monkeys in mumbai

temple trees

2005-07-04T23:17:00.000-07:00

temple trees, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

the cuttings we took from the vineyard temple tree are fully rooted with big beautiful leaves and one amazing flower. it's our little bit of india growing in our kitchen.

car

2005-07-02T18:08:00.000-07:00

car, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

i actually took this with my Ptown motorhead friends in mind... the only people outside of india i've met who might actually build something like this...

next to the taj

2005-07-02T18:07:00.000-07:00

next to the taj, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

red sandstone mosque next to taj mahal

taj

2005-06-28T19:31:00.000-07:00

taj, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

our first view of the taj mahal, blurry but i like the setting including the surreality of the hot air balloon being inflated off to the left.

desert

2005-06-28T19:30:00.000-07:00

desert, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

when you wake up in the desert the minah birds have been eating bugs off your camel all night and there are tiny tracks in the sand and in their fur and little poops down their sides. when you stop for lunch and a herd of goats pass through and add their dung to your camels, little birds and chipmunks come out of seemingly dead and dusty bushes to fight over each little poo ball and scuttle back into the brush with it.

street life

2005-06-28T19:27:00.000-07:00

street, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

we didnt take and post enough pictures of regular street life though it was what we were surrounded by and affected by so often. it turns into one of those almost quantum physics situations, though, and maybe the hardest part of being in india for so long for me, personally. the act of being there and observing your surroundings changes them. being white stands out so much that it disrupts the stream of life around you. i'm not a journalist and am uncomfortable with taking someones picture without their permission for the most part. here's one, though, taken from a bus window, i think, in rajasthan. pretty typical little street scene.

mr peanut gets a hug

2005-06-28T19:00:00.000-07:00

mr peanut gets a hug, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

and this, being hugged by a very nice musician friend of rohan's, is mr. peanut. mr peanut is one of the unofficial winery dogs. he's not fed by the bungalow staff, though he might be by the workmen in shacks out back. he shows up, generally at night, and runs with the officially sanctioned puppies and dogs through the fields after helping himself to whatever is left in their bowls (if theres no one there to chase him off.) rajeev does not approve of mr peanut and swats him off the comfy chairs on the patio he likes to sneak up and nap on. i think rajeev thought that andy and i (ok, i) fed mr peanut and encouraged him hanging around, but i swear it's not so. he looked healthy enough that i could resist feeding him, but he had such a great personality that neither of us could resist playing with him. we'd go for an evening walk and there'd be a rustle and flash of ginger fur in the vineyards and hurray, mr peanut would join us for our stroll, always polite and gentlemanly as a funny little stray dog could be. the night of the opening party, or rather the next morning before dark as the party stretched out, someone left the downstairs lobby door open and in ran mr peanut to join the festivities. he danced with guests, politely had a cracker or two when it was offered, charmed the hell out of everyone (except for rajeev, who just shook his head low in resignation and admitted temporary defeat to 'that little doggy') and made his guest appearance before disappearing into the night.

scooterpigs

2005-06-28T18:50:00.000-07:00

scooterpigs, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

i didn't add a counter to this site until we got back - our connection speed was so bad we just got our business done, tried to keep this updated and reread emails from home 5 or 10 times each... i'm pretty suprised to find so many hits when we've been back so long and never even added most of our final stories and pics. so... i'm adding some here and there now that we're readjusted (mostly) to our lives in SF. it's almost easy to feel as though India was a dream though i know that we're both changed by our trip.
this picture was taken in Bundi. every day we'd leave our hotel and step around a pile of little piggies and puppies napping together, playing, snuffling, and drinking the incredibly foul black water constantly running through the ditch. they get much bigger and less pretty - grown up they are astoundingly ugly, all coarse black hair and jutting hipbones, generally missing an ear and eating garbage or highly suspicious piles from the pavement. supposedly their ears are clipped to varying degrees by the very low caste people who claim them as their own to identify them. in another town a hotelier with a powerful voice and personality told us that their meals were vegetarian but if we asked ahead of time he'd have his cooks prepare us chicken if we wanted. we said that vegetarian was fine but he kept insisting, sure that americans needed meat and even offered pork. it was late and we'd been on trains for hours and i didn't really think when i said something, trying to reassure him lightheartedly that we were fine without meat, about having seen some pigs out on the street that i'd prefer not to eat anyway. i honestly was just trying to joke our way out of the conversation and into our beds and was so sorry when, offended, he drew himself up and responded that those street pigs were not for eating, that indians ate 'pretty pink shiny pigs just like americans.' i felt pretty bad about that until later when i realized that other indians had told me that they WERE eaten - and anyway, i'm pretty sure most of the pigs i've seen in america aren't exactly pink and shiny, either. oh well.

whatdoesitsay??!!

2005-06-28T09:57:00.000-07:00

whatdoesitsay??!!, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

found on the ground in an abandoned fort in Bundi, my favorite town on our travels

oh

2005-06-22T19:59:00.000-07:00

i miss rohan. and raja. and dylan. and parrots on bamboo scaffolding. and pariah dogs on every corner.

buzzard

2005-06-13T18:35:00.000-07:00

buzzard, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

desert life is harsh.

camel

2005-06-13T18:34:00.001-07:00

camel, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

i think andy rode this one

palace critter

2005-06-13T18:34:00.000-07:00

critter, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

can anyone tell me who this creature is? i know there must be a story....

pretty

2005-03-30T14:34:00.000-08:00

pretty, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

andy and laurel indian wine party style

bar shot

2005-03-30T14:33:00.000-08:00

scene, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

top of the bar, hanging double bottle lights, bottle projection wall, and balcony view

wall

2005-03-30T14:32:00.000-08:00

wall, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

this wall has one side with clear glass facing in for wine bottle display and one side with sand blasted glass and lights for a nice fuzzy projection effect. that works both ways so that you see the same effect from the lobby below. the floor is blue epoxy. to the left in this photo is the glass display area and entrance, to the right is the glass mosaic bar and exit to the balcony. there are large viewing windows where you can see the bottling room at work, but you cant see them in this shot.

crystal palace

2005-03-30T14:21:00.000-08:00

glass, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

here's the display area, made of glass to reduce claustrophobia in a small space and, oh yeah, cuz it's pretty and sparkles

bar full o' people

2005-03-30T14:19:00.000-08:00

barfull, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

we finally get to see it in action

final touches

2005-03-30T14:18:00.000-08:00

final touches, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

there are more pics and adventures to share without respect to actual timelines, but for now we're moving on to heading back to maharashtra to put some final touches on the tasting room for our opening party. here priya (one of our favorite indian friends) and i clean the bottle lamps above the bar.

lengur lounging

2005-03-30T14:15:00.000-08:00

lengur, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

the red faced macaques are pretty freaky, little mean sharp toothed drunks looking for a beer brawl, but the black faced lengurs are mostly chill (unless you have something they really want). Hanuman, the monkey king, is supposed to be a lengur.

kid and kid

2005-03-30T14:13:00.000-08:00

kids, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

he was snuggling and petting on his goat as i walked by so i asked him and his mom (?) sitting nearby if he'd like to have his picture taken. he really wanted the goat to look at the camera when i took it and then for it to see the little digital image when i showed it to him.

painting detail

2005-03-30T14:10:00.000-08:00

painting, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

i love the detail of the foliage. the palaces used to be covered with painting like this but most of it has worn away...there are a few spots that give a glimpse of how bright and vibrant they must have been.

boatbuilders

2005-03-30T14:05:00.000-08:00

boatbuilders, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

these guys were very proud, and rightfully so as you can see, of the boat they were building out of popsicle sticks, complete with powered lights and little characters having tea parties on deck.

lady of the sands

2005-03-30T14:03:00.000-08:00

desertho, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

we stayed one night near this womans house in the desert where she lived with a man, a toddler and a baby, a few dogs, and a few dozen goats and sheep. she came and sat by the campfire with us for the evening and was very entertained by staring at me and laughing (what can i say? i'm pretty damn funny sometimes). her little hut (with no electricity, of course) is surrounded by giant high tech windmills that our driver said power the border between them and pakistan. the land right around there is covered with ancient coral and sea life fossils. very surreal in the desert.

boys in camel drivers village

2005-03-30T13:57:00.000-08:00

puppeez, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

the boys showed us their very new puppies and offered to let me take one (so i'd have something to play with while sitting on a camel for the next 4 days?)

girls in camel drivers village

2005-03-30T13:56:00.000-08:00

girls, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

we got to hang out in our camel driver's village for a while with all the kids and have lunch with his family before setting out. this pic was taken while the girls were still warming up to us (the boys are bolder) - later the girls showed us how to play a game involving a stack of rocks and a ball made out of tied up plastic bags. we weren't very good at it.

roomofmonkeez

2005-03-30T13:52:00.000-08:00

roomofmonkeez, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

the whole palace was filled with bats, lengurs, and macaques

bundi

2005-03-30T13:49:00.000-08:00

bundi, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

and here's a view of the palace from the rooftop of our hotel )the lower left area is home to some 'bad monkeys much biting danger!' the little local boys who adopted us warned us about.
we ran into some pretty scary macaques that wouldn't let us pass and made little angry drunk faces at us if we got too close.

bundi st

2005-03-30T13:47:00.000-08:00

bundist, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

finally! some travel photos. here's a street in bundi, our favorite town

homehome

2005-02-28T08:36:00.000-08:00

2 things in this post.
#1 - we are BACK, unpacking and readjusting in SF.... but we will be posting some more pics and stories so don't give up now if you're still interested. the last few weeks were so busy and all of our pics are temporarily stuck on andy's ipod, but there's plenty of travel stuff and, of course, the opening party for the tastingroom to share.
#2 - i wanted to explain why i posted that last post even though it disturbed some people. india is very very different from the united states in so many ways i couldn't even have foreseen and won't claim to entirely comprehend. i know that everyone's experience there as a traveler is different depending on their own backgrounds, where they travel and who they meet, etc... it's huge and made up of a fascinatingly cohesive patchwork of different religions, geography, tribes, languages... (i would never recommend mumbai to my mom, for instance, but know that she'd enjoy the wildlife parks and temples in rajasthan). we had a great time and learned and saw so much but it wasn't always easy or nice and i felt like it was important in sharing our experience on this blog to not just talk about the beautiful colors and gentle people. this trip was a huge impact on my life for which i'm very grateful and hope i came out a slightly more conscious world citizen at the end. the colors ARE beautiful - men and women love to wear hot pink and bright orange or peacock blue, whole cities are painted pink or blue, hibiscus grow as big as plates, green parrots flit everywhere...and poverty that seems shocking at first reveals a strength of dignity and enjoyment of life and family thats really very inspirational and comforting and gives me, personally, more hope for humanity. part of our experience there, though, involved learning how we reacted to so many new things we hadn't seen before (especially me) whether it's villages of kids who all want to play with you or seeing elephants and camels on the streets or lepers begging or small children sleeping on the floor of the train station in a pile of stray dogs or accidents and deaths and the very un-western reactions others have to them. it's quite a strange, deep adjustment having come from a culture that is based on the importance of the individual as opposed to the larger community. so... that's why i posted something unpleasant like that, if that makes any sense.

this one is upsetting. don't read it if you're easily upset

2005-02-16T05:49:00.000-08:00

life is cheap and we are sad soft westerners
i know that people will ask how our trip was and what we thought of india when we get home and i just don't know what i'll say.... it's such a huge experience on so many levels that it may not be possible to convey hardly a fraction of what it's been. we had a big shock of the reality of the everyday dangers and cheapness of life here this week and i'm sharing it here as a part of our overall experience with india but it's not a nice one.
we had just gotten off a train in bharatpur and were standing on the platform with our bags, fending off a few hopeful porters and sorting out how to get to our hotel. the train started up again and began moving along slowly. when the 3rd class compartments rolled by i commented to maurice, a friend who arrived in india 2 weeks ago and is traveling with us, to look and see how packed they are - so full that people hang out the windows and doors and luggage is held over heads. one car went by with about 6 guys holding onto each other on the doorway, none with more than a toe and hand hold on the car, and just as i said that alot of people die that way (or so we've read but never seen til now),the one on the outside (maybe 20 years old) fell maybe 30 feet from us and there was a terrible series of events where he hit the ground and his legs got caught between the train and the platform but pulled loose and he turned to face us and maybe get up on his hands but then got caught between 2 cars and crushed in the middle and then snapped down between the car and the wall and dragged off a hundred feet or so where the train finally stopped just long enough to free his body and then kept going. the whole time we watched but were helpless to do anything and it was terrible to see his face that second before he got pulled in for good and just became a lifeless body. there was a moment i thought that we could help with first aid but it was just too fast and horrible and then over. this is a common occurance here - few other people reacted much, we walked off shaking and pale, almost sick, while most everyone else continued chatting and smiling, a few looking over the edge at his remains, officials making their way over but not running. as soon as we passed his body a beggar woman holding a grubby naked baby sent her older child crawling up to us on one leg and one knee length stump to hang on to my sleeve and grin and beg as we stumbled past. another beggar woman squatted gazing down at what was left of the boy who'd fallen and i felt a touch of anger cut through the shock and horror that this mom didnt get her child a cane or at least a stick so that he or she (i couldn't tell) could walk upright instead of scraping their stump along in a perpetual groveling half squat, that there seemed to be no dignity allowed in life or death and this boy wouldn't even make the local paper because, as our hotel owner told us later, even in a fairly small town such as this these things happen every day.
i don't really know what else to say about this.

the work of goblins rather than of men

2005-02-14T23:17:00.009-08:00

" ... from whichever side you approach it Boondi Palace is perhaps the most striking in India . . . . even in broad daylight, is such a Palace as men build for themselves in uneasy dreams - the work of Goblins rather than of men" --- rudyard kipling.
that's what sparked us to go to bundi, which is not a big tourist destination at this point. rajasthan seems much friendlier than mumbai altogether, but bundi had the most people saying hi and chatting with us without trying to sell us anything of any place so far. and it's beautiful. it's in a valley with stone walls and lookout towers built on the surrounding hills, the bottomland has a lake, hundreds of brahmin-blue houses ans havelis, winding streets filled with cows and dogs and pigs and overall quite friendly people and bicycles and marching bands (always marching bands, everywhere we go, it's wedding season)..... there's a huge fort and palace built and added onto by successive maharajas until it became an mc escher dream of winding stairways and hallways leading to places you don't expect and other spots you can see from lookouts and rooftops but can never seem to get to. it's been mostly abandoned to bats and monkeys and a just a few tourists a day - the only staff that seems to manage it is a cured leper with no fingers who takes your ticket and a few men with sticks who chase the mokeys out of the parts that are maintained (a garden courtyard and 2 rooms that retain the original wall paintings in pretty good condition).... so you can wander in it for hours and see no one but the monkeys, jumping over holes through a few floors, wading through several feet of reeking bat and monkey poo, peeking through falling down doors to see if that stairway goes anywhere or that if that room has another entrance that leads to the next adventure... the black faced lengur monkeys sit and watched us, holding their toes, but the red faced (and red bootied) rhesus macaques are pretty mean and we ended up carrying sticks some of the way to make them let us pass. very indiana jones, very cool, very recommended.
and! our friend maurice from chicago joined us here to share and add extra spark to some adventures

oh yeah

2005-02-05T05:47:00.000-08:00

we don't have our computers along so all the cool pics of rajasthan will have to follow in 2 weeks.

on camels and wind.....

2005-02-05T05:15:00.000-08:00

camels fart. alot. quite stinky, really. sometimes their tails stand out straight behind them and kind of flap in the wind when they fart. they walk single file so the person behind them is not spared the full effect of this. they also make deep loud strange chewbacca noises and blow raspberries and spit up white and green froth, especially when they're flirting. nonetheless i like them. so do lots of birds that like to climb on them and eat their bugs, dung beetles that come out at night and roll away their poops, and more little birds and chipmunks that scurry out of sparse desert chapparal to steal more poops and run back into the bushes with it. in the morning, on a desert safari, as a man in a turban and handsome white mustache makes some tea to share with you, you can admire all the tracks in the sand of the various creatures that visited you and your camels overnight. there are also tracks and bird poo all over your camel. then, after some eggs or porridge and reloading of blankets, camel food, saddles, etc., you climb back on (ignoring the bruised spots from the day before), the camel stands up (and up and up, they're really big), and you ride off across the desert in a motion not unlike a slow motion mechanical bull. you sit and rock and drink water and pull your scarf across your face to block the sun and watch birds and goats and other camels sometimes, or rocks and sand and scrub other times, or silently in your head prove and disprove the existence of god and souls other times, question your culture and your response to other cultures and then decide that you're thinking too much, wonder about the shapes and colors of the rocks beneath the camels big strangely spongy paddle feet..... i'm pretty sure we went through a broken coral garden with fossilized shellfish at one point...... sometimes you go through a village and play with the kids and admire the puppies and baby goats they show you.... sometimes you stop and sit and chat or be silent with the camel driver......
all in all it's pretty cool. then you come back to the smallish town you left from 4 days earlier and it seems loud and busy even though you've been living in one of the most crowded and noisy cities in the world up 'til last week, and you realize how your pace has slowed with the slow camels and quiet, smiling driver (you don't usually think much about the existence of souls, for instance) and you feel grateful and happy that you went on your desert safari and cleansed a bit of your inner space of mumbai madness but your butt hurts and you smell worse than the camels and you go to a hotel for a shower and move on to the next adventure.

fireworks and solid gold dancers and palaces, oh my

2005-01-31T04:38:00.000-08:00

we've been priviledged to tag along with an indian wedding party for a few days in udaipur. wow. there is no party like an indian wedding. they held a party last night in palace grounds for a few hundred folks that included not only tons of great food, gorgeous clothes, djs, flower petal decorated footpaths, a few live bands and singers and a dance troup with several changes of sparkly outfits, but the soon to be wed couples entrance was announced with a full fireworks show. not just sparklers, mind you, but at least the equivalent of a mid-sized town 4th of july celebration. udaipur has been a great experience with several moments of extreme beauty and travel-mystery. one of those was watching the fireworks overhead exploding above the palace walls while the bats went crazy and flickered and swooped against the sky. another was walking across a dry lake bed today, surrounded by palaces in the near distance, camels in crazy outfits walking by with striking men in long coats and orange turbans, water buffalo tended by tiny old women in white and young women in bright pink s, greens, and blues with baskets of cow dung on their heads, and listening to the rythmic broadcasting of the muslim prayers roll across the landscape. very very cool. tonight we get on a 12 - 16 hour bus journey to jaiselmer where we hope to do a little camel safari......

plans plans plans

2005-01-29T08:56:00.000-08:00

so we're off tomorrow early morning for rajasthan, we get back the day before the tastingroom opening party, then 3 days in mumbai and we come home. where did time go? why didnt i learn hindi and take yoga? how will i ever describe the immense emotional, visual, emotional, world shaking, auditory, humongous experience this all has been to people who ask politely at parties?
we'll be home (though, personally, i'll have lived longer in india than in SF) on feb 24th. we have an art show in mid march to prep for so will be pretty distracted for the first 3 weeks but then y'all gots to come help us readjust. and you must cook delicious food for us because we are thin now. we'll post rajasthan pics (camel safari! tigers! mustaches!) asap when we get back to mumbai but won't have a lot of internet access between now and then. stay tuned......

bar from deck

2005-01-29T07:25:00.000-08:00

bar from deck, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

Zoiks. It's almost finished. Here are a bunch of photos of the tasting room, reasonably complete, but still very dusty.

You should come and see it. Really.

view from behind bar

2005-01-29T07:21:00.000-08:00

behind bar, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

glowy bottle wall in progress

2005-01-29T07:20:00.000-08:00

glowy bottle, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

view from entry

2005-01-29T07:18:00.000-08:00

view from entry, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

merchandising area

2005-01-29T07:12:00.000-08:00

merchandising area, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

merchandise area interior

2005-01-29T07:08:00.000-08:00

merchandise interior, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

America's worst

2005-01-29T07:05:00.000-08:00

americas worst, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

We've been meaning to post this since the election. This was the headline of a major indian newspaper the next day. The talks of America's isolation from the rest of the world at a time when some major economies are developing continue to make me sad. For all you rabid conservative Americans who might just randomly happen upon this post, please don't use us as a sounding board to express your righteous indignation that I don't know what I'm talking about. I didn't write this headline.
We're heading to Rajasthan tomorrow to begin a little traveling. Floating palaces, camel treks in the desert near Pakistan, lion safaris, bike riding through bird sanctuaries and the Taj Mahal are all part of the itinerary. Our friend Maurice is going to join us for part of the trip. We wrote him a little note to help him get safely and happily to us in Bundi about some lessons we have learned (mostly re: taxis) and figured we'd just post it here so it looked like we were writing a lot.
Advice for maurice:
1. don't bring too much baggage, or leave some in Bombay with your computer ie set of nice clothes. We'll be hauling things around quite a bit and it's a lot easier to shake a pack of rickshaw wallahs when you can bob and weave.
2. Bring some warm clothes (not Chicago warm) for the AC trains because they can be freezing cold in the heat of winter.
3. Don't take any gifts from anybody. They are usually attached to the giver by serious strings verging on ropes.
4. If someone tells you you can't go or do what you want to do, don't believe them. You probably can, but they won't make any money unless you do it their way. People will tell you the hotel you want is closed or there are no buses and you have to take a taxi and they will be lying. Sometimes someone with no commercial interest in you will be very helpful, but they are hard to discern from the rest.
5. If someone approaches you they will likely have a commercial interest in you. If you approach them, they are more likely to be helpful without wanting money.
6. Ask taxi and rickshaw wallahs about the fare before you get in. Ask a few drivers to see if the fare is fair or not. Mumbai taxis always use the meter, but in other towns you might have to negotiate the fare. Baggage up charge in Mumbai is 3 rupees per bag (maybe 5) but sometimes they will ask for up to 20. Mumbai taxis have a fare card they should show you at the end of the ride. The meters are very old and fares are roughly 15 x the meter for cabs and 10x the meter for rickshaws. The red column is for the night rate which is from midnight until 6am. Sometimes a cabbie will point to the red column to get more money if he thinks you don't know any better, but now you do. The last few days, they all seem to have cards with only the night rate which they show foreigners. If one way of scamming you fails, they will often try two or three more.
7. Make sure the taxi wallah makes eye contact with you when he says he knows the destination you want to go to. Make him repeat it. Many times they will just nod you into the car without really knowing the destination and just start driving and then ask you questions as to where they should turn. If you don't have an answer theyâ??ll jump out and ask people at random following their advice hither and thither until you finally reach your destination. This is less likely if you have a fixed fare.
8. Don't let anybody pick up your bag or take it out of your cab or your hands. They will always want money for carrying it even if it is just from the trunk to the curb.
9. Don't let people guilt you about tips. Most Indians don't tip and if they do it at a restaurant it's tops about 10%. If someone carries your bag, Rs20 is good. Cabbies get a few rupees tip but we generally give them 10% because their job sucks.
10. If you give change to a beggar word will travel and you will have many more. We usually still give some rupees to the severely handicapped....
11. Don't believe little girls who tell you they don't want any money, just milk or baby formula or whatever. They'll take you to a store where the owner will jack you on the price and then they will return whatever you've given them and split the money with the shopkeeper. The baby won't get any special food. We got nailed with this one when we first got here much to the amusement of our flatmate.
12. Don't let anyone clean your ears, or if you do, know that the big ball of wax they show you at the end to let you know how useful they are is actually the accumulation of earwax of all those who came before you.
13. Expect mice and cockroaches on trains, but mostly only cute little ones (at least for the mice, cockroaches are never cute.)
14. The omelets and veg cutlets and tomato soup on the trains are tasty and okay for eating. You might want to wipe the fork off or dunk it in your boiling tea for 10 seconds to sterilize it. They'll often hand it to you straight from their pocket.
15. Don't let this list scare you, we were having fun writing it. You'll be fine. Did we mention the lepers?

my new rajasthani mustache and a dream

2005-01-29T06:44:00.000-08:00

lolo andy rohan mustache, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

This is a photo of my new mustache. I met this famous Indian actor name Amir Khan who had a very sporty stache. He was a nice guy and I had just been planning to shave my deliverance mustache, so instead I just shaved part of it. Now people look at me and say Amir Khan which is funny because I look less like an american but people here pronounce it ameerican which is very similar. Ha ha ha get it. Yah. Okay.
So I had a very lucid dream before I had the mustache. Here it is. Now this is like a real blog where we share our inner secrets and post them for the world to see and then look hurt if someone makes fun of you or talks about it at a cocktail party.
A Dream
It begins in a giant shopping mall. I'm shopping with a couple of women and 2 gay guys who all seem to be friends of mine. We are looking for a present for someone. I think it's somebody's birthday or wedding. The store is immense and we keep going from room to room filled with racks of cloths and dishware and towels and all manner of stuff. It seems endless, sometimes the rooms are cavernous and lit with fluorescent lighting, sometimes they are a series of small rooms with openings between them . We go through one door and find ourselves in the middle of a huge auditorium facing a giant movie screen. The auditorium is at least a football field in size, maybe two and already filled with people. We find some seats and sit down to wait for the movie. We wait for quite a while and then somewhere in front of us an old woman stands up and begins to sing a song of unrequited teenage love. As she's singing I begin to hear a voice in my head. It is an ominous male voice narrating a story. It's own story about wanting to destroy the world. It is searching for a body to take over. As he is narrating, we approach a middle age man in a suit and hat. It goes momentarily dark and then I hear a struggle between the man and beast. There is the sound of a door opening and someone screaming as they are kicked out. The door closes. The voice mutters 'Goodbye sucker' and now me and the evil guy are inside the man's head, staring out through his eyes. I understand that the man's soul has been kicked out of his body.
So now my viewpoint is through the body's eyes. The voice is narrating. We walk through a strange house and into the garage. Now all I have to do is get to the office, get inside and find the weapon access codes. We get into an old, meticulously maintained 50's land yacht that reminds me vaguely of my grandma Hope's old car. Now we're driving. We approach a military compound. If only they see my pass, I'll be through the gate and on my way. We approach the guard and the body holds up a pass while looking at the passenger seat so that the guard can't tell that the body has turned invisible. I guess without a soul the body still exists, but the face can't be seen. The guard waves us through and we drive a little farther and park the car.. We walk to the edge of a steep rocky slope. There is a steep and craggy path down to a concrete building about 500' down. It's the man's office. In the middle of the slope, a large dead oaklike tree stretches out from the slope face. Our walk down is slow and vertiginous and the voice is slightly manically repeating it's plan. All of a sudden I feel a push from behind. I am left standing on the slope as the body with the evil guy inside falls away from me. As it falls, it hits s tree branch and the head pops off. All of as sudden there are hundreds of wooden looking heads wearing fedoras falling with the body towards the compound below. The body lands, and the heads land like a bunch of nuts shaken from a tree. When I look again, the body is gone and there are the fallen bodies of a boy and a girl. As I stare down I realize that the body of the girl is body of the old lady in the theater in her youth. All of a sudden I am back in the shopping mall with the two gay guys. They are still looking for a present.
Then I wake up and take a leak. Did I mention I had a flu and had taken some cough syrup with codeine in it?

don't worry mom

2005-01-12T09:39:00.000-08:00

cops, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

Well. Just the other day, we were driving up to Nasik to check out the tasting room--which is looking fine I must say. A bunch of folks from the winery were coming up for a meeting so Sula hired a couple of Toyota Qualis (SUV's) and drivers to get us all to the winery. I felt like a giant, slightly lighter due to earlier food poisoning, doo doo because I had been bequeathed Stefanie's only whiteys get it flu that involves delirium, 102+ fevers and all that fun stuff. I had really planned on bailing on the trip, but somehow ended up in the car at 6 am and didn't know how to get out so away I went with all the rest.

Our car was packed and, luckily for the rest of us, laureL actually likes the very back back seat. Not only that, she can read back there on windy mountain roads. So off we go, horn a honking, car a swerving, vehicle a passing. Our driver seemed to really believe he could not be harmed. After a few close calls where we were passing trucks into oncoming traffic and actually forcing oncoming traffic onto the shoulder, we all asked the driver to chill out. This seemed to have some effect and, lulled into a false sense of calm coupled with the fact that we'd all gotten up before even the most confused roosters began crowing, we all started to drift in and out of sleep.

I can't really say what the sound effects were, but I opened my eyes just as a large white Ambassador (an Indian car whose design hasn't changed since the 50's) was deflected off our front fender with a sickening crunch of metal which could only be rivaled by the sound of crunching metal on the other side as we bounced into the side of the truck we were passing. Basically, we were squeezed out between the two vehicles like a big square metal bar of soap. We shot out sans our sideview mirrors and some paint. As the driver regained control, he began accelerating despite our protests to pull over and do the right thing.

I think laureL and Stefanie and I chose to follow the lead of our Indian counterparts and when they stopped protesting and just accepted that we were continuing onward, so did we. Hell, I don't have this country figured out yet that's fer sure.

We continued winding our way up the mountain at a slightly more leisurely pace for about 15 minutes until we are overtaken at high speed by the white Ambassador which proceeds to cut us off so that we are forced to stop. In the heat of the moment, it seemed like 20 guys (probably 4 or 5) piled out of the Ambassador and start beating on the car. One guy has a hammer and is threatening to smash things. Another guy picks up a big rock and tries to smash the windshield but only succeeds in cutting his hand and bleeding on the car. People are yelling.
Women in the back seat(but not the very back one) are screaming. Fists are pounding. They want the drivers blood.

The driver starts to open the door and someone reaches over the door and tries to pull his hair out. Adrian, who is sitting in the front passenger seat, opens his door and someone climbs over him and takes a swing at the driver. To be honest, I think everyone in the car kind of wanted to take a swing at the driver too, but we didn't think it was appropriate. I can't blame the guys in the Ambassador for being mad, but it was beginning to seem a litte too much. Meanwhile, a group of men begin to cluster around the car. There are a few motorcycles parked, but nothing that could transport the 20 or so additional guys that appear. It seems like some serious mob violence could happen.

The driver gets out of the car and starts getting man handled by the guys from the Ambassador. Adrian gets out to try to talk to people. I get out to reduce the threat of violence to the driver and start actively discouraging people from hitting him and see laureL, calmly holding onto one end of the hammer man's hammer telling him "no." "No." "No." until he lets his hammer arm go limp. Now there is shouting and gesturing all around. People are milling back and forth. People are yelling at the driver. People are yelling at Adrian. People are yelling at the guys from the Ambassador. People are yelling at people who weren't involved in anyway. The threat of violence seems to have subsided so laureL and I get back into the car. The tide seems to have turned and now the people who just appeared are yelling and threatening the guys in the Ambassador. 1 guy from the Ambassador climbs into our front seat to ride with us to the police, but the crowd outside is getting more hostile to them, so his buddies take off and he gets out of our car and starts yelling and getting yelled at and then suddenly hails a cab and splits. All of a sudden everything is calm. People are smiling and shaking hands and patting the driver and Adrian.

What the *$%@!

Adrian gets in the car and explains that all the random dudes are villagers. They are upset because the Ambassador guys were threatening to hammer us in front of their village and they don't want the bad PR. Our accident happened in front of someone elses village. It turns out they were threatening to tie the guys in the Ambassador up and then just leave them in their car as punishment for the behavior but Adrian convinced them not too (or so he says).

Anyway we all get in the car and start off again. This will be the end of part one of this story. I'll finish it later. I apologize for running on and on in a very non poetic fashion. Sometimes the words just flow out and sometimes each one is a painful burning sensation.

fairy tale tree

2005-01-12T08:25:00.000-08:00

FAIRY TREE, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

this is a tree we passed a few times on our way to rajeev's favorite beach - i thought it was jackfruit from the road, but up close i couldn't tell what it was....maybe some sort of buckeye/chestnut relative. i though it was beautiful, though.

new years eve

2005-01-12T08:21:00.000-08:00

new years, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

this pic is missing rohan and priya, integral parts of a great night (and i'm not smiling despite it, as i said, being a GREAT night).... but here's stefanie, rajeev, andy and i on new year's eve....

spot the dolphin

2005-01-12T08:16:00.000-08:00

dolphin, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

one day we took a 'no dolphin no pay' boat trip from near our house that motored around the bay for a few hours. we all sort of expected our guide to point at a distant black shape and claim it to be a dolphin sighting or some terrible reject mechanical dolphin to flounder by. it actually turned out to be a great trip, the guide was a lot of fun, there was free beer and goan bbq, we finally got to see the other side of the shore across our river, inmates waved at us from the local prison (ok, that part was kinda strange, especially when we found out that some of our new mumbai friends had spent some time there), and we all took dozens of pictures of brownish green water right after beautiful pinkish gray dolphins leaped through it. we saw lots of them, tossing fish in the air, jumping and even doing sort of backflips, sometimes pretty close to the boat. then on the flight back to mumbai we could see them far below in the ocean as we rose above the ocean, a nice parting sight from goa.

goa again

2005-01-12T08:04:00.000-08:00

shells, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

did we talk much about goa before? ummm, let's see... long time colonization by the portuguese and then a hippie invasion in the 60's followed by a rave explosion in the late 80's and general tourism has added some interesting flavors to the mix. the food tends to be diverse and tasty, lots of local fresh seafood and more safe fruit and vegetable choices than most of india (though andy and i did get pretty sick, maybe from fresh salad). it's definitely a party scene and heavily touristed, from fat sunburned retired europeans to intense stoned israelis who look like jesus, but the locals are some of the wealthiest in india, overall, and seem very happy and relaxed (though with an unusally high rate of alcoholism). you don't see the kind of poverty that you do in mumbai. even local women wear knee length skirts regularly; it's just more relaxed and was definitely a welcome break for us over the holidays. we flew down with rajeev and were soon met by rohan, priya, and rohan's friend from new york, stefanie - a really good mix of friends to spend the new year celebrations with.
my side story regarding goa is that i bought a few baby anklets on the beach from one of the kids that peddle goods there. i have a cousin who was adopted from india as an infant and who has never been here, herself. in fact, she was adopted by mormons and may be one of the only indian mormons in existence, i would guess. she just had her first baby and is curious about her roots, so i thought that the baby anklets would be a good present. after i got them i found out that this cousin was actually born in goa, so her new baby girl will have something from her mother's birthplace. i like serendipity, wheeeeee

piggy

2005-01-08T07:58:00.000-08:00

piggy, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

the same mama pig as i got a pic of last time we stayed in goa - her babies are as big as her now. she's a strange grunty creature with a wiggly nose who can be tempted closer with bits of bread and her eyes are strangely endearing and gentle, but she still scares me just a little.

goa

2005-01-08T07:51:00.000-08:00

goa, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

here's the view from the remains of an old fort (portuguese, i assume) in goa, overlooking vagator beach and anjuna, i think

tsunami

2004-12-29T08:43:00.000-08:00

for anyone interested and looking for information, http://tsunamihelp.blogspot.com/ seems like a good resource to concerned citizens wanting to help with relief efforts (jen and teddie, you rock!)
we've received a few concerned emails, so i wanted to let y'all know that we're alive and well (except for a bit of flu or food poisoning) in goa, where the effects of the tsunami were fairly minimal. we were actually in the ocean around 2 ish when the water cooled off suddenly and a current came up parallel to the beach fairly strongly and moved us a little ways down - nothing too freaky at the time. it just as suddenly switched directions a few minutes later and our friend rajeev came out to say hi and mentioned that a few waves had come much further up the beach than any others and had them scrambling out of the way. it got strangely choppy and deep as the waves came in - when we got to shore someone said that there had been a huge earthquake in sumatra, someone else sai bangladesh, etc.. when we got to the flat we're staying in across from a river, all the neighbors were gathered by their bamboo dock and we noticed that the normally calm water was rushing in at great speeds and higher than usual. the locals said that they'd never seen anything like it, even in monsoon, and that people were catching fish by the bucketloads. the water rumbled by, then stopped and got quiet and reversed direction just as fast - it seemed to drop impossibly fast. for the rest of the evening while we were awake and checking news on our laptops the water would switch directions every half hour or so and go from almost overflowing to near empty. fortunately, though beach shacks were flooded and boats got a bit banged up, no one seems to have been hurt in goa - 4 kids got washed in at the beach we'd been at by another freak wave later in the day but a foriegn tourist and indian policeman on vacation saved them. much much luckier than those down south and closer to the epicenter. anyway, i'm sure everyone sees the papers and knows whats going on as well as we do.

weaverbird nests

2004-12-22T22:34:00.000-08:00

weavernests, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

a closer look at the nests of the weaver bird....

pretty truck

2004-12-19T08:28:00.000-08:00

truck, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

this one isn't as decorated as some but is still quite pretty, i think. from what i understand they get more and more ornate as you go north. Andy says the ones in Pakistan are amazing - attached carved altars and panels and lots of hanging chains, etc..

india is great

2004-12-19T08:16:00.000-08:00

india is great, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

an example of the painting that's done on the trucks - most are bright colors with 'horn OK please' painted on the back in large letters (sometimes so stylized it's hard to read, with palm trees and waterfalls painted inside the letters) and 'stop' painted over the left side rear light, sometimes actually OVER the light so that if it's a working brake light you'd never know. eyes are painted on gas cap covers, devil-like 'evil guy' faces are painted on to scare away other evil guys, small painted chains are hung in rows from the bumpers to create a jingling fringe, doors have stamped tin panels with scenes and gods on them....

steel truck

2004-12-19T07:46:00.000-08:00

steel truck, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

this little truck carried all the steel for our balcony railing - kinda like the workers, small but deceptively strong.

weaverbird tree

2004-12-17T23:20:00.000-08:00

weaverbird tree, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

i haven't yet seen a weaverbird that i'm aware of - though i've seen drongos, hoopoes, mynas, bee eaters, egrets, green parakeets, and kingfishers - but we found a tree full of their nests. they weave them out of grasses so that they have a long tube at the top and a cozy little basket hanging beneath and are about a foot or more long. here's our weaverbird tree next to the pond and above a tomato and pepper garden minded by some villagers near the winery.

dragonfly

2004-12-17T23:00:00.000-08:00

dragonfly, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

you can tell who has ahold of the internet connection when all the animal pics appear... we escaped from the winery grounds for a little hike last week and walked around a nearby pond admiring water buffalo submerged but for their noses, goats and their herders, weaver bird nests, etc.. the air in nasik is filled with dragonflies right now, swarms of them all pointing the same direction in the breeze as they hover in the vineyards and birds swoop down from electrical wires to catch them.
the winery construction crew members are all pretty amused by my interactions with animals, whether it's playing with the half wild puppies that live by their shacks, taking the covers off the landscaping lights at night so they shine up in the trees and i can see the bats, taking pictures of bugs and stopping to watch birds..... but then, all i have to do is walk by to make them laugh, so i'm not too worried about ruining my reputation.

toad

2004-12-17T22:46:00.000-08:00

toad, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

i'm so proud of this picture. this guy (who may very well be the one that peed on me when i picked him up, maybe that explains the slight menace in his eye...) was sitting on the steps of the bungalow in nasik one night when i walked back from the winery. i thought the flash would scare him off but i had to push him off the step after the photoshoot so no one would step on him.

frowny kids

2004-12-14T08:41:00.000-08:00

frowny kids, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

here's the frowny dairy kids. we tried to show them their picture on the camera but they wouldn't even look, just kept staring straight at us with no change in facial expression. hmm. at least we didnt scare them too much.

the one who loves me

2004-12-14T08:14:00.000-08:00

buffalo, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

maybe not best, but this water buffalo took a shine to me recently. We were checking out the front of the winery to think about ways to landscape the entry when the guys at the water buffalo milking farm across the dirt road starting talking to us over the fence. Maybe talking at, around, up and down is more like it since we no speaka da language. Since we weren't really sure what they wanted, but they seemed friendly and we were looking for something to do, we walked into water buffalo land. Those dudes (ettes) are big and shiny and goofy. The guy who called us in came out to greet us and led us into a milking shed. We walked past this character here and laureL said this girl was checking me out. I looked back and sure enough, she was. She was even drooling a little. Very flattering. As we were taking pictures of the guy milking his water buffalo, I kept looking back. You know how it is when you think someone is checking you out so you keep looking to see if they are or not which only encourages them more because they think you are looking at them? Yeah. Like that. So finally, feeling slightly uncomfortable, we took her photo and the photo of the two little dirt faced kids who were staring at us with that mixture of awe and fear usually reserved for martians and got back to work. . . and you should too.

windows

2004-12-14T07:49:00.000-08:00

windows, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

cement doesn't have the same permanence here - everything is made of it because wood is so scarce- and labor is cheapcheapcheap. in other parts of the winery they've built , torn down, and rebuilt walls 6 or so times. so we dont feel too bad when we make trouble (which we do every day) and suggest a few extra windows in the offices to let in the gorgeous views. now they've gone window mad, the response was so positive, and this man is knocking another hole into the wall in the future pantry.

the magnificent mustache

2004-12-14T07:36:00.000-08:00

mustache, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

a man we think of as 'the magnificent mustache' captured at last in digital format. his job seems to be involved in smoking suspicious looking cigarettes, thoughtfully stroking that impressive 'stache, and smiling at the girls carrying rocks on their heads. not such a bad life....

room with a view

2004-12-14T07:31:00.000-08:00

room, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

putting together cabinets for behind the bar.....

Tasting room spiel

2004-12-13T06:32:00.000-08:00

wall, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

okay. I'll begin a little design spiel that I may cut short for one of two reasons: dinner(I'm starving), or the battery runs out.

Alright, so the tasting room is a rather strange shape. The building was engineered before it was designed, meaning that it was already under construction before an architect was hired to carve out some more public space. As a result the building is built like a small brick building that one might defecate in (this is a paraphrasing of a colloquialism in an attempt to avoid swearing--which I, as you all know, detest), but in some places the ceilings are only 6 ft tall.

Anyway the tasting room is two long and narrow rooms that form a sort of 'L' shape opening onto a large balcony overlooking the vineyard. In order to minimize the impact of the wildly varying ceiling height and encourage people to move through the space and out onto the balcony, we created a series of strong horizontal elements. In the crystal palace that laureL mentioned, the horizontal element is a "swarm" of green glass boxes which wrap around the green glass walls and flow into this teak wall. The teak wall bends around the corner and leads out to the balcony. The wall breaks through a glass wall that intersects both the teak wall and the 34' glass tile mosaic bar. The teak wall has another "swarm" of white boxes with acid etched glass that cut through the wall. The boxes will have suspended bottles of wine with lights behind them that all point out towards the vineyard, creating another strong horizontal element leading you out to the beautiful out doors.

okay. gotta go. battery is dying and soup's on.

back hoe

2004-12-13T06:21:00.000-08:00

everyones aworking, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

I think it's a back hoe. Anyway, that's what these folks are. I know we've said it before, but I'll say it again. It's all done by hand folks. These people are in the process of digging what will turn out to be a deep ass hole. The guys hack away with picks and assorted tools and the women load up the dirt and carry it away. Construction workers here may have it worse here in a many ways--toxic chemicals, hellish hours, few safety precautions--but they do get to work with lots of beautiful village women all day long. Funny you don't hear any whistles or cat calls and they all take tea and lunch together. Anyway this whole is now complete. It's about 12-15 feet deep. They are now building a stone retaining wall inside it and then pouring concrete around it to prevent the winery entry drive from sliding onto the lawn in front of the vineyards. It's all there in the picture. Can't you see it? Well it will be fairly soon.

The tasting room is supposed to be finished on the 24th of December and the official opening party(as of now) is January 22nd, 2005. We're going to head to Goa for the holidays, come back and supervise the construction of the lobby and the vintage wine gallery and then head out for a month of travel or so before returning to the good ol' USA.

Which reminds me of a little art project I've started on that I am inviting you all to join me in. Hairier men will likely have the best success. Shortly after George W. was re-elected I began daily collecting my belly button lint. At the end of the year I will divide all the lint into 3 glass containers to separate the red, white and blue lints (the only colors of belly button lint I ever seem to get). I think I'll call it "True American" or something just to prove that you can still be an american through and through even if you don't support Bush. Anyone who wants to join in and start saving their lint should join in. Maybe we could fill a whole room with it? Wouldn't that be exciting.

okay. NEXT!!!

glass guys

2004-12-13T05:47:00.000-08:00

glass guys, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

here's the glass crew - they asked me to take their picture when i showed them the shots of them lifting the glass. the guy with the flute even played a little song.

glass lifting

2004-12-13T05:43:00.000-08:00

glass downstairs, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

a small area for merchandising got added after we'd started the intial design, so we created what we've been referring to as 'the crystal palace.' basically its such a small area, and with a wierdly downsloping roof, that we decided to make it all out of green tinted glass to make it less claustrophobic and emphasize the translucence and sparkle of glasses and bottles sold within. even the shelves will be green glass now that we've found the right guy with the right optically clear adhesive to glue them directly to the glass walls. as you come up the stairs you'll see through the outside of the little room through varying thicknesses of glass, giving depth and color but still showing whatever is displayed from both sides. we were fortunate, after much searching and arguing that our idea IS possible, to find a guy right here in Nasik who was confidant and willing to do the job. here are some of his crew lifting the glass walls up to the next floor.

table saw, indian style

2004-12-13T05:33:00.000-08:00

table saw, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

after supervising conservation crews and being a park ranger for the county government, i can be a bit of a stickler for safety regulations (YOU teach inner city youth to use chainsaws and see how you feel about safety gear!).
it's different here. i have yet to see a man with a jackhammer wearing so much as earplugs. i've seen men welding in casual sunglasses. no respirators are worn, or gloves, when applying toxic fixatives and finishes. eeeep. human life has different value when there are so many more poor waiting for the same job. one of the things we like about the contractor we've been working with is the respect he shows his men. the guy in this photo is the one who gets the hardest tasks lobbed his way and seems to be able to do just about anything with a few tools and his bare hands and feet. there's one little electric circular saw shared among the whole crew and here he is making creative use of it upside down as a converted table saw to cut long L shaped cabinet door pulls.

one woman working

2004-12-05T21:41:00.000-08:00

one woman, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

i swear i swear i swear these guys laugh and hint and flirt to get me to take their pictures, waggling their heads and making oddly signifigant seeming eye contact and making little motions at my camera and their faces - then i take the picture and all smiles are off. i always thought people looked stiff and unhappy in old photos because they had to pose so long but im starting to think that its just a reaction by people who dont see cameras often - or they saw the old photos, too, and think that they're supposed to make that face. as soon as i lower the camera they jump up and down and giggle and call their friends over to see the little digital image. maybe i should have andy off to the side take pictures of the process so that we can capture the elusive indian smile.

its time to play find the iguana

2004-12-05T03:00:00.000-08:00

find the iguana, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

little iguanas are everywhere in nasik and anywhere, it seems, with enough green space. they seem to defy gravity at this size in a 'crouching tiger hidden dragon' in the bamboo tops kind of way.

toolbox

2004-12-05T02:38:00.000-08:00

box, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

toolbox complete with girlie sticker...

tasting room bar

2004-12-05T02:32:00.000-08:00

bar and footrail, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

here's the inside end of our bar so far. it's entirely handcrafted - even the 34 foot long curved radius on the top edges is handcarved from solid timbers but damn close to perfect. when it's finished it'll be covered with small glass mosaic tiles that change in color as the bar goes through a glass wall to the outside deck and should smoothly curve into an epoxy floor.

puppy

2004-12-05T02:11:00.000-08:00

puppy, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

there're a few dogs and three tiny puppies living near the shacks of the winery construction crew. i've taken to saving a bit of chapati for them after lunch. the families living in these shacks work on the main part of the new winery building and have been 'camped' there for 2 years or so, i think. most pictures we post of people working outside are with this crew. we work with a different crew hired from mumbai for the tastingroom, through a different contractor. our crew is all male and sleeps in the unfinished winery at night. some of them are very good problem solvers and carpenters once inspired and encouraged to maintain a strong level of detail and finish - we're very happy to work with them.

who you calling turkey?

2004-11-26T23:39:00.000-08:00

andy n zirhan, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

So here it appears that I am the man of the house carving the turkey. What you don't see is that soon after this picture was taken I handed the knife to young Zirhan and he, with his best impression of a knight at the king's feast, dismantled the rest of the Turkey with zest and vigor.

Organizing a thanksgiving dinner/potluck is a little different here. Firstly, turkeys are a rare bird which only come out for a few christian holidays like Christmas. We ended up going to the Marriot because their South African pastry chef imports butterball turkeys from the U.S. to cook thanksgiving dinners for ex pats for a small fee. Turns out our turkey came stuffed, with gravy, 3 vegetables and some oddly shaped pumpkin pies. It was all really quite tasty (at least to us Amereeekans).

The day after we went to the Marriot and organized the turkey, we received a phone call stating that we could not have the turkey on Thursday, but they would have it ready for us on Friday. After some indignation and ground standing, we were told it was all a terrible mistake and we would have our turkey on Thursday as planned.

The potluck aspect was a little different as well. Some people brought or bought dishes and brought them, and others brought their raw ingredients and their cook who went in the kitchen to attempt american food. The kitchen was a place of great mirth and awe at the "big" chicken and other american culinary oddities. The big chicken was retrieved by Rohan's driver, Raju, who had to suffer a one and a half hour wait for the turkey probably as payback for our inflexibility about the timing of our turkey.

All told, it was a great feast with suitable levels of mirth and chaos and that staple of american culture--the distended and somewhat painful belly of over indulgence.

PIE!!!

2004-11-26T23:17:00.000-08:00

PIE!!!, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

happy girl got pumpkin pie

thanksgiving among the indians

2004-11-26T23:15:00.000-08:00

thanksgiving, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

complete with dogs underfoot, startlingly charming children, a lovely toast by rohan, flowers, just enough food to be too much (yayy, leftovers!!!) and choice of 3 deserts.
it all pulled together at the last moment to be a good thanksgiving. raja and raju, rohans cook and driver, were very impressed by the looks of the 'big chicken" (actually a medium small turkey) but not so impressed with the taste (lacking in spice). i tried to explain what a turkey was and was met with big eyes and laughter. perhaps my mimes of massive bird size, fan tail, and wobbly chin thing (what is that called, anyway?) were not enhanced by the wine and whiskey.
hmm

it could be napa but it's not

2004-11-26T23:04:00.000-08:00

rose n grapes, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

grapes

2004-11-26T22:55:00.000-08:00

green grapes, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

the late rains didn't hurt the crops after all. everything is green and growing. we're starting to appreciate the fresh air in nasik after 4 months in mumbai has wiped the last clean traces of california air from our lungs.

hindi for industrialists

2004-11-26T22:34:00.000-08:00

we bought a book of hindi phrases. unfortunately we unknowingly picked up the one written for.....well.not us, anyway:

repeat after me:
may-rah bun-dook laow (bring my gun)
mayrah bun-dook lay challo - bun-dook key nah-lee doos-ree ta-ruff karo (carry my gun - face the barrel the other way)
maiyn batack cub maar suck-tah hoohn? (where can i shoot a duck?)
tum bud-maash ho (you are a rascal)
up-nay dostohn ko iddar mutt laow ( don't bring your friends here)
moojay toom-ha-rah dung pasand na-heehn (i dont like your manner)
up-nay cup-ray bud-dull lo (change your clothes)
may-ree luck-ree lay aow (fetch my stick)
ya tash-taree saaf na-heehn high (this plate is not clean)
up-nee angoolee-ahn iss-say doo-r ruck-oh (keep your fingers off it)

making friends will be so much easier now.....

just a quote i like....

2004-11-20T20:59:00.000-08:00

Professor Marshall MacLuhan -
"For many years I have observed that the moralist typically sustitutes anger for perception. He hopes that many people will mistake his irritation for insight...The mere moralistic expression of approval or disapproval, preference or detestation, is currently being used in our world as a substitute for observation and a substitute for study. People hope that if they scream loudly enough about 'values' then others will mistake them for serious, sensitive souls who have higher and nobler perceptions than ordinary people. Otherwise why would they be screaming?...Moral bitterness is a basic technique for endowing the idiot with dignity."

pretty girl

2004-11-17T07:15:00.000-08:00

cow, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

cows are often decorated here, sometimes painted with designs or just big swatches of color, sometimes their horns are painted or big garlands are around their necks. i though this one had to be in the running for prettiest cow, though.

elephant

2004-11-17T06:50:00.000-08:00

elephant, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

what's bigger than a rickshaw, scarier than a cow when encountered on the road but arguably less scary than a monkey if you have a banana in your hand, and can carry telephone poles or circus girls on its nose?

this little piggy went to Goa

2004-11-17T06:28:00.000-08:00

piggypiggy, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

you hear about the cows in the streets in india, and mumbai has gotten us used to 10 dogs, 3 cats, and 2 goats and a few skinny chickens per block, but it's not til you get into the countryside a bit more that you see the piggies. huge fat ones surrounded by tiny ones no bigger than some rats i've seen at the train station. these ones aren't so radically sized but andy was glad the mama didnt decide to charge him when he took this.

Egomania

2004-11-16T09:13:00.000-08:00

punkr stencil, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

I'm sorry, I don't have any recent photos to post so I'm still drawing from photos of London.

photo. text. photo. text. photo. text.

blogging is kind of cool, but quite a restrictive format for those of us to lazy to write our own code or sumpin.

Anyway, I don't know about th rolled up trousers and shirt cuffs with no sleeves (actually that's kind of cool and I would have probably done it at some point in my life if I'd thought of it.) This is just a random stencil in London that made me feel loved.

We just took a holiday trip to Goa for a week. We rented motorbikies (plurals when you make words up can be tricky) and split our time between obese Swedish and English retirees and Israeli trance heads. Kind of like shacking your head back and forth real fast while your watching television--kind of cool and weird and stupid(if anyone is watching you). Anyway, riding a motorcycle in Goa is much more mellow than Bombay, but by no means a Sunday drive. I learned a lot about cows for instance. Cows respect trucks and buses. They begrudgingly acknowledge cars. Motorcycles are smaller than cow size and are therefore insignificant. I watched laureL get completely cut off by a cow who decided to cross the street for a split second before I had to avoid a head on with a taxi passing a bus passing a bike passing a large reddish Swedish woman with western notions about personal space in a land with no sidewalks. She might have been English. Some of my scariest moments involved driving through herds of cows.

We spend one night following the trance train. Huge regattas of motorcycles going from one place to another, trying not to be the last one in the parking lot when the Goan police roll through to hassle anyone too messed up (or more likely, with enough of a conscience) not to ride. That's how we ended up joining in--we were just going to wander down to the beach when a crowd of people left the club we were near because it closed at 10. The police came and started asking us what we were doing and what was wrong and looking at us very suspiciously, so we did what any innocent bystander would do, we split.

It was a fun(ny) night. The trance scene seems to live on in the collective minds of the Israeli youth and some 50+ year old hippies. I spent a bit of time hanging out with 3 Life of Brian style Israeli Jesi (plural of Jesus?) aww. battery is dying. gotta post. end of story.

rain

2004-11-08T05:49:00.000-08:00

after a sunny morning and a dry but thundery overcast afternoon, e few lightning blasts have opened up the sky into a full torrential downpour here in nasik. i know it's bad for the grapes (hey, Wil, you know the line), them in the midst of flowering here, but it smells absolutely gorgeous. andy and i went out onto the patio for a bit and watched a happy toad hop by one of the garden lights, soaking up the water so that he can pee on me again the next time i pick him up (he holds about 1/4 cup as far as i can tell, quite impressive.) the guesthouse lights keep going out and lightning flickers every minute or so. it's beautiful.
there was about a week in mumbai when there was lightning every evening across the bay, sometimes branching over 1/4 of the horizon and flickering every 30 seconds or more. we sat in our window, 7 stories up so with a good view, and watched. sometimes bats, which have 2 foot wingspans here, flew below us. if they get between you and a streetlight you can see right through their wings for a split second before they all but disappear again.

Guess who's birthday it is

2004-11-06T05:29:00.000-08:00

rohan's b-day w laurel, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

Why yes, it's Rohan's birthday. The proud little boy on the left, and guess who just realized its not their birthday so they don't get any presents? Well it's a trick question really, neither laureL or the moose head will get any presents on this day.

This event actually happened before London, but I haven't downloaded any new pictures from my camera and I figured I ought to post something since laureL's been doing all the work and taking all the heat from the right wingers with poor reading comprehension skills and a bit too much righteousness on their side (see the comments of her political rant). Really this picture is just an invitation for me to splutter and mutter for a few minutes so you know that I too am still alive and haven't been eliminated and replaced by an inflatable doll with a baseball hat and 3 day stubble who protects wimin from car jackings and the like. Though this post may be the only thin shield of evidence you have against this theory.

What to say? The winery is coming along nicely. It makes a huge differnce to be able to put down the dog-eared, tattered printouts of computer renderings of the space we have been waving around for the past 3 months and actually see the place resolve itself and life size, 3-D, full surround design. I think it is not going to suck. I think, in fact, it is going to be really cool. I, which means probably laureL, will post more pictures as it progresses. Everything here is done by hand. People cut sheets of plywood with a hand saw and then hand plane them to their final dimension. The only power tools on site are one small circular saw and a power drill, but they are cranking it out. Everything looks a little rough right now, so it's going to all come down to the polish at the end, but I think they will pull it off.

Art

As laureL posted, and maybe I did too but I can't remember because now I am old, the show was poorly publicised and, therefore, lightly attended. Let's just say we made a major "investment" in our art careers. I did get a piece into a show that had just started at the Denver Museum of Contemporary Art that includes such art rockstars as Damien Hirst, Fred Tomaselli and Mr. Murakami (I think his first name is Takashi). You know the guy. There are also 3 New York galleries of repute that expressed interest ind doing a show (which ain't bad either), and Black and White Magazine out of Australia (I'm not sure if there is more than one magazine with this name) is supposedly doing a big spread on the "Everybody is Somebody's Terrorist" Series this month. If you see it, let me know how it looks.

ps. We think the lurker is Susannah(#1 choice), followed by Dave or Antje or Michelle. Did we guess it? This is a response to the comment posted to the Comments post. Capiche?

tastingroom

2004-11-04T11:53:00.000-08:00

tastingroom, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

We've been in Nashik working on the tasting room. I say working but we're not allowed to actually make or even help move anything, which is frustrating for both of us. Our job here consists of a barter-like exchange of ideas and stubbornness with the building contractor over our design and how he wants to build it. Andy having built furniture and both of us having some sort of construction experience probably makes us more difficult for this man as we're rarely willing to accept his constant appraisal of, "this is impossible." Each day we change designs slightly to make construction easier or take stands and insist on details remaining as per our drawings. It's a constant wrestle of stubbornness on both sides - but equally both sides are not only compromising but really concentrating on figuring out different ways to accomplish difficult tasks. It's a good relationship, I think. We've made a lot of progress.

loLo gets political

2004-11-04T11:40:00.001-08:00

My big hope for America. Oh boy. I can only hope that this is a phase we’re going through that will end in us becoming a country that understands that we’re part of the international community and our actions have consequences. My own naivety admitted freely and allowed for, I hold onto a shred of trust, however slim, that my country is reacting to a violent smack upside the head with fear and stubborn close-mindedness that will fade into a willingness to work with the rest of the world as the next stage of maturity sets in. Reactionary violence occurs throughout the world and can’t be stopped by making more enemies. In the past 4 months I’ve spent time with Irish, French, and English people as well as many, many Indians and read newspapers in both India and England. The sentiment is overwhelmingly anti-Bush and anti-American policy. Bush’s intellect and cowboy posturing is almost daily the object of media ridicule, hatred, and fear. Everyone asks us how our country could do this, how we can act this way. We joke among ourselves that we’re moving to Canada or Mexico instead of coming home but I do love and believe in my country and am more likely to move to Ohio to try and make a difference. But GODDAM people, who forgot to teach americans to think about a bigger picture than their fear and dumbass pride? If we can't be better than this there's nothing to be proud of anymore.

raki2

2004-11-04T11:40:00.000-08:00

raki2, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

this is Raki 2, winery greeter, on the newly poured tasting room balcony. he's strangely undoglike and quite charming.

party dresses at work

2004-11-04T11:30:00.000-08:00

girl, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

This is the little girl of some of the construction workers. For the last few days that we were here in Nashik she's been playing quietly in gravel piles and balancing things on her head in imitation of the workers. Kids here entertain themselves with whatever they have at hand or playing with each other, 5 year olds carrying babies on their hips as they run around. In Mumbai they play inches from traffic in the street - sometimes you'll even see them pooping a few feet from traffic throwing stones into the cars to entertain themselves while they take care of business. Here in nasik they play at the work they see adults doing, even toddlers holding wood between their little bare feet while they pound nails in with the biggest rocks they can lift. As adults the construction workers build with very few tools and no safety equipment but don't seem to get hurt too often (makes me wonder if we do a disservice to our children when we sanitize their worlds for safety). The guys building the tasting room share one tape measure, one little skill saw and 2 or 3 small hand saws, a pair of nippers, a few small hammers and some planes. And immense patience for the work and the constant changes that are asked of them. In other parts of the winery we have seen them build brick and cement walls only to have to chip them down and rebuild them in a slightly different spot 2 or 3 times. There's something in my western mind that would want to sit down and refuse to put the wall back up until they were sure where it went but for these guys its all the same to them as long as they have work to do and get paid. If someone wants to pay them to keep knocking down and rebuilding the same wall, that's fine. Of course, that's an assumption on my part based on the lack of reaction I see, it could be very different when they talk about it amongst themselves. A common theme I hear from management here is that no one will question or respond to their statements so they don't get any feedback. I've certainly been guilty of smiling and nodding at work when it's all swearing and cussing inside my head.

lungiman

2004-11-04T11:26:00.000-08:00

lungiman, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

We're both pretty shy about taking people's pictures but they usually like it, especially if we show them the image on the little screen. Our plan is to get a bunch of pics of the winery construction crews printed out and bring them back as presents since we're always walking through their worksite. This guy actually squealed when I showed him his picture on the back of the camera and called his friends over to see, too. There does seem to be a cultural tendency to try and look very serious for the shot, then get really excited and smile afterwards.

when manti attack

2004-11-04T11:22:00.000-08:00

mantis, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

Just before lunch we were standing in the courtyard and a big butterfly visited the lemon tree next to us but flew to the other side as I pointed it out. I feel like a dork here for always getting excited about plants and animals that no one else pays attention to. “Hey, an iguana! Look, a banana tree! Oh cool, the hawks here sit on the ground instead of in trees - they have different hunting and social patterns! Wow, a frog! I caught it! It peed on me!” I have no pretense of cool here in anyone’s eyes. Anyway, I slipped around the tree to see the butterfly again and saw it get nabbed by a preying mantis hanging upside down from a leaf, so I stayed to watch some of the battle. Later in the day a few butterfly wings littered the ground beneath a very fat green mantis.

comments

2004-10-29T01:25:00.000-07:00

hey, we just realized how to change the settings so that anyone can comment, not just registered bloggers, so come on! let us know who we're talking to out there!

usha uthup

2004-10-28T23:35:00.000-07:00

Last night we went to Jazz by the Bay and saw Usha Uthup sing. We'd been there once before and I'd been pretty bored - bad cover songs by so-so bands, the usual expensive cocktails and social banter you can't quite hear over the music. There's really only so long I can pull off the smile-and-nod routine before I get squirmy and peevish. Last night was different. We were there with all 3 of Ramesh Sippy's grown kids (one is our housemate Rohan) - for those who don't know, he's pretty much the greatest and best loved Hindi film director in th history of Bollywood - and the lady singing had sung for one of his movies a few decades ago. You'd pass her on the street in India and probably not notice too much other than that her sari and jewelry is nicer than most - she's older, plump, with glasses underlining her large bindi. Her smile is a bit devilish for someone who otherwise might be described as matronly. Her voice, though....WHAM! She's got the belt it out, full, throaty voice of a James Bond intro. I don't know if it'll come across online as well as it did in that little room but you should give it a try at her website (our connection is too slow for me to test it) - http://www.ushauthup.com. She bantered between songs about when she only got to sing bad girls parts and background music because her voice is far from the indian high pitched good girl ideal and asked the Sippy kids to thank their father for her break in his film. She won over the crowd with her suprisingly naughty grin and huge voice - well, most of the crowd knew her and loved her already, so really she won over us. Pretty cool.

guccigucci bird

2004-10-28T23:29:00.000-07:00

guccigucci, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

ok, repost of last bird i made - onyx chip head and formica sample feathers, copper wire body.

ye olde english

2004-10-27T22:57:00.000-07:00

english peeps on train, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

I couldn't help myself. I tried. I tried for quite some time, but the train ride from Michelle's place in Egham to London was just too long and I didn't have anything to read and I was bored and I kept looking at this old gent's scowling mug and finally I just had to do it. I took his picture. It's a tribute. It takes a lifetime to get the corners of your mouth to turn down just so. . .so . . .so English I guess. The lady next to him wasn't too bad either. They weren't together. I enjoyed my little stay in old blighty. I enjoyed all the peculiar old characters we'd find telling stories of being chased by squirrels in the park or just meandering about wearing funny hats with flowers. I think England has a higher density of these characters than many places. . .except maybe the passengers of our plane ride home.

There were a lot of old Indian folks on our 747. There was a whole posse of really old guys wearing wooly hats pulled down real low with just the front rolled up a little so their eyes could peer out. One of them had the grumpiest look I had ever seen. He made this guy look like the homecoming queen in the homecoming day parade. The other ones had the uncomprehending, slightly blissed out looks that only really old people can have and wandered about the cabin at random.

Nobody can trash a plane like a group of Indians.

bible thumpin bidness

2004-10-27T22:42:00.000-07:00

christian bidness, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

It ain't my bidness, but it is a bidness. It's been a while since I've stayed in a hotel with all the accoutrements so I'd kind of forgotten about bibles in night stand drawers sitting amongst the years of pocket lint and pencil shavings. This is my little tribute to that aging liaison.

(hint: the mask on the left has a big cross on the back)

laurel and cloaca

2004-10-27T22:18:00.000-07:00

laurel and cloaca, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

anyone who knows what a monotreme is should find the background marquee amusing.(i'm thinking of a kids show called magen the monotreme) but this pic is also for heidi to see her handmade scarf in london. world traveling handicrafts.....

southbank view

2004-10-26T23:14:00.000-07:00

view, originally uploaded by seamonkeylifeboat.

names of pubs:
queens head and artichoke
unicorn house
drunken monkey
the elusive camel
dragon and cabbage
names of train stations:
paddington
tottenham
egham
cockfosters

etc.