Curryland Chronicles: (Way) Off the Beaten Path
Our resident Israeli next door neighbor in our guest house in Kasol appeared one day at our door, flustered and desperate. He had just come down from the mountains and was dying for a hot shower, which we had the power to provide him with, as we were paying extra for the luxury of a...
Curryland Chronicles: Driven Wild
There are several ways to get to the Parvati Valley from Dharmsala: a local bus, an overnight bus to Manali (which would reach our stop, Kullu, at about 3am), or a hired taxi. My prior experience riding an Indian local bus was last year in Kerala. The supposed length of time to travel between Varkala...
Curryland Chronicles: No Means No and Yes Means… No?
My boyfriend has dubbed India the “land of ambiguous gestures.” From the signature side-to-side head waggle that doesn’t signify a yes or no but is mostly equivalent to saying “okay” (which doesn’t necessarily mean “yes”) to the noncommittal wave that substitutes a point or signal to one direction or the other, Indians are notorious for...
Curryland Chronicles: Tailgating the Krishna Das Concert
As I’ve previously made clear, heady chanting isn’t exactly the kind of thing I find easy on the ears. When it’s a team of Buddhist monks at a temple in Cambodia and I’m sitting cross legged in the back, getting lost in the monotone rumbling chorus of murmuring words I can’t decipher and I can...
Curryland Chronicles: Lasagna in Little Lhasa
Genocide sucks. Especially when it’s been going on for over fifty years. The situation looks bleak for Tibet. But in Dharmsala, India, the ex-pat Tibetan refugee community thrives. The Dalai Lama holds residence here after fleeing his home country in 1959 after the “Battle of Chamdo,” or the Chinese invasion of Tibet (also ironically referred...
Happy Glampers Part One: Camp Chic in a “Love Bubble” Airstream
glamping (noun): glamour + camping This is for all you city slickers out there. Maybe you would not be caught dead grilling a hot dog fireside, slumbering beneath the stars open-air in a sleeping bag, or fighting off mosquitoes (or the occasional bear) in the untamed American wild, yet you still have a thirst for...
Curryland Chronicles: Still Life With Rishikesh
A baby cow nearly peed on us while we were seated in a cement cove near a chai stall playing Scrabble (or “exhibitionist Scrabble” as my boyfriend has recently been calling it, since whenever we play a whole flock of Indians- usually men and boys- gather around closely, gaping and observing our every slow and...
Curryland Chronicles: A Skeptic Among Us
I love music festivals. I was raised by Deadheads. I enjoy road trips and camping. I definitely don’t wash my hair every day. I believe in the power of intention. When serendipitous, synchronistic events occur, I get all warm and fuzzy inside. Coincidences are my favorite. I believe in “soul circles,” a phrase coined by...
Curryland Chronicles: Sign, Sign, Anywhere a Sign?
India needs a good sign guy. Nothing too crazy. No elaborate graphic design or stylish fonts. Basic words and arrows. And perhaps a sign-placement consultant. That would do the trick. The Goa airport is a small and relatively easy place to maneuver about. But it lacks the basic quintessential things that maximize airport efficiency and...
Curryland Chronicles: A Musical Interlude
India has gone and proven me wrong. Quite literally right after I had published my last post which rambled on and on about the “end of the season” and how quiet everything in Arambol has become, I closed the laptop and glanced up at the beach to see the last few minutes of the fiery...
Curryland Chronicles: Burning Down the House
Down the street there is a tiny bakery. There is no sign out front and I am not sure if it even has a name. It is a modest store front with two steps up to get inside. The place is immaculate. There is always at least one pair of sandals out front- sort of...
Sintertainment: Spiegelworld’s Absinthe is a Winning Formula
When it comes to luring traveling entertainment seekers, Vegas has a lot of tricks up its sleeve. Pipes, skin, acrobatics and laughs are some of the most prominent. Absinthe might unite these ingredients better than ever before. Christened after a green, arguably hallucinogenic alcoholic beverage and housed in a white sideshow tent pitched at Caesar’s...
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