Lizard in the Toilet and Other Surprises

Loner Man Who Hangs Around the Guest House

Mr. Gecko lizard in my toilet!

There are surprises every day here in Chandigarh, so I thought this would be a time to share some of them with you. Last night I went to sit on the bathroom throne and out of the corner of my eye, I thought I saw movement, something I don't think I've ever seen before unless under the influence of some prohibited substance. I took a closer look at there was a 7" Gecko lizard staring at me from the side of the bowl. We just kinda stared at each other a minute- at least long enough for me to get a picture of him. I took my roomate's toothbrush, something I am sure she will appreciate, and poked him.

He played dead, even though his eye was blinking at me. I found out later when faced with a larger predator, they will play dead. So I just picked up the lid and told him to get the hell out of my bowl, and he must have realized my next move would be to pick him up by the tail and fling him into my roomate's bed,so he left.

I'm sure he was after the leftover Daal (crappy looking lentil stuff) that I stopped eating about a week ago. Even the feral dogs turn up their noses at it.

Loner Man

Loner Man behind our Guest House

This is Loner Man, who hangs around our Guest House. We started seeing him the first week we were at the guest house and now, we kind of know his patterns, though he is cagey, and we are careful to keep a safe distance from him.

We were told there is a troupe of about 15 monkeys who live in the park. This one, however, stays separate from the troupe, though we did see him with at least one other monkey in the last few days, so no one knows for sure.

I usually see him around 7am when I go outside for

 my first cup of coffee. He is hanging on the roof at the corner overlooking the courtyard, just scoping out who is in the courtyard. He always has this same look on his face - warily conscious of everything around him. He usually walks the walls and when we walk the walls, we see his "deposits" on the wall tops as well.



Then there are the wonderful birds who speak to us all day long. Here are some of them we see on a regular basis right outside our front door:

This is one of the long-tailed parrots that fly around all day long and perch in the trees in front of the guest house. In particular, there is a pair of them that hang around together and spend time every morning looking for insects or something inside a knot hole in the tree in front of the deck.

The parrot pair with the lower one looking into the tree knot hole.

Don't know the name of this one, but he also hangs out with his buddies around our house.

And of course there are the peacocks, which are plentiful and quite vocal. They have a sound kind of like a baby or cat crying and it still is hard for me to get used to. They wander into the courtyard around 8am, because there is a local woman who leaves food for them.

male peacock in our courtyard

We also have beautiful pilated wood peckers, red and yellow finches,herons, hawks, doves,large black birds and more - I just haven't been in the right place at the right time to capture them.

Well, that's it for now.Keep those notes coming in so we know you still miss us!
j

Cement Arrives!!!!!

Cement delivery by bicycle

Adam sifting sand before mixing.

Cement arrived  this morning! Yeah to the cement Gods! It came by bicycle, I kid you not. One of the wonderful workers at the park pedaled his way to our staging area with three bags of cement, sand, one cement mixing bowl and a bucket of water! Thank you Nek Chand!!!

The cement arrived about 10 am, as promised with one helper to show us how to mix proper cement and grout. Adam, from Britain, has the most professional experience with mosaics, so he is the one to test everything first. We have to sift the sand to get the big pieces out, then mix it proportionately with the cement and then add water.

Our teacher shows us how to apply tiles

Our helper, a wonderful Indian man with the patience of a saint, showed us the consistency and how to apply the tiles. It looks so simple, I know, but if the mix is too wet or too dry, they don't stick to the wall. And the cement is the grout as well so you have to grout and wipe the tiles down as you go. It is very tricky actually.








As for me, I am having more fun posing for pictures for the tourists through the park. Today we roped off our staging area, so they can't actually walk on our tiles anymore, but they do all come up to the rope and ask us where we are from and if they can take pictures. We actually take turns allowing them to take pictures and we talk about the park and why it is so important that we came all the way from around the world to volunteer our time here. Locals are surprised because they don't value the park for art very highly, which was a surprise to those of us who follow folk art environments.


Of course, dog was oblivious to all the action and slept right through the occasion inside the rope of course, next to a pile of broken tiles.

The picture below was taken about an hour after we started and it shows how slow it is to tile on a cement column or any other surface. Remember, Anita and Adam do this professionally for a living!

Adam serious at work!!!

As for me, I'm still collecting tiles. I got up early this morning to go get tiles and bring them to the site. I found some garlands of chrysanthemums left over from a weekend wedding at the park, so I brought them over to decorate our rope that now keeps folks from wandering into our space. 

Anita, from the UK also, is also a mosaic artist and is very serious about her
mosaic tiling.

Our cement mixing station with Adam taking the lead!

Summer is Coming

This is our new staging area where we will be applying mosaics to columns soon we hope! (Front- to- back) Alan, Sue and Adam work in the new staging area. Alan just watches since he fractured his foot in Nepal. He is the filmaker! 

If you watch Game of Thrones, you know the family motto for Winterfell is "Winter is Coming."

This is Adam's design. He is a professional mosaic artist and is the
most diligent of the volunteer group along with Sue and Jody.

Well, here, folks say the hot season is coming. Already, around 4pm, it is 85 degrees Fahrenheit, and it is too hot to  work in the sun. Starting this morning, we all got up around 7am and started early shifts that knock off about noon and pick up in the late afternoon. I am one of the laziest. I start at 7:30am and knock off at noon and don't come back for the rest of the day....hey, I am one of the oldest, or at least that is how I rationalize it!

This is a design by Sue for her column.

I brought mostly winter clothes, and what I did bring for warm weather is way too hot as it is for all the other volunteers as well. So, the women have started to go into town and buy light cotton tunic fabric for about $8 (400 rupees) and have them tailored and sewn for 200 rupees (about $4.50). We are all testing different shops and tailors to make sure this whole tailoring thing works, but so far so good.

This is Sue's other design

We would buy short sleeved or no sleeved tops from the stores, but we are all too big for what they sell on the racks. The average Indian woman is about a size 2. A size 8 is large and a size 10 is XL. They do make an XXL but they look mostly like housecoats! So, we are experimenting with buying special fabrics ready to be made into tunics and having them tailored for our different shapes. More on that as it develops..

This is Jody's design

Our newest volunteer - We call him "dog"  or sometimes
black and white dog, since there are so many that run around the garden.
He likes bacon lettuce and tomato sandwiches as well as fresh peacock meat!

This is my design so far....are you surprised? I decided I was
not making a design until the cement arrived! It is a little
more formed than this now - hopefully I will make some progress
tomorrow morning!

Sorry to tell you but we are still waiting for cement. However, Nek Chand did come visit us at our staging site to see what we were planning in the way of designs for the columns, so this is a good sign. Nothing happens without Nek Chand, so his visit is sending a very strong message.

Last night we drowned our sorrows with cheap local whisky and Gin and tonics at our guest house. Everyone brought their laptops to try and download their e-mails from Sarah's 3G network, but it is just not powerful enough to download our data. It seems we have to go in town to get that done.

So, we wait and we wait.

(L-R) Jody, Nek Chand, Alan and Anita discuss Nek Chand's thoughts on our mosaic and on the timetable for cement.

Well., that's it for today...a little positive reinforcement will go a long way. I think we will break out the Gin and tonic for tonight's dinner with the gross Indian food they give us!!!

j

Cement is Coming

School boys at the park think we are aliens from another planet!

I'll believe it when I see it....they say cement is coming....maybe cement is really the next messiah, and we don't know it yet. Everyday, we talk hours about cement..is it really going to be here? Do they really want us to have it? Maybe it is a political issue and we don't know it. What do we do if there is no cement? etc...etc.

In truth, given every other obstacle we have had to face, why should we expect it to be here?

However, we strategized at dinner night before last and decided to send the two men of the group in to talk to Nek Chand about getting approval to actually begin work on a series of columns we have been eyeing for over a week. To our amazement, it only took us a day to actually get to him, and for the men to get approval to move ahead......that is if we ever see cement.

(L-R) Sue, Adam and me at our three-time daily chai break!

He promised us cement today or tomorrow, which means maybe by the end of the week it will be here. Mind you, we are in our third week already and we have not laid one piece of tile on a wall or column yet!

(L-R) Local chai customer, Sue, park security manager,
Ram Rod and me. Everyday, when we pass Ram Rod, he asks "chai?" and
no matter what we are doing, or how important, we stop and have a cup of
tea with him. We talk to all the locals and spend time shmoozing!

So, in the meantime, we have chai with Raj Ram (I call him RamRod) with the tea walla in front of the park three times a day and we are all helping Alan to begin filming digital video on the volunteer program and the park, which has been fun. We all agree that the materials and information sent to prospective volunteers needs an update and a greater degree of detail, so each group does not have to start from scratch.

No one likes to be left out of pictures. These guys are always at the front
and love to be in our photos or filming!

That's it for today - off to pick tiles, or to pretend like we are actually doing mosaics until the cement arrives...hahaha....

j

Sikh and Ye Shall Find

Sikh Guard at the Golden Temple in Amritsar

How many times, especially in America, have we made assumptions about men with turbans in our communities? Unfortunately, in a back lash of anti-Muslim sentiment following 9-11, we lump anyone looking eastern in dress, or god forbid, with a turban, all into the same category. In ignorance, I have done it. We all have done it as we muddle through the process of learning more about the different sects and their beliefs and integrate people with new thoughts and beliefs into our communities.

So in this journey to northern India, we are located in the state or province of Punjab, of which Chandigarh is its capital. And as it happens, Punjab is where many of the Sikhs live. And the Golden Temple, that we visited this past weekend, in Amritsar, is a pilgrimage and holy site for the Sikhs. So who are the Sikhs exactly and where do they fit into this panoply of eastern religion.

Sikhs studying their holy scriptures

From what I have learned, and  I am no theology expert, they are a pretty cool group, and from those I have spoken with and observed here in Punjab, my respect and admiration is growing.

First of all, Sikhs are not part of the Muslim, Hindu or Buddhist religions. They are a monotheistic religion that believes in one God, just like the Jews and Christians. Their three key beliefs are to believe in one God; live your life with integrity and honesty; and to share your good fortune with those less fortunate than you.

The religion started here in Punjab, but in what is now Pakistan territory (remember it was partitioned in 1947). The doctrine was formed through 10 gurus over the ages, and their teachings comprise their scriptures. The men wear turbans, and the women may or may not wear a face covering. And women are treated as 100 percent equals in the religion, something very rare and refreshing actually.

So that is my primer on the Sikh's - short and sweet.

So with that said, we went to the Golden Temple, which is one of the Sikh's holiest sites. I won't bore you with details about the site, since the pictures say so much more.....

Bird's eye view of mosaic marble floors in courtyards.

Worshippers bathe in the holy water at the site...quite a site to behold!
There is a private bathing house for the women.

A bird's eye view of the Golden Temple which is surrounded by a pool of holy water and then four-sided white marble buildings with coves for various gurus and teachers. Worshippers wait in line for hours to worship inside the temple.

There is a Sikh museum in the complex as well with portraits of all the gurus and martyr pics. These are pictures of dead martyrs which were really gruesome...

That's all for today....more tomorrow...

j