In a bright and airy first-floor apartment, in the Sanjaynagar locality of Bangalore, listening to the early morning traffic and the scratch of my sister's pen on paper in the room next to me, recuperating from a long, surprising day On the Town, meeting and spending time with friends of friends and defying sleep at 7 AM. Trying to configure words to put a shape to how I got here, where I've come from, and what it was like along the way.
I've traveled some 1,700 since my last post, and have another 300 or so before I sling down my pack for more than 24 hours. From Sangatya in Udupi region to Mangalore, to Bangalore on an overnight train; to Zahirabad on another overnighter. I spent two weeks with Usha on her little homestead outside Machnoor village in Andhra Pradesh and all too quickly had to leave again with hardly a chance to consider how much I'll miss her. My time there warrants far more energy than I have for it now; I'll have to devote some words to it later. Back to Bangalore on the same train, going the opposite direction, with the purpose of meeting Dove at the airport and getting a jump start on our month together roaming the mighty India. Thanks to the great kindness of Usha, who put me in touch with her friend Shailaja and her niece Anupuma, and the generosity of Anupuma herself, who left town for a holiday in Goa but left the key to her apartment in my care (after knowing me for, you know, an hour or so. We call that Trust and I dig it.)--Dove and I have had a safe, comfortable place to spend the wee hours of the morning sipping tea and chatting away, catching up on a long separation and playing show-n-tell with the contents of our backpacks. I guess I'm through being amazed; somehow it doesn't seem strange at all for her to be here, suddenly a part of this edge of my life that has until now been foreign and estranged from the rest. Maybe it's the sleepless night talking, but it seems natural. I'm happy to see her, happy to have this time together. Pleased as punch that she's in my life.
Today we'll roam Bangalore lazily and hop on a train to Mangalore in the evening. By lunchtime tomorrow we'll be back at Shreekumar's little tropical paradise, ready to throw off our packs, put on our work clothes, and dig in.
