moorepants

Painting I see many people painting their houses, fences, etc. Most houses are brick so there isn't much to paint. But people seem to keep things very tidy and nice looking here. So they don't seem to like any trim on the houses to look as if they aren't well maintained. But on the other side of things there is a ton of great graffiti. It is illegal to do graffiti but there are special legal places to paint. I've really been impressed with the street art and it so cool that is changes everyday. Sometimes really great art gets painted over and someone puts up crap. There is something liberating about both enjoying and destroying art. Like Vishnu and Shiva, something is always born again. Transportation The transportation systems here are quite amazing. I can ... read more

We arrived in Mumbai with only two full days left in India. After the standard process of bargaining with a cab driver and having to force him to take us to the hotel we requested, we stepped out onto the amazingly clean streets of Mumbai. We had heard horror stories about the extreme amount of people in the city, but we were quite suprised to find that it wasn't very crowded. The traffic almost seemed to have some sense of order to it. I think one reason it was like this is because the city has laws that prevent rickshaws within the main city area. This left only cars and taxis on the streets, and it left us with an uncanny feeling that we were back in the US of A. Mumbai is definitely the wealthiest ... read more

Bean and I wanted to spend a few days relaxing at the beach before we came back to the cold winter in the US, so we decided to go to a little town on the northern coast of Karnataka that was rumored to have some spectacular beaches with little thatch huts to sleep in. We booked one of the most expensive buses that are available in India for the night journey, hoping that we could actually sleep. Even full size heavily cushioned beds weren't enough to keep the Indian roads from keeping us awake all night. We shared this bus with a bunch of westerners all heading to either Goa or Gokarna. The majority of them were hippies all trying to make it to the party scene in Goa. We were dropped of at the outskirts ... read more

The bus ride from Mysore to Bangalore was much better than our previous one. We got a deluxe bus (more comfortable) and traveled during the day. All of the villages and towns we passed through were packed full of people. I believe the Karnataka election results were being broadcast over loudspeakers on the main streets and everyone was out to hear the results. As soon as we got back to Padmanabh's house we were whisked off visit Mahesh's family. They were very kind and stuffed us full of home cooking. His father is a rice merchant and the rice pancakes we ate were made from the rice that he sells. Both his parents didn't speak English and Bean and I still haven't picked up any Kanada so Padmanabh translated for us. We had an enjoyable evening ... read more

We've spent the past two days in one of the most beautiful places I have ever been to. After leaving the farm in Palahalli we traveled several more hours by car to our current destination. We drove through a wildlife sanctuary where we saw wild peacocks, foxes, deer, and fowl. Prashanth drives extremely fast, like he is in race or something, he finally hit a bump hard enough that his front bumper fell off. We tied it back on with some string and continued on our way through blooming coffee estates. The smell of the coffee flowers filled the air. We arrived at the base of the Irpu Waterfall and Brahmagiri Trek route at about 8 in the morning to meet up with a group of 15 trekkers. Most of them were accountants or business men, ... read more

Well, we've spent the past couple of days hanging out with our new german friend, L.S., and trying to get a sense of what The Mother's experimental city is all about. We have definitely realized that we need much more time to really understand how Auroville works. The main goal of the experiment is to create a place where humans beings from all over the world can live together in unity. After spending a couple of days there, we can see that they are far from doing that, but on the other hand they are much closer than many other communities around the world. We visited the matrimandir finally after being turned away on Sunday. This is a giant golden golf ball with a meditation chamber inside that is the center and focus point of the ... read more