The Golden Temple

This is just to check in your shoes

Mandatory foot bath

First glimpse of the Golden Temple

Baddest dude in India

Guards relaxing and chatting between skewering unruly tourists

People bathing

Download this one and zoom in on the artwork

Everybody eats for free

But it takes a lot of volunteers to feed them all

Baba Deep Singh Ji

Sikh Pope's House

Entrance to the temple. Download and zoom in to see the detail. Look how thick the gold is.

One last look

We arrived at Amritsar, parked, and the four of us piled into a couple of rickshaws and took off for the Golden Temple.

Once there I realized this place was far larger than I expected. So many people visit that they have a special place across the street to check your shoes. Also again we had to cover our heads so I had to buy a special gold scarf that says ‘Golden Temple’ on it. Somehow I didn’t feel very holy.

At the entrance you literally have to walk through water in order to clean your feet and properly respect the Temple. That’s pretty cool, as long as they keep refreshing the water.

We entered the Gurdwara and this vast square pond surrounded by large walls opened before us. It’s about a square mile in size and surrounded by high walled buildings. On one side is an isthmus which juts out onto an island in the center of the pond. On this island sits a temple covered inside and out in gold. This is the Golden Temple proper, the Harmandir Sahib. Now it’s not built OF gold, it’s gold sheeting, about three tons worth. Three freaking tons. And it’s not like the cute gold leaf you get in most churches, it’s more like an eighth of an inch thick. I’ve never heard of a Sikh taking a vow of poverty.

Right after us walked in a small, fierce, badass looking dude in a very fancy getup with a beautiful black hat and a sword about one third his size. He wasn’t big by any means, but his countenance was quite severe, this mofo was not to be trifled with. Rajeev told me he was from a special warrior clan of the Sikhs and dressed traditionally. I asked Rajeev if I could take the guy’s picture or would he get mad and run me through with that sword. After all, when you’re in someobody else’s holy place you’d best confirm before discovering you’ve made a faux paux that could cost you your life. “Another stupid tourist took a picture of a Sikh warrior, toss his body with all the other infidels on the other side of the wall”. I doubt I’d even make the news.

Rajeev said it was okay to take his picture, but I still kind of pretended I was just taking a bunch of pictures around the temple and only got one of the warrior. While he wasn’t very big, I’d still pick him in a fight with a Crip anyday.

Most of what Americans know about the Golden Temple is that this is the central place of Sikh worship. Okay most Americans don’t know jack about the Golden Temple, but a few are old enough to remember a religious zealot named Bhindranwale had taken over the Gurdwara in 1984 and hundreds of people were there. India’s Prime Minister, Indira Ghandi, had sent in the army to root him out, killed a few hundred people, and destroyed some buildings, including the Akal Takhat, the seat of government/religion for the Sikhs and home to what I incorrectly call their Pope (I can’t find his proper title). The Golden Temple itself sustained some damage from gunfire but was not destroyed.

What’s really amazing is that I can find no reliable sources of information about what really happened or how extensive the damage was. I ask again and again why it happened and I receive vague answers about how ‘complicated’ and ‘political’ it was, this from both Sikhs and Hindus. It would take hours to explain the politics involved they tell me.

The nearest I can make out is that Bhindranwale was a Sikh fundamentalist who would preach/hassle/attack (again depending on your point of view) against those who did not live up to the purity he wanted from Sikhs. He was definitely used by Indira Ghandi to strike at another troublesome Sikh group at one point and was implicated in a murder. The Sikh’s tell me he became a megalomaniac and decided to challenge Ghandi in the Golden Temple. He never openly declared for an independent Khalistan (Sikh homeland of the Punjab), he was probably too smart for that, but the implication was there. Indira Ghandi felt she couldn’t allow this and ordered the military operation.

But so many questions remain. Why in the world would she do something so obviously fraught with peril? Her own Sikh military commander resigned rather than approve the military action against the temple. Did Bhindranwale take pilgrims hostage or were they supporters? I can find no mention of hostages, even the government didn’t claim there were hostages, so they must have been supporters. Why did the Sikh Pope in the Gurdwara allow Bhindranwale to set up shop there? The Sikh Pope (I can’t find his name anywhere) has no problems with weapons in the complex as separating Sikhism and weapons is like separating Christianity and the Cross, but what was the ultimate goal?

To make matters worse, while there is a free press in India, I’m told there are 27,000 daily papers, they all are just different versions of Fox News, spreading lies and disinformation rather than rooting out facts and truth. It’s obvious the Indian government is hiding something and just wants the issue to go away. But the Sikhs have created their own campaign to downplay Bhidranwale’s fanaticism. I have a well educated Sikh friend who told me that Bhidranwale wanted to restore respect for the Golden Temple because people were leaving cigarette butts and trash in the pond. Automatic weapons are needed to fight cigarette butts.

I’ve only been to two Sikh Gurdwaras now, but I can say without hesitation that they were very clean. Gopi says all the Sikh gurdwaras are spotless, the Hindu temples are dirty. Considering he’s a Hindu that says something about what to expect. I can’t imagine anybody smoking in the Golden Temple or anybody leaving any trash around. I didn’t so much as see a candy wrapper in the pond. But then again, maybe Bhindranwale’s made his point.

This proved to be a huge miscalculation for Ghandi and it cost her her life when her two Sikh bodyguards assassinated her a few months later. The Sikhs smile proudly when they tell me that the Golden Temple has only been attacked three times in history and all three leaders who ordered the attacks were killed within six months.

While I don’t see any sign of Sikh’s seeking independence, whenever a discussion of the Golden Temple comes up, no matter how non-existent their English, the Sikhs make sure I understand their repulsion to the attack on their sacred shrine.

We ate at the Gurdwara first before going to the Golden Temple. At least 1500 people were being fed there. A sign hangs at the entranceway that I find to be very spirtitual. Remember this is a translation, I’m told the original language is very poetic.

The Lord himself is the farm
Himself is the farmer
Himself he grows and grinds the corn
Himself he cooks
Himself he places in on a platter
And Himself he eats too
Himself is the water
Himself the toothpick
Himself he offers a handful of water
Himself he calls the men to eat
Himself he bids them off
The Lord is merciful
He makes him walk in his will

This was eating on an industrial scale without industrial machines. Just hundreds of people pitching in. Tons of food being cooked, handed out, and platters being cleaned. All for free of course. It was a chaotic well oiled machine.

We walked around the Gurdwara and came to a place showing the story of a Sikh warrior named Baba Deep Singh Ji who had been fighting off enemies outside the Gurdwara. In the fighting his head was cut off but he held his head in one hand while continuing to fight with the other. He was determined to fight his way inside the Gurdwara before he died and he succeeded.

Rajeev looked at me, “This is possible you know”.

That’s nothing, the Christians popped a guy out of his grave after three days.

Up in the visitor’s center was more information about the Sikh Gurus, there were ten of them, and paintings of damage done to the Golden Temple. Hmmm, I bet the Indian government didn’t allow any pictures taken of the damage. In today’s YouTube world, that is now an impossibility.

But also, as befits a warrior religion, there are a dozens of large macabre photos of Sikh’s who have been killed in defense of their religion. The corpses are all cleaned and dressed with garlands around their necks, most I believe are from the 1984 battle. They died as holy warriors.

We got in line to get to the Golden Temple and it was packed. Indian’s believe that unless you can feel their nipples in your shoulder blades there’s too much space between you. What I didn’t find out until later is that most of the people were not Sikh pilgrims, most were Hindu tourists.

The Golden Temple is exactly what it looks like except up close the gold is all beautifully inscribed. Can you imagine being the guy writing in this gold? The gold is in sheets about three feet across. Odd corners and rounded edges are all covered with writing, every inch. St. Peter’s has some fantastic stuff, but nothing like this. Benedict should make a visit.

Inside, the Sikh’s holy book, called the Eleventh Guru, lies under a beautiful blue blanket while a bunch of guys play instruments and read from their scriptures. I’m told this is broadcast on the internet, but I couldn’t find it. People were throwing money on the floor, something about all that gold makes you feel rich and like giving more.

Upstairs there is another smaller room where people, Hindu, Sikh, and even some Western tourists, sit and soak up the atmosphere. All poshly laid out with brightly colored rugs and pillows. Up on the roof you can look out over the whole Gurdwara and touch the golden plastered domes.

“How about that!” Gopi stroked one of the gold domes. There’s something about touching gold to make you think that prosperity will rub off on you. He motioned with his hand at all the gold and the fantastic view of the entire Gurdwara, “Pretty impressive isn’t it?”

I looked out and had to agree, this was dang impressive, and worth a trip to India.

Luck of the Irish

Guinness Workers Housing



“Will you marry me?” I asked.

I was at the Dublin airport and trying to find the bus to the hotel. There to assist me was an Irish angel. Flame red hair, striking green eyes, alabaster skin, and rosy cheeks. A perfect model of Irish beauty topped off by a lilting Irish accent that just melted my heart.

The girl giggled, even her giggle had a lilt to it.

I shook my head, “No, no, I’m serious. I do this all the time.”

For some reason she laughed even harder.

Ireland, the home country, where one third of Americans originated. Jeez, I lived in England, you’d think I could have taken a weekend trip or something. But somehow I never got around to it. I regret it now, not because Dublin is great and I’ve missed something special all these years, it’s not, I think ‘Dublin’ is the ancient Celtic word for ‘boring’. It’s just that it is obvious the place has transformed like a, well, transformer. All the buildings here are either 100+ years old or 10- years old, without a never-you-mind in between to link them together. I missed seeing history before modernity altered it permanently.

New buildings and old warehouses. Bank building stopped mid construction.


Don’t get me wrong, the new buildings are sharp and sleek, but they sit all around these older buildings. I’m not sure Frank Lloyd Wright could make it all fit together, but it certainly doesn’t work here. And not to mention that due to the Great Recession, many of these buildings, like the one across from my hotel, lie empty, begging for occupants like forgotten ghosts of better days gone past.

I took the city tour bus and ended up at one of my lifelong goals, the Guinness Storehouse. This was their factory for over 200 years and now they’ve revamped it for tours. As it turns out making beer is very boring, when you have to throw in ‘water’ as one of your four ingredients you hype it shows you’re grasping. Yes, yes, yes, I know, it’s special water from some local hills they call mountains.




Still, they managed to make a nice presentation. My favorite part was the advertising. I also found out that John Gilroy (I used to live in Gilroy, CA) was the guy who did all their advertising drawings years ago. You gotta hand it I to them, they learned from their American cousins, the gift shop you have to pass by twice, once on your way in, and once on your way out. I mean, how can anyone turn down Guinness spiked chocolate truffles?



Of course there’s the free pint at the end of the tour, but to top it off it’s served on the seventh floor in a round glass room with a 360 degree view of Dublin. The view is amazing and absolutly beauti…no, strike that, I mean the view is boring and absolutely dreary. Dublin was an industrial city until Ireland’s tax laws turned it into a tax mecca and businesses started rolling in. But it still has that industrial feel. If Dublin has a sister city it’s probably Hamburg or Cleveland. I’m told they asked Rio de Janeiro for sister city status and were informed they should try Lima.



Aaaak! They serve Budweiser at the Guinness plant!

There’s no skyline to speak of. A few nameless boring churches dot the horizon, but who cares really, it’s not like anything interesting ever happened here except for the continuous failed bloody uprisings. Why were the Irish so desperate for the English to leave? If they were smart they would have proposed a trade.

“Listen, you take Ireland, and we’ll go to one of those lovely Caribbean islands you have. Sure, we’ll still be English slaves, but we promise not to revolt. Why? Because at least it’ll be sunny and warm.”

The major attraction is the Dublin literary pub crawl where you can go to the same pubs that famous depressed Irish writers frequented. It dawned on me that I’ve never read any of these guys, I guess it’s because they remind me of the Russian writers, long winded and miserable.

Many years ago the IRA blew up a column to Nelson on their Main St. because it was put up by the British. During the boom Dublin decided to substitute a new monument, something to recognize the city by, something they could be proud of, something that would put them on the map, like the Eiffel Tower, or Corcovado. They had over two hundred entries. They chose ‘The Spire’ a non-descript 394 foot needle of steel. You don’t even notice it, and when you do you wonder, ‘WTF?’ At first I thought the thing was peeling at the base until I looked closely and realized it was done on purpose as ‘art’. Makes you wonder how bad the other entries were.

I saw a sign that showed a guy with a cell phone in his raised hand, head thrown back in victory. The caption read, “Finally, mobile betting”. Yes, Ireland finally has a use for all that technology Steve Jobs invented.

Last remnants of the old city wall


There are so many white people here it’s beginning to creep me out. And they all look the same to me. Even the cleaning ladies in the hotel are white and don’t speak a word of Spanish, I can’t communicate with them, maybe they’re Russian. Actually Dublin does have a large immigrant population, including Chinese and Africans. You gotta be really desperate to leave your country for Ireland, I guess nobody told them the Irish were Emmigrants, not Immigrants.

I have zero problem understanding people here, unlike England, where the English murder the language. It must be because so many Irish came to America. Or perhaps it was all those old movies with the Irish cops so I got used to the accent.

Actually I do have a problem understanding some people, there are a lot of people from other countries working here. I always pride myself on understanding people’s accents. If someone comes up to me and asks, “Zaaa Dwaaa”, I know to point them in the direction of Safeway. But it turns out that accents are three dimensional. I understand German, Russian, and Spanish accents, but now I have to understand German-Irish, Russian-Irish, and Spanish-Irish accents. And just think about Chinese-Irish!

It looks like they’re trying to revive the Celtic language. All signs seem to be in both English and Celtic. Good luck with that one, millions of Chinese are trying to learn English and you want to get everyone off English and back to your native language? If you want to spite the English why don’t you start driving on the right side of the road?

Cheers!

Kumar and the Cops

My friend, I’ll call him Kumar, his real name since he won’t deny it, has experience with both Indian and American cops. While reading this, remember that Kumar is one of the quietest geekiest Indians you’ll ever meet. Even among the quiet and geeky high-tech Indian set he stands out, or should I say, is unnoticed.

This is too bad, he often could warn me of trouble months in advance, but because he was a geek, nobody else listened. But I did, I always listened to Kumar.

One day at work he came into my office to discuss something, for some reason we got on the subject of police and he related this story.

Kumar’s friend Srini was moving from the East coast to the West coast back in the mid-nineties and asked Kumar to come with him. He’d rented a truck and was hauling his car on a car dolly behind the truck. They didn’t want to stop at a hotel so they were driving all night through Tennessee when Srini stopped at an all night gas station in the middle of nowhere. Not thinking clearly he pulled into a parking space, how was he going to back out with the dolly behind him?

They went inside and the service station lady was a bit taken aback. White and black men she was familiar with, but being all alone with brown men made her nervous at 2 A.M.

“Do you boys need any help?” she asked.

“Yes”, they replied. They didn’t know how they were going to get the truck out.

So she called the police. Seems like a reasonable response to two lost Indians in Tennessee.

A standard issue good ‘ol boy cop comes out and instead of saying, “Um, no crime has been committed here, perhaps I should be on my way”, decides he’s going to instruct these foreigners on how to handle trucks and cars. He has them back out a little bit, but of course that didn’t work. I think somehow the car was backed up a bit off the car dolly as well. But the point is that they unhooked the trailer as much as possible, but the car dolly was still caught on the ball of the trailer hitch because of the way they’d backed out earlier.

The cop stepped up to the junction of the T-bar and trailer hitch and tells Srini to move the truck forward. Kumar and Srini start talking in Tamil now.

“I don’t think you should do that with him there”, Kumar says.

“What can I do? He’s a police officer”, Srini answers.

Indians are terrible about questioning authority. That’s why it took them one hundred years to get their independence, they kept asking the British to leave nicely. If a cop or manager tells you to do the impossible, an Indian will keep trying, or pretending to try, but will never say, ‘You idiot, can’t you see this will never work?’

Sure enough Srini moves forward a bit, the tension is released, the hitch comes lose with a pop, and the T-bar flies up and hits the cop square under the jaw and sends him flying 20 feet.

“What did you do?” I asked Kumar in horror.

Kumar answered, “I thought the cop was dead. I looked at Srini in the side view mirror and his eyes were as wide as saucers.”

A brown man had just killed a white cop in Tennessee. He would be lucky if they read him his rights before the execution.

Then the cop moaned a little. Kumar went over to him and knelt down. The cop motioned for Kumar to hand him the electronic number pad strapped to his shoulder. Kumar did so and the cop slowly punched in a few numbers.

“And then within one minute all I could hear, from all directions, were sirens” Kumar said amazedly. The ‘Officer Down’ code gets other cops attention.

The police arrived to find a brown man kneeling over a wounded cop. They didn’t exactly draw their guns but they did have their hands on the holsters and were quite edgy in asking Kumar to back away.

They took the cop to the hospital, got their story, and held Kumar and Srini at the gas station for twelve hours until the cop was conscious enough to give a statement and verify their story. The cop must have been pretty embarrassed.

Then Kumar starts telling me another story, about how back in India he was riding a motorcycle without a license or registration. He entered an intersection where a cop was directing traffic and the cop sees him and knows he’s got Kumar dead to rights. He puts his hand out for Kumar to stop.

Kumar is torn between stopping and running away, so he chooses a middle ground and lays the bike down while skimming along on the ground with his jeans absorbing what could have been a nasty road rash.

The bike spins around and around and bowls the cop down. Before the cop can recover, Kumar gets up, hops on the motorcycle and rides away.

I looked at him severely holding up two fingers to make my point, “Wait a minute!”, my voice was raised, “Am I to understand you took down two cops in your life?!”

Geeky little Kumar’s smile said it all.

How to Bribe an Indian Cop

We bribed a cop today.

Wait a minute, just let that sink in a bit.

We…bribed…a…cop...today.

As a former Federal Officer I’m horrified. As a tourist in India it’s a charming peek into a different culture.

I won’t say who or where in order to protect the guilty, but here’s how it went down.

In India the cops just sit by the side of the road with a couple of small portable metal fences on wheels to kind of denote a traffic stop. They don’t pull everyone over however, only when they notice something wrong would they pull someone over.

Our infraction was that there was a problem with our license plate. It was a brand new car with a temporary plastic front plate. Someone had tried to steal the plate and instead had broken off the first two letters of it. These letters are merely the State designation, think of it as if all California plates started with CA.

We had realized this was a problem, but there was really nothing we could do about it, it was a temporary plate. We’d have metal permanent plates in a few days anyway. It wasn’t like they could issue us a temporary temporary plate. In the mean time we’d fashioned a temporary solution, a large paper sign in the front of the plate with the missing two first letters. This is India after all, you improvise.

So seeing the menace to society we were, as we rounded a corner the cop motions us to pull over. Now I don’t know what happens if you run from cops in India, but it seemed that it would take them an awfully long time to get in their car and chase you. They kind of reminded me of the old fat county cops we had in Maryland who were too lazy to get out of their car, if you run away on foot, they’d just give up the chase. Not that I had experience with that or anything.

Our cop, I’m told, was very nice about our situation, normally they can be absolute dicks, but there is the possibility that a Westerner sitting in the front seat may have had something to do with their demeanor. He asked for a license, which it turned out we did not have on us, and the registration which was just a temporary.

This left the cop in a quandary. In the U.S. the cop would normally issue a fix-it ticket for the license plate, a ticket for the missing driver’s license, and make somebody else drive you home. But this is India, there’s no really good way of tracking things. The cop has only a few things he can do, he can seize your driver’s license, which we didn’t have, seize your registration, which is temporary anyway we’ll get a permanent one in a few days, or seize the car, which is a whole lot of hassle. And God knows Indian cops don’t want a whole lot of hassle, they want to do the hassling, not be a participant.

So the cop asked the driver what he thought the solution might be. The driver answered that perhaps a ‘spot fine’ would do. Spot fines used to be common in India, you’d pay the cop your fine and go on about your business. But as you can imagine this left a lot of room for bribery, the world’s second oldest profession. Thus they did away with spot fines. But tradition is hard to give up.

I’ve never been able to bribe anybody. It’s a grave weakness of mine. I have a hard time tipping the valet, it seems like I’m paying him not to harm my car. I only tipped a maitre d’ once in my life in Las Vegas to get a better seat, and I still feel slimy for doing it. I understand that concierge’s get big tips, I’d love to use one sometime, but I wouldn’t know how much to tip them, therefore I just do everything myself.

My friend told me about going to the Indian Consulate in San Francisco to pick up a visa but she arrived five minutes after closing. Sorry.

Oh wait, she slipped the guard five dollars and was let in. Five dollars? Five dollars?! That’s it? The guy risked his livelihood, his future, possibly even jail time, for five dollars? This is a Consulate guard? If she could bribe him for $5, what will he be willing to do for $100? That’s why bribery is so heinous.

Graft and bribery, the scourge of the Earth. I’ve given a lot of thought lately as to what constitutes an ‘advanced’ country, and rule of law is at the top of my list. Yes, China has a booming economy, but the ones making a killing are the well connected and best at bribery. The rest of the country is subjected to their whims, destroyed thousand year old neighborhoods, destroyed food, destroyed water supplies, and destroyed air. Go live there for a few days and decide whether you really want your job back that was shipped over there if it means living like that.

Yes, we have our graft and corruption in the U.S., one need look no farther than Wall Street and Washington. But those guys really don’t like it at the local cop level and tend to enforce those laws a bit more stringently. If everybody in America started doing it, it wouldn’t be nearly as profitable for the guys on top.

One of the main reasons for ending Prohibition was graft. So many people wanted to drink alcohol that everybody was in on it, from cops, to politicians, to judges, the bootleggers were greasing so many palms the rule of law began to sag.

It’s also interesting that Prohibition is the only amendment added to the Constitution of the United States that restricted our rights, and look at what a flop that was. And now it seems all of the Amendments proposed from abortion, to government guided prayer in schools, to flag burning are all restrictive of rights. You never see any of our representatives proposing amendments demanding more rights to privacy from an intrusive government and corporations.

Oh, I’m sorry, I forgot, the Supreme Court did grant a new right, free speech for corporations, our new American citizens. According to Conservatives their philosophy is original intent, after 225 years we should divine the original intent of our Founding Fathers. The Roberts Court decided that this is was what the Founding Fathers fought and died for, the ability of massive corporations to give unlimited amounts of money to back politicians.

There’s only one problem with this ‘original intent’ philosophy, our Founding Fathers banned corporations. They were only allowed under strictly limited circumstances of time and scope. Why? Because they knew that corporations would become so large and powerful that they would threaten the freedom of Americans. And guess what, they were right.

The driver pointed out to the cop the predicament we were in, we’d done our best, fashioning a sign that clearly displayed the missing letters.

Ah yes, but the problem is the letters are too large. They were about a centimeter larger than the actual license plate letters.

It’s not like we had created the letters smaller than the license plate in order to try and hide ourselves from the hawk-like eyes of the police, they were bigger, and quite clear.

This sort of flouting of the sacrosanct laws of India would not stand. Who knows what manner of ill repute would spread if this infringement of the norms and mores of Indian society were allowed too stand. Chaos may ensue. Chaos!

Then again, who’s going to notice adding more chaos to the infinite chaos of India?

I wondered how close we had to be to the proper size of the lettering, for the cop to let us go? A half centimeter larger? A millimeter? A micron? Would the Lord Viceroy pull out his trusty caliper and measure this license plate to perfection to ensure the safety of all of those entrusted in his care?

In the mean time a family of five on a motorbike, the mother sitting side saddle, with her baby in her lap, passed us by. The police didn’t notice.

In the end the spot fine was…drum roll please….100 Rupes, two dollars.

Have a nice day Mr. petty, useless, pathetic, scum sucking, low life, plague on mankind, Policeman. Don’t spend it all in one place.

The Baha'i Temple

Look how relieved the people are to have their shoes on again.

I met the most beautiful woman in India today. We were touring Delhi and as my tour book had been left in a bag with the hire car that was now back in Agra, I had no idea what to see. There’s actually nothing in Delhi that had piqued my curiosity unlike the rest of India, even though it is the biggest city.

Delhi is a Garden of Eden compared to the other parts of India. Going to Delhi is like going to New York City, highly unrepresentative of the country. The streets are clean and wide, the gardens are flowering, and the buildings in good repair. Kinda the opposite of New York actually. I was in heaven.

So our driver takes us to the Ba’hai temple. Wait a minute, I got the apostrophe in the wrong place. Bahai’ temple. No, that’s not right either. Baha’i temple. Who the heck names a religion with an apostrophe in it? Why didn’t God give them a name with proper spelling?

This temple is shaped like a lotus and quite striking looking. It sits in some beautifully sculpted gardens and somebody cleans up the trash. I’ve noticed that many of the most beautiful places are walled compounds that have somebody who cleans up the trash. Now they just need to keep expanding their walls until the whole country is cleaned up.

The most curious thing about the Baha’i temple is the test everyone must pass to see if they are worthy of entering. The stones of the walkway are dark brown and absorb the 115 degree heat of the scorching sun and I daresay magnify it. But again, you have to take off your shoes to get inside. They have mats over the hot stone walkway, but even the mats are hot and you are getting first degree burns on your feet. The bare stones mean second degree burns.

The first test comes as you give your shoes to the shoe check people in a low building about 30 meters from the temple. Now you have about twenty feet of blazing hot rock to go before you can get to the mats. People are hopping and skipping around like spasmodic ballet dancers. I guess this is the first test of the Baha’i faith, walking across hot coals.

Nobody notices the temple anymore, everyone is concentrated on keeping themselves on the mats and looking for those areas where some Baha’i saint had poured water on them. Even the rope mats are blazing hot. But luckily where they’ve poured water it can reach no higher than 212 degrees Fahrenheit.

We finally make the suffering 30 meter trek to the temple entrance and get ready to go in. Then they stop and give us a lecture about what to do and not do. The standard, no shoes, no talking, etc., etc. Once inside it is just one big room with chairs facing the center with a lectern. We sit down in silence and wait for the act to begin.

Nothing happens. Good grief, they’re not even going to try to convert us? At least the Mormons show you a giant blonde haired, blue eyed, Jesus. Don’t you guys have a slide show? There’s nothing to look at but the lectern? At least give us a foot high Ganesh. We sit awhile longer and then decide to leave.

The way out is much more dangerous than the way in however. There is a ten foot section between the shade of the temple and the mat leading away from the temple back to our shoes. The mat is already packed with people in a long line to get their shoes, there’s no room there. The hot coals will fry your feet in seconds.

People break in small packs when an opening appears on the mat, even getting toward the edge of the shade is hot so you’re hopping from foot to foot while you wait. And this is India after all, there’s no concept of orderly waiting your turn, people push past you or around you if they see one centimeter of mat appear.

It’s very similar to watching the movies of the antelope trying to cross the crocodile invested waters in Africa. Some make it, some don’t, and it’s just as painful.

It’s now or never, I break with the next pack. But my polite American instincts kick in with the ladies. The men have shoved their way onto the mats, the ladies bring up the rear and I allow them to pass. But I cannot take the pain. There’s no more mat space left. Joining them on the mat may mean assaulting somebody’s wife and I dare not do that. I flee back to the safety of the near shore (the shade) dancing the dance of a psychotic madman and shouting Celtic curses and oaths the whole way. Everybody laughs at the stupid American. With the next pack I made it out to my wonderful protective shoes, but boy, I will never forget those coals.

At least I’ve had one religious experience, enlightenment if you will, in India. I resolve never to take off my shoes again.

Luckily we found a visitor’s center as I’d only heard that Baha’i was an offshoot of Islam and I knew nothing about it. Maybe somebody here knows what’s going on.

This woman dressed in a beautiful traditional Indian Sari was talking to a group of Indians in perfect Queen’s English explaining the religion to them. She was gorgeous. Her father was Scottish, her mother Iranian. She had big brown eyes, perfect skin, a Venus with both arms. I was ready to convert.

She explained that in 1843 a guy in Iran named Siyyid Alí-Muhammad declared that he was a John the Baptist like character , he was to be called the ‘Bab’, and he was preparing the way for another ‘manifestation of God’. Other manifestations were Buddha, Jesus, Mohammed, etc. So the Baha’i believe other Religious prophets were valid.

But they believe there will be further prophets and they believe in the ‘unity of God’, ‘unity of religion’, ‘unity of mankind’.

What she was saying, like all religions sounded so wonderful at first. Love, peace, joy, tranquility. Aaaaahhhhhh.

Then she started talking about the ‘manifestation of God’ in the form of a guy named Baha’u’llah. Oh good grief, God’s chosen one has two apostrophe’s in his name? Is God having fun with us? Hopefully he won’t send a prophet from Denmark and we’ll have to deal with glottal stops too.

It turns out somewhere in Israel there is a picture of Baha’u’llah which she described as the only photograph of a manifestation of God on Earth and if you go there you can view it.

“Why don’t you guys just scan it and post it on the internet? That way the whole world can see the Manifestation of God?” I asked.

“It’s a very holy thing” she responded.

That’s a first, I’ve heard of holy buildings, but this is the first time I’ve ever heard of a holy photo. Not only that, photographs decay, all the more reason to scan it.

Another guy came up and the two of them went on a full court press to convert me. Baha’u’llah died a natural death and his son spent forty years in prison until his release and then he toured the world, including the U.S. to spread the religion. Thousands died as martyrs for the religion. They all went peaceably by the way, they didn’t take up arms. They also seem a bit too proud of their martyrs voluntarily going to their execution. Your religion ain’t gonna last long that way.

The religion originated in Iran, but due to persecution moved to present day Israel. The world Baha’i headquarters is in Haifa, Israel. Those poor Israeli’s, they have a fourth religion they have to contend with?

In a little known event of the Iranian revolution, when the Ayatollah Khomeni took power he put all the Baha’i up against the wall as heretics of Islam. Who’s going to notice when you’re executing so many?

Then this splendid creature told me the story of the Bab, the first guy I mentioned. He was sentenced to death by the Shah back then. A firing squad of 750 men was produced, I guess they wanted to be sure. I can’t imagine how you can arrange 750 men to all fire at the same time without them hitting each other somehow. They came to get the Bab and he was dictating his last instructions to his secretary in his cell. He said, “The execution is not scheduled for another five minutes, please give me this time with my secretary and then I’ll go”.

They refused and dragged him out to be executed. The soldiers fired and a huge cloud of smoke obscured everything. Seven hundred and fifty rifles produced a lot of smoke in those days. When the smoke cleared they were shocked to discover that his body was nowhere to be found. I figured he was blown to smithereens, but I was told I was wrong. When they searched around they found him alive and back in his cell with his secretary. He wasn’t ready to go yet.

They had to bring in another group of 750 men to perform the execution again because the first batch were perturbed and couldn’t be enticed to repeat it. This man was obviously from God. The second time they got the execution right.

The beautiful woman looked at me, her face so radiant and her eyes wide after telling the story.

“This is true”, she said, “There were witnesses”.

Oh dear girl, don’t you realize you could have replaced Inga and her heavenly lotions? We could have been so happy waltzing among the stars? And then you tell me I should accept this story? I hide my grief and I turn to leave. Every religion has to have its crazy side, otherwise nobody will believe it.

Trains, Planes, and Automobiles

For those wondering, I’m not on another trip to India, I’m getting around to writing the stories I have from my first trip.

Trains

We took the train from Jaipur to Agra, First Class. What you have to understand is that in India First Class doesn’t mean what it does in the U.S., or Europe, or Japan, or South America, or Alpha Centauri. First Class in India means that you:

1) Don’t have to hang on the outside of the train
2) Have your own seat
3) Nobody’s sitting on top of you

A friend once described Indian train stations as a scene from a post apocalyptic movie, Mad Max does Mumbai. She’s not far off, every type of person was there. The standard chaos of India is somehow magnified in a train station. Jeez, I wonder what a riot looks like here?

There was a special waiting room for First Class, but it was so mobbed, dingy, and stuffy that I preferred to wait outside on the platform with the masses. If an Indian paid for First Class, he is damned well going to use all First Class privileges, no matter how revolting.

It’s hard to describe the train, I believe it was left over from the British when they left, and while it has been regularly cleaned, and I cannot say it was dirty, after six decades of use, the grime just becomes part of the train itself. Think of your car, the one you grew up in as a kid, the one you spilled your milkshake in, the one with cookie crumbs, the one you threw up in, the one you lost all those jelly beans in, the one you smoked dope in, the one you had sex in, seven decades later, after your kids, grandkids, and great-grandkids had done the same, and you get an idea of what I’m talking about.

I picture archeologists a century from now when the rail cars finally can no longer be used, going through them to discover how people lived in earlier decades.

“Look Alfred! I’ve dug down through 160 layers of stains on this seat. The first stain shows that the person was eating a yogurt with high quality fat. Thus we can conclude that in the 1940s the people ate better than they do today.”

“Another stain is mustard, thus obviously an American sat in this seat in the late 50’s, probably the child of an American Diplomat”.

The Indian railway system was created by the British, after all they invented the train. What!? The train was not an American invention? No dear reader, Americans didn’t invent everything, we just think we did.

So the railroads were built by the British, actually the Indians built it, the British did the planning, design, and direction, the Indians did all the work. In fact the British built railroads all over their Empire which are still in use today. They may or may not run on time, but they’re still there chugging along even in the hinterlands of Africa.

The Indians went directly from colonialism to Socialism in one fell swoop, the British controlled everything one day and the Indian government controlled it the next. The problem with Socialism isn’t that it doesn’t work, it’s that is does, for a while. The economy exists like a vampire off of the previous investment made by others. What happens is that things just slowly decay, and people get used to it. Unless the government can somehow channel investment correctly (which is rarely) things just grind down.

The Indian railway system has been on it’s last legs for fifty years now. Just enough is put back into it to keep it going, like an IV of barely pink blood, but somehow it still runs. Movies and documentaries marvel at the Indian train system. It’s kept the country together and somehow our train was even on time.

Many places in India have metal detectors, the Taj Mahal, the train stations, etc. But only in the airports do they take it seriously. Except for the airports you don’t have to take anything out of your pockets. You just walk through and beep, they don’t even notice. I presume if you have an AK-47 it will beep really loudly to wake them up.

At the train station I was waiting in line to go trough a metal detector, as this is India there really wasn’t a line, just a crowd. So people are going through and it’s finally my turn. Now you’ve seen metal detectors, they’re designed for one person at a time to go through. As a guard is watching me I’m always very careful to walk through them slowly and not make any sudden moves.

As I get into it, a guy tries to shove his way through sideways. That’s it. I’ve had it with Indian pushiness. I turn and yell at him, “Excuse me! Do you mind? There’s no reason to shove me”. He just stares at me like I’m some sort of nut case to object to his rudeness. I really hate being the ugly American, but Lord knows it works. An angry babbling American sets them back on their heels.

Planes

Air travel is not much more expensive, is much more efficient, and much faster. That’s why we caught a plane to Jaipur from Chandigarh. But Agra has no airport so we had to take a train. Of course just like the trains you feel like you’re taking your life in your hands on an Indian airline. The problem is it’s not your hands, it’s the Airlines hand’s.

Before boarding the plane there was an announcement for Kovi and I. The airline lady told us that we were on a small plane, about 40 seats, and in order to balance the weight in the plane they were going to put us in the back. She apologized profusely, telling us it was all just a precaution for safety. I was happy that they’d notice something like that. She issued us new tickets and we boarded the plane.

When we got to our seats I realized something was amiss. We were still in the same seats that were originally assigned to us in row three. Sure enough, the front of the plane was packed full, and it kind of petered out towards the back. I wondered how they packed the luggage. Was it stored up front below us? Would the plane pitch forward after takeoff?

I asked the stewardess about our seats being changed and she just told me there was ‘no problem’. Uh oh, when an Indian tells me ‘no problem’ I begin to worry.

After a few minutes I again called her over and insisted that our seats had been changed for safety reasons and she should check with the Captain. We were supposed to be seated in the back.

“There is no problem, sir. As you can see the back is full”.

I looked at the back of the plane and the last two rows were empty with about six people taking up the last eight rows total. The woman must be hallucinating, but there’s no point arguing with an Indian about reality. For centuries Indians have lived in a situation where they are forced to ignore reality in order to maintain their own sanity, they have this down pat. One alarmed American on a plane isn’t going to change their world.

Okay, don’t panic. Surely if this is really a safety concern the pilot will check. Nope, the pilot didn’t care enough to even open the cockpit and see if things were balanced. I figured the plane was large enough so it shouldn’t matter, the airline lady said it was just a precaution anyway. So I said a prayer, and had my hand on my seatbelt to bolt to the back if the plane so much as hiccupped.

We took off without a hitch, but I couldn’t help thinking that the ticket agent didn’t care enough to check if our seats had been reassigned correctly, the stewardess didn’t care, and the pilot didn’t care. It must be their first day on the job.

Automobiles

We had to drive from Agra to Delhi because we wanted to see Fatehpur Sikri about 15 miles west of Agra. Delhi is north. Fatehpur Sikri was where Akbar the Great moved the capital after some soothsayer’s prophecy. It’s like moving Washington D.C. to Harper’s Ferry, West Viriginia, it just doesn’t fit.

After touring Fatehpur Sikri, getting back to the main Agra to Delhi road was an adventure. Instead of taking the highway back to Agra and then north to Delhi, we were going to take a ‘shortcut’. I saw parts of India no Westerner has ever seen. The road literally petered out outside of a town after a few miles. In the town we forced our way through a crowed market only to realize the reason everybody was blocking the road was that everybody knows it goes nowhere so nobody drives that way. Not us. We were on a mission from God, to find the Delhi-Agra highway, or die trying.

Leaving the town it was obvious there once was a road here, probably built with some foreign aid in the ‘60s. A yellow line in the middle and a foot wide piece of asphalt it sits on is all that’s left. The middle yellow line sits up about a foot high above the dirt roadbed too as it protects the earth underneath it from the rain. Everything else has washed away. That yellow line of asphalt was our guide, we ourselves had to drive through a moonscape of craters. The moon buggy the Astronauts had would have served us well.

At one point it turned out we had doubled back and almost re-entered the town we had left. Yet our driver and guide would still not be persuaded to go back to the highway.

I was apoplectic. Kovi was angry with them as well. I envisioned a camel caravan discovering our desiccated bodies in the middle of the desert and thinking, ‘Another stupid tourist trying to take a shortcut’. As we were only driving 2 miles an hour at times I considered getting out and walking, at least I wouldn’t be smashed around the car like a salad shooter. Again I was getting to experience India as an Indian instead of a pampered tourist on an air conditioned bus. How I longed to be a tourist again.

We passed a truck carrying a family and asked directions. They assured us we were headed in the right direction. I was not assured. I wasn’t even sure we were going north we’d taken so many wrong turns. Amazingly, out of nowhere, after bouncing around for what seemed like forever, we did emerge on the Delhi-Agra highway. The shortcut only cost us two hours. Now all we had to face was the normal terrifying traffic on one of the most heavily traveled road in India.

Indians believe in karma, what goes around comes around, it’s kind of like fate, you can’t avoid it. Only an hour later when we got to that intersection and the motorcyclist hit us did it become obvious that the Gods had been toying with us and delaying us for a couple of hours so we could perfectly match that appointed meeting time. We were part of the motorcyclist’s karma, while we thought we were touring and traveling, we were really just there to dish out an ass whooping on that poor motorcyclist.

Shiva, the destroyer, strikes again.