A saree for Melanie (part 1); two girls show me their bull; Sanju rides the bus

Melanie needs a saree to wear to Soundarya's wedding. Vasanthi, our most generous host, has saree material just waiting. She shows a sample as little Sanju walks through the room. If Melanie looks tired, just remember that the two of us had just finished a 41 hour trip from Alaska to India.

We were both tired.

Vasanthi drapes a saree-in-the-rough over Melanie. Melanie likes it. Next, we must go to the tailor to get it fitted.

We are going to walk to the tailor now, and then we will catch a bus into downtown Bangalore to do some more shopping for saree material. Jesse, Buddy's mom, helps little Sanju into her sandals.

Jesse, originally from Malayasia, runs a small school for little children. She used to hold it right here, in the living room of her sister and brother-in-law, Vasanthi and Murthy. Sanju was one of her students. Sanju has graduated now and moved on, but she sees Murthy, Vasanthi, Jesse and household as her own family and so comes over almost daily just to hang out, to love, and be loved.

Sanju walks with Jesse as Melanie follows.

Vasanthi leads us to the tailor, but his little shop is closed for the day. So we walk a little further and there is another tailor, in a tiny, open-faced shop. That's how it is in India. Little tiny shops, everywhere. 

As I photograph Melanie, I feel someone tap my elbow. I turn and see these two girls. Although they do not speak much English and I know nothing of their language, they let me know they want me to photograph them with their *bull.

Murthy tells me that India has more than 700 active, indigenous, languages. 

After I take their picture, I show it to them on my camera's LCD monitor. They are most pleased. "Beautiful!" they say, "thank you." Then they walk away, waving as they go.

Sanju, Jesse, and some other little kid at the bus stop.

Sanju and Jesse ride the bus toward downtown Bangalore. I will continue this story shortly, meanwhile...

...I jump ahead to today, right here in Wasilla, Alaska, USA, where I took a ten-mile bike ride after I ate breakfast at Carl's Jr. My first two days back home were filled with warmth and sun, but today it rained.

The rain in India is warm, but this rain was cold. It felt good. I thoroughly enjoyed it. When I got home, I took a hot shower. I enjoyed that, too.

*I originally referred to this little bull as a cow, but was corrected by Sandy's cousin, Kavitha V. Kavitha wrote:

"In India the bulls are used for ploughing the fields, the bulls that are born with large humps and disablities are not used for ploughing.  These bulls are decorated and brought from house to house accompained with music. It is considered aspicious when a bull visits a house. In ancient India, people used to worship thier livestock. It was only after the white revolution beef eating came into picture. Now it is considered as a form of beggary."

Melanie and Buddy at the banyan tree

This is Buddy, my nephew-in-law, but I just call him Buddy, or nephew - I don't waste time with the inlaw part. As I move through my India take, I expect Buddy to become a familiar sight in this blog. He is a college student, studying hotel management and in the not too distant future hopes to land a training job on a cruise ship.

Maybe he will then cruise to Alaska. If he does, Melanie and I plan to go a port that he will land at and take some ice cream to him. Chocolate ice cream, with little chunks of donut and raspberries frozen into it.

He is standing inside the multi-sectored trunk of a banyan tree near Murthy and Vasanthi's house.

Cobras are known to sometimes hang out here, especially during heavy rains, but Buddy is not afraid and neither am I.

Nor is Melanie afraid.

She is not wearing a saree. She will need one for the wedding. Where will she get it?

I was going to show you, but I am just too damn tired. Jet-lagged big time.

I will show you tomorrow.

Unless I sleep all day.

That would be nice.

I don't think it will happen.

My computer screen grows blurry in front of me.

My eyelids keep falling down.

Maybe it would help if I ate cake.

But there is no cake.

What am I to do?

One year to the day after I drove Murthy and Vasanthi to the Arctic Circle, Melanie and I arrive in Bangalore; Soundarya - the bride-about-to-be with kittens

This is Soundarya Ravichandran and while I have wanted to return to India ever since I first came in August of 2007, she is the reason I came now. Tomorrow, she will become the bride of her soulmate, Anil Kumar, and Melanie and I will be there. 

I first met Sandy at the wedding of my niece, Khena, to her cousin, Vivek and there has been a strong bond between us ever since. I consider her a soul friend and I call her "Muse," because ever since I met her, whenever I am taking pictures, I try to imagine how the images might interpret my world to her.

In fact, there are many, many, many pictures in my portfolio now that I took specifically for her. She has actually seen only a very few of these images, as it would be too great of a task to either post or email, or even process them all, but I have them and she is the reason.

Not long after we met, I promised her that, if it were at all possible, I would come and take pictures at her wedding when it happened.

So here I am.

And here is she, with a kitten born to a feral cat at the house of Vivek's parents, who are hosting Melanie and me.

And here is Melanie and me, reflected off the window of the Seattle airport train that takes passengers from one one course to another.

Melanie, in the Mumbai airport.

A little girl in the Mumbai airport.

Forty-one hours passed from the time I drove away from my house to when we met Murthy and Vasanthi at the Bangalore airport. Murthy then summoned his favorite cab driver, Gulpi, and then brought us to the house, where Vasanthi made us coffee.

She makes it with milk and it is the best coffee that I have ever tasted. 

As we ate lunch, Sandy picked up my camera and turned the tables on me.

In India, it is polite to eat with your right hand, so I am exercising good manners here. Vasanthi is also a great cook. If she were to resettle in Anchorage and open her own restaurant, Wow!

Sadly for me, I love spicy food so much that I spent a few decades overdoing it and now the doctor has forbidden me to eat it, except a little bit every now and then. And when I overdo it it, I know it real soon.

But in India, the food is spicy. And so good.

One year ago, on May 8, I drove Murthy and Vasanthi up the Haul Road to the Arctic Circle and then on to Cold Foot. I had planned to take them on a whale watching cruise in Prince William Sound, but Murthy had read about some folks who had crossed the Arctic Circle on the Haul Road and then received a certificate attesting to the fact that they had done so.

He was convinced that the government had a little station there where they awarded everyone who came across with such a certificate and his highest goal was to go get one.

I knew that there would be no such station, but, along the way, I managed to find a place in Fairbanks that did issue such certificates to tour groups, and so I picked up a couple and at the circle awarded them myself.

Now Murthy has the certificates hanging on the wall for all who enter to see, along with the picture that I took of him and Vasanthi at the sign that marks the Arctic Circle.

The beautiful little girl is their granddaughter, Vaidehi, who lives with her parents in Chennai, on the coast.

Sandy and the two kittens. I will post more of the cat series on Grahamn Kracker's No Cats Allowed Kracker Cat Blog when I get the chance.

Vasanthi, Soundarya and Natarajan, their father and grandfather. 

Easter Sunday, part C: We eat and hang out

Remember those strawberries that I photographed in Carr's yesterday? Here they are again - desert, on Easter Sunday, 2009 at the Hess home in Wasilla, Alaska.

The main course was ham, mashed potatoes, potato salad and green beans. Even before dinner, we could not stop ourselves from eating eggs. When it came time for the strawberry shortcake, Kalib wandered about, mooching off of whomever he saw eating in front of him - in this case, Mom.

Charlie borrowed my guitar for awhile and filled the house with wild music. As for the guitar, it is a martin and I first saw it in the display window of a music store in Globe, Arizona, in 1976. I went inside, the salesman got it down for me, I took a seat, and played a bit of Bach on it.

Never had a guitar sounded so good in my hands. I had to have it. It cost $1800 and my annual income was $10,000. I didn't care. I put some money down on lay-away and kept paying until that day came when I could finally pick it up and bring it home.

I did love that guitar and I even played it in a master class with Christopher Parkening. Many people used to think that I was really good, but that was only because they did not know better. I knew better.

There is only one way to be really good on the classic guitar, and that is to play and play and play and play. Practice, practice, practice. I'm a photographer, I'm a writer. I hardly have time for both. How could I be a classical guitarist, too?

So I put the guitar aside, because the only thing that I could do with it was to play works that other people had composed, that other guitarists could interpret much better than I could - but I can create originals with a camera, and keyboard.

Once, during one of those times that I have mentioned when I was broke and in dire need of money, I took this guitar to a pawnshop right here in Wasilla. The fool behind the counter asked me how much it was worth. I told him.

He laughed loud and scornful, asked me what kind of fool I thought he was. At most, he said, it was worth about $150 - he had seen a lot of guitars and he knew - so he would loan me maybe $50 for it.

So I walked out of his store with no money but my guitar in its case, leaving the fool to think that he was very clever, with no idea of the profit he could have made had he given me a loan that reflected its true value, if I had then defaulted.

I often imagine that the day will come when I am able to do nothing but sit at home and write my books, and that I might then find myself with a little time to play the damn thing again.

But really, I don't think so.

As Lisa looks on in bemusement, Melanie reads a few lines from the Anchorage Daily News, concerning Wasilla's most famous resident. These are the words that she read, ""April 6, 2009, Juneau, Alaska -- Responding to the missile test by North Korea, Governor Sarah Palin today reaffirmed Alaska's commitment to protecting America from rogue nation missile attacks." 

Both of my daughters were most amused. 

Juniper came out with Lisa. We were all happy to see her, but she was unhappy the entire time that she was here.

As for the blue golf-ball, Kalib got to hunt Easter eggs twice this year. The first time in Shonto, Arizona, down in his ancestral Navajo home. There, he found an egg that designated him as a prize winner - he won a toy golf set, with a minature plastic golf cart and minature clubs, but large, blue, plastic golf balls, including this one.

Uncle "Tiger" Caleb was greatly pleased.

Melanie and Lisa continue to engage in little verbal battles, which they smile and chuckle through. Many such duels arose today, and I was at the center of at least one.

Melanie asked, "Dad, is there any way to play music in the house?"

"Dad's not anti-music!" Lisa retorted.

"I didn't say he was!" Melanie shot back.

Then everybody chuckled.

Later, their bellies full, Melanie and Charlie walked out to Melanie's car so that they could drive to Eagle River and eat a second Easter dinner with Charlie's parents.

Remember what I said when Melanie left after her last visit? It always comes to this. Every time she visits, she leaves. Every single time.

Lisa stayed longer, but, then, just before 10:00 PM, she carried Juniper to the car, came back in, passed hugs around and then she, too, drove away.

Yes, it always comes to this.

Both daughters come to visit, separately

Yesterday, she said she might come out and have breakfast with us this morning, but she arrived a bit before 3:00 PM. I still offered to take her to breakfast, but she was not in the mood for it and neither was I, to be honest.

She found a box that Kalib plays with when he is here and opened it up. "My kitty!" she exclaimed, for she did not know this kitty would be in it. She said it had been a very long time since she had seen the kitty, which was a gift to her from Jacob.

To me, it looks less like a kitty than a tiger. A white tiger. See that creature walking across the floor? That is Chicago. Chicago is a kitty, albeit full-grown for probably a decade now.

Chicago? A decade old? Chicago Kitty?

Where does the time go?

And speaking of tigers, Melanie was not certain whether or not she would come to India with me to attend the wedding of my Muse, the beloved Soundarya Ravichandran.

Today, Melanie announced that she has decided to come. It was the email from Murthy that convinced her.

We leave one month from tomorrow.

It will be fun, except that the nights will be dark there.

I can hardly take a dark night, during that time when the Alaska night is light.

It takes a lot to drag me out of Alaska during the season of light.

For Sandy and her wedding, I will venture forth into the night that is dark.

We waited until 4:00 to go get coffee, to see if Lisa would arrive. But she did not, so we went without her. As the car was warming up, we saw our neighbors from four houses down walk by with their two dogs. 

It was strange to see those two dogs on leash, but there they are.

We went to Mocha Moose, where they still have a sign up that says "Palin Fever." After this past week, none of us were feeling even the slightest bit of affection for our governor - who, for a brief period in history, I actually did admire and adore. This did not stop me from drinking Mocha Moose coffee, which is usually pretty good but today was subpar.

Immediately after I drove us back home, Melanie climbed into her little car and drove away. I don't know why, but her visits always come to this. She drives away and goes home.

Immediately after Melanie left, Lisa showed up, carrying laundry. She cooked us dinner: stir fry chicken and straw mushrooms. It was quite excellent.

After dinner, I took Lisa to Dairy Queen for ice cream. As we neared the Parks Highway, I heard the whistle blow. I was thrilled. I pulled out my pocket camera, put it on the dash, and, grateful for the fact that I had a red light before me and no car behind be, pointed it toward the railroad tracks.

And then the train came rumbling through!

It was thrilling - as it always is.

I never get bored with the train.

I love the train.

I have never ridden on it, but I love it.

Maybe this summer I will ride on it, and blog about it.

And I hope to ride the train in India, this time.

Last time I did not.