Enter the Brigadier

"Mark, let me tell you something," the Brigadier begins gravely, "I believe that all people are brought together for a reason. When I came into Farhan's office last night the moment I saw you I knew why I had come."

"We phoned you," I jest.

"What? No, I didn't have to come. It was the middle of the night. But I knew there was a greater reason that I should come there. You see, Mark, people are like magnets that can draw similarly charged individuals together from even continents away."

"I thought it was oppositely charged bodies that are magnetically attracted."

"What?" The Brigadier splits his attention between the serpentine mountain road and our conversation.

"You said similarly charged individuals are brought together, but it's..."

"Yes, like-minded individuals. People with similar vibrations."

"Good vibrations. Now you're talking like a real Californian."

I reflect on the torment of the previous night's decision. The three burly Mujhadeen had taken a shining to me and wanted to take me to some of the remotest villages that had been damaged by the earthquake. They were ready to hit the road in the middle of the night and the door to their SUV had been open and I was three quarters in. Farhan had hurried over to me at the last second and said that the Brigadier was inviting me to go to his field hospital in Muzaffarabad the following day. I had asked Farhan what I should do and he had said I really couldn't go wrong either way.

In the end the mystery of the Brigadier was too compelling to pass up. As Ali had so accurately pointed out, the Brigadier was larger than life – literally. He rivaled the most mountainous of the mountainous mountain men in girth, filling his kurta like a tarpaulin-covered balloon, while he also strode a good six inches superior to the tallest of them. He had arrived in the middle of the night with the notoriety of a master problem solver, but had been unable to persuade either the doctor or the truck drivers to move from their positions. What had impressed me most is that he hadn't forced the issue in service of his reputation. Instead he had assumed Farhan's former position in the easy chair, occupying it like a throne, while generating a range of alternative solutions to the impasse. When he spoke, everybody listened.

His son, Arham, whom at first I took to be a servant, attended promptly to his father's commands which were issued calmly and with a certain tenderness. Unlike the Brigadier, Arham was bespectacled, his garb Western, frame compact, and he sported a curious collection of a dozen, long black chin hairs from that screamed out for culling. When it was determined I had cast my lot with the Brigadier he ordered his son to drive me to the hotel so I could collect my belongings and then bring me to his house where we would embark for the mountains at 4:30 am. It was 2:30 am at that point and the trip to the hotel and back to the Brigadier's house would take 45 minutes. I resigned myself to the fact that I was going to enter the mountains neither well fed nor rested.

Call in the Heavy Artillery

As Ed exits the room he suddenly turns and impishly says, "Remember Mark, always talk to the person next to you on the airplane." Years ago I had very intentionally implemented this very program and I take his injunction to be yet another wink from the great beyond. A half hour later Farhan, whom I had been in contact with about the possible sponsorship of dome structures for quake affected areas, arrives at the ActionAid office and we head out in search of food. Farhan is somehow younger, more youthful, and generously padded than I expected from his emails. He is dressed in a fitted suit that gives him the appearance of a Wall Street go getter. He fires up a remixed hip-hop CD in his Honda luxury sedan. I feel slightly goofy in my mock-Muslim garb in the suddenly very secular milieu.

"What kind of food are you in the mood for?" he asks.

"Actually this could get interesting. I'm vegan, so I don't eat any animal products at all." My confession amuses Farhan who eyes me skeptically.

"How are you going to survive in Pakistan...and the mountains!"

"It's an open question."

We drive to Pizza Hut in the waning light of an early winter's eve. Islamabad is an unimaginatively planned city a la Chandigargh with Battleship-labeled sectors like F-4 and G-15 and markets vaguely reminiscent of bland American strip malls. Pepsico has done nothing to make its pizza franchise culturally relevant and it once inside there is no discerning one is not in Kansas anymore. Farhan is intrigued by my cheese-less pizza order, but is too busy entertaining his two cell phones to try any. "I tell you Mark. I don't get a moment's peace anymore. I've been neglecting my work to collect relief goods and now everything is just snowballing. I have over two-hundred unanswered emails waiting." Farhan, who I come to learn was raised in Dubai and London, is having a hard time adjusting to the slower pace of life in Pakistan. He sells UK property for a land trust based in London and just recently set up an office in Islamabad. The earthquake awakened a part of him that he didn't know existed.

"I was just watching television after the quake and knew I had to get up in the mountains," Farhan explains, " I haven't done anything adventurous in my entire life, but when I saw how bad things were in the villages something just clicked and my apprehension was gone. A couple days later I was on a deteriorating bridge with only three wheels of the car making contact and just laughing about it. We had delivered our first load of blankets and that's all I cared about. When I think about it now I realize how close we were to falling off the bridge. We certainly would have died. My friend wanted to get out and help direct me to keep the tires on the rails, but I told him to get back in the car because if we were going to die it would be together." Farhan is laughing and I am grinning. He takes a couple of calls before continuing his narrative.

"You know I have just been working 20 hours a day ever since the earthquake happened almost a month ago. But somehow I never get tired. Every truckload of supplies that I manage to send up makes me want to send two more. The look on the faces of the villagers makes everything worthwhile. Now I'm getting in trouble with my business associates for using our office space to store the collected goods – you'll see what I mean later. I'm kind of out of control. At some point I have to turn my attention back to work, but it's hard. Sorry, just one minute." Farhan takes another call and two words in his second phone rings. He rolls his eyes and asks the first caller to hold while he answers the other phone. At one point in his three-way conversation he marries the two phones together at 180 degrees so the callers can shout at one another in primitive hi-tech fashion.

The calls are in regard to three trucks which have arrived from Karachi loaded with donated goods shipped from Dubai. They have nowhere to park within city limits of Islamabad and the drivers are anxious to head back south. Meanwhile three businessmen have arrived from Lahore and are raring to have their share of the goods transferred to their trucks and head into the mountains. To straighten matters out we head to Farhan's office, which is in a well-guarded compound at the end of an affluent suburban street. The office itself resembles a well-appointed bungalow – enough so that Farhan shifted his living quarters here after the earthquake left a large crack in the ceiling of his six-story flat. He misses his jacuzzi and sauna, but is otherwise satisfied with his new digs. When the gate opens I spot a mountain of blankets, tents, and clothing in a deep well running the length of the house. "My business partners are giving me a lot of grief for taking over the office space, but I'm the big cheese in our Pakistan office so they can't do anything about it. Now they too have been catching volunteer fever and nobody is sleeping at all which explains the bloodshot eyes." Farhan remains remarkably good humored in light of his stressful environs.

Shortly after we arrive the three businessmen from Lahore are welcomed into the reception/living room. They are all former mountain-dwelling Afghans and to a man they are super-sized with fingers seemingly as big around as my wrists. The densely bearded trio, dressed in tent-like, earth-toned kurtas, are introduced as Mujahadeen by the ever-bemused Farhan. In Pakistan, like Afghanistan, the kurtas have rounded edges and worn loose, unlike the straight cut Indian variety. I feel uncomfortably effeminate in my smallish and slightly sheer Indian pajama. The mountain men look me over as if sizing me up for a game of buzkashi with me serving as the goat's carcass. They relax somewhat when Farhan gives them the skinny on my intention to volunteer in the earth quaked zone. After tea the three giants stuff themselves into the back of Farhan's sedan and we drive outside the city to where the relief-laden trucks are queued impatiently by the side of the road. We hold a pow-wow in the pitch black and the passing traffic brushes uncomfortably close to our position, drawing up towers of dust haphazardly painted by misaligned headlights. The drivers are talked into waiting until midnight to enter the city when they will be able to find parking to unload.

Farhan has finally developed an appetite and suggests we secure a late dinner. The restaurant he chooses is close to Pizza Hut geographically, but a world apart in ambience. The walls are adorned with scenes of Afghan rural life and ruins, including a depiction of the larger-than-life Buddhas that were subsequently shelled into oblivion by the Taliban. Many of the paintings resemble the imagined worlds of pulp sci-fi novels in their strangeness. The entire menu from A to Z is meat-centric. Farhan explains my dietary regimen to the bewildered Afghans who special order a soup and salad for me. In the meantime a plate stacked high with meat kebabs arrives. There is no possible way they will ingest the meaty mountain I muse, but am proved wrong in the trivial span of fifteen minutes. My soup arrives and immediately starts my veggie-sense tingling. Suspicious that something is amiss with the brownish swill, I cautiously submerge my spoon and strike a solid form. I move the mysterious mass up along the slope of the bowl and discover it to be a hunk of meat fashioned into a sphere. Farhan chuckles and suggests I just eat around the offensive matter. Meat eaters will never understand that food once touched by meat is forever tainted by association. Next the salad arrives. It appears to be nothing more than a generous bowl of smallish, pink and purple onions. I am about to plop one into my mouth when something at the bottom of the bowl catches my eye. I shift the onions to reveal a meat core! I resign myself to going without a second dinner. I can feel my apprehension rising with regards to securing sufficient calories in the mountains.

"Just wait till he gets to the Musaffarabad!" Farhan cackles with delight to the Afghans who still aren't quite sure what to make of the reluctant diner. Four plates of sizable bird carcass are served and once more I am inclined to think this will be the foursome's gastronomic comeuppance until one after another they are licking the meatless bones that once served as fleshy superstructure. Resonant belches are offered up liberally to the consternation of none. Next comes strips of dark meat which I take to be beef and they are swallowed up like displaced tongues leaving me in mute awe. Finally sated Farhan turns his attention back to his neglected cell phones which have been vibrating for his attention. They are bearers of bad news.

One of the trucks has scratched a doctor's Merc while making a turn and the indignant victim has taken all of three of the truck drivers' licenses and is refusing to return them. Without their licenses the drivers are unwilling to proceed into the city where the transfer of goods can take place.

We return to Farhan's office to work on a solution. One by one Farhan and his coterie phone the agitated physician and try to talk him into relinquishing the documentation.

"Sir, the vast majority of the cargo is medicines to replenish the depleted stores at the hospitals and camps in the mountains. Surely as a doctor..."

"Yabbitty, yap, yap."

"Yes, yes I understand. It's unfortunate, but a bigger tragedy..."

"Yabbitty, yap, yap."

"Yes. No. I understand, but please consider for a moment..."

"Yabbitty, yap, yap."

Farhan's friend from London, Ali, is the last to try his luck. Whereas the Afghans are built like mountains Ali is built like a tree and towers a good four inches above everybody else. He dresses in a curious commingling of East of West – loose sweat pants and a Harley-Davidson t-shirt are worn with a traditional Pathan cap and jacket. To continue working with Farhan, Ali moved with his family to Islamabad two years ago and they have finally adapted to life in the Islamic state after a bit of a rough patch. Now he, like his boss, has contracted the volunteer bug.

"Doctor, I am very sorry to disturb you sir at this late hour, but I would like to make you an offer..."

"Yabbitty, yap, yap."

"Right. That's why I am calling. I am willing to pay out of pocket whatever amount you think is necessary to cover the damages to your vehicle."

"Yabbitty, yap, yap."

"I completely trust you. You can estimate on the high side and then refund the difference if you choose."

"Yabbitty, yap, yap."

"What is the real issue then? Sir, there are people suffering tonight up in the mountains that will really benefit from..."

"Yabbitty, yap, yap. Click. Buzzzz."

"I can't believe it. The bloody chap's hung up on me." Thereafter the doctor switches off his phone and everyone present is at a loss as to how to proceed. Farhan remains good-natured about the situation and he reverts to what any South Asian worth his namak would do in a similar situation – he has a round of tea served up for all.

"Oh yeah, Mark can't have any," Farhan remembers with unbridled mirth.

"I can have black tea. Just not any with milk," I offer, more interested in setting the record straight than in actually having anything to drink.

"Oh, that's right," Farhan says slightly crestfallen. The dainty tea cups look ridiculously small in the giant paws of the Ali and the Afghans. The trio inquires into Farhan's land development business and he goes into salesman mode at 1:32 am, but you can tell his heart is not really into it. He excuses himself to his office/bedroom and returns in blue jeans and t-shirt with a corduroy jacket. Even in somnolent repose he remains appropriately attired for a GQ shoot. Over the next minutes Farhan's body sinks ever lower into his easy chair in what appears to be a precursor to sleep, yet his eyes remain wide open and scan an unseen thought-scape. In time he begins the demented snickering of the severely sleep-deprived.

"What is it?" Ali asks.

"There's only one man that can see us out of this mess," Farhan teases.

"Who?"

"You know who."

"Who?"

"You know who."

"I'm too tired to figure it out," Ali complains.

"You know who," Farhan persists. Ali scrunches his face in puzzlement before a slow smile straightens his features.

"Oh no, not the Brigadier," he says.

"He said to call him up if we ever needed help," Farhan points out.

"We do need help... But it's so late, early, or whatever."

"Should we call him? He's such a character. He just might be able to make the doctor come around by using his connections."

"The Brigadier, the Brigadier... he's larger than life," Ali muses slumberously.

"Should I call him?" Farhan smiles. "I'll do it if somebody tells me to."

"Go for it," I say, "Call in the heavy artillery."

Lost in Transit Elation

On the eve of my trip to Pakistan I debate over what to pack and wonder what conditions I will find in the mountains. Paramahansa Yoganada-ji's poem Divya Banjara suddenly springs forth from the recesses of my memory and tunes out the mind's anxious static. Trepidation is replaced by quiet anticipation of the adventure that awaits. "Let's go," encapsulated by a whisper and a prayer.

I will be a gypsy,
Roam, roam, and roam!
I'll sing a song that none has sung.
I'll sing to the sky;
I'll sing to the wind,
I'll sing to my red cloud.
I'll roam, roam, and roam.

The exact wording of the remainder escapes me. It is something to the effect of proceeding to stranger, yet stranger lands, yet always being the king of your portable domain.

I break my Sunday fast sharing dinner with Mama and Papa in their bedroom/kitchen/living room. My contribution is asparagus brought from the very Americanized Khan market. The strange vegetable generates much discussion as to how it should be prepared, how it is grown, how it should be addressed and so forth. In the end Mama opts to fry it in the pan with some potatoes and eggplant and all agree it is delicious.

The following morning features a brief calm before a flurry of activity. At Mama's insistence I share with her the minimal secrets to my morning sits on the veranda. In exchange I make her climb the stairs to top level. In the weeks I have spent at the guest house this marks the first time Mama has left the second story of the compound. She makes labored squeaking sounds as we ascend, like air being forced out of a leaky bellows. "Mama's health not good," she huffs, "but I do everything I need in this life." She takes a two minute break on the landing half way up. Mama manages to sit for five of the ten prescribed minutes and then sits her way back down the stairs one at a time. When I join her in the courtyard she insists that she sat for the full ten minutes. I negotiate with Mama on a storage fee for the tens of thousands of Pakistani friendship letters, then head to the market to procure winter clothes and fire off last minute emails. Lastly I find a shipper for the over-sized portrait of Jesus in a meditative pose that I had commissioned by a local artist. I balance the piece precariously on the back of a bicycle rickshaw completely hidden from the view of those in front. As we pass, people turn back to see the life-size Christ in blissful serenity in the maddening crowd. The slightest breeze threatens to send the sail-like painting soaring into the heavens and I have my hands full keeping it earthbound.

My bags packed, I sit for lunch in the American Diner at the India Habitat Center in Delhi and order the usual: chili bean soy burger, side of sauteed mushrooms and a Hawaiian Sunset. I select California Dreamin' on the juke box and then idly peruse the Times of India while I wait for my order. The juke box clicks, whirs, clicks some more before Que Sera, Sera begins playing. What happened to California Dreamin'? Whatever (will be, will be). The Times prominently features two stories linking Pakistan to terrorist acts – the ISI's hand in the 1993 bombings purportedly divulged by recently extradited Abu Salim, and the alleged involvement of at least two Pakistani nationals in the recent Delhi bomb blasts. Page two publishes claims by Pakistan's human rights organization, Ansar Burney Welfare Trust, that the children orphaned by the earthquake are being recruited into terrorist camps. The melodramatic Where Have All the Children Gone follows Que Sera on the jukebox. Clearly the Universe is enjoying herself.

I haggle for a rickshaw and then am off for the Indira Gandhi International Airport. The rickshawala sings snippets from film songs and is sufficiently shocked when I chime in that we almost collide with the neighboring truck. We motor past street kids selling tabloid papers at a polluted intersection, a bare-bottomed child drinking from a filthy water bottle, smartly uniformed school kids at the bus stand, cows exchanging tongue baths, horses being walked at the polo grounds, and a Fellini-esque, giant-sized, inflatable Spiderman bounding around the lot of a petrol station. As we roll up to the airport I invite the driver to accompany me to Pakistan. "Very hard for Indian go," he says, "My everything here."

At the airport I encounter the all-too-familiar Indian bureaucrat that revels in his governmental-given power to make one wait without explanation or eye contact. "Excuse me, excuse me? Hello? My flight leaves in forty minutes would it be possible... Hello?" Nothing. As I look around at similarly frustrated travelers I consider that at the very least this breed is impartial in their non-application of timely assistance. The months spent in Indian queues (or more accurately 'scrums') have trained me to use the time for standing meditation rather than give in to the indignation of endless waiting. A half hour elapses before I am cleared to leave.

Once inside the departure area of the terminal I discover that my PIA boarding pass provides no gate number. An expansive painting of a flock of birds flying into a fiery cavern is evidently hung to keep people ever mindful of the dangers of flying. A trio of loudly laughing Germans passes by and I overhear their destination as Lahore and fall in behind them. The female of the trio is clad in what might pass as club wear in Europe. As we pass through what is the fourth security check since entering the terminal, her male companions loudly tease her when she raises her arms behind the screened partition where female passengers are frisked. To their delight she does a mock shimmy. The security staff do not look amused. Both men are rather burly, but one in particular sports a vast shoulder spread that makes me self-conscious of my India-withered frame. "You aren't so tough," I think to myself, "You're just the type that give Westerners a bad name." We proceed to yet another queue for yet another security check. Women to the left, men to the right. The German woman keeps up her banter with her companions while aggressively attacking a Subway sandwich. She leaves her place in line to shove the sandwich in the mouth of the broad-shouldered man while the other guffaws. "C'mon, you guys. Tone down your road show," I think derisively. It is then I note that the large man's arms have an odd angle at the shoulders. Closer inspection of his hands reveals that they are frozen in a neutral position and unnaturally smooth. It finally dawns on me that he has no arms, or rather he has two prosthetic arms. I sheepishly cease my internal critique of their behavior and am inspired to reflect on how imperfect impressions are. I peer out of a poorly caulked port hole at the orange orb of the setting sun. My last sight of India is of a woman on the tarmac stooped over and shoveling asphalt into piles. She appears to be ten-months pregnant (or maybe she is just bowling-ball fat).

The plane trip begins with a prayer in Arabic and then a stewardess comes on the PA system and announces that the flight to Lahore will last fifty minutes, God willing. Once airborne a man in his late twenties, looking for all the world like Eric's fictional fourth brother, overhears my vague plans to help with earthquake relief and introduces himself as Ed, project designer for ActionAid. "What kind of work are you looking to do?" he asks.

"Anything hands on. I heard cholera is becoming a real problem, so maybe just digging pits for latrines."

"I thought you would say that," Ed says grinning and slowly nodding his head. Evidently I look like a poop pit digger. The food tray comes by with a choice between crustless bread and croissant sandwiches. "Which one is vegetarian?" I ask the harried older man serving as a steward. Immediately several passengers within earshot of my inquiry laugh caustically.

"You are going to have a hard time in Pakistan," one offers.

"You are going to be very hungry," another pipes in.

"Actually I'm vegan."

"Then you are going to starve to death," the second commentator says amending his original prognosis. The steward shakes his head defiantly.

"There is no vegetable sandwich. Only meat." I opt for some orange juice and gnaw anxiously on the emergency procedures card. Ed leans across the aisle and gives me his bio. He has just come from one week of sun and fun on the 'hard to leave, really' beaches of Kerala and before that 'one of the most awful places on the planet' Kabul where his headquarters are. Ever since he turned eighteen he has been working non-stop in the non-profit world. After ten years he is starting to burn out.

"There's no money in it, really," Ed explains, "You get some nice satisfaction from the work, but just as often disappointment. To be honest, really, the only reason any of us Westerners do this stuff is for the adventure." Currently he has been given one week to design a earthquake relief project on which to spend 3.5 million dollars. I tell Ed that I would love to load or unload relief goods or help drive trucks into the affected regions. "This is exactly what we need," he says grinning once more. "I, myself, don't get the chance to go into the field anymore. I'm fly here and there, but I'm always stuck behind a desk now-a-days. I just got married last year, so I am looking to settle down and just lead a boring life, really."

In the Lahore terminal a lean, red-headed girl that towers a good two-inches over me introduces herself as Molly and says she overheard my conversation with Ed. "That's so cool that you're going to do relief work. What got you interested?" I start to fill her in on my stint in Ahmedabad, but she cuts me short. "I was there just a few weeks ago," she says, "Were you with any group? Do you know Manav Sadhna?"

"Yes. Jayeshbhai is amazing. How do you know about Manav Sadhna?"

"My friend Sonal..."

"Sonal Shah?"

"You know IndiCorps?"

"You know IndiCorps?"

It is a strange case of two people having occupied the same orbital space, but only coming into contact once the connective bond had been broken. It adds to my growing sense that I am but a player in an drama being scripted piecemeal. The author (or authors) of the play seem to come up with theatrical devices, tire of them and introduce new characters with the restlessness of someone wanting to fast forward to the climax. Both Molly and Ed are booked for Islamabad on the same flight as mine.

I visit the restroom to change into my Super-Ordinary Muslim Man costume of plain white pajama kurta. I have no idea what to expect in Islamabad and want to draw as little attention as possible. When I emerge from the stall the washroom attendants look at me like I have a screw loose. I take a look in the mirror and think I've done not too badly and decide to dismiss their stares as fashion envy. Back in the waiting area Molly studies my wardrobe change from head to toe before commenting, "Oh, you've put on your costume." Her tone is the same as one might adopt when humoring a senile relative.

Molly loans me her guidebook to look for hotel possibilities after explaining everything in Islamabad is booked due to a spate of international conferences. The Lonely Planet Guide to Pakistan plainly instructs vegetarian travelers that knife-wielding fundamentalists are the least of their worries and that they should leave the country for greener pastures ASAP. It gives no advice to vegan wayfarers presumably because their unqualified demise is so completely self-evident. A photo spread in the middle of the guide book features mountain scenery that triggers memories of an old and repetitive dream of mine where I am shown a vast, towering range of mountains and overcome by the desire to travel to them. Could these be rocky giants of my vision?

After writing down the numbers of some Budget Hotels I turn my attention to the newspapers folded in the pouch in front of me. While all major Indian dailies have long since superseded USA Today in the use of saturated colors and bold graphics, Pakistan's Nation and News both have the appearance of dated high school publications. There are no stories relating to the bomb blast discoveries made in India. An editorial pooh-poohs India's earlier claims of the probable involvement of rebellious Kashmiris in the attacks. "Our beloved jihadis risk their lives daily in striking at military targets and would never stoop to a cheap attack on civilians with bombs. It is most likely the Indian government that has coordinated the bomb blasts in an effort to discredit our struggle." Elsewhere an article addresses ideas on how to overcome the so-called 'trust deficit' with India. It is amazing to me that India uses the exact same language in reference to Pakistan. Apparently the trust deficit exists in both directions across the border. A special section in the newspaper details the myriad problems facing the residents in the earthquake affected region. I am champing at the bit to get into the mountains.

In Islamabad I am the last passenger left in the terminal along with an porcelain-skinned elderly woman in elaborate victorian dress. She seems completely out of place and period in the modern environs of an South Asian airport. I am missing a box containing my shoes and trekking poles while she is searching for a microscopic pin that served as a hinge in her hat box. She recruits two airline employees who feign to look around the now empty luggage conveyor for the missing pin. I join in the futile search and catch the gaze of one of the employees who rolls his eyes in frustration. I am called away from the charade to check a large cargo container for my missing box and find it at the bottom of the pile hopelessly distorted out of shape. When I return to the terminal the apparition of the woman has disappeared. In fact, the entire building is empty save for a jackbooted army man who sits listlessly by the door armed with an assault rifle. I step boldly through the sliding doors to where a few taxi drivers are waiting for the next flight to arrive. In spite of my costume and full beard no one deigns to speak to me in Urdu. One driver is antsy to take me immediately to Islamabad, but another in attendance insists there are no rooms available in the city. A man guarding the only phone booth makes some calls on my behalf to Islamabad's sister city, Rawalpindi – and although there are some vacancies all refuse to accommodate a foreigner. "Much problem for hotel to have foreigner stay," explains the phone operator. I begin to steel myself to the possibility of a cold night spent on the street.

I decide to enlist the original taxi driver and take my chances in Rawalpindi. From the airport we drive through neighborhoods that improbably bring to mind a nameless industrialized area somewhere in southern Illinois. Definitely not what I was expecting. Only occasional trucks of fantastical multi-colored decoration remind me I am sitting at some 170 odd degrees topsy-turvy with respect to the the States. Several futile stops are made before I find a featureless hotel on the main road. The proprietor reluctantly takes me in after I strike a properly portentous stance. "Call the police. Call the army," I dare him, "I am friends with the Captain and the General."

That night in my room I am too giddy with my new environs to sleep. After watching some pro wrestling on the static filled television (the first idiot box watched in many months) I pop a randomly selected bootleg DVD from Delhi into my laptop. The bootleg was produced by someone who videotaped the movie in the theatre and hence the screen is periodically obscured by patrons returning from the snack bar or headed to the restroom. English subtitles were added to the already English movie and are unintentionally comical in their inaccuracy. Interestingly, however, they provide insight into how an English-speaking South Asian might easily misinterpret an American's English. The transcriber, clearly not expecting to encounter anything of local relevance in the movie, mishears the very South Asian appellation Sameer (an Indian or Pakistani convenience store operator in the Boston based movie) as 'so we' on one occasion and 'the man here' on another. The italicized matter is taken verbatim from the subtitles.

Four Brothers

Oh okay, Darnelle. So the candy just happened to jump into your pocket?

Oh, okay, there are now, so the candy is just happened into your pocket, huh?

Sameer is going to call the police right now.

So we gonna call the police right now.

Is that the way you want to lead your life, huh?

Is there where you want to live in your life. huh?

I happen to believe that you're worth more. But you have got to believe it Darnelle.

I happened to believe that if you work more... Well, you're the police in turn now.

Are you bullshitting me?

Are you bullshit with me?

Now you tell Sameer.

Now you tell the man here.

So let's take a look at these Thanksgiving birds.

So, lets take a look at this thanksgiving birth.

Must have gotten off for good behavior.

He is good enough for good behavior.

Not likely.

Not like that.

I love you, man.

I love your hair.

Another model citizen, I'm sure.

Another mother suicide I'm sure.

I thought you said there were four?

The one just sitting in the floor?

Angel? Pretty boy. Ex-hustler...soldier. I guess he's a no show today.

Angel? Pretty bored. Ex-sailor, soldier, I guess he is not sure, I think.

In thirty years she only came across four lost causes.

I mean, 30 years, she only come across 4 lost of course.

Trust me, Fallow. These kids are congressmen compared to what they would have been.

Trust me, fellow, his kids are concluded compare to what they would.

But, I thought the mother was a saint.

But, I thought the mothers sick.

Air Force Ones

At 7:00 the children start to trickle in the courtyard at the Air Force School just off of Lodi Road in Delhi. Dark-blue pants for the boys, skirts for the girls and azure-colored button-up shirts for all. Organic clusters of two to twenty form, fall apart and reform. From my vantage point on a neighboring roof it has the appearance of delicately flagellating pond life under the microscope. An imposing ten foot wall forms the front of the stage and is breached in four places by stairs leading up to the school or down to the courtyard depending on which way one is headed. Just before 7:30 the headmaster, dressed in freshly-pressed khaki pants and starched white oxford with blood-red tie, approaches the microphone for a sound check. "Yes? Yes? Okay? Yes? Hello? Hello?" Levels are adjusted until his voice is suitably imposing and then he starts barking orders. "Form up! Get into your lines! Hurry up, there! Hurry up! Into your lines! Hurry up!" The blue globules of students get drawn into wavy strings before tightening with parallel precision. A group of thirty uniformed girls take up position behind the headmaster who moves to the threshold of the stage to inspect his charges. This neatly arrayed chorus leads the other students in a patriotic number before the headmaster ominously retakes his position at the microphone.

"One of your classmates was feeling very smart and decided to violate school policy. He will not be joining you today. He will not be coming to classes tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, or next week. Those of you are feeling his fun was commendable will be advised that he has been expelled forever from the school. I want all of you to think about that long and hard. Your actions reflect on the good name of the school and we will allow our reputation to be tarnished by the foolish acts of a few. I want all of you to think about that today."

A synthesizer is brought onto the stage and set to straddle two impressive loud speakers. A senior male student approaches the keyboard with the solemn comportment of a concert pianist. I am expecting to hear another patriotic tune, but am flabbergasted to recognize the opening strains of the Final Countdown. Midway through the song the musician punches a button to activate a pulsating percussive accompaniment. He plays the song in its entirety with the passion of a robot while his classmates must remain frozen in formation. The comic effect is nonpareil.

After the song is complete the students are channeled into four lines of equal length and fed into the staircases leading to the school. The headmaster continues to harangue the rank and file with punctuated severity. "Stay in your assigned order. Keep your lines. Keep your lines! Heads up! You keep in mind what happens to rule breakers. Single file! Eyes forward!" In the gaps between his commands the clip-clop of thick-heeled shoes echo throughout the courtyard.

No more than five minutes elapses before a mop-topped man attired from head to toe in bleached-white prep wear sashays onto center stage with a portable cassette deck in hand. As he endeavors to connect his stereo to the amplifiers a trickle, then stream of pre-teens refill the courtyard, shepherded by three sari-clad staffers. Bright-white shorts for the boys, bright-white pleated skirts for the girls and black belts and white polo shirts for all. The children are redistributed between columns until all are of equal length and perfectly spaced at arm's length. Three consecutive lines are anchored by identically obese Sikh boys in blue turbans. Shorts pulled high over the waistline, they bear the telltale hallmark of the worldwide fraternity of nerds. Two girls ascend the steps to the stage and take up positions to either side of the instructor. I am prepared to watch a regimented drill in physical education befitting of a hard-nosed military school.

With Broadway-like flair, the instructor whirls away from his cassette deck to face the students and flicks his collar up a la Richard Simmons. The tape begins with an infectious maraca setting the rhythm to light raps on the snare drum. The beat is immediately familiar, but I am unable to place it. The instructor stands with one arm akimbo and the other raised skyward to snap out the beat as he bounces on the toes of his shoes. When the taped vocals start all present launch into choreographed routine. Simultaneously some three hundred students jump, twist, turn and gyrate to The Ketchup Song by Las Ketchup.

(To come anywhere close to appreciating the remainder of this narrative as much as I did in watching it unfold, you are encouraged to download The Ketchup Song mp3 from Limewire or a similar peer-to-peer file sharing system.)

Friday night it's party time
Feeling ready looking fine,
Viene diego rumbeando,
With the magic in his eyes
Checking every girl in sight,
Grooving like he does the mambo

The Sikh boys perform their steps one to two beats behind the rest of the group. They watch those in front and ape their moves with sluggish imprecision. As the body copies one body posture the eyes and brain are already registering another and the result is stumbling mayhem. The instructor himself executes the moves with a precious banality that is completely devoid of soul.

He's the man alli en la disco,
Playing sexy felling hotter,
He's the king bailando et ritmo ragatanga,
And the dj that he knows well,
On the spot always around twelve,
Plays the mix that diego mezcla con la salsa,
Y la baila and he dances y la canta

In stark contrast a comely girl in the second row is singular in her movements. How is it that one in three hundred identically dressed children can stand out like a turtledove among house pigeons? Most of us emerge from the womb kicking and flailing with bodies slightly tight around the hips or pinching at the shoulders. Others are fairly comfortable in their skin and may go on to excel in athletics or live to be one hundred three. But it is only one in three hundred thousand whose clay is cast so perfectly that her movements manifest something of the heavens in corporeality.

Asereje ja de je de jebe tu de jebere seibiunouva,
Majavi an de bugui an de buididipi,
Asereje ja de je de jebe tu de jebere seibiunouva,
Majavi an de bugui an de buididipi

I cast my gaze hither and thither among the students, but it is drawn back to the dancing prodigy time and time again. She has taken the ridiculous, vaguely calisthenic movements of the routine and woven them into effortless grace and seamless beauty. There are none of the slight hesitations that would betray self-consciousness – she has crossed the line where the dancer becomes the Dance. She dances for no one, but for the pleasure of the Universe herself.

Many think its brujeria,
How he comes and disappears,
Every move will hypnotize you,
Some will call it chuleria,
Others say that its the real,
Rastafari afrogitano

I am twelve again and hopelessly infatuated with the vision of physical perfection that is the eleven-year old boogie queen. She was born to dance and is as free as a bird on the wing.

Asereje ja de je de jebe tu de jebere seibiunouva,
Majavi an de bugui an de buididipi,
Asereje ja de je de jebe tu de jebere seibiunouva,
Majavi an de bugui an de buididipi

Dream of the Net Head Ball Bouncer

John and I stare out from the departure rampway at the mushrooming super cloud that dominates the Southern sky. Its location makes it appear that Ahmedabad has been bombed into oblivion – a draconian governmental program to give the newly proclaimed mega-city a fresh start.

Mere sketches of the robustly thin duo that arrived in Mumbai seven months prior, John and I fantasize about the varied vegan cuisine available in the States. John fixates on the chai with soy milk that he prepares with clockwork regularity back in the Bay Area. He is an tea-drinking aficionado and replays the steps in preparing the perfect cup with the exacting detail of a true addict. My mind has set another repast: a steaming Smart Dog topped with Veganrella cheese, relish and thick spaghetti sauce on a toasted bagel. A pint of Chocolate Cookie Crunch Tofutti awaits in the freezer of my fantasy.

For weeks now I have been battling with diarrhea, odd bouts of flu, and a lack of appetite for any of the Gujarati foodstuffs. The mere mention of double-thick roti makes my stomach turn. If I stand just right in the sunlight my bellybutton can be seen from the backside. Acquaintences don't hesitate to tell me how really bad I am looking, man. "You're looking really bad, man. What happened?" What can I say? India happened. John, too, has now fallen victim to the "skinnies" and sports a similarly prominent backbone ridge sans shirt. Withered wisps of once well-padded Westerners are we.

John and I talk about rekindling the dreamlike quality that makes India so enchanting. Returning to Delhi for meetings with prominent people seems about as exciting as going to a large city for meetings with prominent people. The letters to Pakistan project seems sufficiently significant to bear the banality of the pending powwows, but our bodies are hell-bent on an alimentary succour that is not forthcoming. We stand outside the terminal in a sluggish, semi-daze after learning our Delhi flight was for 3:30 AM and not 3:30 PM. We will have to return to Ahmedabad for the night.

A pair of men approach our position and I overhear the bigger of the two say, "Gujarati?" to his friend as he looks at John. The comment is totally improbable, so I take it as a harbinger of the dream returning to potency and motion them over. We stand on opposite sides of the rampway railing. I point to John.

"Ek dam Gujarati," I claim, "From Surat. Family of diamond merchants." The men look at John with amazement.

"Gujarati," John confirms, pointing to himself. The larger of the pair asks John some questions in Gujarati and John nods enthusiastically, but is unable to respond to the man's satisfaction. We steer the conversation to English and the men introduce themselves as Amit and Ashok. We learn Amit has a brother in Chicago in the computer software business. I've been claiming to be "from near Chicago" for the past six months – an exaggeration precipitated only by the familiarity of the city to Gujaratis. Many of them hear it as "New Chicago" and marvel at their lack of knowledge of such a place. Awkwardness follows when the stranger is too familiar with the Windy City and inquires where exactly I live. I am forced to explain, somewhat dubiously, that I am some 250 miles down the road, but America is quite big so it still counts for near. John excuses himself to go to the bathroom and I seize upon his absense to coach the more fluent of the two, Amit, in a dream role.

"Actually, John's from America, but his wife is Punjabi," I explain, "I've got an idea, but I need your help. When John comes back look at him for a long time while slowly stroking your chin." Amit readily agrees almost too readily and mimics my motion. "No, not now. Wait for John to return and then do it. Then point to his eyes and say you can tell from them that there is something interesting about his wife. Yes, something unusual. She is not from the Americas or even Europe. No, you sense she is from somewhere else. Ask to look directly into his eyes and pretend to concentrate." The man is smiling broadly now and seems to get where I am going with the set up. "Then say she herself is from somewhere not too distant. Not Ahmedabad. Somewhere further. Yes, somewhere to the north. Say you are getting an image of turbans and beards and are hearing music. Yes, bhangra. Is she Punjabi?" Amit laughs and rubs his hands together like a cartoon villain in anticipation. "Take your time, but you absolutely have to do it," I tell him, "It will be a treat for John. He'll love it."

"Yes, yes," Amit cackles with giddy mirth.

"Her name is Loveleen, so also say something about her name being filled with great heart."

"Lovely," says Amit.

"No, Loveleen. But, yes it is lovely."

Almost on cue John emerges for the airport terminal and rejoins us. Amit loudly proclaims, "You don't look like your from Punjab!" I am dumbfounded. John looks confused, but doesn't seem to have registered that I have had a hand in this odd observation. "Where is your wife from?" Amit practically shouts. My dream-weaving fun is being destroyed with hard-to-comprehend zeal. I move slightly behind John and frantically motion to Amit to go slow, hoping there may be some chance to salvage the charade. I point to John's eyes and stroke my chin hoping to remind Amit of the fortune telling routine, but he only stares at me dumbly. I decide instead to distract John before he can answer Amit's question and buy some time.

"This guy is absolutely amazing," I lie, "He can just stare into your eyes and intuit your deepest secrets. When you were in the terminal he told me that I was single, but that you must be married and he said that he could even determine where your wife is from just from looking at your eyes. He totally confirms that the dream is still alive and well here."

John looks impressed. "Really?" he says with wonder, before turning back to Amit who is looking completely lost.

"Look into his eyes," I tell Amit, "Can you tell us anything about John's wife?" He briefly glances at John then back to me and shrugs his shoulders. "Re - mem - ber? You know something about John's wife, right?" Amit shakes his head no.

"You are married?" Amit asks John. I grab my hair and pull skyward.

"Yes, he's married! Can you tell us where...his...wife...is...from? Is she also from America?" Amit stares at me as if I am speaking Greek. "Maybe she is from Europe? From Greece?"

"Your wife is from Greece?" he asks John. At this point John looks just as befuddled as Amit. I've lost all hope of pulling the scam off.

"I spent the whole time you were in the terminal coaching him on how to read you mind," I explain to John. Amit looks on, now smiling, and vigorously confirms my confession by nodding his head. I turn to him. "What happened to you?" I say, "I thought we had it all worked out, but you didn't say anything about his wife! You acted like you didn't know anything."

Amit gives me a look like he has landed on Pluto without his headgear. Then slowly a grin forms and he snaps his fingers smartly, "I get it! It's a joke! But my English is not good." I heave a sigh of one utterly defeated, before we all share in a good laugh.

A rusted bucket of a rickshaw rolls by with a completely incongruous neon-green cable running from the meter to the axle. Maybe the dream is coming back. I point the discrepancy out to John and he ends up noticing the IndiCorps vehicle just beyond the rickshaw in the parking lot. It isn't lost on me that the same vehicle picked us up at the beginning of our fantastical odyssey in Ahmedabad. It stands either as the perfect midway bookmark of our trip or a taunting symbol of how little we have really accomplished – it's as if seven months have elapsed and the car is still there waiting to take us into the city. We haul our luggage over to the IndiCorps Sumo and look expectantly back to the terminal for Anand to appear. We figure he must have come to drop off or pick up one of the IndiCorps fellows. Minutes pass, but no Anand.

Two boys selling net-wrapped balloon balls approach to hawk their wares. John takes pity on one and selects a red ball. I encourage him to discard the ball and keep only the flimsy net-bag that it came in. He tosses the ball aside and hands the net to me which I put over my head. The perverse humor is lost on the boys who run to reclaim the ball. Two girls selling the same balloon-ball novelties have seen the transaction take place and run over in the hopes of unloading more of the toys (or the nets that hold them). Instead, I snatch the ball from the boys and set up an impromptu game of volleyball in an effort to distract their minds from work. The ruse is successful and the fun transmutes into a soccer game with the girls on my side and boys on John's. Yet another vendor girl catches sight of our frolic in the parking lot and works her way into the game which has now turned into a hoop-less variation on basketball. The play is vigorous and a child will periodically be sent sprawling onto the concrete, but no matter. Dust yourself off, dab up the blood, and jump back in. My incessantly diarrhea-racked body, which has been bed bound for the past couple weeks, is in no shape to be moving at all, but somehow the sheer enthusiasm of the children keeps it animated. My heart is racing like in the movies just before the slow-motion sequence where the protagonist crumples to the ground clutching his chest.

Families form tea-time circles at various locations of the parking lot and look on approvingly at our break-neck antics. I ask our playmates if they would like to take a meal break (I want to die on a full stomach). The idea is received enthusiastically by all and we make a move for the airport employee's canteen some hundred meters to the side of the terminal. Midway our progress is halted by a security guard who indicates the children cannot pass. I am indignant. "This is my family. She is my little sister, these two are my little brothers and these two are also sisters. We're hungry and we're going to have dinner together." The guard is sufficiently flummoxed that we are able to proceed without further incident. At the door to the canteen the eldest of the girls suddenly gets cold feet about entering, and, in spite of my exhortations, she opts to return to the parking lot with the poles of balloon balls instead. The restaurant is a dirty single room with one corner forming the kitchen and counter. The employees help John and I move a marry tables together and arrange plastic chairs to accommodate our dinner party. Two scruffy boys appear from nowhere and take places at the table. My initial reaction is to exclude them from our dinner party, but ultimately I decide this has to be an open door affair. I insist that everyone wash hands and say a brief prayer before snatching up the samosas and fried triangles of unknown content. The canteen staff is unable to contain their curiosity about our gathering.

(In Hindi)

"Where are you from?"

"The USA. America."

"Why are you with these kids?"

"What kids?"

(Laughing) "These kids."

"They aren't kids. They're just family."

"Yes, sir. Very Good!"

"Not sir, just brother."

I inquire about the girl who has stayed back and one of her friends promises to set aside some snacks for her. The greatest kick is to see my adopted siblings in the unusual role of being able to order their preferences. Tomorrow they will bake anew in the airport parking lot and the security guards will hound them with their batons, but tonight we dine together.

Ducktor Quack-a-Doodle-Doo

Ashok is holding his left arm at half mast and looking bemused. He shows me a peanut-shaped lump that has developed in his armpit. "You're are going to die soon, brother," I deadpan. His smile disappears.

"But the doctor said it was just a rash."

"A rash? What doctor said that? You aren't going to die anytime soon, but you have a swollen lymph node which means you probably have some kind of infection. Did you really go to a doctor?"

"You are right," Ashok says nodding gravely, "It wasn't a doctor. It was just a..."

"M.B.B.S."

"Yes, how did you know?"

"No doctor would have told you that it is just a rash. Tomorrow you should go to a real doctor."

"Yes, you are right."

The following evening I come up to Ashok's room to check on him and he is in bed with a large green leaf in the crevice formed by the ailing armpit. An application of red powder is visible along the edges. Ashok pokes at the leaf with his finger and awkwardly tries to get a better look at himself by craning his neck down and forward and squinting one eye.

"So it finally sprouted," I say, startling him from his self-exam.

"Yes. My wife knows some cure from her village," Ashok explains, "It's ayurvedic." Every backwoods Indian cure is casually ascribed to the hoary body of healing knowledge.

"But it will be sad when you have to cut it down, hai na?"

"What, no. Oh, I get it, it's a leaf. Yes, it's funny, I know."

"Seriously, even if the leaf manages to reduce the swelling there is likely an infection in your body somewhere that has caused the lymph node to swell. You still should see a doctor just to be safe."

"Yes, you are right," Ashok says. His signature cliché is repeated with such precision that my ego is seduced into a slight self-satisfactory throb. Playing doctor has never been so easy.

We go down to the street where two medical clinics sit directly opposite one another. Dr. Rajinder Singh on one side and Dr. (Vaid) Baldev Dass on the other. Ashok heads toward Dr. Singh's clinic then at the last second veers to the other. "It is cheaper," he explains patting his pocketed wallet.

"The sign says so, but do you think there is a real doctor here?" I ask Ashok as we enter.

"I don't know. Maybe? We'll see anyway."

"Yes?" a voice inquires from behind a curtain at the back of the deep and narrow office. Long wooden benches flank the anterior of the room and are followed by glass cases brimming with brown-glass bottles and clear plastic containers copious with pills.

Ashok explains his bubbly armpit ailment to the disembodied inquisitor pausing midway to remove his shirt. Finally a fifty-something man, with thinning whitish hair, pokes his head out and glances first at Ashok's armpit and then to me before quickly retracting. I take him to be the clinic's namesake.

"Is there any test you guys can do to determine what's causing..." I start to ask.

"Boils!" (Vaid) interrupts.

"But his lymph nodes..."

(Vaid) pretends not to hear my protest and begins barking orders to a youngish, bespectacled assistant who fishes in a jar for differently colored pills. In spite of the signage I conclude that these be no properly sanctioned men of healing and tell Ashok I will check across the street to see what competing snake oil they have to offer. I whirl around to see two heads disappear behind a partition in the back of the opposing clinic. The offices are so perfectly aligned that one is given the impression of being in a single, impressively long room, broken only by a maddening torrent of interlopers in the midsection. Two shoe boxes with cutouts set in opposition.

After navigating the traffic-congested divide I discover the layout of Dr. Singh's clinic to be identical to the (Vaid)'s. I proceed to the back of the office where I find a distinguished looking older man and a young assistant seated at smallish desks behind the partition. They self-conscientiously occupy themselves with a melange of papers and files. "Are you Doctor Singh?" I ask.

"Yes, yes. But not now. They're looking," he says. I turn back curious to see to whom he is referring and see Ashok paying for his envelope of pills and the pill's dubiously-qualified prescriber leaning out from behind his curtain – peering past Ashok, through the confusion of the street and right to where I stand.

"Is Doctor Dass really a doctor or just a M.B.B.S.," I ask. In truth, I myself don't know the difference between the designations, but had overheard someone speaking derisively about an M.B.B.S. degree sometime earlier.

"He is not even an M.B.B.S. He passed only tenth standard," Dr. Singh avers.

"But the sign says Doctor Dass."

"You can write anything on a sign, isn't it?"

"Yes, but you are a real doctor?"

"Yes."

"Even though your sign says you are a doctor?" My perverse attempt at humor is lost on the doctor (self-professed at least) who is clearly distracted. "My friend has had a impressively swollen lymph node for the past couple of days and was wondering if you could determine the cause." Dr. Singh leans to look beyond me to (Vaid)'s clinic.

"I can have a look tomorrow. Now will not be good. It would look bad." Ashok enters and I turn to him. Over his shoulder I can see (Vaid) peeking at us again with one hand on the curtain. Our eyes meet and he releases his hold on the curtain to return to hiding.

"He can take a look at you tomorrow, but doesn't want to do anything now," I explain to Ashok, "He said the other doctor really isn't a doctor." Ashok smiles grimly and looks to Dr. Singh.

"You can't have a look now?"

"It would look bad. You were just at the other clinic isn't it? Come tomorrow morning before the other clinic is open."

As Ashok and I leave I look more closely at Dr. Singh's sign. Dr. Rajinder Singh M.B.B.S. (Pb) M.A.M.S. (Vienna) P.C.M.S. (Ex). His shingle is rich with acronyms, but his warning about fake claims rings on in my ears. I catch him, one last time, spying across the street at (Vaid)'s clinic and he grimaces slightly when our eyes meet. Obviously I have upset some delicate balance. I turn to look again at (Vaid)'s sign. Dr. (Vaid) Baldev Dass & Son R.M.P. Regd. Medical Practitioner. What (Vaid)'s appellative lacks in acronyms is made up for with the parenthetical 'good' name I muse. A new client stands in his clinic, but (Vaid) is again looking with considerable distress across the street into Dr. Singh's and then to Ashok and me.

The next day I find Ashok reclining shirtless on the third floor veranda. His armpit sports a large piece of cotton affixed with a strip of tape. "What happened," I ask, "Was it a cotton plant?"

"No, the doctor gave me some oil and put this bandage on."

"You mean Doctor Singh from across the street? Oil on the lymph node isn't going to do anything for the infection."

"Yes, it was Doctor Singh."

"He didn't say anything about what kind of infection you might have or give you any antibiotics?"

"No. Just oil in the armpit."

"I don't think he is a real doctor."

"Yes, you are right."

Postscript:
Many months back while still in the States I received a package from One Infinite Way. No other information as to the sender was given. A sucker for mysteries, I breathlessly I tore open the parcel to find a single bootleg DVD, Munna Bhai M.B.B.S., and a business card proclaiming "Smile. You're it!" To this day I have no clue (Nipun) who sent the mysterious parcel. That night, as I lay on my couch, I propped my laptop open on my chest and watched the nearly three hour Bollywood masterpiece in its entirety. I can safely recommend this movie to anyone wanting to idle away an evening and to be initiated into the healing secrets of jaado ki jaaphi.

The Comedy of Airs (In Four Farts)

>>> Environmental Sanitation Institute
>>> Sughad, Gujarat
>>> September 12, 3:45 PM

John gives the IndiCorps fellows our standard disclaimer that we have been battling one or an other sickness for weeks and aren't normally so singularly skeletal in appearance. He then launches into a heartfelt explanation of the connection between spirituality and service. The stark honesty and vulnerability of his presentation creates a reverent silence at its conclusion.

An ascending, rusted-muffler fart rends the quietude. One of the IndiCorps fellows is a compact, nervous Britisher bearing an uncanny resemblance to Michael Myer's fictional Austin Powers character. In complete sincerity he takes full responsibility for the eruption. "All right, then. That was me and I'm quite sorry for it. Quite loud, really." Everyone is seized by wild laughter with the exception of the perpetrator who darts questioning looks about the room and is slightly befuddled by the sudden frivolity.

>>> Humayun Road
>>> Pandara Park, Delhi
>>> October 2, 3:45 PM

Migrant workers have set up a temporary encampment along the road a stone's throw from Khan market. I make eye contact and exchange smiles with a button-nosed tiny tot. Emboldened by her mother's prodding she approaches me for begging.

"Tumhara naam kyaa hai?"

"Preeti," she says shyly lifting her hand for alms. I foment to distract Preeti from her mission with my patented hand variety show and swing my computer bag behind me in preparation. I dramatically line my thumb up for removal. "Dekho, dekho," I command her. I am overcome by an irrepressible and sudden surge of gas through my colon and my sphincter resonates in absolute tandem with the thumb slide.

"Chee, chee, chee," Preeti scolds in retreat with nose wrinkled. I sulk away feeling badly that she probably thinks the fart was intended as part of my short-lived routine. I look back a single time to see Preeti relating my foul play to her mother, but at least she is smiling. Later when meditating the scene comes to mind and my tranquility is shattered by a sudden sharp guffaw and waves of mirth.

>>> Green Guest House
>>> Pahar Ganj, Delhi
>>> November 6, 10:45 AM

Mama is feeling particularly affectionate toward me after I administered an impromptu arm massage earlier in the morning and calls me over to sit next to her. The Nigerian brothers, still buzzing from the previous night's intoxicants, are in their room laughing off their highs. The larger of the brothers had been pacing the courtyard for an hour at dawn, and, interspersed with privately enjoyed chuckles, wishing all comers and the walls a very good morning.

"Jitay raho," Mama blesses me with a hand placed atop my head. She tells me to pull up a chair, but I decline explaining the floor is more comfortable due to the chronic pain engendered by my sciatica. "Mark you really like good son," she proclaims, "I feel as like your mother." Then ever so slowly Mama shifts her weight away from me and issues forth a sonorous fart of over five seconds duration. The poisoned wind breaks directly across my face. The cackling Nigerians crescendo with wild hooting as if privy to the comic opera playing outside their room. Mama offers no commentary on the indecorous assault. I stare gravely at the opposite wall marshaling all my resources not to lose it.

>>> Nav Jeevan Home for the Aged and Orphaned Children
>>> Tirunelveli, Tamil Nadu
>>> February 26, 10:17 AM

Shakar, the driver, explains in broken English that my octogenarian roomie isn't able to understand Hindi.

"He speak only Telugu. If you want speak Hindi, then other old man speak Hindi. Full Hindi." Shakar points to the neighboring room. A nearly subsonic rumble reverberates from behind the closed door. The sound is akin to that produced by the subwoofers on a tricked-out low rider. It culminates in a pizzicato whine and terminates, inexplicably, with a pop.

"Did you say full Hindi, or full windy?" I ask. Gales of laughter buffet the plastered walls of our hostel.

The Great American Essay

"Be great!" he commanded finger thrust in the general direction of my solar plexus. "BE GREAT!" What simple advice I marvel some nine months and nine hundred kilometers separating my person from the guru's kingly injunction. He, himself, had been clad gaudily in the garb of kings of yore – ridiculous satin robes, bejeweled necklaces, and a fluffy, animal-skin brimmed hat – and held court as the most royal of royals do, allowing his subjects to prostrate before him. I sit on the edge of my too-hard bed and eat three-hour-old chow mein noodles from a borrowed plastic tub with a borrowed and bent spoon. A mouse comes to scavenge for edibles from the refuse heap I have created in one corner of the room. Daily visits have emboldened him to the point of being flinch-free when I toss him a bit of bread with a dab of jam made from blackberries, which, according to the label, were collected by children of Himachal Pradesh.

Earlier in the evening I had gone to the rooftop of the Cheapest and Best Evergreen Guest House mock-zombie style followed by the son of the hired hand whom Dipti loaned three hundred rupees to get a bicycle rickshaw on loan, but he spent on whiskey and girls instead according to Mama. We ascend the stairs under which is tucked the former servant, who returns now to ail away the hours on donated medicines prescribed to treat the swelling of organs brought on by years of smoking hashish, opium and too many other drugs the names of which I could not catch. I twirl the boy around and around and launch him star-ward (we counted three together) with lunar leaps before reducing him to a mass of tickles on the wet bedding he and his father share. Two days earlier I had sat for meditation in this same place and heard someone approach, or so I thought, and only after maybe five minutes of uncanny silence I had peaked to find the normally hyperactive, pleading and whining boy sitting in half-lotus posture not ten inches in front of me. Not a peep.

Yesterday, I had just returned from the Pahar Ganj's main bazaar where I had been trying to purchase a ticket online for Pakistan to beat my Indian visa deadline and assist with earthquake relief, when an explosion reverberates from the street. I assume is just one more of the fire works being set off in anticipation of Diwali which is only two days off and I am theoretically destined to miss because I have to leave the country. Ashok, the young Rajastani that has been trying to ghee me up for a loan to purchase a motor rickshaw appears in the second-floor courtyard of the guest house looking shaken and says there was a bomb blast on the street and body parts are scattered hither and yon with one person's face half blown off and it is bad. He assures me there is nothing I can do to be of help as police have cordoned off the area and later Papa is glued to the television and informs us that three bombs, then five bombs, then, no, three again, were set off in the city – two of which are on my daily route. The number of dead ascends late into the night and when the former child soldier from Nigeria comes home drunk he gets into an argument with Papa about who is stronger and stumbles into the fuse box killing power to the house.

The next day, which is today, I grab a rickshaw to head to Defense Colony for the first official meeting of the NGO for street and slum children that I am co-founding with the charmingly imperious Dr. Manjula Krippendorf. Past a Panicker's Travels bus, past a Society for the Eradication of Cruelty to Animals van, past the red-bordered rectangles on the wall where urinating is prohibited and into the tony neighborhood of the Doctor's bungalow. Five minutes early. The policeman, the Times of India model and the owner of the restaurant at Khan Market all arrive by noon, but the Doctor, who is four for four in being late to meetings, is not destined to show up for another hour when she arrives breathlessly apologizing and complaining about the traffic in the market saying that it takes so much time to get things done during the festival season, no?

After the meeting I ride with the policeman in an ambassador-style police car with a giant-sized cologne bottle secured with plastic brackets on the front dash board where one would normally expect to find a shrine to Sai Baba of Shirdi or the multi-armed Durga astride a tiger. At an intersection a street child approaches the car and holds up copies of The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari, Steven Covey's Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, and Chicken Soup for the Soul, but we don't know what to say to him because we haven't gotten that far in the planning of the NGO. The policeman is on 24-hours call due to the bomb investigation (the three bombings were most likely coordinated?!?) and when we arrive at his house I am repeatedly offered sweets by his wife whom he repeatedly reminds that I am fasting and all the while I still have to get back to the Pahar Ganj to look at other Web sites to check on tickets for Pakistan or risk becoming a fugitive on the run from the visa goon squad once again. The police complains that his son isn't aiming high enough and seems lazy and wonders if I can't give him a second pep talk and what I think of him, but his son is in the next room and so I defer judgment other than to say that he seemed like a 'cool' kid. 'Cool' clearly doesn't satisfy dad who excuses himself from the room without comment.

An animated Sikh doctor comes calling and gives me a vigorous massage/beating for my sciatica while we share notes about the salutary nature of the vegan diet to which he has been a twenty-five year adherent and though he is fifty four he looks to be in his twenties. He tells me that his daughter is staying in Maryland, but she doesn't like it there and that Americans are all iron with no hearts and that they make great men, but poor humans. "To be great you must not just have this," he begins shaking a clenched fist, "but this too," he finishes punching the hand to his chest in a fashion that leaves no doubt as to his Panjabi pedigree. The policeman's wife asks the turbaned doc what she should do about this and that ailment and he tells her she is of ten heads and has to become of just one mind, not thinking about tomorrow or yesterday, or later today or earlier today, or the next hour or the last hour, or even the next minute or the last minute, but just now and now and now and then the pains will take care of themselves, because they are not primary in nature. She nods absentmindedly and insists that he have some more sweets.

I take the 480 bus, or the 520 back toward the Pahar Ganj where police vehicles and armed patrols are sprinkled among the Diwali shoppers to give the appearance of security to an audience that is largely indifferent. I weave my way through the hoards to the Yogoda Satsanga Society and bask briefly in the stillness of the meditation room before acquiring ten heads of my own over visa issues, air tickets, where to store the pile of student letters, the street-child NGO, where to find food to break my fast that lasts till midnight, the ache in my left knee, disease-carrying mosquitoes, diwali, bombs, and how cold it must be up in the mountains at this time of year. The subsequent visit to the internet cafe confirms that it won't be possible to purchase tickets for Pakistan online and so I am destined to slip into non-compliance with the visa requirements the following day and do the bureaucratic shuffle once more.

Late that night, which is tonight, I slide in the DVD that was supposed to include a four-pack of bootlegged Hindi films and discover Alexander the Great instead with an option for Korean or Russian sub-titles. Alexander works his way east to India cutting down barbarians on his black steed that used to be afraid of its shadow and his mom keeps reminding him in flashbacks that he is destined to be great and there it is again. Be great. Alexander and I struggle with what that means. Be great. Oliver Stone tries to make the movie itself great by casting Anthony Hopkins in the role of a former compatriot of Alexander's now living in Alexandria and waxing reminiscent about Alexander's exploits. After ballyhooing his accomplishments for the first ninety nine hundredths of the movie, Hopkins' character ultimately is torn as to whether Alexander was all that great really.

Alexander is inclined to measure his greatness against the myths of old, those in particular of Achilles and Hercules, which Alexander pronounces, "HERA - cuh - lease" in a faux-Macedonian accent which sounds vaguely British. For him it is also tied in with the concept of fearlessness, especially overcoming the fear of death which is the greatest fear of all and in doing so become immortal in a way. Alexander's male lover is inclined to find him great because of the way he cocks his head ever so regally while sharing his dreams of joining the world's peoples under one banner. Alexander's large-breasted barbarian wife finds him great because of the way he fights back in bed and hisses at her. My own take is that greatness lies, at least partly, in forsaking the measuring stick of success provided by the society at large and superseding the confines of egoic ambition to the point that we die while still alive and can fearlessly pen a life story of ever-increasing connectivity and creativity without regard to gain or loss. Peace Pilgrim would be an exemplar. To give up a worldly inheritance for an unbounded and unknown universe may seem irrational, but it is essential as breath (is breath essential?) to those too great to be satisfied by the mundane. Greatness, in this context, is born of necessity – the phoenix ascending from the ashes of a self-lit funeral pyre.

At 12:01 a.m. I seize upon the noodles that I bought on the street at 9:01 p.m. and find them a tad slimy, but I am famished so I don't really mind, though I can't manage to stomach the second bag and decide instead to give it to Mama who fries it for the hired hand who took the 300 rupees from Dipti and the former hired hand who sleeps all day under the stairs and is thankful for the fruit I sometimes bring and is always needing more medicine.

Farmer fellow,
Pits stained yellow;
Hired hand,
Pituitary gland.

Just great.

Ruby Tuesday

Yesterday I learned of the passing of my beloved companion of twelve years. Ruby, a dwarf rabbit, meant the world to me and was a true comforter to any and all that took the time to sit with him. (Nipun, Kevin, Derek and Eric were a few of the lucky characters to share his darshan.) While a lengthier piece on this remarkable soul is to follow, I thought he would chortle in approval it if I were to use this space to issue a challenge for this upcoming Tuesday (which is next Tuesday no matter when you read this). The challenge is this: to provide solace – material, mental, spiritual – to some person, plant, animal or insect that is hurting or troubled. While most of this do this anyway, the challenge is to step outside the normal bounds of what you find comfortable to extend this comfort. Not an easy challenge, but a fitting memorial for a remarkable creature who consistently sought to bring out the best in me and others.

Don't question why he needs to be so free,
He'll tell you it's the only way to be,
He just can't be chained,
To a life where nothing's gained,
Nothing's lost...at such a cost.

Goodbye Ruby Tuesday
Who could hang a name on you,
When you change with every new day,
Still I'm gonna miss you.

Still I'm gonna miss you Bug.

Things I Saw Within a Hundred Meters of One Another

Two one-armed men wrestling over a ten rupee note.
A man relieving himself against a wall while his dog turned away in embarrassment.
A kitten gnawing on a rat's carcass double its size.

Judgment Day: Gregory Pecking Order

Being a whitey in India produces a wide range of reactions, including, sometimes, none at all. This lack o' reaction is most often the case in areas heavily visited by tourists, where fair-skinned Europeans are as common as kabuters (pigeons) and don't merit any special attention. Think the Taj Mahal in Agra, the Pahar Ganj in Delhi and Rishikesh in the foothills of the Himalayas. On the flip-side is the wide-eyed wonder of village children in remote regions or even the abject terror of the extremely young who may believe they are in the presence of a ghost for the first time. In Ahmedabad, the reaction to Westerners usually falls between the two extremes. Legions of males ranging in age from the early teens to early adulthood delight in calling out, "Hey, gora!" (Hey, whitey!). In the slums many will drop whatever they are doing and run out of their homes to shake hands Western-style, leaving one with the impression that this is a lesson taught early and often about the beloved customs of the paleface. People everywhere will call out "Ha-low, ha-low," and be reduced to hysterics when you respond in kind. I soon learn that the query "How are you?" can only be properly satisfied by the response, "I'm fine, thank you."

At the Gujarat Sports Club I encounter yet another reaction which might best be described as snobbery. The Sports Club is perhaps Ahmedabad's most exclusive, and Mr. Shah, Director of Memberships, and his bureaucratic retinue are not at all thrilled to be granting a temporary membership to a shabbily-dressed and emaciated American. I have had to pull strings from up high (or rather, had to have them pulled for me by the Goodfather) to finagle the requisite recommendations for a guest membership. No less than the Minister of Recreation for Gujarat and two assistants have vouched for me. Still, as Mr. Shah looks over my application, it is clear that if he had his druthers I would be unceremoniously removed by the uniformed security that flank the entryway to the club. During our meeting in his office he deigns to look at me but a single time and then it is only with an expression of utter disappointment that I haven't spontaneously vaporized. As we sit in silence, waiting for I know not what, I replay the previous day's travails in my mind.

Estrella and I part company with John and Loveleen and head past the schools and shanties scattered on the old grounds of Gandhi ashram, across the large, barren plain, over the river of sewage, and finally up the rise into the Tekra. My motives for the trek are twofold, with one fold ulterior. Firstly it's been months since I promised Lakshmi champels (flip flops) and secondly (and secretly) I want Estrella to meet Anandi and family hoping that it might inspire her to venture out from Swarg more often. Estrella visibly tenses as we wend through the crowded, narrow alleys and residents pop out from all sides to offer handshakes or inquire as to our country of origin. She makes little cooing sounds that sound like they could be a precursor to fainting and whispers bits of German to no one in particular. We arrive at the plateau where Anandi's room sits. "Oh, Anandi! Main apne dost ke saath hoon. Uskaa naam Estrella hai. Voh Germany se hai."

"Oh, Mark!" Anandi says laughing and feeling for hands and arms, eventually settling on Estrella's. Anandi is always amused to meet me and simultaneously reproachful for my not being more regular in my visits. Anandi's geniality (and arm stroking) puts Estrella at ease and within minutes the usual cast of family and locals gather around to get the scoop on the blond-haired newcomer. A local shopkeeper insists on buying Estrella and I a round of ThumsUp, the leading Indian cola with a disturbingly strong chemical aftertaste (i.e. above and beyond what you would normally expect of a cola product). A non-ending stream of youngsters feeds the crowd that surges to get a peek at us, thrusting tiny hands forward for shaking. When the crowd become too unruly Anandi stamps her foot, puts her finger to her lips and shouts, "Choop!" (Shut up!). I inquire as to Lakshmi's whereabouts. A search party is dispatched to her house, and she eventually makes her appearance at the back of the pack, a good head higher than any of her peers. I ask her if she can go with Estrella and me to shop for champals, but she explains her mama (uncle) won't let her leave the immediate neighborhood. Anandi, Meena and Jignesh seize upon the opportunity to offer themselves as ready champal candidates and I half-heartedly decide to accommodate their wishes, knowing full well the potential for unsavory consequences. Immediately a cascade of additional entreaties is loosed. Meena moves to block their requests.

"No, Mark. Hunh, hunh, hunh," she grunts pointing first at herself, Anandi and then Jignesh. Anandi seconds her motion of familial exclusivity and urges us to leave quickly. Estrella looks on in wonderment at the chaotic proceedings. By the time the five of us squeeze into a rickshaw a mini riot of locals shouting shoe sizes after me has developed. The rickshawala is in no mood to see his primary source of income overwhelmed by the hoards and accelerates out of the melee pushing bodies to the side with the blunt nose of his vehicle. I instruct the rickshawala to head to CG road knowing it to be the prime shopping destination in the city. Within 30 seconds of departing the Tekra we pass a roadside champalwala selling pairs of colorful footwear for only 30 rupees (about 75 cents) each but I hesitate to order him to stop. It seems too easy and I worry if Anandi and crew be disappointed to get ordinary flip-flops from a local vendor. I look to Meena and Jignesh who have also seen the cart but do not indicate any desire to stop so we continue the additional two kilometers onto CG road.

CG road looks like it could be a shopping district in any metropolitan area in the US with many of the shops having English names or prominently advertising American brands. I eventually catch sight of a second-story shoe store promising 50% off of everything in stock and being a sucker for sales (real or imagined) order my entourage to disembark. We immediately draw the attention of local street denizens who are fascinated to see me leading Anandi by the hand up the stairs. Inside the shop the clientele reacts with thinly veiled revulsion upon seeing our motley crew and are quick to give us a wide berth. A round-faced, twenty-something salesman descends on our party. His cologne is unmistakably Used Car Lot #5. I explain to him my intention to buy shoes for my three companions and he quickly selects some ridiculously-fragile looking high heels for Anandi and Meena. Meena is charmed and gazes at me expectantly. The shoes are meant to accompany a formal silk sari or evening gown and are priced accordingly. Meena is dressed in her sole soiled frock. The outing was intended to find basic footwear that would protect feet against sharp objects, scorching earth and contact with excrement. The high heels look like they would topple in a slight breeze. I try to steer her toward some more practical shoes, but it is virtually impossible as the store has almost no selection outside the dressy stuff. The salesmen seizes the opportunity of my distraction to entice Jignesh with some sneakers replete with LEDs and neon stripes. "Maaaark?" he intones with doleful eyes, "Aachaa lagtaa hai?"

"What's important is if you like them? Aachaa lagtaa hai?" I envision with horror the reaction of the other Tekrites and Manav Sadhna staff were they to see Anandi and family parading about in shoes that cost as much as a month's rent on a small house. If only we had stopped back at the simple street-side champalwala. Jinesh senses my dissatisfaction.

"Aachaa lagtaa hai?" he probes again. No, they don't seem quite right I let him know. He sets the shoes down and his shoulders droop. He appears doubly crestfallen: hurt that his selection didn't please me and hurt not to be getting his gaudy selection. I pick the shoes up and hold them in front of him.

"If you like them, that's what important," I say. Jinesh isn't buying it and communicates that he will like only what I like. He senses I'm going to be a tough customer to please. My relationship with shopping has always been antagonistic, dating back to the days of wearing Sears Toughskins when the cool kids were all in Levis, and then switching to Levis when everyone else had moved on to designer jeans. And so on. Many shop when they get depressed. I get depressed when I shop. The vast majority of my wardrobe (if one could call it that) is a hodgepodge of clothes donated by friends, left by roommates, or recieved as part of various credit card sign-up promotions. I wear clothes until the holes exceed coverage, which is to say pretty late in the game. In India my clothes are dirty within five minutes of washing, an unfortunate consequence of my enthusiasm for all play and work involving digging, dirt or muddy water. Anandi and family, like most of the slum dwellers, possess one or two outfits which are almost perpetually dirty and frequently torn. But, the condition of their clothes is simply a reality of heavy use and living in unsanitary environs and not out of any shared aversion to consumerism or predilection towards dirtiness.

"Maaaaark?" Jignesh produces another pair of shoes for me to inspect. While still flashy, they are a definite improvement over the first pair. I encourage him to walk around the store. He looks to the salesman for approval and hesitantly takes a few steps as if someone might strike him with a cane at any moment. He has been conditioned by a lifetime of being the low boy on the caste totem pole.

"Go. Jao. Chalo. No worries. Fikar mat karo." I urge in my peculiar mix of broken Hindi and simple English. "How much are they?" I ask the salesman who is all unctuous smiles.

"I have seen your picture in the newspaper and read about the work you are doing, so don't worry about the price. I will give you a deal," he assures seductively. I look over at Estrella who is steering Anandi and Meena toward slightly less high, high heels. Anandi takes a pair in her hands and clucks approval. She tries them on using Estrella's arm to balance herself.

"Oh-ho, Mark!" she calls out laughing in a way that suggests she is suffering from vertigo. I ask Estrella to search for something more rugged with even less heel. In the meantime, Jignesh has completed his circuit of the store and presents himself in front of me.

"Maaaark?" he says, "Aachaa lagta hai?"

"If they feel comfortable to you, then I like them," I answer and ask the salesman to translate. He could say practically anything to Jignesh and I would be none the wiser.

"You weel tell the meester Marx that you like da shoes veery much or I will keel you twice!"

Jignesh confirms the fit. I waggle my head to confirm approval. One down and two to go until I can relinquish the unwanted role of the practical papa. Meena whirls in front of me in yet another pair of heels. I pick up a similar pair and point to the heels. "Not good. Baaaaaad. Four legs good. Two heels baaaad." She smiles even though she has never read Animal Farm or any book for that matter. The salesman disappears up a hatch into the attic and throws two boxes of champals down.

"These will work," he predicts confidently. Although vastly improved over the earlier selections they are far too small for Meena's or Anandi's feet. More boxes are tossed down. Meena is finally fitted into relatively expensive, but attractive and solid-looking sandals, while Anandi settles on a dressier pair of shoes with modest heels. The entire ordeal is played out under the glare of unabashed staring by the other customers.

The total cost for the three pairs of shoes comes to 800 rupees which is the exactly the price marked on them. The salesman explains that this price is the special sale price, but he is willing to take another 50 rupees off because I am me. "But I thought everything in the store was half off," I complain.

"Yes, everything is already labeled with the half-off price." The ruse is transparent and if I were by myself I would simply walk, but I am eager to bring the episode to a close and so I pay the fake sale price minus fifty. Estrella leans in as I go to my wallet and intimates that she would like to help pay because she supports the cause. I suggest instead that we take our gang to lunch and she can help with the bill there. She readily agrees.

Our group, three fifths of which are incongruously bedecked in dazzling footwear, walks only a few dozen yards to a somewhat trendy eatery in a trendy square off of the very trendy CG road (do you detect a trend?). Meena is giddy that lunch is being included in the outing. The waiter gives us the twice over, but doesn't seem terribly put out to have us enter the almost empty AC section. Meena arches her back and nods her head like a bobble-toy with and unleashes a teeth-bearing grin when I read the pizza section of the menu. She is a kindred clown who smiles nearly 80% of the time. Estrella, Anandi and Jignesh also opt for pizza while I settle on samosa. The pizzas come heaped with a conical super-abundance of cheese and each one looks like it could feed a family of four. Meena is ravenous and transfers the food from her plate into her mouth with clockwork efficiency. She pauses only to supplement the gorge-fest with generous tears from my tomato uttapam. Within the next half hour, Jignesh and Estrella also manage to finish their pizzas--Anandi is simple undone by the preponderance of cow curd. I am inclined to reprimand her with the line about people starving in India but hold my tongue.

A curious onlooker in business garb leans over from his table to ask me where I am from and what I am doing in India. I give him the usual spiel on the India trip and he nods his approval. "I am in the diamond business," he says flashing a watch adorned with the precious little rocks. "Can I order you something?" he says. I decline, but thank him for the generous offer. He inquires about Estrella next and then invites the two of us to sit with him at his table.

"Oh, we're eating with our friends," I say, waving my hand in the general direction of Meena, Jignesh and Anandi, "but we could squeeze you in at our table." My hope is to extend Mr. Diamond's sociability to my guests. Instead he is visibly put off and declines my offer, but continues to probe as to mine and Estrella's occupations, interests and so on. When I try to weave Anandi into the conversation she is as loquacious as usual, but the stranger's replies to her are mainly curt dismissals of one or two words. She quiets. Meena eyes the man with distrust and uses subtle facial expressions to communicate her unease to me.

When I suggest ordering dessert all are immediately ready to indulge. Everyone, save I, orders sundaes that come heaped with chocolate syrup, sprinkles and miscellany of unknown origin. Again Meena is up to the challenge and expands like a blow fish to create room in her modest frame for the three scoops of ice cream. Estrella also manages to complete her sundae, while Jinesh tosses in the towel with one scoop left and Anandi two.

The businessman loiters while our meal is being finished. "Where do you need to go, my friend? I can take you to my office and show you the work I do." he suggests. I explain that I have plans to take my guests to Law Garden, a local park with ample greenery, but suggest I can take him up on his offer some other time. "I will give you a ride to the park, no problem. But let's talk outside for a second," he says, getting up from his table and pointing toward the door.

"I need to pay our bill first," I protest. The invitation to speak to him in private is not particularly enticing. He insists repeatedly on a minute alone with me and I finally I acquiesce despite my reservations. Meena looks on and wrinkles her nose with disapproval. Once outside, Mr. Diamond sidles up alongside me as if he is going to share a deep secret.

"I hope you don't mind me telling you this," he begins dramatically, "but the people you are with are bad. You must leave them here and get away from them or they will take advantage of you." I reassure him that they are my friends, but he isn't swayed. "I am telling you this for your own good, you must get away from these people. I know them. They will try to take all your money."

"You actually know them? Where do you know them from?"

"Not them, but I am knowing their type, my friend. You will not be understanding because you are not from here. I am trying to warn you. They are bad people."

"They may be bad, but their shoes are nice," I joke. "No, seriously I can vouch for them. I have spent many days with them, eaten with them and even slept at their house. They are incredibly sweet. Far better people than myself in fact, and I am sure you would like them too if you got to know them." Mr. Diamond shakes his head with frustration. "You don't have to give us a ride if you don't want," I say, "I would understand." I still harbor hopes on sharing the joy of connecting across social strata with him.

"Okay, come," he says unenthusiastically and disappears into the parking lot. I motion for the rest of the gang to join me outside and Meena looks at me questioningly.

"I think it will be okay," I assure her, "He is going to give us a ride to the park."

I sit up front as the four others cram into the back seat of the compact car. Mr. Diamond cringes as his car is invaded by Anandi's motley-dressed trio and looks in the rear view mirror to Estrella for comfort. His eyes dart repeatedly between the mirror and the road. "I hope you don't mind my saying this," he begins, "but you are very beautiful." Estrella, a very ordinary looking German, is accustomed to the flattery laid on by Indian men attracted to the paleness of her skin and responds to the businessman's advance politely, but with little interest. Mr. Diamond takes a road that I imagine to be away from the park, but not knowing for sure I remain quiet. He continues to glance at Estrella in the mirror, but she keeps her focus on the passing streetscape. Anandi attempts to make conversation with Mr. Diamond, but he shoots down her entreaties with undisguised contempt. Meena furrows her brow in distress and Anandi's expression, normally indecipherable, also registers worry. I look at Mr. Diamond and imagine his mind to be squirming like a toad--it's clear he is wrestling internally with some horrible decision and I begin to think that I have made a colossal mistake in accepting the ride. It should take five minutes by foot to get to Law Garden and we have been driving for at least ten.

"Isn't Law Garden in the other direction?" I ask as innocently as possible.

"Yes, we are taking the back way," Mr. Diamond explains unconvincingly, "We will go to my house first, so I can show you around."

"That would be great some other day, but today we need to go to Law Garden. We have to meet friends there." He acts as if he hasn't heard me and turns his attention again to Estrella.

"I hope you will let me offer to gift you a necklace," he says, "A beautiful girl like you should be having something very beautiful to wear." Estrella laughs nervously and refuses the offer. I reassert our wish to go directly to Law Garden.

"Let's just drop these people first," he says indicating Anandi, Meena and Jignesh, "Then we can go to the park or wherever you want." It's almost as if I can see the thoughts forming in his mind in slow motion now. He intends to whittle the party down to two and eventually one. How he will dispatch of me is anybody's guess. His demeanor is rapidly going south and we are continuing further still from the park.

"Why don't you drop us at Law Garden today and then tomorrow we can spend the whole day with you," I suggest disingenuously, in the hopes of allaying his lustful impulse.

"But I have to go to Dubai for two weeks starting tomorrow," he complains.

"That's perfect," I say, "We are going to be tied up with work at the Gandhi Ashram during that same period, but are going to have so much free time afterwards." Mr. Diamond pouts. His malformed plan isn't shaping up as he had hoped. The wheels in his mind are turning a little more slowly, but he is still proceeding in the opposite direction from Law Garden. "It wouldn't be nice to only be able to spend a few minutes with you and then have to rush off," I say. "Let's make a definite plan to meet in two weeks and spend several days together." The offer sounds preposterous to my own ears, but Mr. Diamond eases off the accelerator.

"So you give me your cell phone number and address and then we will meet as soon as I get back," he says.

"Yes, that's what will do. We will be able to spend so much time together then," I say. He slows the vehicle reluctantly and makes a languid U-turn back toward the park. He peppers me with questions to confirm our next get together and to insure Estrella will come along. His demon smells a rat, but I throw myself completely into the role of his best-friend-to-be and he appears to have resigned himself to dropping us at our requested destination. He hands me his business card and a second one for me to write my cell phone number and address on. I don't have a cell phone, so I just write down a variation on his own number hoping he won't try it before we are clear of the car. I delay in handing the card back to him. When we roll to a stop across from the park we spring from the car as one and he leans across the passenger seat to make one last improbable appeal.

"Let's just leave these people here and then we can go somewhere else," he shouts above the noise of the traffic.

"Next time we will do that," I lie, and then lead the others in the opposite direction from the vehicle. He shouts something more, but I don't acknowledge him and continue to corral the others across the street and instruct them not to look back. Meena turns to me.

"Voh karaab aadmi, hai na?"

"I guess he's bad and good like I'm bad and good. Anandi's bad and good. There's bad and good everywhere I think."

"Aap nahin karaab aadmi," she offers.

"No, I'm bad too. Trust me," I say. I only have to think as far back as the shoe buying episode for evidence. Am I fueling a cycle of dependency by buying the family gifts? Why did I only take Anandi's family? Am I attached to my role as material provider? How would I feel about her family if the roles were reversed--whould I privately despise their advantage?

"No! Aap nahin karaab aadmi!" Meena insists defiantly and shakes her head to exagerrated effect. We enter the park which is a haven of green in an generally dusty and polluted city. Estrella and Anandi find a bench in the shade to sit on while Meena and Jinesh make a beeline for the swing set. I find various twigs, leaves and flowers to place in Anandi's hand and ask, "Yeh kyaa hai?"

"Ooooooh, Mark!" Anandi will say invariably and then go on to identify the item in Hindi. Estrella takes over my role as game show host, so I join Meena and Jinesh who have been calling me incessantly to push them on the swings. It is amazing to see Meena at play. In the months I have known her it is the first time I have seen her so utterly carefree. It never ceases to amaze me how uncomplainingly she looks after her sister. She and Jinesh laugh with each push and compete for my attention. When some local boys want me to push them, Meena clucks her disapproval and tells me that they aren't good kids and shouldn't play with them. For a second I am under the impression that she actually knows them, but then quickly realize that just like Mr. Diamond, she is making the assessment based simply on a cursory once over.

The park isn't far from Swarg so I suggest we all visit head over to the flat next. Estrella interlocks her arm with Anandi's and leads her, while Meena, Jinesh and I ascend the five foot wall that borders the street and walk atop it. I ask what each tree's name is in Hindi and again pull leaves off branches for Anandi to identify. I grab a couple of long, grooved drumsticks from one tree and beat a rhythm on the side of the wall while Meena and Jinesh dance behind me. Our parade is cut short when Meena squeals excitedly about the towering tree whose branches I am navigating through to stay on top of the wall. She starts plucking the papery seed pods from its branches and then extracts the seeds by rolling her hands together and letting the papery shell blow away. She offers me an open palm of the minute brown seeds and indicates I should eat them. They taste slightly nutty and very familiar, but I can't place what it is they remind me of. She employs my reach to collect a handful of the fattest pods and insists I have a second helping. The bad taste left by the day's earlier interactions is all but erased by our Huck Finn-inspired, carefree ambling.

I never enter Swarg unnoticed. Too many open doors look out onto the stairs, and too many children with too many requests are only too happy to announce my arrival. "Mark! Oh, Mark!" But today they are strangely quiet when I appear with my adoptive family, and one by one, they fall into a solemn procession behind us as we ascend the stairs. The silence is unnerving, so I turn to the usually impish Prachee and introduce my friends with wild-eyed panache. She manages a meager smile, but remains mute. Anandi and crew are clearly picking up on the sobering milieu and have also fallen quiet.

Once inside the flat I recruit Nisharg to organize a game in the livingroom. He cooperates by ordering his playmates to sit in a circular formation on the floor. I integrate Meena and Jignesh into the circle and then return to Anandi to walk her through the adjoining bedrooms and kitchen so she can get a feel for the place. Word has quickly reached the aunties in Swarg that Anandi is in the building and they begin filtering in to see her for themselves. Two, then three at a time enter to look on at her with gape-mouthed pity or repulsion. Most are familiar with her story from the several articles about our friendship that have appeared in the local media. I encourage the new comers to take a seat and converse with Anandi, but they remain huddled in the far corner of the room refuse to budge. Anandi doesn't need eyes to see what is going on and sighs loudly with resignation. I read her reaction to be more from weariness, or even anger at the crude comments of strangers, rather than any sense of self pity.

The children pull me impatiently into their game in which a ball is passed around the circle and one child with eyes closed suddenly commands the activity to stop. Whoever is left holding the ball must enter the circle and sing a song, dance or act out a scene from a film. Estrella is a little flabbergasted to find herself holding the ball, but gamely stands to perform a little impromptu disco dance. After their initial uneasiness with our guests the Swarg children seem to have accepted Meena and Jignesh as playmates. I can't help but note the disparity in dress between the nattily adorned Swargites and the dingily-clad Tekrites. Meena and her brother, as well, still seem a little uncomfortable and shift self-consciously in the growing din of laughter.

Anandi indicates they should be heading home soon to check in on Alpesh who was left under the neighbor's care. "Chalo," she says. As is my habit, I respond with the non-sensical rhyme, "Chalo chalengay, hello halengay." As is her habit, Anandi chuckles and echoes, "Hello halengay." I lead Anandi onto the mountain of footwear piled at the threshold of the door and am able to locate her new shoes somewhere near the bottom. I line them up, side-by-side and she wiggles her feet in. Meena, Jignesh and Estrella follow suit, then the now exuberant Swargite hoards and finally the still mummering aunties.

We catch a rickshaw back to the Tekra where we are greeted by a throng of children eager to see the day's booty. I am crestfallen when Lakshmi appears on the scene and Meena and Jignesh taunt her with their flashy acquisitions. She politely bears their teasing and even manages a half-hearted smile, but her hurt is transparent. Alpesh also is clearly hurting for having missed out of the shopping spree and is in a foul, vindictive mood.

Even on good days Alpesh suffers from dramatic mood swings that the amateur psychologist in me attributes to the fallout with his father. He desperately wants an adult male to bond with and will soak up hugs like a dry sponge whenever I first arrive on visits. But at the first hint of my having to go his eyes will literally glass over and the hugs will turn to choke holds and snuggles come with a bite attached. I often reflect that he will wear the reminder of his father's acid attack like a glossy cap of shame for the rest of his life. Anyone he becomes intimate with will eventually inquire about the marbled, hairless portion of his skull and he will be left with an unpalatable choice. Make up a lie as to its origins, or give up what little pride he might have painstakingly crafted for his father in the retelling of his unspeakable sin. Either way the event will be revisited in his mind. How to forgive under these circumstances?

Today Alpesh clamers onto my lap and interspersed with his playful hugs he applies resentful fingernails like claws along my arms and neck. He alternates this with blowing his nose on my shirt, spitting on me and biting my belly. Meena upbraids him for his behavior, but he is in no mood to heed her admonishments. The day's events have worn my patience thin and I forcibly keep Alpesh at arm's length by applying a hand to his forehead which only infuriates him further. I indicate to Estrella that we should beat a hasty retreat.

Back at Swarg, Estrella confides that the day's events were something of a personal breakthrough for her. Her desire to reach out to those in need is sincere, but inhibited by extreme anxiety in unfamiliar social environments. The two trips to the Tekra have given her a little confidence and she vows to get out more often. She ascends to eat with the upper-flat neighbors and I decide to head to Ashram Road to unwind from the day's events. Outside the door to our flat I run into the neighbor's teenage servant who is just getting off work. She is also headed to Ashram Road to catch her bus, so we walk together. Originally mystified by my salutations and banter she has come to enjoy our accidental meetings and good-naturedly reprimands me in Gujarati for unknown transgressions. Like so many of the domestic servants in Ahmedabad she makes her home in the Tekra. Tonight, after working in people's flats since early morning, she will return home to wash clothes, sweep and help prepare dinner for her family. At the road she spots her bus and runs to meet it pausing midway to turn back and wave goodbye. No sooner than I find a bench to unwind on and two college boys come hurriedly up to me. They inquire if I am alright or if the girl was misbehaving with me. I assure them that there is no problem. Nothing stolen? No, she is just a friend. Maybe you don't understand, they offer. This girl is not a good kind of girl. She is from the slums. I am too tired to contest their assertions and simply repeat that she is a good friend even if she is lacking money. They stick around to ask where I am from and what I'm doing in Ahmedabad. Business? In explaining the one-year experiment with service I find myself getting revved up and invite them to participate in one of the activities someday.

"It's really quite remarkable," I say, "No matter what you may think of the slums there are real riches there. Some of my best friends here in Ahmedabad live in the Tekra. If I had never ventured there I would have missed out on so much. It just takes that first step of overcoming our preconceptions. The rest is easy. You should come with me one of these days." One of the pair seems at least a bit curious, while the other winces visibly – neither are receptive to my offer. I learn both are studying business and are in line to take over their families' factories when they graduate. I ask them what they made of the communal riots and the more sociable of the two becomes reflective.

"The riots were bad," he says.

"What do you think was behind them," I ask.

"It was just politicians wanting to spread fear in order to secure votes. The people really don't have any enmity toward each other. We work alongside each other every day. But the politicians controlled gangs of thugs and it was really bad."

"Did you see anything? Or did everything happen on the other side of the river in the old city?"

"I saw some things," he says plaintively. He pauses, lost in thought. "There was a van full of muslims by the airport. It was stopped and surrounded by a crowd of maybe fifty people. They had hockey sticks and cricket bats and the windows were broken. The driver was pulled out and they discovered he was Hindu so he was pushed out of the circle. Then the mob poured kerosene all over the van and on the passengers and set everything on fire."

"Did you try to do anything?" I ask.

"No, what could we have done? I was only with three friends and there were so many in the mob. They would have killed us too. There was a family of twelve or fourteen muslims in the van that were burned to ashes. The screaming was horrible."

A nerdy looking young man with thick black-rimmed glasses and a Baltimore Orioles cap approaches and interrupts our conversation.

"Hi! Do you know where I'm from?" he asks, staring intently at me.

"No. I don't. I guess somewhere in India?"

"No, India sucks. I'm from America. Where are you from?"

"I'm from America too, but I like India a lot."

"No, India sucks. What is your name?"

"I'm Mark. What is your name?"

"You can call me Greg."

The college boys eye Greg inimically and they turn as far away from him as they can without actually sitting backwards on the bench. Greg's demeanor brings to mind Dustin Hoffman's character in Rain Man. His disposition makes it impossible for me to remember him without placing a lollypop in his hand and propeller on his cap.

"Do you think Indians suck, Mark?"

"I don't think anyone sucks really." I lie.

"I hate Indians," Greg says matter-of-factly, "I've never met an Indian that isn't stupid."

Inside I laugh the maniacal laugh of one beginning to lose his mind at the end of a long perverse day. I worry about the reaction of the business students to Greg's vitriol, but thankfully they are indiscriminately blocking out everything he says. I come to learn that Greg is visiting his uncle in Ahmedabad and lives in Lawrence, Kansas, where he went to college.

"Mark, don't you think all Indians are stupid?" Greg asks.

"I don't think so. Indians are stupid, smart, beautiful and ugly, just like Americans and Puerto Ricans are."

"I hate India though," Greg says unfazed, "Indians are dirty and stupid. Let's leave here Mark. Where are you going?"

"I wasn't going anywhere right now. I was just going to sit for a while and was talking with these guys," I explain. Ridiculously, I still harbor hopes of connecting dots and somehow weaving everyone into the conversation. Greg turns to the student who related the riot story.

"Are you a Hindu?" he asks. Internally I sigh the sigh of one fighting a fight that is not to be won on this day. The student pretends not to hear Greg's question. Greg moves slightly over and repeats his question. The student glares at Greg with naked contempt.

"I'm not Hindu, Muslim or Christian," he says spitefully. "These things get people killed."

"Hey, are you stupid?" the second student says to Greg before leaving the bench to sit on his motorcycle some twenty yards away. Any coolness of hanging out with me has long since waned with my talk of service work and my willingness to interact with the mentally-challenged Greg. For his part, Greg seems unshaken by the crassness of the student's comment.

"I hate Muslims," says Greg. "What are your hobbies, Mark?" I'm too flabbergasted to process his question with any genuine interest and simply state that I don't think I have any. "My hobbies are the army and hot tea," Greg announces proudly, "Do you like the army, Mark?"

"The Indian Army?"

"No, way! The American Army! Mark, let's get out of here." At this point I have given up on integrating everyone into the conversation and decide to exit with Greg before he causes a whole new riot. As we walk up the road I reflect how every moment truly is an opportunity to serve. No matter where we find ourselves, no matter what mood we are in, if we keep the mantra of service ever present in our minds the possibility for service will be revealed. I vow to try in whatever way I can to release Greg from some of his hardened perceptions on our walk together.

Mr. Shah raps the desk with his fingernails bringing me back to the present. He snaps his fingers to have an office peon fetch the requisite papers to sign my life away to the Sports Club of Gujarat. I smile meekly at him, hoping to break his stern veneer, but succeed only in solidifying his scowl.

Later, I sit for dinner at the Club's upscale restaurant and reflect with some amusement on the rampant judgments we pass on our fellows. It starts sometime in the second grade, when Dean Meyers is excluded from the after-school handball gang because he has a lisp, and then goes on ad infinitum. The shoe salesman takes me for a well-heeled, easy-to-dupe American. I see him as a weasel of a shoe pusher. Mr. Diamond deemed Anandi and family to be bad folk. He sizes me up as a hopelessly naive do-gooder, while I condemn him as a calculating do-badder. Meena, declares me to be good man and then warns me about interacting with the bad children at the park. The Swarg children get over their apprehension to include Meena and Jignesh in their play, but the aunties are disturbed by their and Anandi's presence. The business students warn me about the bad servant girl before they are labeled as stupid by Greg and they, in turn, grade him in a similar fashion. Mr. Shah finds me contemptible and I find him preposterous. It seems to be an almost foregone conclusion that the more people we can assign to unmeritable positions the greater our own stature becomes. But I am becoming acutely aware that it really doesn't work this way at all.

With every judgment we pass we add a brick to the wall that keeps us from genuine communion with others. In the process we become the clown princes of miserable kingdoms of isolation. We wish to admit only those that are roughly equivalent, or higher, in stature and these select guests inevitably reinforce our insecurities and fuel another round of judgments and resentment. More than just building castles of sand, we become ridiculous in our pronouncements about others by inviting others to judge us by the same standards. Case in point: the Gujarat Sports Club prides itself for its exclusivity and yet the menu of their restaurant reads like it was penned by a drunk street urchin. (Parenthetical matter is appended by moi for maximum mockery. Readers are invited to do the same with this entire essay.)

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The Blue Bay Special

Rules and Regulations
1) Orders once places will not be cancelled.
(Make sure your order was at one time a place: see Pasta Ala Indiana below.)

2) Members are requested to wait for at least 25 minutes after placing their order.
(Then totally freak out.)

3) Members are requested to record their complaints or suggestions at the counter.
(Counter charges may be leveled and level counters may be charged for.)

4) Please avoid smoking to avoid suffocation.
(Self-immolation is also highly discouraged.)

5) Special dishes are served on advance order from the respected members.
(You just better hope what they ordered suits your taste.)

6) Sales tax shall be charged extra.
(On top of any taxes.)

7) Your cordial co-operation is requested.

Veg Starters
Crispy Baby Corn Human Sauce
(I'm vegetarian, but I eat human sauce.)

Fusion
Pasta Ala Indiana
(Oh, that industrial-strength Gary gravy is to die for.)

Combination Rice With Fusion Sauce
(It's atomically correct.)

Maxican
(Turning it all the way up, down south.)

Continental
Spaghetti Primavera With G. Bread
(It's a G-thang, homeboy.)

Chicken In House Special Sauce
(Be sure to inquire about our Chicken Outhouse Special Sauce too.)

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Two days after gaining temporary membership to the Sports Club I bump into Mr. Shah outside the Club's library and he smiles warmly. What could possibly have brought this sudden change in attitude I wonder. "I saw the article about that stuff you are doing for that poor lady," he says, "This is good work you are doing."

"Oh, really? It's in Gujarati so I haven't had anyone tell me what exactly it says yet."

"I didn't actually have time to read it. But the article looks impressive." Impressive indeed!