INSOMNIA PIX

Today's Vocabulary Word:

Oota gante = Kannada (sort of) for "lunchtime"






It's 3AM in Chicago and lunchtime in Mysore -- which means it's the time for photos:






Around the corner from the tailor Sachin, the Ayurvedic Hospital, the fabric-pusher Mansoor, the Bharath diagnostic center (where we got mammograms) and the word famous Piles and Fistula Clinic.







Karnataka's answer to Reservoir Dogs? As far as I know, "voilent" is not a word. Yet every poster for this fillum boasted the same typo. You can tell from the writing and hero's moustache and poofy hair that this is a Kannada fillum.








The road by Tina's house in Gokulam, where I often dined on breakfast of y'eggs, coconut dosa and a large masala chai. Note the absence of the One-Legged Man, Dirty Wee Boy with Monkeys and Snakes, Impossibly Thin Woman with Infant, and others in need of Western rupees.






The back room where Harini and Shashikala of Three Sisters give ayurvedic massages and castor oil baths. They stand holding a rope made of twisted fabric (top middle) and let their feet do all the work. The room is on an angle, so you end up inching towards the wall on the right, and they have to keep telling you to slide back to the center. Afterwords Shashikala bathes you with warm water as though you're a helpless infant -- quite a healing treat for the improperly mothered.







The famous Three Sisters frozen lassi. It takes forever to make, comes in flavors such as banana, papaya, cocont and mango, and becomes unexpectedly unavailable when the power goes out. They close the kitchen door securely and there's great secrecy when they make it; while sitting on the floor in front of the fan you can hear them pounding away on something that is either a block of frozen yogurt (my theory) or a block of ice (everyone else's theory) or something else. On my last day it was quite hot and I had a saffron one, which immediately cooled me off and made me feel felt like everything would be OK. Still, I was packing up to the very last minute and was delayed a couple of hours in Amsterdam -- which meant time for an awesome veggie sandwich on that too-fresh brown, seed-encrusted European bread; fresh-squeezed orange juice; and a superstrong latte. Not enough time, though, to view the Rembrandts on display at the airport. Funny, I was the only one on the flight wearing Indian dress.