THAT SAID....

Today's Vocabulary Review:

Make a Move = to leave
STD = phone booth
Fast: promiscuous

....Tomorrow I'm going for the jungle with Matrika. On scooters. Bad lady me for bailing on the anatomy workshop, but the call of the elephants, tigers, poisonous snakes etc. is strong, and the prospect of not one but two safaris cannot be ignored.

Today I was named a "regular customer" at the Southern Star restaurant and given a 20 percent discount on the bill. How this happened is beyond me, but like getting an unexpected yoga posture one does not question. I signed my name on the chit in Kannada, which elicited smiles all around.

Recently Overheard:

"They just give them to us."

--Male yoga student marveling at how easy it is for westerners here to obtain very dangerous four-stroke weapons (ie, scooters).

"Are you going to Regaalis?"

--Male yoga student asking a peer if they plan to swim at the Southern Star, which recently changed hands and was renamed (and now has a new favourite customer).

"What's Regaalis?"

--Female yoga student

"I Just can't get enough of their chicken sausage."

-Male yoga student, referring to the Southern Star's infamous East-meets-West buffet.


"She got Lasic surgery in Bangalore and can see perfectly now. It cost her $850 US"

-Male yoga student.


"What's Guantanamo?

--A fellow yoga student. From America. Asking Satya C. what the hell she was talking about when she read aloud from an article about US Senators calling for an end to the unconstitutional detainment and torture of suspected (but never charged) terrorists at the US detention camp in Cuba.


Deafening distorted helium-y Bollywood-y temple music amplified to a painful decibel level that breaks local laws as well as the 1949 Geneva Conventions accords regarding torture.

--heard at this very moment up and down the street and inside every building along the way. Yet no one has taken up arms.