14-Morning traffic in New Delhi.
Moving to the Metropolitan hotel for a night and then back to Saptagiri for the night before I leave, because it's near the airport.

Wisdom comes from knowing what to overlook.

Deb says not to bring back anything "too weird".

Greater wisdom comes from not ignoring a wife's advice

As I wendy qay around Connaught place, center of Delhi, an ever "helpful" Indian points me off in the wrong direction (I have a map) and suggests it take a rickshaw otherwise, "you end up with dog shit on your shoes, sir".

"Very nice sunglasses, sir. You look like movie star".

All the guide books say, without exception, that the people of Varanasi are the pushiest and most bothersome in India, but I think that Delhi is worse, and, in fact, the people of Varanasi left me, remarkably, alone to wander and marvel.
For that, I am grateful.
One book said that it might be the best or worst part of a trip to India, and I admit that before I left home, I was a little worried that I had chosen to go there. Its reputation put me off.But now, from the perspective of a few days and seeing Delhi again, I'm glad iI stuck the decision out.
Watching clothes being washed in the Ganges, boats being built with a handsaw and a chisel, bodies being burned and the wood for each size body being weighed and assessed a price, Buddha achieving his insights beneath his Bodhi tree, and the celebrating of Holi in a cloud of mosquitos, all this has no place at all in New Delhi.
Deb told me that I would look pretty stupid if I didn't make it to Agra and the Taj Mahal. I said I wanted to go to Haridwar, but it doesn't seem to be possible, and Agra is.
Off to Agra tomorrow.

An undercurrent of anxiety swirls just out of sight here, and that is the crisis in Japan and the threat of a nuclear catastrophe. The newspapers are full of the horrible news, but on TV you would never notice.
Bollywood and Bruce Willis everywhere.
No CNN. No BBC.
Hard to figure
There is a channel, CCTV, which is the chinese CNN, and they do notice what is going on, it being right next door, so to speak. They worry that the wind will shift.
I worry that the wind will continue to blow across the Pacific Ocean. It's a big ocean, I know, but hardly big enough under the circumstances.

I wonder what all the Japanese people here are thinking.
Their english is not so good, and mine seems to be deteriorating.

One reason to go to Agra is to take advantage of an English-speaking guide because I have so many questions.

" Tuk-tuk, sir! Natural air condition'"

I suppose that its not everyone who, denied a trip to Haridwar, has to settle for the Taj Mahal.

First bottle of wine since I left U. S. The nibbles in the bar are salted, dried banana chips.
I asked the waiter to turn on the TV for tonight's cricket match and , unless it involved India, it would not be shown.
"We are a prideful nation," he said.
We laughed.
The music is by Raul Sharma, really lovely, although I think the name of the cd is "lounge music"!
Pineapple upside down cake!
First dessert since Switzerland.


I'm worried about Billy John and Kimiko. This mess in japan will only get worse, I'm afraid.

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