beer and paneer

the giant globe at the heart of auroville looks like a golden golf ball on legs. inside, apparently, is a crystal ball and white pillars and the sun comes through and spreads light...we aren't allowed in because it is under construction, the inner chamber still needs some work.

there's a silent hum around this place. the grass is obviously brought in and laid out, kept tight to the ground by workers, watered by hand. there are signs which read KEEP TO THE PATH. i can't help but make this symbolic.

we rent bicycles and peep around. it is clearly a spiritual community. a self-sustaining village right outside of pondecherry, a french colony 2 hours from mahabalipuram along the coast. we are here for the day. all visitors must watch an introductory video with information about "the mother" a french woman who moved to india and stayed here with a her guru named aurobindo until her death. the video is very high-science. lots of images of dna strands and the universe in motion. the village is planned out like outer-space, the map they give us is a spiral galaxy, in the center is the golf ball sun. people here keep to a tight curfew but the land is owned communally and there is no money. but by the look of this place, money had to have come from somewhere...it looks like we're in 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY everything but the globe is white and outdated, like yesterdays dream of the future, it was after all built in the 1960's. there should be fembots running around, hunting for enlightenment in white go-go boots.

on our bikes we negotiate silently who's to lead. i get grumpy and tired of being led around, so i zoom by as fast as i can and leave everyone in the dust.

on the beach we swim and sit and get sand in our hair and i don't look at cohdi at all.

.....

at a bar throwing back rum and pineapple juice, with louise, a backpacker friend we met in mahabalipuram...we're staying together me and her, not with the group, but at a different hotel, just for the night, and it is definitely nice to have a break. some time.

but for now, this moment here, drinks are in hand, and the ocean is over our shoulder, we're all here, me, louise, cohdi and the rest of the gang and it's awkward, things are still awkward...cohdi's talking to everyone and i'm staring at the moon wanting everything to somehow change. just change! on the walk back to the hotel louise and i talk about the noticeable level of tension and god and bikinis, while a diseased stray dog follows us for three blocks.

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in mahabalipuram a man notices the green pendant i found on the beach. cohdi and i both spotted it, he said i could have it and he helped tie it on. i'm wearing it around my neck now, and he asks if i'm a muslim. i say no. inside his shop he tells me that what's inside the small fabric square is someone's prayer, some words for someone's pain or protection, nothing to take lightly. in the morning i come back to his shop, and he opens it, my beach necklace, and reads the paper inside and instructs me to throw it directly into the ocean saying it is "very bad. not for you."

he places his hand on my head and blows some magic breath in my face reading some words from a book that looks as old as time.

down at the beach the town is celebrating some festival, a shrine to VISHNU on a raft, it's being taken into the water by shirtless men and drums and people wailing, releasing. i take the necklace in my hand, shove through the crowd, with all it's broken pieces i wrap it into a bundle, weighted by a stone, and throw it to the waves.

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i got two hour-long massages by alan, a young man from the village, one of the few who doesn't own a stone carving shop or net fish. for 300 rupees in his room i lay on some sticky vinyl table and to the sounds of people outside in the market place bargaining and talking, horns honking in the distance, and the chickens...he makes everything i don't need anymore go away with his hands. the oil is from KARALA, a nearby state, his family is there, it smells like smoke and mystery.

after the second day, i ask him out for a beer. and we talk under a bamboo roof about
life and language...he says that americans talk like they're chewing gum.

on the beach with alan, on a rock and laughing, cohdi and laura on a nearby rock, but far away. cohdi, i sense is jealous. maybe i'm wrong. maybe i just want him to be, on some level. maybe it's all in my head. maybe maybe. maybe i want him to be hurt, dissatisfied, out of control.

alan's girlfriend in germany sounds beautiful. i guess a lot of germans come through mahabalipuram, he says she'll be back soon. he can read her messages but doesn't know how to write back.

.......

back in delhi after our adventure away. back to scheduled time and itineraries. we check-in to our hotel and go over to cohdi's dad's house. he's not home, so we have the place to ourselves. i head to the computer and write this.

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louise was talking about being sick but unable to puke. a friend was near her, trying to help saying repeatedly, "think of beer! beer and paneer!" and it worked.