One more thing

Oh Eliza, a surfboard from Cali would be nice...

Exchanges of things from the World

So I totally forgot about the whole exchange of commodities idea when we get back, so...

Jake, from India, I would like a Sruti Box, what it is:

A sruti box is a small wooden instrument that traditionally works on a system of bellows. It is similar to a harmonium and is used to provide a drone in a practice session or concert of Indian classical music. Adjustable buttons allow tuning. It is also called sruti petti in Tamil and Telugu and sur peti in Hindi. (Wikipedia)

If you can find something that makes a drone sound...sieze it!

Sarah, from Nicaragua, I would like some cocaine. Preferably uncut if you are able to get it from the source, and maybe about two or three kilograms. That should last me for a little bit. Otherwise, I've seen great tapestries from nicaragua when I worked at the textile museum, any possibility of that?

Now, more importantly, is the question of alcohol. I am going to see what the whole deal is with liquids coming back from France, but I know with champagne, you have to carry it on the plane with you because of the air pressure. Otherwise, is there anything specific that you would like? I can reccomend some particular good wines from Bordeaux and from Avignon, as well as some liqueurs like Kir, Calvados, and Absinthe. I'm going to Germany next month on a beer run with my eurorail pass, so there's that possibility too. Let me know, but I'll see if I can some of this stuff in the US now seeing as how I'm 21, I'd be more than happy to be the alcohol connection. Also, I'm making a run to Brussels, so there's belgian chocolate, and Austria, Switzerland, and Prague.

Think about it...

Eliza Part III: The Reckoning

I know, I know, I haven't written in a while. You'd think I had more
time on my hands to do this kind of thing than you guys would. Anyway,
I'm here to remedy that partly. In 15 minutes I'm going to the common
room in my "Blunt: Blazing to Victory" sweatshirt and my "Blunt" hat
for Camelympics. That's right, it's that time again. I'm not doing
any events myself, but I'll probably go see a few. I do have a lot of
work this weekend, though. I just finished a 5-pager, and I've got
another, and then a 10-pager both due next week. Hope there aren't any
tests coming up that I'm not aware of.
I don't think I told you guys that I took the train down to Princeton
over fall break a few weeks ago to visit a friend from high school. It
was awesome seeing the campus, which is so different from ours. I got
a lot of interesting looks, because apparently there are no blind
people there. Favorite comment (from group of passing drunk girls on
saturday night, refferring to me): "No one's blind." Actually, the
campus was so overwhelming, that I was kind of glad to get back to
Conn. Wow, I must sound like a wimp.
I'm actually running out of time here, but Sarah, I got your postcard,
and thanks so much! Any music (or drinks) you'd like to bring back
would be awesome. My awesome neighbor read it to me. Oh yeah, and
I've had indian food twice recently, though I'm sure it's not as good
as what you're experiencing, Jake. I love hearing about your lives,
and Adrian, keep the awesome anecdotes coming!
Miss you all, and continue living it up!
E

La vie en rose

So I had an anonymous complaint for more posts, and not knowing what to write about, I shall give you a typical day in the life of me. Every morning I wake up at something like 7:15, 7:30, take a shower, make tea, have some toast in the kitchen of our apartment. I bought some chestnut jam the other day at an open air market dans le Village Bercy, et mon dieu , il est delicieux! Wait…English…sorry. Its late and I’m having trouble concentrating, it happens to the best of us. So I walk to the metro Cour St. Émilion, which is not far. There’s a Starbucks on the way, which I save for the afternoon for study. It’s a like a Starbucks in any other country, only everything is in French. Get on the metro, take the 14 to Bercy, change stations to take the 6 to Denfert-Rochereau, it takes 25 minutes all together. Walk up rue Daguerre, take un Metro, it’s a free newspaper, from the Wine-O who hangs on the corner near Monoprix and yells at people and inanimate objects during most of the day. Don't judge him, he gives me a free newspaper in the morning.
Past the fromagerie, la boucherie, la pâtisserie, la poissonnerie, et les autres magasins. Sorry, cheese shop, butcher shop, the bakery, and the fishmonger. The smell is amazing walking down that street. The IES center is a few blocks up on the left, across the street from an accordion shop. Classes in the morning at the center are grammar and culture, literature, and ésthetiques. Have a quick bite to eat at the café down the street, and take the metro across town to Paris IV, Université de Paris, and have classes in ethnology of Paris, and the history of the Mahgreb. After that, if its Tuesday, go to choir at 8 to 10:30 à la Cité Universitaire, and then head home, or on other nights go to Starbucks, study for a few hours, and then go back to the apartment of my host family. Either make dinner, have dinner with them, practice viola, study, go to sleep.

Such are my days here. And yes, the semester here is not a semester off, I have to study a lot, but that’s really okay since I’m here to study to learn and speak French. It has gotten a lot better too, considering I’ve only been studying it for two years.

This way of live, however, is something to be marveled at, because this is how most French university students live, and it is completely different than the US. This, I think is the biggest difference between other abroad experiences I’ve had, in that you really live and study here, you work hard and study, and so are integrated into student society. Some of it is painful, and some of it is pleasurable, but its something you share with other Parisians, because you are one of them. At least for a little while.

And now for your entertainment, a few anecdotes about the French.

1. The lovely scent of urine is everywhere, no matter where you go, or what time of day, you will smell l’odour de pee-pee, wonder where its coming from, wonder why you are wondering where its coming from, and then look at the naked woman on “La culture de plaisir” poster, and…wait…what was I talking about?

2. People make out everywhere, and frankly its getting annoying. Seriously, I go to visit Jim Morrison and Chopin in Père Lachaise, a famous old cemetery, and there are couples straddling eachother, and making out. For God’s sakes, a cemetery? I go to the park on a nice day to do some reading and the couples have taken all the best spots for studying. C’mon guys…

3. Greek food is the Mexican food of Europe. It’s everywhere, its cheap, and its amazingly good. Its not like there’s no Greek food States-Side, but its amazing over here. I could live on gyros and fries for months.

4. Nobody goes to McDonald’s for the food. Everybody goes to McDonald’s for the Wi-fi.

5. To say it is raining hard, you say “Il est comme les vaches pissent”, (its like cows pissing). No joke.

More later. Very tired. Endorms…pardon…

Cochin

Greetings from one of the last outposts of Indian Judaism. It's true!

We arrived here last night after spending a day cruising the backwaters of Kerala. The way that works is that you get on a houseboat and sail around the larger areas, dining on absolutely delicious Keralan seafood. After lunch, you get on a canoe and explore the small canals and see small village life up close. It's a tourist attraction, so there are other white people around, but it's still very neat to go right by, say, women washing the clothes in the canals.

Some people also decided to try toddy, a local liquor made from fermented coconut milk. I opted to steer clear, but I'm told it tastes and smells like fish. Yum!

Cochin is a bit of a letdown so far. The pollution is the worst I've seen since Bangalore (which is why I'm inside in the middle of the day) and the synagogue is closed for renovations, and they're not sure when it'll be open again. We did walk around Jew Town, and get hassled by approximately one billion shopkeepers eager for us to just look around, no obligation, you don't have to buy, it doesn't cost anything, blah blah blah. Just walking around any Indian city takes the patience of a saint.

Speaking of patience, one thing that's starting to drive me mad about this country is that just about everyone is trying to rip us off. We have to go into any store or rickshaw transaction with the assumption that the price we're quoted is going to be outrageous, but a lot of the time we don't know what the reasonable price is. I hate haggling, and I especially hate haggling when the amount I'm being ripped off by is equivalent to about one dollar. I'll work up a full head of steam, realize how little 20 rupees is worth, and then just decide to get in the rickshaw and get it over with. It's possibly my least favorite thing about the country.

Anyway, we're here until Wednesday afternoon, when we fly back to Bangalore, and I'll actually have to begin work on these papers. Hooray!

A rude Frenchman? Well I never...

As if living in this city wasn’t stressful enough, man this week was a dilly of a pickle. To begin with, classes are not really going so well, and I’m not sure if it’s the language barrier or the subject matter involved, but I feel like I’m failing all of them. We are told that the students in the university system are taught that they are extremely stupid, so its working, maybe? I still haven’t figured out the grading system at all. Some of the professors I really like though, there’s this one Sophie Fesjian, who comes in late to class every day, puts down her notes, goes outside to smoke a cigarette, and comes back in to class to teach. She’s a total badass, and I love her for it. But yeah, I feel like I’m failing. And it’s so weird, because every day, so matter how much I prepare for each class, I still feel like I have no idea what’s going on sometimes. So this week:

Monday: I am standing in line at Monoprix with my groceries, and this man comes up to me and asks me if he can cut in line, because there was only one person à la caisse, register, so I’m not in a hurry, so why not? He says to me a moment later, “Parlez-vous anglais?”
“Oui, monsieur”
“Oh, je peux savoir par votre visage, il me dit que vous parlez anglais” (Oh, I can tell by your face that you speak English.”)

What the hell? My face? I struck up a conversation with an old lady behind me who said that he didn’t mean anything because everyone studies English. Still, my face? Yeah, I can tell by your face that you’re an asshole buddy. How about I take you outside, and slap you with my asparagus? No, I didn’t say that because:
1. Violence is wrong, children.
2. I don’t want to start an international incident.
3. I’m overreacting.
4. That asparagus I got was delicious (I got it with some tornados, small steaks, and had them with some croutons, and it was one of those times where you are like, “Oh my god, I can’t I made this, this is so good”.) and using it my primary weapon would have been a waste of good food.

And so I left it at that.

Tuesday: It was my desire in the first place to do something musical here. The orchestra was impossible to get into, so I joined a choir (many of you are rolling your eyes, don’t think I can’t see you because I’m on another continent). I showed up, I got my music, was able to do most of it because it was what I had learned in sight singing class. But on one particular incident, I got lost. It doesn’t help that I am one of four tenors. Le professeur called on me, to sing something, and I explained that I was lost. He said, “Quelle nationalité êtes-vous”?
“Américain”.
The look on his face: priceless. Disgust, contempt, arrogance; all of which rolled into a Frenchman. Oh yes, it gets better. Later he was demonstrating how to sing, with your belly and chest out and some muscles contracted. I wasn’t really paying attention; I was looking at the music. He says, “Its very easy for Americans to do because they are so fat, isn’t that right monsieur Américain”? Looking right at me, I didn’t know what to say.
“Oui, monsieur”
“You see, he doesn’t really know what’s going on”.
Everybody laughs. I laugh. I laugh while gritting my teeth, my face a boiling red, and saying, “motherfucker, motherfucker, motherfucker…”
And yes, I am going back next week. I’ll take all the abuse he gives me, as long as he lets me sing. Whatever, its an excuse to meet French people. Also, I feel like if I make him acknowledge me as a human being, and not just an American, I will have accomplished something here.
C’est la vie…c’est ma vie jusqu’à là ici à Paris…

Pondy

Greetings from Pondicherry's hippest Internet cafe, Coffee.com. This has to be the strangest place in India. It was a French colony until the middle of the twentieth century, and it's immediately obvious once you enter the city. All the streets have French names, the cops wear French uniforms, the streets are broad avenues insted of the cramped alleys of normal Indian cities, and our waiter at dinner last night spoke French as a first language. Then you step out into the street and get buzzed by a rickshaw. Very odd.

We came here from Chennai, which I would be perfectly happy never seeing again. Exceedingly polluted, absolutely unwalkable, and with the hardest-bargaining rickshaw drivers I've ever seen. There's really very little to see there except the government museum, which commands about 45 minutes of your time.

We came from there to Pondy, seeing some temples on the way. This morning we went to Auroville, an experiment in cooperative living just over the border in Tamil Nadu. It was founded by one of India's revolutionary political leaders and his companion, a French woman known as the Mother. We saw a film on how wonderful it is to live there, and saw their meditation center (which resembles a giant golden golf ball), but couldn't see the actual village. Still, an interesting thing to hear about.

It's lunchtime now, and we'll be seeing an ashram after that. More updates to follow.

Riding the rails

There are times when I'm sitting in my room and listening to music that I forget I'm in India. Then the smell of burning garbage begins to waft in and I'm reminded.

In a few hours, we'll all be getting on an overnight train to Chennai, formerly known as Madras. We'll be touring Tamil Nadu and Kerala for two weeks, looking at temples and beginning work on our final projects for the architecture class. Eliza, this means I won't be able to put your posts online for awhile, so you'll need to talk to someone else.

We just got done with our weeklong break from classes, which coincided with the Desara festival. This involves thousands of tourists pouring into Mysore from all over Karnataka for concerts, sales, and a big parade. During the festival, it became absolutely impossible to go anywhere in the downtown area. I thought I'd seen crowds and traffic in New York, but this is something else. At least there we don't have to deal with cows in the road.

By the way, what kind of cool stuff do people want from India? All I know is that Areti wants "kooky" earrings. I need to bring some part of the experience back home for you guys!