Linguistic Linguini and 'Marching' into 'Madness'!

Comments left on previous posts have niggled my noodling, ratcheted my ratiocination (I misspelled the word in an earlier post as "racination." That word has become associated with President Obama as in making something about race.), stimulated my synapses and fired my fingers to bring us to today's post.

In traveling, both figuratively and literally, I'm often confronted with translation problems.  Whether it's something about transportation, directions, food or local customs, I usually end up with more questions.  For example, in India, you only receive with your right hand, especially food.  In Italy and France, when asked how many scoops of gelato or croissants you'd like, holding up the finger next to your thumb means "two" scoops or croissants.  Hold up your thumb if you only want one, although why you'd only want one gelato scoop or croissant, especially while in their countries of origin, is a topic for another day.

Prior to my literal traveling, I like to read as much as I can about the destination, both fiction and non-fiction, and if available, have access to maps of the local areas, and a handle on some of the most basic phrases in that country's language. These have been a source of many funny and sobering moments, but, again, perhaps a post for another time.

While on my second trip to India, for a meditation retreat, time, time travel,
and traveling back in time were made evident almost on an hourly basis.  My first clue that I was in for an entirely different traveling experience was in reading the website's last bit of directions to the ashram:

"A landmark to the Ashram is the NR Colony bus stand (close to Basavanagudi). The Ashram is one furlong (1/8 mile) from the bus stand."

This photo is actually outside the ashram's free hospital, but gives a good indication of the terrain and this "road" is definitely one of the better ones.

I was traveling with my son and one of my sisters during this trip and while this was my sister's first trip, and probably my son's sixth or seventh, we were all regularly reminded of how India assaults (not bad or good, but "differently") your senses --- all six (!) --- of them.  We were met at the airport by my son and hopped into Bashir's taxi (driver's personal car) for our approximate 4-to-5-hour drive to the ashram. It was daytime and we'd been in transit for approximately 30 hours, with 20 hours of that spent in the air.  The first senses assaulted: eyes, ears and noses!  The masses of people, roaming animals, cars, trucks, rickshaws, bicycles was overwhelming.

My son knows the rudiments of the Hindi language and between that and 'international' hand/sign language, can get along fairly well while in India.  Bashir spoke the local language --- Telegu --- and a little bit of Hindi.  During this multiple-hours drive, we were treated not only to lunch at Bashir's house, but to . . .

'Marching into Madness'

Both this post and blog will be interrupted for the next few weeks as this blogger is a major fan(atic) of college men's basketball and more particularly that time of year that's come to be known as 'March Madness.'  I'm kicking off the weekend viewing the last-regular-season game between rivals, Cal Bears and Stanford Cardinals.  Go Bears!  When Selection Sunday rolls around, I may interrupt the interruption and post my picks for the Big Dance:  the Sweet Sixteen, the Elite Eight and the Final Four.

Where are you 'Marching?'