Mostly somewhere else

India #8

Saturday 27 January
On the way back to Delhi

On the bus our guide named kumar (not his real name, he said it’s too hard to pronounce, so that’s kind of his stage name) calls a bathroom stop a “technical stop.” It took us a while to figure out what he meant, so now he says a pee-pee stop.

One thing I would like to mention is how much India is a live & let live place. People are just hanging out going about their lives, and I haven’t really seen one argument or public spectacle. The attitude here is called chalta hai, which means (American translation) “what are you gonna do? Shit happens.”

New developments in the mass-murderer pedophile case. After their initial hearing, the former MP & his also-implicated servant were attacked by a crowd (one account says by a bunch of lawyers?!?!?) & were sent to the hospital. This required all kinds of security barriers and a lot of people couldn’t get in, a 2-yr-old boy who fell on the stove in his house died of his burns for lack of care.

Another three news items:

Bombay High Court has ruled that a muslim man saying I divorce you three times (talaq talaq talaq) is not enough for a divorce, that arbitration should be tried first. The case is of a man who said the triple talaq & paid his wife the requisite 600 rupees for the iddat, her 3 menstrual periods after pronouncement of talaq. That’s about $14. maybe if a husband talaqs you & you’re menopausal you get paid forever? The court is saying that’s not good enough. Interesting case of religion v state.

A servant is protesting that the Rs1.5 lahk (lahk = 100,000 rupees) she was promised for her kidney was not paid by her employers, who only came up with 60,000 rupees (less than $1400). By the way, 1 crore = 10 million rupees. Interesting how they lump larger amounts under different names.

A couple of teenagers kidnapped a 6-yr-old boy to get enough ransom to buy a motorscooter, but killed the boy because he didn’t know his home phone or his mother’s cell number.

On the road: The country people use cow dung for fuel. They mix dry grass in & pat it into cakes about 8” across and then put it out to dry when it’s dry they use the cakes stacked up for fences, walls, etc., or display it on the roof in an overlapping circle that looks like the top of a fancy pear tart. They also stack it into beehive shapes – sometimes almost as tall as a person.

The weather was very foggy/smoky this morning & as we were driving, honking constantly of course, I was thinking that in this situation we often get huge chain-accident pileups. Sure enough, about 2 minutes later we drove past a 4-car pileup, with people pulled out of the cars lying on the median.
By the way, people passing through toll booths on camels have to pay the same toll as cars.

We will spend one night in delhi, then catch the plane back at midnight Sunday. Don’t know what we will do between checkout time & the flight.

This is probably my last message. I have really been impressed with this country & how friendly the people are despite their often dire circumstances. A smile and hello is enough to get a positive response from just about anyone. The sensory overload of colors smells tastes sounds & crush of people & animals was just amazing. I will be happy to get home where it’s clean & QUIET. And will not eat Indian food for a good while. I’m up for a lot of salads & a hamburger.

India #7

Friday 26 January
National Day – Indian independence

This is india’s 4th of july and the main effect that my fellow travelers have noticed is that it’s a dry day and the only drinks to be had are in the minibar. Lots of people were out today at the Red Fort of Agra, most of the ladies in saris that look like they’re for dress-up - Sunday-go-to-meeting outfits. Yes, another red fort.

After the fort we took horse carriages meant for two riders & a driver. In our case, 4 riders & 2 drivers to balance the weight forward a bit. I don’t know how the horse survived it. I don’t know how we survived it! We went to the opposite side of the river from the Taj Mahal and the streets are narrow & can’t be maneuvered by a bus. The drivers said heh heh to the horse and touched the top of his neck, perhaps a veiled threat that more stern measures were possible if he didn’t keep moving. At one point the two people in the back had to get out because he couldn’t get enough momentum going to get up an incline.

I was in the front, in the driver’s seat, and he (actually they) sat on the cross members of the cart. So I saw all the oncoming traffic, which was great. We’ve seen the traffic from high up in the bus and at street level trying to dash across, but have never been in the flow of traffic as today. When we were going down particularly narrow streets the driver would wave his arms and holler at oncoming bull carts to move over, give him room (this is what I sounded like to me anyhow). At one point a motorized tricycle cart didn’t move over enough & ran into us, but it was no harm done except a lot of shouting. (By the way, these trikes are designed for two riders behind & one driver up front, but I’ve seen up to 8 people in them – wild!

Some news items of interest:

A series of disappearances of children and young women turned out to be at the hands of a serial killer who took 38 victims. He chose very carefully the kids of poor families, so the cops ignored the accusations, telling the distraught parents that their kid probably ran off or eloped. Some directly accused the fellow in whose house & grounds were found the bones of the victims, but … it didn’t hurt that he was a former member of parliament either. Same all over the world huh?

Farmers are up in arms in an agricultural area where the govt has exercised eminent domain to take their land & make it available for india’s biggest car maker, Tata. Tata reps have come back with the real zinger – “what do these people want? We paid them 70 rupees a day to build the wall around our site.” That’s about $1.50. “Guess we’ll be eating cars from now on,” said a spokesperson for the farmers.

A british reality TV show called Big Brother was in the news when the “white trash” brits living in the house being filmed 24/7 said ugly things to the 2nd rate Indian movie star who was invited on the show (for several hundred thou), calling her a Paki and a dog. The main tormentor is named Jade Goody, and she’s made millions getting famous in the show, including promoting a perfume … that’s bottled in India!!! Whoops.

Their newspapers are different from ours in at least two ways – they’re all in color, with lots of photos, and they are a mixture of our “serious” papers and the supermarket celebrity rags.

My favorite part of the Sunday paper though was the Matrimonials, 12 full pages of families seeking appropriate matches for their children, about 3000 entries. About 90% of marriages are still arranged here, so it can be a bit of a struggle to find the right person. The ads are arranged by language, by city, by ethnic group, by religion, and by caste. Here’s an example: “KKB 29/5’7” v h’some IIT MBA worked in Infosys well-placed Seeks b’ful qlfd girl from cultured Brahmin family” a lot of the ads ask for a beautiful homely girl, by which I guess they mean a homebody as opposed to a career woman. They often say caste no barrier or no dowry.

Bedtime! Tomorrow we bus back to Delhi, so it’s time to pack, again.

India #6

Thursday 25 January
Agra – Taj Mahal, the Resplendent Immortal Teardrop on the Cheek of Time!

We got up very early to catch a 6am bus to get the Taj Mahal at sunrise. It was so beautiful (duh) and a lot larger than you think from pictures. You also never really see the gardens & side buildings – a mosque, a guest house (17th c Motel 6) that flank the Taj, two other smaller buildings, and an elaborate entry gate. There are lots of workers who keep it immaculate.

The Taj Mahal is the burial tomb of the “beloved” wife of Shah Jahan, the grandson of Akbar the Great. She died in 1631 having her 14th child (I guess he really DID love her, yikes!), and was buried someplace else for 22 years while he had thousands of workers construct the tomb. It’s all marble-faced, most of it elaborately carved with flowers & geometric designs, and vast sections inlaid with semiprecious stone like lapis. The workers who did the inlay still live in Agra (well, their descendents I should say) and their work is famous all over.

We came back to the hotel about 9 for breakfast & a nap, then went back about 4 to see e Tajit in the afternoon light – a much warmer look. At 6:30 there weren’t too many people there, but in the afternoon it was packed – families lounging on the grass or on the flat walkway around the Taj, lovers, tourists of all nationalities, mostly Indians though.

I read on a sign that in 1810 an Englishman came up with the idea of tearing the Taj down to salvage the marble. Wow! What a concept. Fortunately he didn’t get very far with his plan.

When you enter any historical site in India you have to go through a security line – actually there are two, one for “ladies” and one for “gents.” (How English is that?) the ladies’ line ends up in a screened-off area so strangers won’t get a thrill watching you being frisked. How different is that from the bathing pool at the temple where the women were wandering around half naked?

Speaking of contradictions, someone in our group took a great picture – two signs right next to each other, one saying “Remove shoes here,” and the other “Do not remove shoes here.” That’s India all wrapped up in one image.

A few interesting things. Mothballs in the sink drains to keep bathroom smells down – or to overpower them actually. Women in saris wearing helmets over their scarves as they zip in & out of traffic on motorscooters. Vendors shouting “hallo, hallo!” to get your attention – again very british. Children putting together the fingers of one hand and moving it toward their mouth over & over to indicate that they want money for food. No concept of littering as a bad thing – no public receptacles and everything just gets dropped. You may remember the ad with the American Indian with a tear on his cheek, if he were an Indian from around here he’d be sobbing.

The honking on the road drives you nuts but it’s actually a polite beep-beep rather than our angry ho-o-o-n-n-n-k-k-k. The driver uses it to warn the person in front that they’re back there. Trucks even have signs painted on the back that say Honk Please. I don’t know why no one can use a rear-view mirror! And considering all the traffic on the road, the honking, although polite, is continuous. I thought that our bus honked about every minute, then started counting between honking “events” to confirm it. Turns out that the longest he ever went was 16 seconds. Multiply by everything on the road & you can imagine.

Smells are really loud here too. Incense, food cooking, animal “waste,” the crush of other people, public “bathrooms” that are just a u-shaped square faced by a wall – no water it seems, not to mention cows, dogs, goats, and monkeys wandering loose.

None of this compares to the loud colors though – the women’s saris are beautiful! Spangly, or with stripes or fancy borders, or all three at once. Flowers for sale everywhere to offer in the temples – very bright colors like marigolds & that deep purple cockscomb? lion’s something? And since most folks are vegetarians, vegetable stands everywhere full of red & yellow & green. Their carrots are red by the way not orange like ours.

Thanks for listening!

India #5

Wednesday 24 January
Jaipur to Agra

Today we left early because it’s a good ways to Agra on a bad road, so we can only go about 30 or so miles an hour, and there are going to be three stops along the way.

It’s another beautiful day, cool and clear. The mornings are hazy because of a mist, and the afternoons because of the amount of dust that gets kicked up during the day. But the cool temperatures and low humidity are heaven for someone from Houston.

We stopped first to see a bath/temple site from the 800s called Chand Bawali. there were 3 sides with the most dramatic steps going down down down along three sides of a square funnel-shaped depression that ended at a small pool at the bottom. The 4th side was a temple area that also went down down down. It was very dramatic and like an Escher drawing.

There was a small village at the site too with about 50 families. There were a number of really poor folks too who were very persistent about coming at you with their hands out. There have been some of these everyplace, but these seemed particularly insistent. Perhaps because the pickings are slim since this is a not-very-well-known site, not even in Lonely Planet! Before very long we fled to the bus to escape them.

I read somewhere that India will challenge your compassion, and it’s true I suppose – the beggars here are more aggressive than I’ve seen in the rest of the world. They practically come onto the bus, standing at the door with their hands out. Occasionally they beat on the side of the bus if you’re not noticing that they’re down there. Of course they’re in a pretty tough situation too, and look bad – dirty, no shoes, kids with no pants on, etc. it reminds me of a homeless person I saw at home once, who had a sign that read, “Have you ever been this hungry?” which was more thought-provoking than “vet out of work please help god bless you.” But where do you start?

Anyway then we rode a long time more on the bus, which I might add has very bad shocks, and on rough roads like we had today it was murder. We arrived at a World Heritage site called Fatah Pur Sikri, which was the home of the moghul ruler named Akbar “the Great.” He was great because he lowered taxes (all citizens can get behind that concept) and tried to get rid of religious intolerance. His 3 wives were hindu, muslim, and Christian. What a guy. His palace was fantastic, very austere in a way, with a series of courtyards and green areas, and a very nice mosque. The light was very nice, so I hope the photos came out.

There was a bit of a panic at one point because to enter a mosque area you have to remove your shoes – you and about 700 other people, so they are all piled up. You have to get someone to watch your group’s shoes or … they might get lost. Something like getting a kid to watch your car in latin America maybe. Anyhow when I came out, my shoes were lost. After a good bit of searching they showed up – whew!

Arrived in Agra at about 7, about a 12-hr day. We get up early tomorrow, leaving at 6:15 to get to the Taj Mahal while the light is good. Better go to bed!

India #4

Monday 22 January
Jaipur

We got to jaipur about 10 am & went first to a hindu temple/bathing complex outside of town in the hills. It was in 4 levels that each was higher up a stone mountain, dug into the side. The water is from a spring that supposedly has some magical link to the ganges, so it’s a special place to come & wash yourself, then attend one of the small temples. There was a men’s pool & a women’s, and people got in with their clothes kind of on, but mostly not. And men and women wandered around each other’s pools freely, so it was pretty loose. These were country folk though who were accustomed to bodies I guess. I can’t imagine the city people behaving this way, although they are also hindus, not muslims. It was nice to see how open they were about their bodies. We were wandering about, hesitantly at first because we didn’t know how they felt about it, but gradually we warmed up too. It was maybe the most comfortable & interesting place I’ve ever seen.

I should mention that cows, goats, and monkeys were running around freely, which gave things a barnyard feel. The people who were bathing threw their scraps on the ground for the animals, so everybody got something to eat. Nobody here spoke English, although they tried to talk to us. We looked back at them quite dumb, so they got a good laugh at our expense. It was all actually quite jolly.

There was a group of women who, after bathing, made a little raft out of a flat round tray. They filled it with little globs of wax made into candles, along with a few coins, and set it out into the pool of water. They sang a song & whenever it came close to the side, swooshed some water to scoot it back out until the song was finished. It was like an offering to the gods.

The folks at this place were very happy to have their photos taken, so it was a fun time.

Then we went into jaipur. This seems to be a more prosperous & cleaner & less crowded place than delhi, although it must be more of a tourist spot as well because there are lots more hawkers who are also a lot more insistent. They follow you down the road sticking their items in front of you, shouting out prices that gradually become lower & lower. Carved animals of “sandalwood,” postcards, books, “authentic” antique paintings of Krishna polo on elephants, men caressing busty women nude from the waist up (!) on old rice paper, brass elephant-shaped shoehorns, etc. there are also fewer homeless people here it seems, although you still see them on the sidewalks curled up, or sitting amongst their few possessions.

The traffic here is even wilder than in delhi though, because in addition to cars, big buses, little buses, bikes, tricycle-cabs, rickshaws, pushcarts, and pedestrians, there are camels, horses, and bulls pulling carts, as well as people riding camels and horses, and we even saw someone on an elephant sitting in the right-turn lane waiting for his signal. Not to mention horses & camels going at about highway speed in places where the vehicular traffic had thinned out a bit. Everybody honking horns constantly (except the animals that is). Forgot to mention guys on fancy spangly white horses dressed like they should be in a parade and several marching bands that were getting in shape for wedding processions. You can’t imagine the din. When we all get home we will have nervous breakdowns from sensory deprivation.

Tuesday 23 January
Still Jaipur

Jaipur is in the state called Rajasthan, which means “land of the rajahs.” It’s the area where the rajahs lived. It’s actually pretty deserty, which is why there are so many camels around. Tomorrow we will drive to Agra, and go through some of the dunes. Jaipur is called “the pink city” because the highness guy had the whole city painted “pink,” really a deep orange/red, to honor the prince of wales who visited in 1876 I think. The city still is mostly this color, and the old part totally is. It was designed in the 1700s on a grid system, not a boring 10 blocks/mile like our grids, but somehow using 9s over & over because this is a special number for the number of important heavenly bodies for Hindus.

This morning we got up early to go to the Amber Fort, which is in the mountains outside the city. It dates from the 1500s, and shows a strong muslim influence in the architecture – arches, fountains, and grilled windows where the women could look out & not be seen. The fun part was that you ride an elephant up the hill to the fort. The elephants are all painted up with flowers etc in all colors on their foreheads & ears. On the way up the hill at about 6 points were guys with cameras that tried to get you to pose & smile – they said, “no good, no buy.” Some of the group did buy their pictures before it was all over. The interesting thing is that the prints were film, not digital, so they had to process them really quick to have any sales at all. Well, even more that they were able to find their potential customers in the hundreds & hundreds of people touring the fort. The challenge being to find the customer before the competition did.

The rajah (or whatever) who built the fort/palace had an apartment for each of his 12 wives, with a common verandah where they could all sit together and gossip. The place was also full of “secret” passages. It had 3 main courtyards, one with gardens and fountains.

We also went by something called the Palace of the Winds, a huge, both tall & broad structure that’s only one room deep (don’t know why it doesn’t fall down). It was built so all the royal ladies could have a place to sit & view an annual procession, again without being seen by the riffraff on the streets below.

This afternoon there were some dancing girls who were hired to pose for us in their bangles & huge earrings & diaphanous veils etc. our instructor fred posed them several different ways for us to work with, with lots of hand signals since he doesn’t speak hindi & they didn’t speak English. Never took so many pix in so short a time.

India #3

Sunday 21 January
Delhi

Today we visited 2 very famous sites in Delhi. Both were very nice parks with trees & grass (haven’t seen much of that here!) & birds flying around & chirping – even some small green parrots! Very relaxing after the chaos yesterday.

The first was Humayun’s Mausoleum, a World Heritage Site that dates from the 1500s, the burial site of one of the Moguls that supposedly was the inspiration for the Taj Mahal, except it’s done in red stone rather than marble. It had the large building, but also a series of smaller ones.

I came back to the bus a bit early & visited with our driver, a Sikh named Kashmir. He has the turban and characteristic clothes, longish beard, etc. I say we visited, it’s a loose term since he hardly spoke English and I certainly don’t speak hindi. He told me his hair is 7.5 meters long (20+ feet?) and he wraps it up in the turban every 2 days, it takes too long to do it every day so he just leaves it “up.” Something like folks who get cornrows in their hair I imagine. He also told me about the 10 gurus of the Sikhs, names etc, which were totally lost on me.

Before we went in we saw a snake charmer guy with 3 cobras – cool! The photo mentor says that in jaipur they will be a dime a dozen, rows of them. We were still pretty excited. By the way this afternoon we went to another part of old delhi & there were cows strolling around amongst the traffic, so we’ve hit a couple of the stereotypes. Now we just need to add elephants to the list & we can go home.

Second famous site was Qutab Minar, a 220-or-so-ft tower built in the 1100s or so. It was originally a hindu site, but when the moguls took over they scraped the hindu parts off of the buildings & put calligraphy & turned it all into a mosque etc. now it’s pretty much just ruins, but very pretty ones. This is a place that families come for a day out on Sundays, so there were lots of women in colorful saris etc. it was also a nice stop. People were all very friendly & smiling, as families often are when they get out of the house & have a bit of fun.

We had a huge lunch at an Indian restaurant – a bit silverish platter with small bowls of lamb, chicken, & veggie curries, lentils, and yogurt, of course with plenty of rice & naan bread. We’ve done some serious eating on this trip.

I forgot to say that today was clear and cool and sunny and beautiful, just the kind of day we treasure & seldom get in houston, fabulous all the way around.

Guess I will close. We have to leave for jaipur tomorrow on a 8am flight, so I’ve got to get moving. Will send a few pix from yesterday, but haven’t had a chance to process today’s cobras, parrots, and ruins. And cows.

More tomorrow if the hotel has internet access!

India #2

Saturday 20 January
Delhi

I am here on a photo trek, sponsored by American Photo/Popular Photography magazine. I enjoy going on their international trips if they are heading somewhere i wouldn’t necessarily go alone – I have gone with them to Turkey & Morocco in the past. This is a small group of about a dozen people, which should be nice & manageable.

The Delhi airport was packed, although we landed about 10 pm. The immigration line twisted all around the hall & went up the stairs almost back to the arrival gate. It moved pretty quickly though. We were met by the company that’s handling the arrangements here in India, and by our local guide for the week, Kumal. He’s thin & quite tall for an indian, almost 6 ft. he loaded us into the bus we will be using here in Delhi, for a 30 minute ride to the hotel.

We were greeted at the hotel with fruit juice, a lei made with a small type of white orchid (i think), and the pretty lady also dipped her finger in bright red powder and put a red dot in the center of our foreheads – a traditional way of welcoming guests apparently.

My roommate is a French Canadian woman of about my age named Solange. I think we will be getting along well. If she can tolerate my snoring. Even though i slept pretty well on the plane (after an ambien) and was wondering if i would sleep the first night, i went to sleep about 1 and slept straight through till 7:30. Luxurious for the first night, when jet lag is usually the worst.

We had a short introduction & image review this morning by our mentor, a photographer from NYC named fred aquilino. He seems very open & helpful. He’s made about 30 trips to india, some of them months long, so he knows the place well. As well as anyone can know a place that seems to be very very complex geographically, culturally, religiously, socially, etc etc. probably no one has a very good hang on it, even well-traveled natives.

After lunch we set out into old Delhi. The city is divided into 2 major sections, old & new. At first the new side seemed loud & complicated & chaotic, until we crossed over, so to speak. Wow! What a scene. You can’t imagine the chaos.

The large streets (2-3 lanes in each direction ) were filled with cars, buses, bicycle-rickshaws, three-wheeled taxis labout the size of golf carts called tuk-tuks (green chassis & yellow canvas roofs), carts pulled by horses & donkeys & bulls, & bicycles. Interspersed with people walking in the outside lane too. Lanes are just a suggestion, and even crossing over into the “wrong” direction is ok too.

People in all manner of dress – the men in western slcks, shirts, & sweaters, some with turbans, some clean shaven, but other is wildly flowing beards & extravagant mustaches. The women mostly in saris, in a rainbow of colors. No, that is too limiting. The rainbow doesn’t have the range of colors that you see here in the quickest blink of the eye. Also Muslim women in black head to toe, with their faces covered as well, even sometimes their eyes, although often the black burquas are studded with shiny stars or sequins. Everyone packed packed packed onto the streets & sidewalks, rushing along to ... where?

The streets were lined with tiny shops of all kinds - local fast foods (looked like fried pies, also baked yams i think, all cooked out in the open on large metal saucers over coals), clothes, jewelry, car part places (what we would call chop shops, I’m sure), anything you can imagine. You could tell you were in the muslims section when the platters of vegetables turned to huge hunks of raw meat, the biggest from water buffaloes! of course there were also folks with stuff just spread on the sidewalk on a blanket – food, etc, but one guy i saw had a scarf about a foot square covered with the pull tabs of zippers. Not zippers, just the tabs. Talk about specialization! And of course people who want to shine you shoes or sell you books about india, even a guy hawking red leather bullwhips “very good quality, very cheap.” And beggars, some with body parts missing or deformed, others just old, many many apparently homeless, some just napping, although why they weren’t trampled is a mystery.

We went to the Red Fort, very famous indian independence landmark for a reason i will have to discover. Very old, belonged to the moguls, which you can tell by the blindingly white marble pavilions, originally inlaid with precious stones to form designs of flowers & birds (diamond eyes!), but now with all but the very highest decorations gouged out for the stones. Nice souvenir, huh?

Then we went to the largest mosque in town, called the Friday mosque (?). it was mostly a huge open-air square, striped with hundreds of white lines painted about 4 ft apart for the faithful to prostrate themselves in prayer – like lanes in a street, to keep things orderly when so many people are praying. Each corner of the square had a very Indian-looking tower, kind of an onion-shaped dome. Of course we had to take off our shoes on entering, & fortunately Kumar had foot cover things for us, because the square had an awful lot of bird shit scattered about. All over the city you see large black birds circling & on the tops of buildings.

I guess the most exciting bit was crossing the street. It seems that traffic lights are pretty much unheard-of, so the intersections are every man for himself & crossing the street is a brave action. Kumar would tell us “Let’s go” when it looked good to him (I don’t know by what standard, it was a constant stream of humanity, on foot, two three & four wheels), then he’d step out, hold out his hand like a traffic cop, and ferry us along. as if anyone would pay attention! But enough stopped (or slowed down enough) that we always made it across, I don’t know how.

Quite a day altogether. I think I will stop now & try to process a couple of photos to send you tonight or tomorrow.

Tiredly, but lots of adrenaline still flowing!

India #1

Friday 19 January
Delhi

Hello to everyone from India – Delhi, actually.

The flight connections were a little bit exciting. The flight out of Houston was to land in Newark with 1 ½ hrs for connection, but then was delayed 1 hour, then 2. after a nail biting 45 minutes, it changed back to only 1 hr 15 minutes late, which acutally worked out fine since the gates were quite close rather than the farthest distance possible, as first scheduled. Dashed from one gate to another, got on with no problem.

The flight was 13 hrs, we ate 3 times – a chicken or vegetarian indian dinner, then a snack which i don’t even remember, then a breakfast, either indian or eggs. I went for the indian dinner curry etc which was too spicy for me so i just ate the rice, then chose the egg as safer in the “morning,” which was about 9 am to my stomach, but actually 8:30 at night in india. I didn’t know time zones could go in half-hours, but here they do. Confusing.

My seatmate was ... are you ready? ... a tibetan monk with dark red robes, 70+ yrs old, named Mr Dawa. He had a US passport, i know because he asked me to fill out his entry papers because he couldn’t write (although he could read, he had a hindu book. Not something that happens every day!

Just wanted to report that I got here OK. I will write more tomorrow, now i have to take a shower & get to bed. We start about 7:30 tomorrow, and it’s already after midnight.

Later.