the top.

The tall fella who had the Marley music had an MP3 and he is not here today so I gave my Buddha bar cd and Indian percussion cd for them to play. “You saw Zakir Hussein perform in Dubai? May we touch your garments?”

Mohan and Simon who also went by Mohan and I stood atop a grassy knoll at the elbow of steady shopping traffic in the market, Mohan with green eyes and a foot shorter than I stood to my right, Simon aka Mohan stood to my left wearing Army blue fatigues and carried a large rifle. “I feel very safe standing next to you.” and Simon smiled. “Fellas, I’m gonna stand here for five…six minutes and if you can help me find a nice girl to be my girlfriend, I’ll buy the first two rounds tonight.”

The woman reading the Anita Desai book pulled out this big camera and showed her friends sitting across from her. “I was so embarrassed. There I stood in my pink two piece bikini, mascara running down my left eye, what a mess, and there on the beach with the Indian people in speedos they ask to take my photos.”

Simon, can you identify the Israeli babes from the Italian babes? The Israeli babes wear surplus army clothes and anything black. The Italians always wear half black half African red, green or yellow and if you look real close they got marinara sauce stains on their banana republic pantaloons.

 

 

 

(3)

India isn’t cheap if you’re generous and you can’t find someone to cut your hair for 40Rs. Waving 500Rs I bribed a young woman in a hair salon for women only to give me a trim and still she didn’t do a good job. When she finished she and another gal held this large and heavy mirror to show me what the back of my head looked like but they couldn’t remain still and I never saw what I usually never see to begin with.

All joking

testing the Gods

paying cash

The levels of intelligence

hardcore naturalist

no cigarettes, shots of whiskey, straight, no additives.

last night outside the hotel we spoke about India’s 9/11.

“I want to kill them. India is my country. Kill the Pakistanis”

That’s great, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth and the subcontinent is blind and hungry. I don’t think anyone will notice the difference my friend.

Was partition a big mistake? Can we blame the English for all of today’s problems?

The Balfour Doctrine, the Partition.

Going Indian nutty when a Penelope Cruz advertisement came on the tv in the shop next to Maya’s travel agency where I bought a bus ticket to Hampi and the two fellas hooted and hollered to see this white dude who believes unpaid celibacy has unfairly burdened him for far too long and can’t rest in one place begins the trek across and up the country hoping he can meet someone he can call a girlfriend though in truth he can’t stay in place long enough to meet anyone.

Mara, the pretty 18 year old at the reception happily accepted a catholic wrist band.

mara: do you know them all?

john: oh, only a few and only those I can see without glasses.

I see jesus there, and mary, and the holy trio. your name is mara?

I have a sister named Mary, maybe I’ll send her this one.

No expectations. Expect anything that isn’t a guaranteed and you set yourself up for a disappointment. Desire a pretty girl and dammit, we’re suffering because it’ll never happen and it’s freaking me out.

Desire. Look for what you want and you’ll never find it unless you act like a lunatic and then you’ll always get what you want. But guess what, behave like a freaking spiritual lunatic and you still have no luck finding a girlfriend. The Indian woman is extraordinarily beautiful and it hurts to see them because I know desire trumps me every time.

kill the desire, find peace.

How can I kill desire, I am not a priest. I cannot and do not want to turn off my libido, alright? Someone is making me wait, I swear it’s a cosmological conspiracy. Ok, I’ll stay in this country, die in this place, don’t go back, please OM MANI PADME HOM JESUS.

The Bombay kid

john: “Ok, I got a question for you. In front of me are 400 virgins, some of them so ridiculously gorgeous. All of them are in black, head to toe and you only see their eyes, noses, and mouths. Some of them don’t have mouths and noses and all you see are eyes. Eyes that slay.

who am I?

Five seconds passes. The young kid on vacation sits and ponders but is clueless. “Ok, here’s a clue, I live in Dubai.”

the kid: “Dubai? I got relatives there somewhere but I don’t know where.”

john: Not very close relatives I reckon, ok give up?

the kid: I don’t know.

It’s hard for me to believe at this point that an attractive young man who dropped out of flight school after two years and is bumming around can’t come up with anything.

the kid: you’re a priest?

john: HA   Mother of St. Antony.

The cheesecloth shirt I bought I thought was worth 700Rs and didn’t bargain at all for was only worth 150Rs. “These stains aren’t going to come out” said one of the hotel staff when I asked him what he thought its value was. well, shite, if I was thinking like a German instead of an Irishman I would have taken the shirt outside of the tent I found it in and looked harder at it. My loss. However, Krishna, looking very religious in his own white vespers, long braided hair and a huge red splotch and pieces of rice on his forehead, and his wife who sat at the entrance of the tent deserves no advancement in their spin on earth for taking advantage of me, knowing full well its value.

The fella from West Wales and his friend Michele. A nice couple, not afraid to talk with me.

A real pretty gal and her two friends in their early twenties left this morning. Where do you think they’re going? Hampi?

Aye. I saw only one eye through the tinted sunglasses when I looked at them from the across the way, but being one who was taught not to stare it was hard to stay away then I remembered I am older than their fathers.

“never trust someone who wears sunglasses indoors”

I hand washed the cheesecloth shirt and on a hanger hung it in front of a opened window. Yesh, it looks like a shirt worth a 100rs.

stupid

stoned

cheated

boned

Write it off, what’s the difference. A sober man would have started at least 300. I didn’t even negotiate, dummy.

SAB KUCH MILEGA

conflict resolution

peace

dove tattoo at the base of the thumb

The Nehwari kumaris in Kathmandu, virgins for life, people afraid to marry them because of bad luck. My goodness, I’ll have no bad luck with a 33 year old virgin, omigod…I think I’m in the wrong country…

be slow to act

quick to think

“Guess who the two fellas are from”. They sense they’re being talked about so they leave. How did they know? A quick look by the Nepali kid who served me noodles and seven up was enough.

“You see, when you got a bulls eye on your back like the Israelis feel they do and they may be right, well then, you’re gonna be discreet and you’re gonna be someone else from somewhere different and shades and shades of life cover up the truth except for one thing…I know who you are.

The mass of uneducated Indians will believe in the deity of a donut if it brings them good luck.

The Deity of a Donut.

One Donut at a Time.

famous johns:

john mcenroe

john adams

john wilkes booth

john lennon

john, the one whom jesus loved

jack oneil

king john the lion hearted

prince john

john the Baptist

jfk

if you can keep your control in India exhibiting only righteous anger and hostility then surely marriage should be a picnic.

Maybe, if…no, adultery is of course grounds for righteous anger, and yes, divorce if necessary, but it’s never a call for violence…an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.

At the Goa bus station my watch stopped and I didn’t know where the bus to Hampi was and I didn’t know if I was late. The dilemmas were temporarily solved in the homeopathic pharmacy with the correct time and where I stocked up on homeopathic vicodine and a few valium for a bone jarring 12-hour trip. A Hampi bound bus however, was pulling out ten minutes before my own was to leave and I climbed on, an angry Indian man tried to tear away the ticket from me and then ensued angry words between us. The bus driver looked at my ticket but he couldn’t read English. A European backpacker sat to the right of the door and through him I exasperated.

john: these guys don’t read or write English. What time do you have?

messiah: 6:20pm

This wasn’t my bus and I continued to dress down the angry Indian who tried to rip away my ticket and once it was settled and understood now this wasn’t my bus, I apologized to the driver and to the angry man.

backpacker: “shake his hand”

I looked at this fella, about 33, German, maybe Hebrew, his English accent could have been Italian, I don’t know, but his advice was right on and I shook the ticket collector’s hand and finally climbed off the bus.

“Drive safely and keep this man safe. He could be the next messiah.”

In the sprawl of buses and taxis and backpackers all waiting to move on I wandered about, mostly right in front of the bus agency office and was reassured by the tiny man who was responsible for getting the tourists on his bus, but I managed to miss the bus and had it out with this agent who told me his men called out the bus to Hampi was here and I never heard which led to me to publicly declare:

“Do not do business with this company because they are completely untrustworthy.” Do not, I repeat, do business here. They are not reliable”

I yelled this as I walked away to nowhere.

A public calling out can work and it did, the man personally escorted me to a taxi where for 200rs we caught the bus. I ought to have protested having to pay for the taxi but by this time I just wanted to put this behind. The value of the 200rs ($5) rendered less to being on the bus and moving on.

Hampi

The cute girl sat down next to me along the banks of the holy river Krishna and sold me three Hindu stickers of the gods, briefly explaining the significance of each; two stick in my journal now and one remained in my back pocket for good luck along with a 2009 Valvoline calender with Jesus, arms spread out to welcome on one side, one of which I gave to her.

john: do you know who this is?

girl: yes, he is Jesus, he is a good man.

john: yes, he is but sometimes you wonder if he’s just tired of it all and wants to wipe out the earth with an ice age and start all over again…

Before we counted our change and made sure our count was correct a crowd of at least 40 surrounded us, not like last night, though I have to admit…

THE CRUSADE TO TRUTH

and what is truth?

Truth is a noun, and it’s the opposite of lying and I did that for almost seven miserable years of marriage and now ten years later I am still haunted. Must I keep bowing?

I saw the girl in the sunglasses again on a rooftop restaurant this afternoon with her friends, her back to me and she wore the same glasses. For reasons embedded in years of feeling I didn’t want to be rejected I declined to intervene in party discourse with three twenty three olds so I walked out of viewing site and found a boy holding a cute pup:

john: what’s your dog’s name?

boy: he has no name.

john: no name? hmmm.

A cute brown pup looking healthy for now, no visible diseases and worms, the food must be alright here, oh but he’s so cute and I just took a shower and I am all nice and clean and ready to eat with my hands…

he rested in my right hand, his heart thumped thumped.

john: what’s your favorite food, fella?

dog: thump thump

john: hmmm…you like cats?

dog: thump thump…zzzzzz

I walked past the girls and kept going right down the stairs and went right up the next ladder to another rooftop restaurant and remarkably there was the dog I named Cat a few minutes ago and we had a peaceful evening looking over the Hampi Bazaar, and the pup enjoyed garlic butter naan in an excited I am happy to have a name now kind of way.

The inverted temple. Why would a shadow be upside down?

I didn’t like the loud American in the temple, offering coconut shells instead of buying 1rs bananas. cheap bastard.

“Can you help me? I’d like to marry a Nehwari Kumari, aged 33.”

Orion and its star cirrus are above me here on the Deccan plains and its another night of no sex. The dog named Cat was fun to play with, it chewed on the shirt my brother’s ex gave to me for Christmas twenty years ago.

A young woman, western, traveling with a group of Indians approached Lakshimi, the temple elephant, not sure of such a huge animal so close, not sure if a piece of coconut shell with little meat for an animal that needs 29,000 bananas a day for crying out loud was suitable or was a tease.

intervention

“Here, give him one of these. They’re tastier” She dropped it the first time, then picked up the banana and gave it to the beast and out they went!

RANDOM ACTS OF KINDESS

GOD

I AM LONELY

I AM NOT A VIRGIN

I LIKE SEX, BEER

AND ANY HOMEOPATHIC

MEDICINE THAT COMES FROM YOUR

GREEN GREEEN

MAYBE FROZEN EARTH!!

how sad to be humble

 

 

 

(4)

I stopped at the monkey temple and a saw a flicker of light, someone was inside, a shadow moved. I looked out at the mountains of crazy boulders on both sides of the river and behind me the sadhu came out of the cave and beckoned me inside, taking my shoes off first, my cheap sunglasses, my camera, and my hat. There she performed a ritual to the monkey relief in the back of the cave. I assumed when I entered the temple Lakshmi would be one of these toothless vagabonds who may or may not be a sadhu but she turned out to be very attractive and my heart hurt. She gave me the red powder and after a few moments of deep I am into whatever is going on with my right pointed finger (I was rebuked when I started to use my left) placed a spot on the monkey’s heart. Then she gave me the gold powder and oh that was hard. I want to put in right on the monkey’s crotch but that is just so immodest so I placed a mark right above that area, foolish man we have here. I marveled at her hair, never cut, a long rope, littered with straw. I held it in my hands, her teeth were pearly white against her hard chocolate smooth skin of 40 something years. I got a hard on.

Outside I walked a few feet away from the temple and she called me over, offered me a piece of crystal sugar and we laughed and omigod I wanted to kiss the holy woman. She smiled so big when I gave her my donation. A generous offering considering the Europeans and Israelis have always been penny pinching yahoos. I told her to keep it quiet as if she was going to tell anyone a white dude just gave her enough to take off for the day and return to her home probably in another cave.

When I returned to my room I took out my camera and looked at images from earlier in the morning and it was then I noticed a line in one of the images and then the crack in the polarizer and the dent from a smash that I cannot recall clearly. Did touching the sadhu have anything to do with this?

“the banks are crooked, they don’t change money but they will accept your credit card.”

Paul was my tuk tuk driver and bodyguard for the next two days in Hampi. He took me to Hespot, the next largest city to look for a camera dealer to replace at least a uv filter.

john: hey look, Paul. what’s this?

paul: muslims, I hate muslims

john: it’s a mosque.

paul: yes, I hate them so much.

john: Paul, you know anyone who goes to that mosque?

paul: no.

john: so you have never met anyone from that mosque.

silence. he’s driving.

john: so, how can you hate muslims if you have never even met the ones who go here? Don’t you think you should as a courtesy at least, greet them before you break their windows and set them on fire?

paul: ok, ok, I only hate muslims who throws bombs.

john: ok , that’s a start.

police: did you see the sadhu in the temple? The lieutenant in his UPS uniform saw the red bindi on my forehead.

john: yes, she’s there.

Paul told me later it is strictly forbidden to take photos of the sadhu but I didn’t ask if it was wrong to touch a sadhu, besides it was none of his or the suspicious looking police’s damn business what I did with a hot lady in the monkey temple, though I didn’t do anything I think I would have been ready for anything.

(5)

After an early morning walk I sat in front of room 12 at the Shanti Guest House and four Korean travelers stir to my left. I approached the cutest one about my smashed UV + polarizer showed her I couldn’t remove the lens, and she, like the rest of them feared and stood up and walked back to her comrades across the enclosed courtyard to her friends. Remembering Darwin and his animals that came before me, I followed the girl and sat with the four of them:

john: konichiwa

kor: we are not Japanese. we are Koreans..

john: how do you say good morning?

kor: omaowa

john: I already forgot. “I’m afraid to tell you that telling the difference between Koreans and the Taiwanese, Hong Kong Chinese, Filipinos, Japanese, and mainland Chinese is an egg toss up”

Would I ever mistake a beautiful Indian woman with a wheatish complexion and Bollywood hair for a Korean woman who wishes I walk away?

In Hospet I searched and found a uv filter. Meanwhile I changed money at a travel agency where the man called someone else who came ten minutes later with the rupees. Paul was surprised but not really surprised I found a place to change. “All the banks you cannot trust, everyone is trying to take something more.”

john: have I overpaid you?

paul: what is fair?

In the back seat of his tuk tuk a hand painted note says 15rs per kilometer. Hospet was about 10km. Any extra money given to him was baksheesh for services rendered while I did my thing. And like a man who hasn’t drunk in a long time, Paul couldn’t wait to buy a new watch so we could be in sync though we knew I was the only customer he had had that relied on a watch in a place where most watches stopped when the British left.

Respect the clock, especially if you got buses to catch.

The last evening in Hampi I lit a candle and placed it outside my room. I had taped a Hindi sticker and my Jesus calendar to the window’s steel grating a few days earlier to keep away ideas that were bad.

I always want what I cannot get.

At the Elephant Stables I sat under a tree and soon a family came and sat in the same shade. The woman who was not married and was sort of on display for viewing for possible arrangements with a respectable suitor walked in front of me. I had walked behind the same woman a few minutes earlier outside the grounds and found her to be quite attractive but desperately sad.

A distinguished looking man in the group, perhaps the father, asked me how I had found India so far. “Beautiful”. And I meant it, telling those who asked I was American was a refreshing wind. A parade of schoolchildren filed past me and started waiving “amerikee” hello baba, hello amirikee…how did they know, what did they see or hear?

Being honest and humble has its privileges but in India it still hadn’t gotten me closer to getting shagged.

Sitting at the entrance of one of the stables watching the holiday folk meander and the enormously impressive architecture when I am suddenly surrounded by 20 maybe more, 12-13 year old school boys.

students: hello, may I ask where you come from?

john: of course, America.

students: and may I ask what your good name is?

How can you say no to good manners? I loved watching the wheels of intrigue spin in their heads when we discussed the blue eyed snake no one had seen yet believed was true.

BLUE

Colombia- missionaries, Cortez, the Portuguese.

Indonesia-the Dutch

The Philippines-Magellan

India-The British

Turkey? The Persians and the Prussians

The black bull came at me and Paul stepped in front and simply pushed it away. “What the hell was that?” The body guard brushed the incident but looked at me as if he knew something I wasn’t going to understand.

DEWA GURUNG

The couple to my left left and now they sit, still within earshot, on the majlis across from me. Before they got up to sit apart from each other the man tried to interrupt Dewa while he wrote his name in my journal. I am glad the happy and very laughable young man didn’t stop writing. The cook at this rooftop restaurant has made some extraordinary dishes including a fresh bowl of muesli with fresh bananas. Yesterday he made hummus that was good but was a little dry. The next time I ate there I suggested a little more olive oil and it came out perfect. “I learned from some Israelis in Dharamsala.” and the soup, where did he learn how to make this delicious minestrone. “I learned from an Italian man. He owns another rooftop restaurant.

The black stone.

“HEY EXCUSE ME YOU’RE NOT ALLOWED TO GO DOWN INTO THERE”

Ha, the fat obnoxiously loud American from Colorado is trying to ruin my day. I proceeded down the odd configuration and stopped almost to the bottom.

“HEY, DID YOU HEAR WHAT I SAID? THE LADY HERE IN CHARGE HERE FROM THE DEPARTMENT OF ARCHEOLOGY SAID DON’T GO DOWN.”

“Are you her spokesperson?”

I stopped listening, looked at the lady in blue and in charge, and we nodded and I climbed up.

Dewa served the second hot piece of bread and I licked up the remains of the hummus and I know the couple who hadn’t eaten anything and were hungry saw this with…I don’t know what they thought.

 

 

(6)

Up and early I went down to the river and followed a trail of shit and squatting adults in semi obscurity.

This mornings breakfast was the same as yesterdays except:

muesli with bananas in warm milk, orange juice, fresh squeezed and a pot of masala chai

VIJAY AWADA   coach 54/84  seat 59 upper berth

Sunset rock, Hampi

To my right two couples, east Europeans: “Do you have reservations for this rock”? I danced for a second and jumped off and walked around until settling next to them.

Behind to my left this white dude and his mat are set up and he goes right into his yogi thing. Then a very attractive dirty blond sets herself up about 20 feet in front of him, an obvious and consciously driven ploy to distract him. My heart sinks and I crawl into a ball on the rock and wonder how long will my loneliness continue.

For five minutes the dude with the mat is chatting with a local fella and the attractive long haired lady is into the yogi thing really good and I am sending out strong electromagnetic waves of good will and love and please turn to your left and recognize the wave that is interfering with your concentration which I have begun to doubt because the white dude is telling the local fella he isn’t going to give any money to him for something he didn’t do or receive. sigh. no good.

I do not wish to see other couples interacting.

sree lakshmi vilas modern café.

People are saying good morning to me. Men that is. One dude stopped in front of me and said “o man” and I moved around him. The women avoid me. The stunning Ukrainian lady didn’t have a chance when I sat down next to her and said hello and waited to inquire about the exact whereabouts of the train station. Within seconds her business and cold blue light eyes were done and gone.

Paul’s teacher, the old man with the long and black and white streaked beard sat behind the desk looked at me with no expression when I put my hand under my shirt and began to thump thump thump thump thump.

and I left sad again.

Never before have I gotten on a train in India so efficiently without even a muster of sweat than the 7226 bound for Vijayawada.

And the really striking young woman I saw on the platform was at my 2 o’clock in the next berth. Sixteen at most, but we locked eyes and dammit. My heart sighed. Another two in the berth said weepy goodbyes at the Hospet station.

Sitting next to the heart melting young lady was a guardian who wore pink and looking in her forties, cajoled and laughed with her hen of young chicks.

The single candle.

walking with the goats, separating the preemies from the rest.

7226 left at …. or so but who’s keeping track?

People will sit wherever they can until they’re told to get out. How long can one sit in a seat not their own, sitting in box seats is awesome until I am shoosed away by people with money.

The very pretty girl and I looked at each other and my eyes blurred and we tried to avoid connecting but there was something there and now I am back in seat 59 and I can only think, afraid to intervene, wisdom at work, mingles with the depressed. How could I meet her? I’m too freaking old, think conventional wisdom you dumb shit. If however, in my wildest of dreams she did accept my proposal, the agreement would be very simple:

1. no questions asked

2. promises to love you like a goddess in return for unconditional love in return

3. all that I do, all that I say your beauty will never leave my lips.

A shemale, meanwhile, thin and dark wearing a blue dress comes into the car demanding money from the couple to my right who gave immediately and to this young man who sat next to the father of one of the teenage girls and earlier tried to take a photo of me with his mobile.

Another stop. The railway official keeps busy taking bribes if no one is watching him. I was. Across from me a thin dark man with a mummy daddy inc sales sheet for dec-jan: 1,43,000,000. that is in rupees, I presume…

I enjoyed Hampi and I didn’t think I would because there was no booze around. It felt odd being honest with everyone and it took on a persona of its own though with the foreigners who think I am something I don’t know what they were thinking nor when children came up to shake my hand.

The vegetable pulou was 27rs. I gave a 50rs and he returned a 20 rupee note, a tax, the baksheesh assumed.

3:30 in the morning and we sit outside Vijayawada. Maybe an hour of sleep. I had the top berth in a car for six, my backpack chained to a chain, at the head of my bed.

January 20, Grand Residency Hotel

The room doesn’t have hot water but it does have a long sofa, a couple of chairs, two single beds, a great view of buildings in this city but most importantly a television.

HOWEVER

Flipping through there is no BBC that the man at the front desk said there’d be when I checked in after five hours in a filthy decrepit-completely forgettable hotel without a tv where I crashed at at four in the morning.

ESPN

MTV

National Geographic

CNBC ------10:15 pm onwards….yes.

In the hotel restaurant I gave the dishwasher my order after a few minutes ordering my thoughts…and I didn’t know he was the dishwasher who isn’t paid to do anything else when the short bellboy who I tipped 100rs came over.

good morning, good afternoon. what time is it? ha. it is possible not having a watch can cause misunderstanding.

ke garne.

So, I gave the bellboy my order as well.

“navaratan korma”

I asked for biryani rice though I should have just said plain white rice which is basmati because this is India but knowing now I confused him I said the former and it was a mistake because there came enough rice for four.

“7-up or sprite and a liter of mineral water.”

Apparently my order was unclear so here comes a guy with a pad of paper, along with a large man and now I am wondering if they’re closed so I stand up and ask where else can I go to eat.

large man: no, we open, apologies it will take 15 minutes to prepare.

john (laugh) is that it? fifteen minutes is how long it will be to run out and get the ingredients and cook it up?

large man: excuse me sir, you are from Germany?

I didn’t reveal my obama hope t-shirt underneath my sweatshirt because the orchard restaurant is freezing and I am hungry.

(7)

Taking a shower with Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth frightened and humbled me but it is already outdated. If it is true that the earth has a birthday of sorts then life as we know it will change big time. When will this happen?

December 21, 2012

the black hole

hadron collider

severe climactic changes

the mayan astronomers

the God particle

the earth’s axis tilts a hair-length and bam, ice age.

On the train to Vijayawada the fella who sold me the veggie pulau never gave me a spoon and didn’t return the change.

Amos is 23 years old and is from Berlin.

Amos: I enter university in the Fall. For now I take a break.

john: how’s India treating you?

amos: Good, except for now…

He didn’t tell me what was wrong and it didn’t matter.

john: what will you study?

amos: philosophy

john: philosophy! You’re preparing yourself to be a very perceptive and very poverty-stricken philosopher unless you teach the stuff and there aren’t many jobs for people who can discern or care to know anymore about Hume and inverted temples, and beautiful sadhus in monkey caves who let you touch their thick ropey hair and smile and you want a shag and the pain hurts in my throat and pants and within thirty minutes and talking to police officers I discover my uv and polarizer smashed.

faith-reason-faith-reason-faith-reason-faith-reason

“DO NOT REST YOUR FOOT ON THE WALL”

On every floor of this hotel are these signs and I don’t understand why people in a hotel would be outside of their rooms with their foot on the walls. I don’t know.

I went out for a water, found a bottle, asked two tuk tuk drivers to take me either to the Kanaka Durga Temple, or 8km away to the cave temples. No English and my pronunciation of these Hindi words must be horrendous so I went back to the hotel and requested a cab at the front desk. I sat in the lobby with my water and they made a big fuss about getting me a liter of water though they obviously saw I had one with me but the man who checked me in said something to the bell-boy who took off and I grew suspicious that he was going to go into my room and steal something so I ran up four floors.

Then I accidently closed the door without my key and wouldn’t you know it, there comes right around the corner a pretty maid who lets me in and I stand looking out at a dirty city when the phone rings so I run down stairs and a tall man with blanched skin hand waits and we shake and his offer:

4 hours, 650rs.

I wanted 3 hours and 400 rupees and he refused to call his boss, refused to negotiate a price, and my temper was going up so in exasperation and in disappointment left; “I do not want to argue with you therefore I will not see your temples since there is no room for negotiation because you are not fair”. I found a tuk tuk driver who when I was trying to figure out which way the river was, he pointed straight up! and I laughed, up? The river is up? And I pointed up and a passerby laughed and he stopped and with him I negotiated a price and a location for 200rs and he was good for the money. He tried to follow afterwards though I put the money in his shirt pocket and patted it gently but I was too fast for him.

Mu-Barak America

I counted eight stations covering the big event and I’m still afraid of a skin head, an extremist, a klan.

please protect him

11:30 am EST9:55 pm Vijayawada

The local media shows Barak dressed a monk in brown cloth, complete with halo and book, birds twittered happily around him like a Disney character.

BABU BARAK

wolf: the entire world is watching this!!

john: no, wolf, I can think of a few hundred million Indians who won’t hear this. Walking around wearing the obama shirt and the school girls at the temple didn’t know the face and neither did Renuk, the cute 12 year old who was with not her husband (a laugh of shock) brother, sister, but uncle. And I know a few in a very dark bar attached to this hotel that won’t watch if it isn’t Bollywood music videos of gorgeous women they’ll never meet and never will I tonight.

The Lincoln bible 1861…never been used since…ok…Lincoln.

Two million at the mall and one man with a bowl and two candles.

PLEASE NO ONE SHOOT HIM

Diane Feinstein…yawn…”a peaceful transition of power.”

Rick Warren…let us pray…

The Old Testament-“hear o Israel…The Lord our God is one God.”

Lead us in humility compassion wisdom integrity freedom justice

All comes from God except a girlfriend…my clock tics and I am not happy to share my life with no one.

Are you finished yet, Rick?

Yeshua

Easu

Jesus-our father who art

Aretha sing my country…We love you honey, it’s beautiful, ok, wrap it up…finish softly…nice job Detroit.

Robert Bennet introduces John Paul Stevens who offers the oath to Joe Lunch Bucket Biden.

Itzak Perlman, Yo Yo Ma, a composition by John Williams. A winner and then a ‘Lord of the Dance rendition’

o jesus

John G. Roberts Chief Justice

please stand…

They messed up. They were nervous and we still cried and laughed and danced and smoked a little more and we understood if you’re gonna make any mistakes best get them out of the way before you’re president.

Humble

Thank Bush

44

still waters of peace

raging clouds, be true to the doctrine

crisis, war, economy—greed irresponsibility, not making the right choices

fix the schools

new energy

we’re threatening the planet

CONFIDENCE, lower your sights? They will be met, not solved, but met? I hope solved.

“the time has come to put away childish things”

…the surest root to the common good. America is a friend with each country (incl the evil ones)

Powers cannot produce peace in Afghanistan? Get the uranium.

Muslims

-sew conflict

-judge what you build not what you destroy and don’t look at your societies and blame the west.

-change

-Iraq-soldiers whisper the guards of liberty. There’s a willingness to fight even though they know they’re fighting the wrong fight? I don’t understand.

Honesty, hard work, loyalty, patriot, old virtues but true. nothing satisfies the spirit of citizenship more.

and there it is. a black president

Poet Nickolas Alexander remembers the people who built America and she speaks of love. Love. A hooker told me I have never loved a woman the way I have wanted to my whole life. Goddamn.

I want my own fig tree to sit under, Mr. Lowrey, but not alone, a beautiful Shiva with large breasts, oh and I missed the reverend’s last Amen.

BBC

It was joy, a wave of electric magnetic magma so powerful you get goose bumps on top of goose bumps.

I guess even a single guy with a hard-on for the brunette in front of him will still never get closer to that garden but can still feel elated at the peaceful and historic transition.

“The bitter swill of segregation”

And let’s not forget he’s a lefty.

Robert Byrd and Jimmy Carter converse:

Robert: “How bout that? A negro in the white house. Never thought I’d live to see it”

Jimmy: Yes, true but I can live with someone who has some white Irish Catholic blood though I’m sure no one voted for him because of this”.

CNN

“Jefferson was aware of slavery and the evils it brought…” BUT that is not what his major concern was at the time. He wrote the Declaration of Independence to establish sovereignty, freedom and independence.

An 18-minute speech, same as JFK.

And there goes Bush. Nixon waved a defiant-proud goodbye. I am happy to see the helicopter get smaller and smaller.

 

 

(8)

The train for Kolkata/Calcutta leaves around five in the afternoon. I managed to reserve a sleeper in second class for 1141rs. The woman who sold me the ticket said, I think, that this was the best sleeper available. “Why is it still second class then?” ah…no answer.

“America is a friend to each nation…who seeks a future of peace.”

“a victory for all colored-sports people” NDTV

“Without a vision the people will perish”

The poor in Michigan are excited in America. Wow, Barak, “we’s all holdin our hands”

Inside the quiet and empty Quality Inn restaurant the big TV has Barak.

waiter: from which country, sir?

john: America (he smiles). Did you watch this last night?

He shook his head in that unmistakable no which means yes in this yingy yangy place.

And I am amazed I made it to this restaurant for 50rs, that includes the tip because the driver turned right instead of left onto a five lane highway and turned right around and drove straight into belching trucks, swerving motorcycles, children with bows and arrows and oh my goodness, my tea has arrived.

“Barak moved to the US when he was three” ???? Wait a second, Hawaii became a state in 1959 and he was born in 1961, being 47.

“Indian children are bleary eyed staying up late to watch this unprecedented event”

wait a second, this came on at 10pm Vijayawada time.

“In Mumbai the bleary eyed children are so excited they may, however fail their maths examinations though according to those we interviewed it doesn’t matter because “we love colored people”.

I ate an uninspiring breakfast buffet in a dark Tulip restaurant. Four men in white shirts ate quietly to my 2 o’clock. A man and a young woman sat in front of me. The girl was about 15 and kept looking at me nervously and wanted to talk to her father but the room was too quiet and small to say anything without all listening in.

“We must pick ourselves up and dust ourselves off”

The man who checked me in yesterday morning in a crazy yet quite orderly transfer from the dump I checked in when the train arrived said I could not check out at 3:30.

the man: “Sorry, sir, 11:30 is checkout.”

john: my train leaves at 5pm, can I pay a prorated cost? half a day?

the man: “no, sorry, 11:30 is checkout.”

I have a hard time believing a line of people waiting to check in here but for twenty bucks, twenty bucks is twenty bucks.

The ceiling above me is quite beautiful and I should take a picture; hand painted flowers all the way round the squared room, splaying onto the ceiling, causing bends in the long green blades of fern and orange and purple hibiscus.

With love from Tokyo, from Japanese in Banglore. Barak mania.

There is still, something about Diane Feinstein I am not sure of. Everyone’s speech/invocation/benediction/introduction/prayer/ will be somehow remembered, they worked hard to outdo themselves and surely with the realization that whatever they said would be shadowed by the chosen one’s 18 minute speech for the ages.

The Indian staff watch the colored man taking the oath. Thank God they don’t understand English very well because every time I see and hear the gaffe I sigh. It was an innocent mistake, the adrenaline outdid the calm.

I think the dark-skinned peoples in this entire country who saw and have seen this man’s face have to be hopeful:

SAB KUCH MELAGA.

Well, not for everyone, really. These fellas are lucky to work in a restaurant where I have been the only customer for the past hour.

A capsule of yesterday:

a walk across the bridge that controls the vast delta and this river, photos with the Muslim and Hindu kids who shook hands to show friendship.

The ghat at the river. I took no photos but watched a pretty girl comb her long long black hair, her brother trying to help to no avail. I saw them again when I ascended the steps to the temple high above the city. She was no more than 15. As the sun lowered I headed for the beach to take sunset photos with the clothes hanging on lines and my o my I have to remember this beach as Shitty Beach, not because of garbage but this is the public toilet for the poor. At least 500 meters of land mine walking and amazingly no smell, a vegetarian diet perhaps reduces stinky emissions.

Then I found a cab who took me away from the tiny swarming beggars, far too close and clingy. I walked away fast and one heart breaking little girl, so dirty with ratty hair, eyes that stopped, a fear which could follow and haunt, I pulled out a 5rs and she smiled then dashed back to the mix. Seeing generosity a hungrier and more desperate boy pursued me harder and I walked faster and he cried and god dammit he got 2rs.

The lobby is nice and cool and I want to take off my boots and like the good Indians of Vijayawada I want to go outside and pee on a wall.

The Australian Open. Andy cocky Murray eats sushi and peanut butter in addition to his steaks and juices and protein shakes. Nadal looks invincible.

On the wildlife channel it seems every show there is some gregarious Aussie wrestling with something you see in a zoo.

Australia vs The Nature of the Beast

Why use an I-pod in your travels if your brain remembers everything? It also seems unfortunate to see travelers blocking out half the experience with their own music. Why, the sound of a city, even the dirtiest of cities, is more meaningful than the best of any Kings of Leon tunes.

You’ve heard?

1) If I were a rich man…

2) the phantom of the opera, music of the night

3) how great thou art

There hasn’t been much Edmund Fitzgerald humming. No raging rivers, thunderstorms, leaky toilets to remind me? Hardly.

You need a lot of faith to bathe in the holy waters of the Krishna River.

A ticket for Bangkok purchased for the 27th from Calcutta, arriving in the early hours when even the handicapped sleep.

Two things that frighten:

1) Large mobs of young Indian men, all the same height, same skinny frames with dark chocolate skin, same clothes and sandals, smashed into a gate where a film is being shown. I stood across the street behind the other observers and wanted to take a photo but what if they turned on me I’d be caught and maimed, robbed by malnourished men. One man stuck in the meld waived towards me and I left. Masses, hard to distinguish between animals, hard to imagine only reason separates these from the cattle who press and moan and bleat and belch.

And why? to see a very sexy warrior kill evil? I…ok, whatever. It still frightens. Billboards along Panda St. of this woman bearing a huge bloody hole in her head, a horrified shock grips her face as if someone ate the last slice of boston cream pie without permission, or there she is with a huge sabre sword, I think in this exception a gorgeous woman even angry, can still be gorgeous. This woman is not gorgeous though if she smiled she’d be gorgeous.

a mocking horror for poor.

2) I still can’t get used to the bald women and children along the river. I took photos of the black hair on Shitty Beach, excusing myself as I walked past the squatters in the disappearing light.

For 1140rs I have a sleeper and a seat and around me people who look like life is ok including a pair of pretty eyes and nose in a berth with a laptop tapping away while in the next car a young asian Indian lady has nothing on her mind except for shagging the guy with the Motown shirt that is just beginning to smell.

“Hey I know Motown, that’s seven hundred miles away…” It’s closer to 4,600 miles but who’s counting when it doesn’t matter.

“Hello Babu” a long line of school children walk by at the elephant stables.

I have been so honest during this trip. What do you attribute to being an honest man?

1. homeopathic vicodine

2. valium

3. herbs and spices and a commitment to transparency provided no one asks questions I am unwilling to answer and could land me in the clink.

I came to look for a girlfriend and ha, I haven’t come close to even meeting anyone and it feels this is how it is supposed to happen.

Six chatty businessmen occupy the berths across from me, the elderly trio left. One schmuck keeps staring at me and even pulled back my curtain to look at the white dude. ACHA!! I got up and pulled their curtain wide and yelled HELLO, and returned to my berth hoping their petty jocularity would quiet down and they’d leave me alone. But the gay clown steals glances at me and I caught one in the stare and said, without saying anything that if you touch me I’ll break your fingers with a crowbar until all 23 bones in your hand are 8,305. Now they are listening to a mobile recording of a man snoring over and over and they chuckle, ha ha, isn’t this amusing, aren’t we having fun? Such simple and annoying entertainment for the clerks.

The ticket agent wears smart trousers, pleated white, ironed, with a black sport coat and a pink shirt. He’s talking to them and money is exchanged.

 

 

(9)

The train stops, it is early morning and people get off to wash at basins on the platform, shrouded in an earthy mist. We are in the state of Orissa. A man exchanges with me a one rupee note for a dirham coin. He is a public relations officer for a steel company. “You’ve heard of Millenium Hotels?” We have nine hours to go before reaching Calcutta. The train, I am told, is only 20 minutes late.

Dr. Snghoshal

Jadavdor Kol-75

64/6 Garfa Main Road Kol -75

The retired professor of agricultural engineering says we are three hours out of Calcutta and recommended two places to visit while in the city though I told him I had a day in the city before I was to catch a flight up to Darjeeling but on the way back had two days to visit, specifically, Mother Teresa’s mission home and the Victoria Memorial. “You must also visit Santiniketan and Bisara Bharah University. The latter was where I taught for thirty years.”

regarding morality

“…action prompted by the motive of…comfort and personal happiness in another world is non-moral.” Ghandi.

So, if someone is going on the mission field to help feed the poor, he must make sure his intentions are pure. Is he going because his community nurtures such endeavors? Is he going because it is a requirement, an expected duty being one who believes such efforts are divine? Is he going because God told him to go? There is nothing wrong with feeding the poor and clothing the cold but if you expect a reward in heaven or on earth any actions are non-moral but not immoral and, are paid for when in full at that moment he seeks recognition.

I don’t mind pulling out long nose hairs in front of the doctor and his wife of 143 years. At 71, retired since 1998 he leafs through my guidebook. “I have been fortunate to see my three daughters marry successful men. One is a professor at Kolkata University, one is a teacher of the arts, and one son is in the upper echolons of business. “Here, take one of these.” A tiny Halloween size Bounty candy bar. “My son brought these back from London.” I didn’t tell him I bought one on platform 5 while I waited for the 8646.

A vegetarian meal went for 32 rupees. Lemon rice and something else sold in containers priced at 15 rupees. One cannot argue with priced meals though a restaurant meal will include a price on every service rendered to enslave the impoverished and uneducated staff and to fatten the fat.

Last nights chatty businessmen are working in their berths. The brown clothed voyeur who didn’t wear a belt taps away at a calculator making mindless notes and yawn…an itchy nose and we’re two hours outside the city of souls. Yesterday’s news says the pollution index was at its highest, reaching the danger red zone. Danger danger Will Robinson.

The state of Karnataka was a state of bananas and sugar cane. Orissa is flat, no rice fields, just dry and brown. It is difficult to discern what can be grown here, tilling appears to be a foreign idea. I’d like to ask the doctor but he is nodding.

“The problems of India and Palestine go back to the British mapmakers.” What about partition? “Should have never happened”. In 61 years of independence there have been 106 changes in their constitution. We call them amendments and they don’t conflict with the original words of Thomas Jefferson.

The windows are tinted yellow in 2AC and the baked scenery looks like Mars. The businessmen are all talking at the same time. Excellent, no one is listening.

Kolkata

“Does the TV work?” The receptionist at the Astoria Hotel instructs the all-purpose boy who led me to my room of 900rs earlier to carry a 14in up four flights of stairs. oops. He earned a tip for his efforts and before I even settled in church bells and the call to prayer blend at six in the evening for a time less people.

I bought a one way ticket to Bagdorga for 3550rs, or $75. At 4:30 in the morning I am vomiting. A liter of strong Kingfisher beer, a liter of light Kingfisher beer and 500rs to the singer at the Princess Hotel on the ninth floor who didn’t care to see who the foreign patron was. Booze is not my friend, happily enough, I find comfort in knowing I will never be an alcoholic.

Hadi Ram Hadi Ram Hadi Khrishna Hadi Ram..

On platform 5 in Vijayawada I stopped in front of a brightly flashing weight scale and put my backpack down. I assumed I’d lost weight having gone vegetarian but the machine asks for one rupee and I only have a two rupee coin and the Japanese coin with the hole in the middle that I carried around and offered to anyone who wanted something from me wasn’t going into the machine when then this very sweet girl approaches me and tells me the machine is ‘no working, broken’. For reasons I don’t understand this act of kindness touched me, an act Gandhi would classify as a moral act and not a non-moral act because the girl didn’t work at the railway station. She was with her family. A spontaneous act of good is and always ought to be moral of the highest order.

non-moral acts, acts of obligation, of duty.

Indian women know how to use their hips so well.

I started out on this trip hoping to at least meet a woman and I haven’t come close. Not even. What’s wrong? I swear the conspiracy baffles. Ten years and counting is absurd. I haven’t minded living alone, journaling and photography give me enough so I am not bored but loneliness feels heavier each day and each day closer to December 21, 2012 it seems tragic to die alone, if that is, I die.

Connections. How did my father meet my mother? Connections. I have none.

The Edmund Fitzgerald begins to hum. Top of Darjeeling, Chowrasta. Tiger Hill, the Tibetan Refugee Camp. How can I help? Meet a nice girl, take her and her family out of poverty. Why not? Siliguri and the Tenzing Norgay Central Bus Station is 12km away from the airport. Seventy rupees, two and a half hours in a jeep, 80km away to Darjeeling.

Spice Jet is clean and on time and wait a second, this is so un-Indian like. The yellow Ambassador Cabs in Calcutta truly brighten the blight up somewhat.

One cannot help notice the attractive ladies, particularly one I stood next to and behind in the line to get on Flight 321. Of course she was with her husband who held their tickets and neither of them spoke. She looked at me when looking to her left, the powerful peripherals of a woman cannot be exaggerated and she knew I found her attractive and there was nothing we could do about it. Sitting in an internet café a very pretty girl to my right swapped stolen glances in each other’s direction but nothing came of it.

In the same café on Sudder Street I am asked for my passport and then the clerk takes my freaking photo. “you gotta be kidding me.” It is for security, sir.” Taking a photo and asking for my passport so I can email is anything but secure. It’s borderline and unnecessary infringement.

john: “ Calcutta is dangerous? I don’t think the city is dangerous, you think it is dangerous?”A swiveling nod and whatever from the pokerface and underpaid underworked kid.

john: You think it is more dangerous than Gaza?”

kid: Ga…wha?

john: Gaaazzzzaaa, a slow enunciation.

kid: Gaza, oh Gaza. Gaza is finished.

 

 

Darjeeling

I can see my breath in the big old room. I can’t wait till morning so I can see what I hope will be the Himalayan Range in front of me. I am told the hotel commands breathtaking views also of the hill station.

so, honey.

From the airport it was 250rs and thirty minutes to Sugulia and 900rs to Chowrasta, the women are so far beyond me.

Each seat in the jeep cost 90rs. “You’re telling me you can seat ten in here?” yes, but they must be small people and with no luggage so I paid for all the seats because I didn’t want to sit around for hours waiting for it to fill up and besides, for $18 the young Nepalese Buddhist driver and his Nehwari wife with a reasonable command of English were pleasant company. They also deserved a 200rs tip for handling roads that makes you believe in mortality and delivered me to the top in exactly two and a half hours.

I am wrapped in a wonderful wool shawl that I am told was made in Tibet by Tibetans here but that didn’t matter because the big brown eyed girl who says her name is Honey sold it to me and I lamely bargained with a girl who could very well empty my savings if she’d marry me. Ha. I am guessing she’s 18 maybe 19. Soft, with red and green patterns with black tassels the shawl is large enough to wrap around me Arab style.

honey: My friend says you look like a woman when you wear it like this.

john: So what? I am warm and your friend isn’t. Ke garne?

honey: You are so smart.

john: You say this to every man who buys a shawl from you?

honey: Business is slow. You are my first customer today. Please try a hat.

She took me by the arm and dragged me into a shop.

john: But honey, I don’t want a hat.

She gave me a tuke, nice but too small and it itched. wool.

john: It’s too small and I am getting a headache.

I took it off and put it on her and tied the laces under her chin.

john: You are so pretty, why in God’s name are you not married?

She beamed and laughed and my heart melted like butter in the desert. She took the hat off and gave me a larger one but was still too small.

john: Honey, I don’t want a hat. I have this shawl to keep my head warm.

She wanted me to see myself in the mirror with this thing on me and I liked it even less. I asked the gentleman in the shop if he knew how much this young lady sold this shawl for and he hadn’t a clue.

john: 2000rs. She is very smart.

or I am very dumb and naïve, though I paid only 1200rs for it, inflating the price and telling others made her feel…well she thought it flattered.

honey: I find a bigger hat for you.

john: I’ll find something bigger for you. What do you want? What do you need?

and we parted ways, promising to see each other the following day, Lord you play, I pray you play.