Goodbye and Hello with a Pit toilet cake!

Yep – you read it right – a pit toilet cake. I am finally ending my blog in the best way I know how – with a picture of the cake that my coworkers surprised me with on my first day back at work. And, brilliantly, it looks like a pit toilet! I cant think of a better way to sign off my Jess in India blog. And see below for a few more photos – although none can top this one! Thanks for reading, it’s been fun.


Oh – P.S. In case you don’t realize – India time is almost a whole month behind central standard time. I know this is crazy. Just imagine the jet lag I am feeling! But see this is the explanation for why I am back and you see me here, but there are still blog posts coming up that sound like I am still in India. Just so you aren’t confused.

A few pics to share...

Doing what what we do best...





Some shots of the market in Mysore


Tea pickers in Munnar


Holy monkeys in Mysore


Construction in Udaipur

Eat Eat Love

This should be the title of my blog. Elizabeth whatever went to India for spiritual enlightenment and to Italy to eat. After India, I am certainly in good spirits but definitely not any lighter.

My whole time in India I had only one meal that I did not absolutely love. So I ate and ate as if I were training for something. The all you can eat thalis (for a dollar) used to lay me up for the rest of the day. But by the end of my trip I could eat such a large amount of food that I thought I would have to roll myself home but then I would feel fine. On the way to India I thought Air India fed us way too much all the time food nonstop it was ridiculous. On the way home I could not get from breakfast to lunch without feeling like I was starving! I was peering up and down the isles thinking where is the food cart they can’t possibly not realize that it has been four (four!) hours since our last meal!

So I ate and ate and my belly grew and grew, and I cut my hair shorter and shorter. And then I broke down and bought yoga bloomers which look like diapers. Is this image making you think of Buddha?! ME TOO! Maybe I was eating my way to enlightenment!

So I ate and ate and loved it. And I ended my stay here with another love – eve. For our tenth anniversary I planned this Indian vacation to be the vacation of our lives. I planned and planned and splurged on a few things because heck – 10 years! I wanted it to be special. As I planned and planned (which was dumb because I knew nothing would be as planned anyway) and spent our money, I couldn’t help it – I let eve on my secret – our tenth anniversary trip. And you’ll never believe what she said. She said “Uh – okay - but it’s our 9 year anniversary you know.”

Shitiot! Well – we still had the vacation of our lives, a celebration of India, food, and love. I might be a little closer to enlightenment since I look like a Buddha and next year for the real ten years – well, there’s always Italy!

No Problem.

As ubiquitous as the head waggle is the phrase “no problem”. Often the two go together. Well, everything goes with a head wobble really. No problem – is as necessary and as useful and as frustrating for the newbie in India as the head waggle. Learning the head waggle and learning to use “no problem” makes it much easier to be understood and to put people at ease – they realize you are not a complete freak – you speak a little bit of their language. I quickly learned to phrase questions with no problem. As in – we are on a mountain trek that was supposed to end at four, but it is four and we have no water and we are still on top of a mountain in the middle of no where. This is where we say to our guides ‘We need to be back at four.’ Blank stare. “Can we be back at four?” No answer. One more time ‘We need to be back at four – no problem?’. OHHHhhhhhhh “No problem no problem!’ smile smile smile. Everyone, including us, is suddenly smiley and happy. Which is funny. Because it is four and we are on a mountain with no water.

This is a perfect use of ‘no problem’. Because similar to the head waggle, it can mean just about anything. As I think I have mentioned – the head wobble can mean yes, no, maybe, I don’t know, I hear you, I see you, Im tired of looking at you, I wish you would go away, you’re weird, I want to pick my nose… Similarly ‘no problem’ has many uses. It can mean ‘oh you need to be back at four? Well it is four, and we are in the middle of f’ing nowhere and there is no waaaay you are going to be back at four because it is four duh. But this isn’t really a problem!’ It can mean no problem as in ‘yes you will have your laundry back before you leave in the morning’ or it can mean no problem as in ‘if you don’t have your laundry back before leaving we will deal with it then and im sure there is some small Indian boy who is actually 24 years old that can run off somewhere to retrieve it, and if not then I think maybe my cousin’s cousin’s boyfriend is driving to your next city 5 hours away anyway and could bring it back to you there, and if not then it isn’t really a problem if you don’t get it back because you people have so many clothes anyway!’

I think it is related to another common phrase I heard a lot in India “Same same, but different”. As in “Do you have these red bangles in a larger size?” Bangles seller “no problem, no problem” and brings out orange bangles. “No – the RED bangles”. Bangles seller waggling his head ‘Same same’. Us – “no not same, different –these are orange, those are red. Bangles seller “Same same but different!’ head wobble, head wobble. This concept I think is a bit like the concept of the multiple meanings of no problem – it’s like no problem has many meanings – that are same same, but different.

Trying to figure out which no problem they mean can be amusing. “No problem I will have my laundry back before I leave?’ “No problem madam, no problem” head waggle head waggle, smile smile. You just cant help but smile and waggle back. And really, in the end not much is a problem anyway if us westerners could just be a little less uptight. I mean really, isn’t red practically the same as orange anyhow, and how important is water or clean underwear anyway in the grand scheme of things?

Another Face Pack

There were some things I knew eve just had to experience while in India. One was an ayurvedic massage. So while in Fort Cochin I scheduled her a full body massage at a recommended ayurvedic clinic. She was excited. Afterwards she was in such an altered state she had to take a walk by herself. I will leave eve’s story for her to tell you – and do make her tell – it is most hilarious.
While eve was having her massage I figured id get another face pack and head and shoulders massage. It had been long enough since my first one that I had started reminiscing about someone rubbing my head with such ferocity that half of my hair falls out during the process (it really does). And I guess I just didn’t feel up for the full body massage that day. (eve’s story will enlighten you as to how someone could not be “up for” a massage.)
But the women who were my massagers didn’t understand this, and weren’t having it. All communication is once again in charades as we did not share a language. Apparently the guys downstairs who I spoke English with about what I wanted didn’t talk with these women. They kept motioning to my whole body, to take off my clothes and I kept motioning to just my head and neck and face and that’s all. For some reason the only way I could think to charade this was to make the cutting off my head motion. You know – stop after my neck. It didn’t work that well. After multiple attempts to communicate to one another, these sweet women just got tired of it and took my shirt off for me. They were gentle but firm and there was no way to resist these women from busily yanking off my clothes. I thought this was particularly funny since at my last facial they wouldn’t let me take off my shirt. They kept trying for my pants but I won on this one. I just wasn’t having it. I wanted it my way. I got this way at the end of my stay – I just wanted sometimes to have something the way I wanted. Even if they thought this was dumb.

They were the most caring and tender women ever. Between the two of them my face pack turned into a full body massage through my pants, and they would take turns with one massaging while the other smacked mosquitos off of me. The room had an open window through which I could hear some guy chanting in the courtyard. Sometimes when I opened my eyes the older woman would have her face 1 inch away from mine staring intently into my face. This was disconcerting and provoked multiple laughing fits. She just wanted to make sure everything was ‘okay’ but it is really funny to have a stranger do this. And like how you cant stop looking at something you don’t want to look at – I just couldn’t help myself from opening my eyes to see her staring at me from one inch away and would start laughing all over again.

At the end of my massage I decided I wanted to shower at our homestay one block away rather than at the clinic. This is very logical because that’s where my clean clothes were. This was the MOST illogical thing to them EVER. But again – I was feeling stubborn that day and wanted to just have this one thing MY WAY.

So again the charades started. Me uselessly talking away, her pulling on my pants - again. This went on for quite awhile. I started laughing. Because remember I am topless, I have dried mud all over my face, and I am in a bathroom with a very old Indian woman in a beautiful purple sari who is trying to pull my pants off – AGAIN!
I won.
Well, kind of. I didn’t shower. She showered me. With my pants on.

I think finally she decided I was a little slow and took my upper body and grabbed my head and put it under the shower and with her other hand rinsed my face. This took awhile because the mud gets everywhere. A few times I tried to take over but she had had enough. She clucked away at me and kept rinsing me like I was a small child. Then she toweled me off and still clucking led me back to the massage room. Where her massaging partner looked at me and they clucked together with lots of waving and shaking of the head. The other woman was obviously also very unhappy about the fact that I had not showered. She went and got another towel and grabbed my head, put it in her space and began to rub it ferociously. I just let her have it. My head I mean. Then she showed me the towel with all the mud stains on it clucking and shaking her head. I just looked at her, feeling a little woozy but somehow very cared for, and smiled.

Then as eve went off on her solitary walk to digest her massage experience (im telling you – ask her about it!) I went back to our little homestay to shower. Hah!

When I got to our homestay – lulu the homestay owner, who was more like our fort cochin mother, asked about our day. When I told her I had just had a massage and nonchalantly mentioned that I had just come home to shower she stopped in her tracks. She turned and seemingly shocked said ‘You did not shower there?!’

I couldn’t believe this. It was like I never learned and I would never hear the end of me not showering at the clinic. I ended up just walking away and went up to my room to shower in peace. Sometimes you just have to assert yourself and fight for your independence. And sometimes this just ends up being way, WAY more work than it’s worth.