Party in Kolkata!

My darling husband threw me his first EVER surprise birthday party and did a smashing job--brought together the handful of friends we've collected during our first month here, domino's pizza (which tastes really really really good here), garlic bread, chocolate cake...and they garlanded the apartment with jasmine and marigold in true kolkata fashion.
My little sis Emma picked out a very special birthday present for me--I don't know WHERE she got the idea that I needed something like that:-) Although it did come in handy for sharing everyone else's cake.
I'm not quite sure why Joanna looks so distressed, but the party really was awesome...
Even though I'm practically a member of the AARP, I did manage to blow out my candle.
Bridget was very impressed with Josh's party-arranging skills.
Anindo-da's daughter thinks we're all a little crazy, but seems to enjoy our attempts at Bangla. And she loved the chocolate cake. Smart kid.

Anindo-da aka The Facilitator. He sits with Josh and helps us schmooze with artists and musicians and writers from all over Kolkata.
Anindo-da's wife, who is also our cooking guru. This weekend we tackle egg curry. Yummm....
Josh basking in the afterglow of a good party.
Emma definately took advantage of the party to rock out.
Some of my glorious birthday flowers. Our Bengali neighbor said it looked like we'd hosted a wedding:-)
The apartment still smells amazing and decadent with all of the flowers and we're still living off the leftover pizza:-) A totally quality way to celebrate 27 years of living...

Much peace and love,
J&J

P.S. Next blog: a tour of our neighborhood--vegetable vendor, krishna sweet shop, the fish merchant and more...

Belated Fotos

Well, I had wanted to get these fotos up with the posting about our hike up to the nunnery in Kathmandu, but that didn't happen. And then I wanted to organize the fotos so they were all sequential and whatnot, but that also didn't happen so much. But asi es la vida. Enjoy...

A view of farmland in the Kathmandu valley from a national forest that we hiked through on our way up.
A couple of Nepalis resting by the side of the road. There was also a peanut vendor who sold us some snacks for the trail.
Heading up into the hills. The ridges you see are created by grazing cows roaming over the hillsides.
We didn't make it to the other side of this ridge, but Mike told us you can see the Himalayas when you cross over.
About half-way there...


A small monastary off the trail where a handful of monks live, work and pray.
This little boy was taking very good care of his baby sister. He was thrilled to have his picture taken, but she seemed more suspicious of our strange faces.
Josh taking in the view at the entrance to the nunnery's compound.
Two young nuns taking a break from the puja to bask in the sunshine.
The puja was held inside this building, at the center of the compound.
The sun beginning to set on the hillside.
A couple more shots before we headed down in darkness.

Peace and Love,
J&J

Home Sweet Home

These fotos are a bit more prosaic than usual, but we wanted to attempt to share the wonder of having our own space in the middle of a city of 16 million people. Our nest is on a relatively quiet tree-lined back street, a few blocks away from one of the main avenues in Kolkata where you can find everything from wedding sarees to pressure cookers to (of course) rivers of chai. Our landlords are both artists--a painter and a sculptor--so the apartment is filled with prints, sculptures and paintings. Very bohemian. And we're adding our own touches--a growing collection of sitars and my books and papers scattered about. Here's a mini-tour of our place (at least, our place for the next nine months or so...) Of course, everything looks better in person, so hurry up and get here and take a look for yourselves:-)


One of our TWO balconies. The plants are good company and, what with Kolkata's air pollution, they come in handy for some slightly cleaner breathing.
Josh in his practice room. A rug merchant in Kathmandu gifted us the kind of wild-looking rug he's sitting on--I'll upload a better shot of it soon--which depicts a famous Persian poet and his wife looking very poetic and amorous. There's some writing which the merchant roughly translated to: "Life's short so love well."
The bedroom which has the HUGEST bed we've ever slept in. Sleeping under a mosquito net is kind of like camping.
Our living room, ready to be filled with guests (hint, hint).
Yep, I'm still fuzzy...that's our kitchen table behind me.
My writing desk with all the fotos and totems I need to keep me company while I wait for inspiration...
The view from our SECOND balcony. The blue tarp shelters a veggie vendor right outside our front door. So convenient. And so cheap. For about 75 rupees (about $1.70 give or take) I can get several pounds of: tomatoes, ginger, garlic, peas, potatoes, onions, okra, carrots, chilis, coriander leaves (i.e. cilantro) and eggs. I love India.
The huge jacaranda tree outside our apartment. We're waiting for it to come into bloom.
Thanks to the support of the U.S. Department of State, Josh is learning how to cook. He's always had a way with eggs, but is now expanding his horizons with daal, veggie stirfrys and paneer dishes. And he also looks so cute in an apron! The Bengali women in our apartment building love watching him at work...I think they're jealous:-)

Speaking of our neighbors, they've all been super welcoming...inviting us over for tea and sending kick-ass curries and sweets. Everyone who lives in the building is related, and I think they've decided that we can be their long-lost American cousins.

We've now had two weeks of Bangla (Bengali) classes and are conjugating verbs like crazy. Interesting fact for ya'll--Bangla is the fourth most widely-spoken mother tongue in the world, with over 220 million people chatting it up. Bengalis sweetly (but wrongly) assume that just because we can say "How are you?" that we must be fluent, and immediately begin talking with us at rapid-fire speed. Even when we stare at them blankly, they strive on, convinced that we will eventually understand. Gotta admire their optimism.

What it comes down to is that life is good. We miss you all though and send much love and peace your way.

J&J

The Joys of Wireless

A Buddhist monastary.
Fields leading to hills topped with monastaries, leading to even bigger hills, and even farther beyond, to the Himalayas (which you can imagine into this foto).
On a back road in Kathmandu.
Hundreds (if not thousands) of prayer flags hang from the top of the Boudha Stupa.
Prayer wheels tucked into the wall around the stupa.
The faithful circling the stupa.
The Boudha Stupa.
Lighting Buddhist prayer candles by the Boudha Stupa.
Spices and teas for sale by the side of the road in Kathmandu.
One of the hundreds of temples and shrines we've passed during our wanderings.
All snuggly in Kathmandu. I was wearing a hat my mom knit for me and a Nepalese man stopped me on the street to compliment it. He asked if my mom could knit one for him too:-)
Impressive bamboo scaffolding.

Joshua and I are ridiculously connected now, with WIRELESS internet in our apartment. Oh, the luxury. So you'll be (hopefully) hearing from us more, especially as we're taking a break from our vagabond ways to chill out in domesticity for a while. We've been checking out the scene in Kolkata--went to a really lame western modern dance performance, an excellent tap/kathak performance, an opening for an art show with pour-your-own drinks, a poetry reading of Australian and Bengali writers...and all of these are FREE! And now that Josh is an official Fulbrighter, he gets hooked up with all the goodies. Like an invitation to the U.S. Consulate for a Presidents' Day dinner. Ooh lala. Hopefully he can sneak me in:-)

We're off to go grub on kathi rolls--one of Kolkata's excellent food inventions--fried parathas stuffed with saucy goodness. We'll buy at least one for anyone who comes to visit us here:-)

Peace and Love,
J&J

Some Visual Aids

Monkeys in Matheran.

Knickknacks for sale outside the HUGE Kali temple in Kolkata.

Josh entertaining himself on our first long train ride (from Delhi to Kolkata, way back when...)

Josh hugging some green outside the Gandhi memorial in Pune.

A man and his horse taking goods to the market in Jaipur.

Gandhi, his wife, his assistant and other revolutionaries were imprisoned in a mansion outside of Pune after his "Quit India" speech. His wife and assistant both died during that time, and he wasn't allowed to leave the mansion for their burials. So he interred their ashes behind the mansion. When he died, his ashes were placed there as well, under the branches of a huge jacaranda tree.

My first view from Matheran--a hill station between Mumbai and Pune--where I went for a couple of days while Josh worked on his sitars. No motorized vehicles allowed...which means no diesel fumes, no honking horns, no near-death experiences trying to get from one side of the road to the other (How did the chicken cross the road in India? I would imagine she never did, and just lived on one side of the street her whole life).

People on the move at the New Delhi train station.

This sign inspires a lot of confidence when you're crossing a street in Kolkata. One of the other great signs we've seen is put up by the Kolkata traffic police and says "IF YOU DRIVE LIKE HELL, YOU'LL END UP THERE SOON."

In India, bicycles are everywhere, doing everything. I love it!

Park Street. One of the busiest roads in all of Kolkata EXCEPT when there's a bandh, like there was back in December, and it becomes wonderfully quiet:-)


We're settling into blissful domesticity in Kolkata...now we just need visitors to entertain:-) Let us know when you're coming...

Peace and Love,

J&J