{"id":354,"date":"2008-02-14T07:51:14","date_gmt":"2008-02-14T12:51:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kuma2.net\/skyeview\/?p=354"},"modified":"2008-02-14T07:51:14","modified_gmt":"2008-02-14T12:51:14","slug":"dispatch-12-new-delhi-india","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.kuma2.net\/skyeview\/?p=354","title":{"rendered":"Dispatch #12 – New Delhi, India"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"welcome_delhi.jpg\"<\/a><\/p>\n

“Very Welcome Delhi”<\/strong><\/p>\n

I arrived in New Delhi during Basant Panchami the puja and festival time honoring the Hindu deity Saraswati. In the sacred text of the Rig Veda she represents a river and the deity presiding over it. Saraswati is also identified with Vaach (speech), perfect speech that denotes intelligence. An apropos greetings being that the purpose of my trip is to conduct informational seminars at colleges.<\/p>\n

Very welcome Delhi is the spontaneous greeting the fellow wearing the brown jacket gave me after insisting I take he and his friend’s photograph, imperfect speech perhaps but heartfelt nonetheless. Of all the countries I have visited India is absolutely my most favorite place. The genuine warmth and generosity of Indians never ceases to warm my heart.<\/p>\n

First time visitors might be put off or even shocked by the chaos, crumbling infrastructure, pungent odor of burning cow dung, harrowing traffic, and calcophy of sound and gritty poverty. It is precisely this discomfort and strangeness combined with Indian hospitality that makes visiting India an exciting and transformative experience.<\/p>\n

\"delhi_1.JPG\"<\/a>This is my 6th annual visit to New Delhi and I still have to adjust my perceptions and suspend judgment when I encounter the unfamiliar. For example when I arrived at my hotel at 2:00 am on a darkened narrow unpaved road. The sight of what appeared to be an abandoned hotel greeted me, the lobby was dark as is most of the building due to energy conservation. The building directly across from the hotel appeared to be in ruins. I booked this hotel on the Internet and thought that perhaps I had made very bad mistake and would be staying in a dive. I was pleasantly surprised by the size and appearance of my room<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"delhi_2.JPG\"<\/a>The hotel and the neighborhood looked completely different in the light of day. The hotel staff has been exceedingly gracious and accommodating. It feels like I’m staying in someone’s home.<\/p>\n

Stay tuned for upcoming dispatches from New Delhi, Mumbai (Bombay) and Pune.<\/p>\n

\"delhi_dye.JPG\"<\/center>Chant peace.
\n[sw 2.12.08]
\nIn The News<\/strong>For better or for worse social change in India is happening at such a rapid pace it’s difficult to keep up. On the subject of gender and sexual identity it seems the struggle for visibility and dialogue is ramping up. Last year one of the invited guests on Oprah the segment \u201cGays Around the World<\/a>\u201d was Prince Manvendra Singh Gohil of Rajpipla<\/a>. The prince\u2019s coming out was so scandalous the royal family disowned him. I was very impressed with how he presented himself on the show and how dignified and courageous he appeared.\"calendar_model.jpg\"<\/a>Today, I came across this article and photograph in a popular gossip newspaper. The article is extraordinary in its matter-of-fact coverage. Hijras<\/a> (Eunuchs) are common if not accepted in Indian culture however the subject of this article clearly identifies herself as transgender, out and proud.<\/p>\n

Times are a changing!
\n
\nIn The News, pt 2<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"metro_masthead.jpg\"<\/center>
\nThe US tabloids and daily newspapers don’t have anything on Indian papers in terms of audacity and spunk. This racy joke is actually printed beneath an article on how parents can make their children’s homework productive.
\"metro_news_1.jpg\"
\n\"metro_news_2.jpg\"<\/center>Tickletalk
\nA guy walks into a bar carrying an 18″ alligator. The bartender says, “What do you think you’re doing? Get that god damn thing out of here. I don’t allow pets in my establishment.” The guy tries to explain. “Look he won’t cause any trouble. He’s well trained and I’ll prove it.” He then proceeds to put the alligator on the bar and says, “open”. The alligator open its mouth and you can see all its razor sharp teeth. “Now watch this”, he says and proceeds to remove his dick through his zipper and lays his balls gently onto the alligator’s teeth. He then orders a beer and proceeds to drink it. All the while the alligator keeps its mouth open and nothing happens. After finishing the beer the man gently removes his dick and puts it back into his pants. He then says, “close” and the alligator closes its mouth. “You see he is perfectly trained. He would do that for anybody. Does anyone want to try?’ After looking around he finally hears a drunk who’s sitting at a table say “Sure I’d like to try. But I don’t know if I can keep my mouth open that long.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Very Welcome Delhi” I arrived in New Delhi during Basant Panchami the puja and festival time honoring the Hindu deity Saraswati. In the sacred text of the Rig Veda she represents a river and the deity presiding over it. Saraswati is also identified with Vaach (speech), perfect speech that denotes intelligence. An apropos greetings being […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-354","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dispatches"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1c8Xx-5I","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kuma2.net\/skyeview\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/354","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kuma2.net\/skyeview\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kuma2.net\/skyeview\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kuma2.net\/skyeview\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kuma2.net\/skyeview\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=354"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.kuma2.net\/skyeview\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/354\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kuma2.net\/skyeview\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=354"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kuma2.net\/skyeview\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=354"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kuma2.net\/skyeview\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=354"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}