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Free hugs in Palermo

When I visiting India several months ago, one of the fun things I got to see and do was meet this talented potter at his home.  Watching him throw pots on his simple but more than adequate potter’s wheel made all my attempts to throw a pot seem ridiculous!  But, I would expect that.  I’m just an amateur.  This man is the real thing.

Below is a rack of small cups the potter had thrown the day of my visit. You can see that the little clay cups are still wet. Once they are dry, they will be fired in the kiln.

Here are a group of similar cups in the kiln after firing.

Here is another batch of the cups after they’ve been removed from the kiln.

Each of these cups will be used for a serving of chai, as here

and, after one use, they will be discarded or even smashed.  That is the traditional Indian custom.  You could call this the original disposal vessel, way before the cardboard cups used at Starbuck’s today.

and then….

when you drink tea as much as I do, you start to wonder…

Which came first? the Brits in India or tea in India?

I used to think that tea drinking was introduced to the British when they arrived in India. I mean, for goodness sake, India produces a lot of the world’s tea, so I just made the assumption.

Boy, was I ever wrong!  In fact, it was exactly the reverse: the British brought the tea drinking habit to India.  Check this info from Wiki out:

Commercial production of tea in India began after the conquest of large areas by the British East India Company at which point large tracts of land were converted for mass tea production. The widespread popularity of tea as a recreational drink began in earnest in the 1950s, after a successful advertising campaign.

Amazing!

More info from Wiki:

Today, India is one of the largest tea producers in the world, although over 70 per cent of its tea is consumed within India itself. A number of renowned teas, such as Assam and Darjeeling, also grow exclusively in India.

The Indian tea industry has grown to own many global tea brands and has evolved into one of the most technologically equipped tea industries in the world.

Well, from what I saw in India, the country is almost unimaginable without tea!  Check out these images.

I rest my case!

Are you getting thirsty?  I gotta go get a chai.

I mentioned in my post on Andy Warhol that I am a very skilled stalker.

Well, in case you don’t believe me, let me show you some proof.

So, I’m in India, admiring an incredibly beautiful, incredibly important architectural monument.  Only this lovely Indian couple captures my eye.  Suddenly, for me, everything drops away except for the couple.  I want to know them.  I can’t do that, but I want to watch them.  To understand them in some small way.  So, I keep them in my vision.  Luckily, this time I have my camera at the ready!  Too often I don’t!

And then, as if they knew what I wanted them to do, they stopped.  They had some sort of a heart-to-heart talk.  It looks like he is trying to explain something, for look at how his hand is held in that universal gesture of “you see what I mean?” or “what I mean is this”.  Who knows, maybe he was just talking about what he had for breakfast.  But, I doubt it.

I was thrilled.  This gave me the chance to look them over more carefully to see  what clues I could find about their lives and drama.  He is Sikh, which is obvious by his headwear.  I believe they were recently married for she is wearing henna tattoos on her hands.  I believe he is laying something out for her to examine.  Had they had a misunderstanding?  They were certainly engaged in a deep conversation.

What is her look saying to him?  To me, it says, “you better watch yourself, new husband of mine, for I have all the options in the world and if you don’t behave properly in our new marriage, you’re gonna be sorry.”  I project.

 

 

I had taken too much of a chance to get any closer or photograph them as they stood talking.  A stalker has to be careful to not overstep. They seemed to know that and turned and walked off toward the monument we were all there to admire.

Check out this great new release.

God Only Knows

Yes, this is India.  The grounds of one of the many luxurious hotels I had the privlege to stay in.  The places for the “haves.”

And, this is also India.  Traffic on a modern highway comes to a complete stop because a herdsman is herding his camels down the road.  In scoots a Muslim (the woman wears the hijab) family of 3 on a motor scooter.  This captures the real India. The everyday India.  Both the family on a scooter and the herdsman represent what could be called “the middle class.”  What I mean is this:  if India had a middle class, which it doesn’t, it would have to be comprised of people who own something.  A herd of camels have a lot of value.  A scooter has value.  That means the owners of these two commodities are not beggars and presumably do not live in a slum.

And here we have another beautiful moment of India.

And yet another view of the same beautiful moment.

And, yet, this is also India.  The real India.  The everyday India of the majority of the people.  The “have nots.”  India will break your heart if you let it.  I let it.

My beloved sister-in-law, Melinda Kay Grimes, lost her battle with cancer and left us.  I knew Melinda from the time I was about 4 years old.  She is as much a part of me as any other person I have ever loved.  More so really, for we shared so much in our respective love of the arts.  We both loved ballet and loved taking classes in any kind of dance.  She once told me she loved that feeling you get in your leg muscles the day after class, for the soreness meant you were working hard and developing tone and skill.  I didn’t agree, because I don’t like the soreness.  But, whenever I have a sore muscle from dancing, I think of Melinda. But we loved all of the fine arts: music, horticulture, geology, painting, theater.  You name it, we both loved it.

Melinda married my brother Richard Jones in 1963 and I was their 10 year-old-flower girl at the old Episcopal Church on Capitol Avenue in Pierre, SD.  Here is my happy family on that fantastic August Saturday afternoon.  I was too shy to drop many petals down the aisle, but we redid it after everybody left the church and had a lot of laughs.

I’ll miss you every day for the rest of my life, Melinda.  I shall never forget you. How could I?  I adored you and you are part of me. It was my privilege to know you for 55 years and to call you sister. Love. Thank you for letting me be your flower girl.  It was the highlight of my childhood.