SKIN PRIVILEGE



After lunch and a nap yesterday, I visited the new Cafe Coffee Day at the end of Devaraj Urs Road. Finally, coffee in my neighborhood!

There's a patio on the 2nd floor, where you can watch everything happening below (without being molested by the riffraff), but I sat in the AC and had a latte and chocolate fantasy cake while outlining a story about green yoga.

A trip of foreign women -- Turkish? Greek? ??? -- came in and sat in the front window. They wore sexy t-shirts, tight capri pants, stylish flats and heavy makeup -- and carried many shopping bags.

At one point a wrinkled woman in a sari came to the window and stared and stared at this bit of western-inspired opulance on Devaraj Urs Rd. What could she have been thinking? It was a bit like a scene from a Kieslowski film.

The next time I looked up, the woman was standing in front of the door, peering in. I wondered if she'd come in, and how the young, good-looking baristas would react.

The next time I looked up, she was gone. Had they chased her away when I wasn't looking?

When I left, I studied the sign on the front door, hoping to find out the cafe's timings. But the sign didn't have them. It said only that they reserve the right to decide who gets to come in -- and who does not.


***


I had a great parking spot, so afterwards I actually WALKED down the street (towards KR Circle) to City Optical Paradise, across from the Punjab National Bank. My $5 Walgreen's reading glasses had not survived the journey, and they were putting in new lenses for RS 400 (around $10). On the walk, I looked at the dresses displayed in front of the shops, and on the return trip I jettisoned my plans to visit The Coconut Family at Sri Rampet and spent the next hour or so buying dresses as gifts. One of them needed to be altered, so I killed time buying towels for me and doing more window shopping.

After finally collecting the altered dress -- "one half hour only, Ma'am" somehow turned into one three times that -- I returned to the scooter, loaded it with packages, and took off, images of dinner dancing in my head.

But I felt the wind in my hair and realized something was missing -- my helmet, which I'd left at the last store.

So I turnd around.

But the only way to double back was to pass the Coconut Family stand, and I didn't want to risk them seeing me.

So I took a different route, which didn't work out.

I did a very sloppy, dangerous U-turn -- losing one bag, which I was able to recover -- and ended up going past the Coconut Family after all.

Maybe they didn't see me....


***


For Friday's led practice, I got a spot in the front row. I figured if anyone told me it was their spot, I'd say "Oh YEAH? Well it was my spot last year." But no one made a peep, and I found myself between Keemo-from-Finland and Cathy-from-America (and Manju's teacher training), and down from Linda-from-Edinburgh. Basically, these are the three people at the shala whom I know).

It was a good practice, although I'm sure Sharath's count has slowed down even more -which is A-OK with me..... though my middle back did start to ache during the interminable headstand.

Afterwards I gave Sharath my photo (which I'd forgotten to include with my registration), talked to no one over coconuts, bought the papers (Bangalore Mirror and New Indian Express) and went to Greenleaf, where they talked me into ordering the pongol. The coconut-y rice dish is only served on Fridays and Sundays, and was amazing.







TODAY'S FUN FACT:

Guruji's birthday party is on the 29th or 30th (I forget which) at 1PM. I hope (and pray) that he'll be there. I'm planning to wear the purple/cream sari Ammu go for me last year -- provided Sachin-the-genius-tailor finishes the choli (blouse) on time.