October 21st, 2008

081022 Daily Links (Oct 22, 2008)

October 21st, 2008

081013 India Postcard 14

 <–Previous  –  Next–>

Bodhgaya To Delhi To Dharamsala

Dom and I split off from the group for a couple of days. Instead of another long bus and train ride, we fly from the capital of  Bihar (Patna). We take a Tata driven by the fellow whose nieces I met yesterday. Annand is along for the ride.

Once again, we are in Maoist country. It looks much different from the car than the bus. The houses are close. The wood fires fro breakfast n the grass huts stings the eyes.

We stop for tea at a crossroads. I can terll from the wide eyed look of the people in the “tea house that big white guys with pony tails don’t stop for tea every morning.

It’s a modified grass hut with deep recesses and an open front. There are maybe ten long tables (like the coffe shops in the real Italian partds of north beach. It,s dark back there and staring eyes are peering out.

The flies are thick here. Annand has me sit at the table closest to the road (in case we need to jump in the car). The table is so thick with flies that I wonder if I’ll be able to sit the tea down.

I mimic the sweeping motion that the rest of the men at the tea house (no women seem to be allowed). That keeps me entertained and some of the flies at bay until the tea comes. When it comes, it is served in ceremonial clay tea cups, slightly larger than a shot glass but shaoed like a half sphere.

In the middle east and some of Southern Asia, “tea” is a hot drink made mostly with hot milk and sugar, The tea itself is like the vermouth in a very dry martini, It’s mostly there by reputation.

Three sips of tea, three big smiles of gratitude and five or six slow rolling waves at the flies and were done. It’s clear that Annand accomplished something by making the stop. We tip heavily and get back in the Tata’

From there, it’s relatively uneventful until we get into the taxi at the Delhi airport.

There’s no such thing as a taxi driver who knows his (there are no women) way around Delhi. The typical gambit seems to be … wander around for a while then, blame the customer for not knowing where they are going.

What’s really funny about this round of the taxi game is that the driver started grumbling at us just as we passed the hotel. 

The Palace Heights hotel on Conneaut Square is a very hip little place in a very upper middle classs part of town. Our room is tiny. The bathroom is so small that you have to come out of it to turn around. But, the water’s hot and the tiny beds are firm.  Our luggage takes up all of the available floor space.

After dinner, I make the first phone calls I’ve been able to make since arriving here. Walking the streets with my phone, I notice the dogs working the block.

Like cows, dogs own the streets of India. Rarely kept as house pets, they live on the streets. They’re sort of wild and sort of tame. They seem to belong to the neighborhood.

For a half an hour or so, I watch a pack of twelve dogs negotiate sleeping space and territorial boundaries on the dark side of the street. There’s a white group and a yellow group in the pack. Barks, growls and yelps coupled with firm physical maneuvers shape this nonverbal dialog. I head upstairs when it looks like they might get a little rowdy.

In the morning we head back to the airport for the trip to Dharamsala, 

<–Previous  –  Next–>

October 21st, 2008

081021 Daily Links (Oct 21, 2008)

October 20th, 2008

081012 India Postcard 13

 <–Previous  –  Next–>

Vulture’s Peak

I have started to stop looking for the Kumbaya moment. Let me explain a bit.

I still can’t exactly figure how I got signed up for this adventure. But, from the instant I agreed to go, I began expecting some sort of transformational experience, a Kumbaya moment. It sort of emerged from an empty spot that has something to do with being an empty nester with a new girlfriend and the inflection point of a lifetime.

If you’re old enough, you’ll remember the spark in Davy Jones’ eyes (from the Monkees) as he sang “I Wanna Be Free” (like the bluebird flying by me) while walking in the sand. I don’t know where I found it but it has been growing… the idea that there will be a moment on this trip that should have a mystical Van Morrison soundtrack.

I keep expecting to be awestruck. Instead, I am getting shoved way out of my comfort zone and experiencing a range of things I wouldn’t have exactly volunteered for. There is no magical enlightenment moment for me so far. It’s much more like a thorough beating…more like the Bridge Over the River Kwai than the Philadelphia Folk Festival.

The scene at Vulture’s Peak (VP) is another frame from a Fellini flick. When we park the car, the beggars descend like vultures. We get beyond them to find the same souvenir booths that are at every one of these places. Beads, statues, pictures but no Tee Shirts. (I harbor a secret desire to find a Buddha Tour jacket with the names of all the stops on the back.)

This is when I find out that we’re going to the top of a mountain on a ski lift. I’m in the line before I have a chance to remember my twin phobias…claustro and acro.  And, to get to the rickety chair lift, you have to squeeze through a very complicated set of mechanical devices and bars designed by an Australian penitentiary architect in the late 1800s. Then you get flung into the air on a seat on a rope designed for people half my size.

The safety signs say stuff like “If Intoxication is present, enjoyment of the chairlift will be restricted”. It should read “You’ll know we don’t like you if we let you go on this thing”. But the real choice is go up with the group (and the armed guard we’ve hired) or stay down with the throng.

I do the noble thing and go up.

When you get to the top of the mountain, there is this huge pure white dome, a stupa, with a golden Buddha at each 90 degree point. You hear the wind rustle, a sound like a jazzy snare drum (tchtatchta tchtatchta) and a very low rumbling bass drum beat. It’s the heavenly Buddhist Jazz band waiting for the flute and piano to come in, I think.

The snare drum is teams of workers who are hanging from rope scaffolds and sanding the rainspots off the marble dome. The bass drum is being beat to keep time in meditation at yet another Japanese temple. 

There is no melodic instrument but there are temple monkeys. The cute little things snarl at you and steal food from infants. Weird.

The real adventure begins here. Vulture Peak is the next hilltop over. Rather than going back down the chair lift, we hike into the jungle. This is where the armed guard comes in handy. The bandits (remember, this is still Bihar) love to pick off small groups of pilgrims for sport. So we edge our way up the path.

We take turns sitting in caves that were the homes of big name Buddhists in Buddha’s set. It’s a good way to catch a break from the mid day sun. We wind our way up to the little platform (it might seat 100).

You can feel the dreams, hopes prayers and energy that have accumulated in the spot. It’s the pinacle of an idea and the essence of a spiritual education movement. It was here that Buddha unveiled his doctrine of the selflessness of persons; the idea that the illusion of self causes most suffering.

It’s all downhill from here. We hop into the cars and drive to Nalanda, a great spiritual University around 750 BC’ Famous for its debate style and rigorous discipline, it was home to many scholars including Buddha. I sleep under a tree, much as I did when I went to college in the States.

We return to Bodhgaya for the next stage.

 <–Previous  –  Next–>

October 20th, 2008

081020 Daily Links (Oct 20, 2008)

October 20th, 2008

081014 India Postcard 12

 <–Previous  –  Next–>

On the Way to Vulture’s Peak

The bus is gone. We’ve shifted to three Tatas, the Indian mini Land Rovers. The next places can’t be reached by bus.

Today, we’re headed to Vulture’s Peak (VP) the site of Buddha,s greatest teaching and Nalanda., the site of India’s greatest educational institution. At VP, Buddha delivered a short talk called the “Heart Sutra” thst summarizes the very essence of Buddhism. Nalanda was a sprawling university, 750 years BCE.

Mind you, we’re still in the state of Bihar and the energy outside of Bodhgaya is high. We take the Tatas to a place where the bridge has been broken, veer left and drive across the river bed. Everyone is excited about the prospects of seeing VP.

I get my first real surprise in the Tata. 

As you might guess, I am very interested in the demographics of the place. We are at ground zero for what is left of the population explosion. The area is very rural and very poor. The families are huge.

In this part of the world, female infanticide is a real problem. Even though dowries have been outlawed for some years, the practice of giving away enough to get your daughter a good husband continues. That means that girls are expensive, very expensive and produce nothing but cost for the family. Boys, on the other hand, are obligated to take care of their parents and are therefore revenue positive. They get paid when they get married.

So, through some not so pretty processes, there are many more boys than girls.  This changes, of course, with income and education improvements. There is a direct correlation between shrinking family size and the educational attainment of women. 

To say that men and women have differing experiences of opportunity in rural India is to use the sort of understatement that befits being a guest in someone else’s country.

So, our driver takes an abrupt detour, once we’ve crossed the river and pulls the Tata up in front of his brother’s house.

Next thing I know, I have three beautiful girl children (maybe 3, 5 and 7) sitting in my lap. In an instant, I’m transported to the best parts of fatherhood. As usual, the girls stare at the white giant. With their eyes that wide open, I fall in love with the crystal-blue near indigo that splashes brightly against their brown skin. They are gorgeous.

The trip resumes and we’re headed to VP again.

My experience with those girls reminds me about statistics. While there is real truth in aggregate numbers, each particular case seems to defy the overall summary.  In a world of heavy female infanticide, I found myself with a lap full of baby girls. It’s really hard to generalize without getting into trouble.

  <–Previous  –  Next–>

October 20th, 2008

081013 India Postcard 11

<–Previous  –  Next–>

Bodhgaya 

Another temple town, Bodhgaya is the spot where Buddha reached enlightment. It seems like every nation except Canada and the US have built a presence here.

Were staying at the Kirti Guest House which is somehow affiliated with the Tibetans. Again, the rooms are small. But, the air conditioning works really well; the shower has hot water; there are few bugs and the food in the restaurant is delicious.

Beds in small Indian hotels are worth mentioning. Since I’m easily 2 or three times the size of an average Indian, it’s no surprise that I don’t fit on the short narrow thin mattresses. The nicest thing you can say about them is that they are firm.

In the morning, Bodhgaya smells of human waste and garbage. In the US, you have to work to smell these smells. Without adequate housing and sewage, it’s the way things are in rural India.

It’s a short walk from the hotel to the temple. It’s  a “stupa”, a spire rising 200 odd feet. Set in a garden of stupas, the whole thing seems to sit in an amphitheatre. You walk down maybe 60 steps to get to the ground floor.

There are pilgrims, tourists and monks of every imaginable variety (though we seem to be the only Americans everywhere we go). There’s a flock of Sri Lankans whose bus paced ours through Bihar yesterday. And, there are billions of beggars and street hustlers.

The day is organized to give us the lay of the land. We visit Japanese, Thai and Vietnamese temples. We travel out to the site of an important episode in Buddha’s spiritual development.

Everyone who visits these places has to come to terms with the beggars and the poverty. Although India has produced the kinds of people who can solve really large problems (Ghandi, Nehru, Mother Theresa), the misery is enormous and overwhelming. It’s not possible to provide enough money or food to make a real difference so each traveler comes to their own conclusions.

I try a variety of things.  The easiest method is refusing to acknowledge their existence. The beggars and hustlers have an uncanny knack for getting and keeping your attention. As long as there is some energy (No is just an undeveloped form of Yes), they keep at it. With persistence that makes hard sell salesmen look tame, they hammer away in pursuit of a few rupees.

The problem with refusing to notice people is that it quickly spreads to other areas of your life. I find that I can’t sustain the mindset required to make them go away.

Some of our group take food with them everywhere they go. It’s a call your bluff adaptastion. In response to being asked for food, they give food. This usually infuriates the beggar.

I settle on taking a bag of small coins with me everywhere I go. It’s not enough and the beggars often sneer at the small coins but it keeps my spirit intact.

October 19th, 2008

081012 India Postcard 10

<–Previous  –  Next–>

Kushinigar to Bodhgaya

I bet that hell is really a busride from Kushinigar to Bodhgaya.

The itinerary has the day blocked off for the adventure, a 12 hour bus ride. We get ready to board and gird ourselves for the long journey. The bus is spacious, the driving tem familiar.

We are traveling through the Indian state of Bihar. It’s the third largest state and widely known as the home of Buddhism. It’s extremely ironic that this cradle of pacifism is currently a rough place. 

The population is 85% rural and 60% under twenty five. There is an explosion rumbling through the culture here. You can’t tell the difference between the encroachment of western style marketing and values and the enormous surplus of young people.

It’s the baby boom on steroids. 60% is over 50 Million people under 25. That’s as large as the baby boom in the US. And that’s just in Bihar (less than 1/10th of India’s population)

India is massive. The middle class across the entire country numbers 300 Million. That means that the consumer market in India is larger than the United States. Then, there are the 700 Million in the lower class.

From the bus windows, it seems like they all live in Bihar. The roadsides are crowded with every imaginable form of small commercial/retail venture. There are thatched huts, poured concrete shotgun shacks and lots of smoke. 

We’ve seen plenty of poverty on the trip but here, it’s relentless. Mile after mile, the villages, pressed against the roadside, start to blur together. There’s a Hindu shrine every 100 yards, small shops selling essentials and people everywhere scratching out an existence.

The road is terrible. We are driving down what will be a four lane highway ten years from now. Today, we bounce slowly down one construction project and then switch highway sides to drive down the next segment. It’s grinding.

For the most part, my travel mates endure the torture with grace and humor. It gets a little tense when Annand announces that we’ve entered “Maoist country”. We won’t be slowing down or stopping for several hours. The bandits are dangerous and happy to have a shot at a bus full of rich Americans.

Traffic is snarled for a couple of hours as a conflict in a small town is managed. Apparently, a really good job was open. There was a test for the job. Although the rich family in town thought that their son should have the job, a fellow from a much poorer family scored better on the test. He got the job. The rich family killed him.

The police were managing a very tense mob for several hours as the community protested the killing. We sat in the bus, a half-mile away, waiting for things to calm down. When we finally drove through, the bus was hit with a flurry of sticks and stones.

Later that evening, we entered Bodhgaya. The bus barely fit in the city streets. There was a gridlock traffic jam that came unstuck, one vehicle at a time.

Our trip took 18 hours. Everyone was ready for bed when we got there.

<–Previous  –  Next–>

October 19th, 2008

081011 India Postcard 9

<–Previous  –  Next–>

Vihan Hopping in Kushinigar

Buddhist monks are sweet. In many lands, families work hard to be able to place one of their sons in the monastery at a very early age. The men who emerge from that early training have a remarkable combination of shrewd other worldliness, wisdom and relative freedom from cynicism.

In Kushinigar, where Buddha died, the hotel Nikko is on the street with all of the international vihans (monasteries). There’s Thai, Tibetan, Indochinese, Japanese, Korean, Burmese, Chinese and others. Annan, Arry, Jess, Don and I agree to go to the Thai and Japanese places. 

I am particularly excited by the prospect of visiting the Japanese temple. Since my divorce, I‘ve become a collector of Japanese antiques. It‘s an interest I share with both my girlfriend and my youngest daughter, Kate.

So, of course, we head off to the Thai place first. It’s gorgeous and gaudy like all things Thai. The best part is the sweet young monk who works to cross the language barrier and explain the temple. He leads us through a couple of traditional Thai chants and points with pride to the structure of the altar and the beautiful artwork that graces the place. 

By now, I’m feeling like the Japanese temple will close before I ever get there. As I  pull away to hurry down the road, the young monk offers Jess and Arry the opportunity to see some special sites in the Thai complex.

I’ve been reading about, studying and practicing Japanese forms of Zen for a very long time. 35 years at least. This quirky form of Japanese Buddhism is at the heart of Japanese culture. The most commonly seen toy in the country is a ball shaped image of the man who brought zen and Buddhism to China (Bodhidharma or Dharuma). 

Great Japanese design is asymmetrical and irrational. The core principle, wabi sabi, is an outgrowth of zen. 

There are monkeys in the junkyard across from the Japanese temple here in Kushinigar. They scurry to a safe distance and then watch me jog down the lane.

I spend thirty minutes inside the temple. It’s a simple layout with 10 ten foot tall images of the men (arhats) who surrounded Buddha during his life. They sit on either side of a simple (large) statue.

We have dinner and an early bed. The morning brings a very full day of driving to Bodhgaya, the site of Buddha’s enlightenment.

<–Previous  –  Next–>

October 19th, 2008

081011 India Postcard 8

<–Previous  –  Next–>

Lumbini to Kushinigar

Today is a light travel day. We’ve only got six hours scheduled in the bus.. We’re headed to Kushinigar Buddha was cremated there.

The sixteen of us fit easily into the jitney. It has about 30  seats and an upfront cabin for the driving and logistics team. 

Our driver, who has remained silent ands nameless, has a hard job. Unlike more western streets, the partts of India we are visiting have bus sized potholes every hundred yards or so. You can’t build momentum. The way you drive these roads is to build a strate3gy. Go through the next pothole or go around it. 

Much of the travel has been on what will one day be a four lane highway. The media strip is finished. Some patches are nearly complete on one side of the media or the other. So, the trip involves four wheel drives style maneuvers as we cross back and forth between half-completed stretches of road..

The front cab houses the team behind a class wall. The driver is accompanied by Annan (who I’ve  mentioned before) and this wonderful little guy who is always waiting at a door or the foot of the steps. Together they work at the details on a moment to moment basis.

The members of our tribe include a six person Asian contingent (a couple and a family of four) and:

- Deb, an early fifty-ish psychotherapist. She’s rail thin with shocking blond hair and tends to wear clothing that allows her to keep a lot of her skin very tanned;

- Steve, a retired professor who specialized in helping students with learning disabilities. He’s soft spoken and always able to add kind words to a conversation;

- Laurie, a software QA and project management type from a major bay are utility. She is precise in the articulation of her needs and extremely well prepared. She knows more about Buddhism than anyone else on the adventure.

- Beth a smiling  late forties brunette. She is a charitable powerhouse and works hard on issues like affordable housing for the elderly.

- Neil, Bet’s husband and the owner of an up scale Oakland grocery store. Steve’s experiences as a lieutenant on a navy destroyer shaped much of his adult life. In recent years, Buddhism is becoming his refuge;

- Arry, a vibrant political organizer who keeps saying “I love Obama”. Arry is an artist who has her fingers in the family door and window business.

- Jessica, a former Deadhead who is now an in home care nurse; She laughs really easily and distinctively. If someone in the group gets lost or disoriented, they just have to listen for Jess’ laughter.

- Don, my good friend who is a mid fifty CEO of a small company on the Midwest. 

- Donyo, a mid forties Tibetan monk. He sxudes a sort of gentleess that is contagious. He is leading the tour..

- And me.

We arrive in Kushinigar at mid afternoon. We explore the shrine and check into another “Hotel Nikko”

<–Previous  –  Next–>

« Previous Entries
Next Entries »
  • Bill Vick: Great stuff John, It reminds me of your articles on Route 66. Keep em coming.
  • glarocque: John, do you think we’ll ever reach a point where all or most skilled/knowledge workers have their...
  • internetinc: hello John, coincidentally our Dallas Hispanic and bilingual job fair is just about 30 days after your...
  • Jindrich: I agree with you John. We have all known for years that keyword based searching does not work well in the...
  • jason davis: 2 days running. I’m loving it
  • glarocque: Great analogy. Vision is like a destination, you never anywhere without one. Once you do have one,...
  • talentedapps: Agreed, John. We have to reduce the jargon and simplify the theory. A profile-based approach tries to...
  • lshanon: Hi John. I just want to clarify - I didn’t trash SEO, in fact I advocated for it. My post was about...
  • ckingsbury: Oh, and I _love_ cover letters. I actually read them before reading the resume, and we built our ATS to...
  • ckingsbury: It’s funny. I read what you’re saying, nod my head in agreement, and yet…. I got what...
Stay up-to-date with recruiting news and johnsumser.com:

E-mail:

Name:

Company: