Tangential Blog

Canon Cinema

2010-05-29T20:00:00.000-07:00

Everyone seems to be in love the new HD shooting Canon SLRs (5D, 7D and Rebel 2ti). I have a 7D myself, and it's the coolest toy I've had in ages.

But depending on the "mission" it's not always really the best choice of video camera. Other times, the cameras unique strengths make it and ideal choice. Here are some of the cameras strengths

1. Small and lightweight
2. Incredible choice of lenses
3. Excellent stills shooting capability

It also has some major shortcomings:

1. Aliasing due to binning or skipping photosites on read-out of the sensor
2. Rolling shutter
3. Highly compressed h.264, 4:2:0 sub-sampled video
4. Poor ergonomics for video shooting
5. Poor on-board sound, which essentially necessitates dual system operation for anything requiring decent sound.

Each shortcoming is minor in itself, but they do add up. Third party vendors like Zacuto and Redrock Micro sell accessories to address some of the ergonomic short comings of camera. Of course, once you pimp the camera out with all the accessories, it's no longer small and light. And the technical issues are still a problem. The accessories do nothing to solve the the aliasing or rolling shutter.

Still, the success of these cameras have gotten Canons attention and now Canon seem to be listening to the concerns of video shooters. Thier recent addition of 23.98fps as a feature on the 5D is evidence of that. If Canon were smart, they would really go after this market because they could OWN it in two years with just a few careful moves:

1. Make a large sensor video/cinema camera similar to the Red Scarlet that takes Canon EOS lenses
2. Improve the ergonomics of the Canon EOS lenses to make them more "cinema like" . This could easily be achieved with the current line of lenses with clever electronic control of the mechanism. Third parties are already doing it on the Red One. But Canon knows their lenses better than anyone, so have an advantaged position in really making it work well.
3. Don't cheap-out on the output options. Consider lightly compressed I-Frame only 10 bit 4:4:4 or RAW for video recording, or at the very least, allow uncompressed 4:4:4 video or packed RAW to be sent out the SDI of HDMI port. HDMI 1.3 supports some incredible data rates, so in some ways it's more versatile than SDI.

and last of all...

4. Keep the price of the system in the "prosumer" range.

That's it. The other details would work themselves out in the planning of the new system. But in my mind, the important thing is to keep it compatible with the EOS lenses to gain the economy of scale that provides. Perhaps they could also create a new line of "super premium" lenses that are above even the "L" series. They could be "super speeds" marked in T-Stops and have improved cinema style ergonomics., etc. But I think they should still have electronic focus features, and be provided in EOS mounts so still shooters could still use them if they like. (That would help keep the volume up so they are still commodity lenses, like the L series)

gigabit NAS from a Walmart eMachine

2009-12-27T20:19:00.000-08:00

One of my big projects/hobbies at the moment is building a digital archive of my all my families photos and videos. We are also digitizing all of my late father's artwork we can track down. (My dad was a very prolific artist and writer... we still haven't even cataloged his entire body of work!) The scans of all the old pre-digital slides, negatives and prints are being done by Scan Cafe. So far I've gotten on batch of scans back from them and I'm very happy with the results.

For the "I.T." side of my project, I'm using a multi-tiered system to maintain the stability of the data:
1. Master server with RAID-6 storage (also runs Digital Asset Management System)
2. Back up server with simple rsync mirror of the master server
3. Off-site Internet based "Cloud" backups.
4. DVD backups of high-value metadata and configs

The Backup Server does double duty and acts as the "Cloud Pusher" server.

At present I'm building the Backup Server / Cloud Pusher. Because none of the inexpensive cloud back up providers (i.e. Mozy / Backblaze) support Linux yet, the Cloud Pusher needs to run Windows. Windows is not my favorite OS. However, in this case it's a necessary evil.

The Cloud Pusher will be running 24/7, so low power utilization is also a requirement.

To address all the requirements I finally settled on using a refurbished Walmart special, the eMachines EL1300G-01w slim desktop. Compared to good contemporary hardware, it's a complete embarrassment...totally low-spec and slow. But for my purposes it is nearly perfect: It's inexpensive, comes with Windows pre-installed, and is fairly power efficient due to it's CPU and other components. (AMD Athlon 2650e / nVidia GeForce 6150se / nForce 430 / 2Gigs RAM ) Seriously, for what it cost, including the Windows License, it's a very good deal. ($180) I would not have been able to even build a functional computer sans OS for what this refurbished eMachine cost. Mass market hardware is so cheap these days!

However, the included 160 GB hard drive was totally inadequate for this project. I replaced it with a 2TB Hitachi.

To migrate to the new 2 TB drive, but keep the OEM install of Windows Vista, I used a fantastic live Linux distro called Parted Magic. Parted Magic is a Swiss Army Knife for disk partitioning, cloning, backup and system rescue. It also has a ton of tools for checking hard drives, system hardware, and doing other useful stuff. To be honest, due to recent versions graphical improvements, it's even become my favorite "Micro-Distro" / "Thumb Drive Distro". Parted Magic has everything you need to boot a machine and get a web browser running. ( When not at work, that's all I typically need anyway.)

Before I even got started with the migration to the new drive, the first thing I did was go though the OEM Windows install and remove the Bloat-Ware and "Craplets" that every OEM seems hell bent on pre-installing. Vista is notorious for it's sluggishness, but with tweaks it can be pretty usable. I went though and optimized performance by turning off un-used services, flashy graphics, etc. Honestly, those two exercises were the biggest use of my time. (And one of the reasons why I so detest Windows). I could have easily set up Linux in a FRACTION of the time required to whip this OEM Windows install into shape. Walmart and eMachines put so much crap on the machine is makes it almost un-usable. They should be ashamed. The Windows license was "free" with the computer, so I guess I had to "pay" for it somehow. But I can see why people have such low opinions of these cheap computers. Windows and the junk the OEMS install on them make the computers seem like complete junk. (When in truth, the hardware is actually pretty powerful)

Once the machine was all tuned up I was ready to start the migration. This is where things got a bit tricky. The EL1300G only has two SATA ports and both are used. (One for the DVD-RW and the other for the hard drive) I COULD have used a USB bridge board to hook the new hard drive up to the computer, but then performance would suffer. I would have also lost access to a lot of the low level control of the drive. What I did was unplug the DVD-RW and use the SATA port it was taking to plug in the new drive. Here is a photo of the computer with the case open and both hard drives plugged in:

[PHOTO]

To boot Parted Magic I used a USB Thumb Drive rather than a CD. At this point I have to comment on how awesome bootable thumb drives are. Not only are they relatively fast compared to an optical drive, they are so convenient! In this case, I could copy stuff from hard drive to hard drive over SATA, for best performance, even though I only had two SATA ports. (Meaning I could not boot from a device on either SATA port) I used Clonezilla (in Parted Magic) to clone the old hard drive from the old 160 gig to a the new 2 TB drive.

After the cloning was done, I re-partitioned the drive using GParted to re-claim the area that was occupied by the OEM "restore" partition, and reserved some new space for my own "restore" partition, which in this case is an disk image I created with PartImage. My new restore partition is also a reserved space for a potential future Linux install. Basically, the entire new setup has a little bit of "future proofing" built-in to protect for the case of a Linux dual boot setup. I haven't bothered doing the install yet, since this machine doesn't need Linux yet. But all the partitions required are in place.

So I guess the gist of this post: Love-fest for Cheap Hardware. Love-fest for Parted Magic. Check out the tool. It's super useful and a great example of how Free Software is completely superior to commercial software. Here is my finished NAS / Backup Server / Cloud Pusher

Long live Duchess.

2007-07-17T11:34:00.000-07:00

The gardeners came this morning and when I went to check the coop on my way out to work the chunks of skin, feathers and the head were gone form the lawn. I'm guessing they mowed over the feathers and they got sucked up with the grass. They either mowed over the head and it was sucked up also or they cleared it. Anyway, there is much less evidence of what happened as of this morning. I'm glad I did the rounds last night because it would have been harder to figure out what happened otherwise. All that was left today was few feathers.

My concern now is that whatever hit Duchess now knows a good place to get chicken easily. It will be back at some point for seconds. Even if I DO lock the chickens up at night I'm going to have to make sure the coop is predator proof because whatever it was that got them is probably going to be more persistent next time. (Especially if it really likes chicken)

The sad life of a prey animal... At most it's only been a few days since she died and already there is almost no evidence that she ever even existed. Well, I mean, I have the chicks at least, so she lives on though them. But her body is pretty much totally gone.

I'll be much more careful with her offspring.

Duchess is dead

2007-07-16T23:25:00.000-07:00

I was away for four days at a family reunion. A friend of mine was taking care of my chickens but since she could only come by once a day she couldn't open and close my chicken coop (The "Chicken Breasts 2000") I decided it would be OK to just leave the coop open the whole time I was gone. I usually close it up at night to keep the chickens safe from nocturnal predators. Chickens are very vulnerable at night because they really don't put up much of a fight when they are sleepy. It wasn't the smartest move, but I felt it would be better than leaving them cooped up, especially considering how hot it is right now.

Enough back story... I got back home today to discover my loss. After settling in I headed back to the CB-2000 and check on the hens and lock up the coop. Duchess was nowhere to be found. But I noticed some feathers scattered about. I widened my circle to include the lawn in the back yard only to find more feathers, chunks of flesh attached to feathers, and a chicken head. The chicken head was pretty beat up, so it's not like I can give a positive "ID", but I'm pretty certain it is (was?) Duchess.

Right now I'm thinking it was either a skunk or a raccoon that did her in. But you never know, a dog might have gotten in there during the day and gotten her. That's never happened before so I'm really leaning toward skunk or raccoon... something nocturnal. Considering that she seems to have been consumed almost entirely, I really doubt it was a domestic animal. ( Who knows, it might have even been a hard up chupacabra)

I'm pretty bummed about this. I would have been a little upset if one of the new hens was the one that got it but for Duchess to be the one to buy the farm is a real upset. IMHO she really deserved to live after giving me so many chicks and putting up with the two roosters for so long. The thing that really has me scratching my head is why that skunk or raccoon didn't ever eat any of the eggs in the past. Duchess was laying eggs in the bushes at one point for nearly a month before I noticed and as far as I could tell no pests ever bothered to eat any. Not even rats.

It was stupid of me to leave the hens unlocked at night. I probably should have moved them into the garage while I was away. Now I know there is SOMETHING that will attack and kill them at night so I will be more careful in the future. I just wish it didn't have to be duchess that was the first to go.

R.I.P. Duchess You will be missed.

Film Making

2007-05-17T13:56:00.000-07:00

Lately I've been involved in a group at work that makes movies. We make little movies as practice for making big movies.

My little brother is also an aspiring film maker. He asekd me for some advice about doing a full feature. I thought the info might be interesting to others so I'm re-posting a more generic version of it here:

Even though I haven't ever done a REAL (i.e. money making ) feature project my self (Uh, outside of my job, but I'm just rank and file there) I have a few pieces of advice from my exposure so far.

There are two important factors: Story and Performance. Everything else serves those things, no matter how artistic it is ( i.e., lighting, cinematorgraphy, etc.) The story is what people walk away with but it's the performance that keeps them engaged moment to moment while they are watching the film. I'm sure you can imagine how a bad performance could kill the whole project.

Your are on the right track by wanting non-suck talent. The actors will bring a HUGE amount to the project. Be very picky about your casting and make sure you audition everyone. If they don't have a good resume and can't do the audition than forget it. You'll never get a good film out of them. (There are plenty of trained actors to work with so why work with amateurs?) Make sure that you are a non-suck director as well! You might want to take some acting workshops yourself, so you can learn how to spot "false" performances and get the best out of your actors. There are several books out there on directing. I'm reading one now called "Directing Actors" which is quite good.

In that same vein, you don't want your script to suck either. I'm not sure who's doing the writing for you, but make sure the script is solid before you start shooting. The right script with the right take can definitely turn heads. Napoleon Dynamite may not have made big bucks at the theater, but it definitely put those guys on the map. Much of that script seemed like it was simply accommodating the resources they had. But it did it in such a fantastic way! Don't forget the local resource you have when coming up with your script.

As for getting crew, I suggest you try to put non-students in the key positions on your crew. Get as experienced a DP/Cinematographer as possible. Same for the sound guy. Everyone else on the crew can be more green. They are basically just moving stuff around after all. But they'll still be learning by watching the pros work, and you film will be much better for it!

From a technical stand point, sound quality is more important that picture quality. Give sound proper attention. Bad sound will drive the audience crazy while poor picture will only bother them a little. "Bad" picture can sometimes even be justified as a stylistic choice... for example, skip bleach, cross processing, or shooting Super 8 will definitely have a detrimental effect on the image "quality" but given the correct stylistic intent the loss of "quality" might actually be desirable! Bad sound is just, bad sound. Make sure you have a good sound recorder and mikes with someone who knows what they are doing running them.

You can't over-prepare. Scout out locations and have a solid game plan at the very least. I personally would board everything out. I'd probably even do a 3D animatic to figure out what shots you can actually get. (Depending on the lenses you have, It might be physically impossible to place the camera for certain shots in a small room) If you have all your shots planned out in advance, you also wont have to shoot too much "coverage", which will save a bunch of time and tape/film. (The side effect is that it might make editing a lot easier as well) If you want to do any dolly shots, I would definitely do an animatic because they can be a huge time suck. Maybe you don't need that technocrane shot? The animatic will tell you in advance for a lot cheaper! The animatic could be just you working. Once you have your cinematographer, you can bring him in on it also. If you get a cinematographer who says he doesn't like to plan like that I wouldn't trust him. He should know there is room for improvisation and improvement on the set and should feel comfortable with planning. But the idea here is the get a really solid basic plan down so you can be honest about your schedule and get the best stuff on the day. When you are actually shooting, you, as the director, should be totally absorbed in getting the best performance from the actors. You don't want to have to worry too much about shot planning etc.

When you are working cheap like this the main problem is getting the commitments you need from the various cast and crew members to "go the distance". That's another reason why planning is so important. You need to be able to tell everyone exactly what the schedule is and how long a commitment you need from them. The shorter the commitment, the better the odds of getting a seasoned cast/crew. If the script is solid enough you might be amazed at the talent you can attract... assuming the commitment isn't too long.

Put a chicken to sleep

2007-04-29T23:08:00.000-07:00

I know of a method for "hypnotising" chickens. You do it like this:

But this trick for "putting a chicken to sleep was new to me:

Chicken 2.0

2007-04-20T00:55:00.000-07:00

As of April 18th I accomplished my second goal for for my chicken project. I bred chickens that I hatched from eggs (first goal) then bred and hatched the eggs from those chickens (second goal). The dam is definitely Dutches and I'm almost certain the sire of most of them is Black Beard. But it's impossible to say for sure since all three chickens, Dutches, Samson and Black Beard, were penned together. One thing is certain, any chick with tufts must be Black Beards since they can only get tufts from a tufted parent.

Things went amazingly well in the hatch. Every single one of the 10 eggs I put in the incubator hatched. 5 of the 10 chicks have tufts. Based on regular Araucana hatch statistics and taking into account the "lethal" nature of the tufts gene, my results are nothing short of miraculous. ( It's considered "normal" for 25% of an Araucana hatch to die in the shell.) They all seem to be doing pretty well now on day two also. With any luck most of them will grow up OK.

In addition to the Araucanas that I hatched from my own eggs, I acquired some "Araucana" pullets from the feed store. They are actually some type of Easter-Egg chicken. I purchased them since I wasn't sure I would be able to get any of my eggs to hatch and I wanted more hens. Now they are somewhat redundant but at least they'll add a little color to the yard.

Here is a close up of one of the new Araucana chicks.
I use the highly advanced cardboard-box-and-hand-me-down-lamp brooding method. Yeah. Only finest for my chicks.

You can see a movie of the chicks in action here: http://www.mediamax.com/lordtangent/Hosted/Chicks_2.0_day_old.MOV

I'm hatching another couple of batches before getting rid of my adult roosters. I'll decide if I want to do another generation later and figure out what to do for roosters at that point.

My RAW Workflow

2007-04-11T19:03:00.000-07:00

Since I "Edit" 100% of my final photos in one way or another anyway, RAW workflow doesn't add much hassle to things. At the very least I color grade the images. (Either making them "accurate" or not accurate... it's a creative choice) I use Photoshop "Adobe Camera RAW" loader.

Some people are critical of the quality of the CS2 RAW loader . I find it good enough for my uses. And the convenience of doing everything in one place outweighs any minor quality differences there might be.

JPEG / 8 bit doesn't have the bandwidth for slamming the color around too much so I usually work in 16 bit from the RAW files. "16 bits" really isn't as "accurate" as you might think simply because of how the linear output of the sensor is mapped up to your gamma corrected working color space / display. But it does carry a little extra data that would otherwise get thrown out. It's nice to hang on to that as long as possible. One good thing about working in larger color spaces like ProPhoto RGB is that less of the data is likely to be "rounded out" of even the 16 bits. Keep reading and it might start to make some sense... or none at all.

Here is break down of my process.

0. When shooting, "Expose to the right"
1. Copy RAWs to the computer on a card reader
2. Open RAW in CS2 RAW loader as 16bits/channel, ProPhoto RGB color space (it is the widest gamut color space that ships with Photoshop)
a. While in ACR (Adobe Camera RAW) I do the basic white balance and if required (as is usually the case when exposing to the right) exposure compensation.
3. Image is now in CS2
4. Edit image as required (Still in 16bits/channel, ProPhoto RGB)
5. After image editing is done I direct the output images as required.
a. Save a Photoshop format image with all data if required for later editing
b. CONVERT to sRGB THEN 8 bits per channel for web / modeles proofs
c. Convert to AdobeRGB or CMYK as per printers requirements (for print) You can leave it at 16 bits if you want. Or not. It depends on the printers pref.

The important thing to remember when working in a more advanced color space like ProPhoto is to make sure you re-map it to something usable by the target audience. The ProPhoto color space wont render correctly on 99% of most image viewers because they have no concept of color spaces. Also, 16Bits/Channel is complete overkill for almost all displays. You only need it as a working space to help reduce rounding error. And, depending on your camera, exposure, etc. the signal to noise is WAY worse the precision of 16bits anyway. You are sampling "noise" for no reason. You keep the extra bit depth around as long as possible mostly for the benefits to image processing. (less rounding error) And the slight improvement in capturing actual precision from the RAW file it gives. (There is some signal buried in that noise after all) It's often ok to throw out the extra bits once you are done with your editing. But not until you are done. It's a one way street. There is not much point in promoting 8 bit images to 16 bit because the precision is already gone.

Basically, I try to do all editing in 16bits/channel, ProPhotoRGB and only convert to the smaller gamut / bit depth as the very last step.

There you have it. All my secrets.

Running Lightwave Screamernet ( lwsn ) under Wine on Linux

2007-01-06T19:07:00.000-08:00

Executive summary:
Yes, it is possible to run lwsn.exe (v9) under the influence of Wine. Even multithreading works! Running lwsn.exe in "-3" (batch mode) is pretty trivial, which means it would be possible to control it with most Linux render queues.

Forward:
Recently I've been doing a bit of R&D on the possibility of running Lightwaves network renderer Screamernet ( lwsn.exe ) under Linux. While Googling around to try to find some pointers I found several people claiming to have had success but no real "How-Tos" explaining how to actually do it. These are my notes to myself. Maybe you'll find them useful as well.

How-To:

The basics...

1. First of all, you need to install Wine and get it configured. This isn't a Wine How-To, so you are mostly on your own in that department. Fear not! Wine is easy to set up. I have one tip for you: winecfg

winecfg is a GUI that makes setting up Wine trivial. You can use winecfg to easily create "fake" drive letters like C:, etc. It's also possible to create fake drive letters for network mounted Linux volumes, similar to the way one can map network shares in Windows to a drive letter. For my examples, I'll be using the C: drive, which Winetools sets up under ~USERNAME/.wine/drive_c/

Another tool you might consider is Winetools. It has a few extra functions that might come in handy once you have Wine setup. Like doing "virtual reboots" of Windows.

2. Once you have Wine installed and some fake drive letters created, it's time to install Lightwave. Lightwave keeps all it's configuration info in plain text files stored under the users directory in the "C:\Documents and Settings\Default User". That's just the default path. LW has a command line switch that allows you to point it to any config dir. As a result, it's possible to copy the LW install dir and config dir anywhere as long as the config files are updated to reflect the new paths to the plug-ins and LW is pointed to the correct config dir.

You only need these parts of your LW install for for LWSN to work:
c:\LightWave\Plugins\
c:\LightWave\Plugins\Programs\

Create a temporary staging DIR on your hard drive and copy all the required parts of LW to it being careful to not mess up the paths.

c:\tmp\LightwaveStagingArea\
c:\tmp\LightwaveStagingArea\LightWave\Plugins\
c:\tmp\LightwaveStagingArea\LightWave\Plugins\Programs\

It also makes sense to create a DIR for the configs under your intended Lightwave install dir and copy the configs there:

c:\tmp\LightwaveStagingArea\LightWave\config\

At this point, you might want to clean things up the and remove other things lwsn doesn't really need from your staging area. The Presets under the Programs DIR are a good example. Screamernet doesn't need those. You might have some other junk you recognise lwsn wont need. This step isn't required, but it will save some space and reduce clutter.

Now Zip up everything in you your staging area being careful not to mess up the paths.

Get that archive over to your Linux box in whatever way makes most sense to you and expand it under your "virtual" C: drive.

TIP: It's important to understand that the paths to all the plug-ins are hard coded in the LWconfig files. If you copy your LW to a "virtual path" under Wine that disagrees with the config, LW wont work. You'll either need to go though the config files and "find and replace" the paths to fix them, or just make sure you copy LW to the same path under Wine as what you are using in Windows. For testing, the easiest thing to do is just make a fake drive and install path under Wine that mirrors your Windows setup. (This will be C:\Program Files\LightWave\ and ~$USERNAME/.wine/drive_c/Program Files/Lightwave/ for most people)

3. Using the above simple case of basically copying LW from C: to Wines "virtual" C: drive, you should now have a working LW on your Linux machine. Here is an example of how you invoke lwsn.exe in "-3" (batch) mode.

wine "C:\LightWave9\Programs\lwsn.exe" -3 -q -c"C:\LightWave9\config" -d"C:\LightWave9\test_content" "C:\LightWave9\test_content\scenes\test_scene.lws" 1 10 1

Wow. That looks pretty overwhelming. Let's examine each part. You'll see it's not so complex. First of all, the quotes help us escape the back slashes. If you are familiar to Linux, you know \ IS the escape character. You can escape back slashes by using a SECOND back slash like so \\. I personally prefer to just use quotes :

wine "C:\LightWave9\Programs\lwsn.exe" -3 -q <--- This is the command -3 puts lwsn in batch mode -q reduces it's verbosity -c"C:\LightWave9\config" -c <--- points lwsn.exe to the config dir -d"C:\LightWave9\test_content" -d <--- points lwsn.exe to the content "C:\LightWave9\test_content\scenes\test_scene.lws" 1 10 1 <--- the last argument is the scene FIRST LAST and STEP Details... During my tests, I noticed that LW and/or Wine dumped some junk error messages out to the console. They did not seem fatal. Everything rendered just fine. But the errors were repetative and annoying. The error messages can be safely redirected to /dev/null , but keep in mind that by doing this you might potentially loose any genuine error messages in the bargain. In my experience, when lwsn DOES fail it does so silently anyway. Redirecting the error output will probably never be a problem. Redirecting stderr (Standard Error) to the "no where" dustbin "null" is done like this in Unix/Linux: [command] 2> /dev/null

So, just add that to the end of your command string to suppress those errors.

Another issue is that Wine wants Xwindows to be running (even though it never actually opens any windows) when lwsn is invoked. This can be a problem if you try to run lwsn on a headless machine (not running X) or on virtual console where the DISPLAY variable isn't defined. It's easy to set DISPLAY for a single invocation of lwsn, or you can set it for the entire console session with setenv. The advantage of making Wine use a remote Xserver is the ram saved by not running any Xserver at all on the rendering machine. But if that's not an option you can always just right X with a really basic Windows Manager or even no WM to keep things light weight.

To redirect X to 0.0 on a remote machine at 192.168.1.10

setenv DISPLAY 192.168.1.10:0.0

or, if you have a name server or entry in your hosts file, you can do the remote machine by name:

setenv DISPLAY giggles:0.0

It's handy to just define the DISPLAY variable right on the same line that you invoke Wine and lwsn with.

redirect for a single invocation like this:

# DISPLAY=fishbait:0.0 [lwsn_command_string_here]
# DISPLAY=192.168.1.13:0.0 [lwsn_command_string_here]

If wine complains that it can't find a local Xserver you KNOW is running, you might need to define DISPLAY for it just to get it to run locally. I had this problem when I attempted to run lwsn on a virtual console. Just set the DISPLAY variable to the local display like so:

# DISPLAY=0.0 [lwsn_command_string_here]

that's all for now!

Hindustan Motors Limited Ambassador

2006-11-08T11:14:00.000-08:00

My first taxi ride in India was in a Hindustan Motors Limited Ambassador. The Ambassador is based on a late fifties era British car called the Morris Oxford Series III. HML has been shipping the car with very little (external) changes since 1958. As a result, the highly iconic Ambassador is widely considered The Definitive Indian Car. HML still sells many new Ambassadors even to this day and there are many older Ambasadors providing reliable service to thier owners.

Ambassadors are built like tanks. Considering their track record, and the incremental improvements made over the years it would probably be pretty safe to say that they are the most "Indianized" cars on the market. India may be developing rapidly, but the fact still remains that there are still plenty of rugged areas that can put harsh demands on a car. Even today the Ambassador seems to be one of the best suited cars for many parts of India.

While I toured India, I road in a newer Tata Indica. It was serviceable, but I had the impression at many times that it was rapidly being worn-out and beaten down by the Indian roads. The Indica is more like a Japanese car. Sure, it's more modern in design, but it also seemed light weight and somewhat weaker than an Ambassador as a result. The drivers I spoke to had mixed opinions on the newer cars vs. the Ambassador. They all had a lot of respect for the Ambassador, though.

Wikipedia Link

Travel Tips

2006-11-07T22:12:00.000-08:00

After de-constructing the way I traveled in India and looking at the various trade-offs I made, I've come up with a few suggestions. I'm sure none of this stuff will be news to experienced travelers. But it might save un-experienced travelers a little grief.

The trick when traveling in India is to find a good middle-ground between Adventure and Comfort. On the one hand, it's quite possible on a western budget, to travel and eat like a king. But then you don't really interact with any "real" Indians or see anything. Of course, the other extreme, which would be to travel and eat like an average Indian, is not such a good idea. (packed buses and trains. bed-bugs, cholera, and dysentery, anyone?) In my opinion, the best is somewhere in the middle. The entire spectrum of experience is available. How do you want to travel?

suggestions to maximize your travel options:

1. Pack Light. Try to fit everything in one bag, preferably a big back pack. Bring a flash light!
2. Give yourself plenty of time. Time is more valuable than money when traveling in India.
a) Try to be as cheap as possible if you have the time. Make you money go as far as possible.
3. Be adventurous. (but not stupid)

It's pointless to bring too many cloths to India. If you need more stuff you can get really nice cloths there for cheaper than what they cost at home. Don't even bother packing socks unless you are going to be someplace cold. (you wont need them)

I didn't follow the "pack light" rule, and I think it cost me some options. I took a Digital SLR and a fairly large kit of lenses. I took too many cloths. Next time, if I take an SLR at all, (It will be tough for me to resist) I will only take one lens. My camera kit was my second piece of luggage and in my opinion "stressing" over it diminished my freedom of movement. My first piece of luggage was also pretty bulky. That didn't help either. Next time, I will take far fewer cloths.

My flashlight was my most valuable piece of luggage short of my shorts. (I mean, undies) I highly recommend an LED headlamp. They are compact and leave your hands free when you put them on your head. My headlight is a cheapy I got at the supermarket, not the sporting goods store type, which are much more expensive. The cheap headlight works just fine. Where I was staying the power outages were frequent enough that a flash light of some sort was a must. But even in more developed areas of India a light will come in handy.

When you pack light, it's easier to take public transportation without stressing about your "stuff". If you keep a SMALL bag of your valuable stuff (camera, phone, etc.) with you, the only thing in your bigger bag is your cloths.

By being Adventurous, I mean, traveling via public transportation and not being afraid to do a little walking. I'm sad to admit that this is something I never actually did while I was in India. I only ever rode in Taxis and Auto-Rickshaws. The rest of the time I drove a rental motor bike. If you give yourself time you can save a lot of cash by riding on the bus or train. Very nice air conditioned "luxury" bus rides are available. You don't need to ride in the super packed "cheap" bus. Ride a taxi or rickshaw from the bus stand to your final destination.

Speaking of rickshaws... you need to be careful of those guys. Actually, taxi drivers as well. Even though technically the business is regulated they try to get away with all sorts of B.S.. Make sure you get a commitment on the price up front, and don't let them yank you around by taking you to gift shops, etc.

It's possible to find very cheap accommodations in India. 3 star hotels and up cost a little less than what you'd expect to pay in the USA. ($25-35) But "guest houses" and hostels are much cheaper, about $5-15 a night. You could probably find even cheaper places to stay, but you might be taking your chances with the bed-bugs.

Home

2006-11-06T20:46:00.000-08:00

I'm home now. My little sister managed to not burn down my house or kill any of my chickens. In fact, she actually spiffed the place up while I was away.

The flights home were murder. I' was in the air for like 24 hours. Fortunately, I was able to nap though parts of the trip. I usually don't sleep so well on airplanes. But in this case the flights were so long there really wasn't any choice.

Now that I'm home I feel a sort of home sickness. It's like reverse-home-sickness. Auroville was starting to feel like home. I assume this sort of thing is normal, and it will pass. I mean, California is a damn nice place to live, so why would I miss India?

I've had some many experiences over the last couple of months, it's going to take me a couple of MORE months just to integrate them into myself. One of my friends said to me yesterday "I've heard that going to India changes people." I have to agree. It will be difficult for me to ever look at things the same way.

While I was India I met several ex-patriot Americans and many other western ex-pats. All of them love India (and/or Auroville. Many of them are Auroville lovers) I was able to get the "inside scoop" on living in India as an ex-pat. Interesting stuff. As I've said, I have a lot to think about. But right now I must admit that I believe I'll be going back to India again. If not to stay, at least for another long visit. There is just too much to see there for one visit to be enough. There are other places I want to see first though, so India will probably need to wait for a while.

Heading Home

2006-11-03T00:44:00.000-08:00

Today is my last day in India and Auroville. I just got news that my dad was admitted to the hospital yesterday complaining of pain shooting up his neck and jaw. At first it was believed that he'd suffered a minor heart attack but after the doctors checked out his condition it turned out it was "just" a partially blocked artery. Actually, my dad is quite lucky. It COULD have lead to a heart attack if he hadn't gone in to the doctor and done something about it. (My dad is a hypochondriac, so that would have been highly unlikely... there are people that ignore that sort of thing, though) The doctors scheduled him for surgery and installed a stint to open up the artery. My dad is now stable and scheduled for release from the ICU today.

All I can think about now is how much it would have sucked if my dad had died while I was on the other side of the world... and only about two weeks from when I was to see him and most of the rest of my family at my brothers upcoming wedding. WOW. What a close call.

Future School

2006-10-27T04:59:00.000-07:00

Today I did a presentation on feature animation to the students at the Future School. Future school? you say. What the heck is Future School? Well, here in Auroville, they have some specific ideas about education. "The Mother" was very clear about what she considered the ideal in education: No grades, no tests, etc. Many people here take that stuff very seriously. So, the Mothers Will, it was. As a result, the first school here is actually called Last School, as in, it is a last school you'll ever need. (You are then expected to teach yourself). The former school here for high school aged kids is called Transition School. It's a place where students can direct their own education. Things are not very structured there. Unfortunately, it also does not provide any kind of certification for students who want to go on to university, etc. As a result, many kids were leaving Auroville for private schooling around age 13. ( or just slacking at Transition school. ) A couple of Aurovillians recognized the need for something new since the Future School / Transition School experiment didn't seem to be working. Future School was born.

At Future School, students can earn "O" and "A" levels in what is a more structured environment compared to Transition School. Compared to any regular western school the environment is extremely flexible, though.

The first thing I learned about Future school that blew my mind was the teacher student ratio. There are 54 students and something like 32 teachers. As a result many courses are more like tutoring sessions than "classes". The school also promotes a mentoring program where students may pick a mentor to help guide them.

OK, enough about the school. How did the presentation go? I would say quite well. The students were attentive and thoughtful in their questions. I managed to cover the concepts of pre-production and the various steps of production in 3D animation. I even had time to talk about the steps of "traditional" (i.e. hand drawn 2D) animation for some students that showed interest. At the end I covered the various paths one could take to get into the business. (There are many!) I also made sure to tall the kids how lucky they are to have such an awesome school. I really wish I could have gone to a high school like Future School. It's more like having a team of personal tutors than a regular school. How could any even semi-motivated student go wrong in such an environment?

Bin-O-Media

2006-10-25T18:05:00.000-07:00

I've been storing my movies at a site called Media Max. The idea was to link them directly from my blog posts, but out of sheer laziness, I haven't been keeping up. There are quite a few now.

If you want to see the movies you can go right to the bin-O-media:

http://www.mediamax.com/lordtangent/Hosted/

Also, don't forget that you can click on all the images on the blog to get a bigger view!

Diwalli

2006-10-21T21:57:00.000-07:00

I'm back in Auroville. Michael was about to leave for AV himself, so he caught a ride with me.

Today is Diwalli (Dee-val-ee). It's a huge holiday here. Like Christmas in the USA. People give gifts and employers give an annual bonus, usually equal to two months pay. Oh yeah... and there are fireworks! Fireworks in India are insane. Technically, there seems to be a limit to how large a fire-cracker can be. But it's based on noise pollution laws, not any sort of energy, powder charge, or anything like that. The "M80" or "Cherry Bomb" type devices are known by the name "A-Bomb" or "H-Bomb" here, if that is any indication of how powerful they are. They are hand-blower-offers, if I have ever seen one. "Two Inch" firecrackers are still available here as well. (IMHO, two inch fire crackers are the only proper fire cracker to begin with... unfortunately, they are considered too dangerous in the States.) Of course, I could not resist participating in the festivities! On the way back to AV we stopped at one of the numerous fireworks stands and picked up some stuff. I didn't go for any of the sparkly stuff. Only things that explode. My only photographic proof is a single movie shot by Michael of some of the crackers going off. Excuse the shakiness. He said the first cracker scared him so much he flinched. The sound on the video can't do the sound of these things justice. They are vastly more loud than the wimpy crackers in the USA. I also set off a few "A-Bombs". There is no video because Michael was too busy covering his ears to shoot a movie! (They are freaking loud)

The particular type of A-Bomb I got was called the "King of King" and for what ever reason features Bruce Lee on the cover:

Along with the obvious Hindu inspired names and images for certain fireworks i.e. Lakshmi Bombs, Vishnu, etc, I noticed surprising number of the boxes featured male and (mostly) female western actors. I doubt the images were licensed. Anyway, it was really weird. I mean, what do Britney Speers and Sarah Michelle Geller have to do with Diwalli?

In the evening the people at Mitra, the hostel where I'm now staying, also set off some rockets and sparkly fireworks.

Overall, the quality of Indian fireworks is less than that of the Chinese fireworks we typically get in the USA. For example, not a single one of the rockets we fired off at Mitra functioned close to the same. One even exploded after only flying up about 6 feet. There were tons of duds and "fizzlers" in the strings of crackers and the A-Bombs I set off were all different in power. (None of them were "weak" but some of them were frighteningly more powerful than the rest!) One of them dudded out... what do you do with a dud A-Bomb? I just moved my whole "stage" area to a different place. There was no way I was getting close to that thing!

All the fireworks felt like a celebration of my return to Auroville. I haven't had that much fun with fireworks since I was a pre-teen.

As far as my new accommodations, I have to say that Mitra is pretty great. 110 Rupees per day and you get "breakfast" (Which really is nothing but whole wheat bread and tea) and Dinner. OK. SO the food isn't great. But you gotta keep in mind that 110 Rupees is like $2.50 a day. The accommodations are basic. A room and a shared bath/lav. But it's clean and the rooms are nice. I lucked out and I'm sharing what would normally be a dorm room for 6 people with just one other person (Michael). We have tons of space. It's great.

Bangalore

2006-10-19T20:24:00.000-07:00

Today (after a pretty brutal day of driving) I'm in Bangalore. Bangalore is like Los Angeles on steroids (or maybe crack?) Imagine all the same problems LA has and then multiply them by 10. Crappy traffic, bad air, poor public transportation, homelessness...etc. The developed areas of the city are good. That's is, they have side walks, the buildings are fairly well built (well, they look good at least) and the infrastructure (other than the roads) seems OK. But one thing the city clearly isn't ready for is the recent explosion in car ownership. From what people have told me cars are a totally new thing. Individuals owning cars only just started in the last 5 years or so. Bangalore (and other big cities) are buckling under the pressure of all the new traffic. I got to experience it first hand when I went to visit my new friend Michael's orphanage, Children's Project. On the way there, it took us over an hour and a half to go about 20km. As it turns out, that was making good time. It took us over two and a half hours to get back to the hotel! (during rush hour)

Pretty much grid-locked. Even the motorcycles can't move:

You'd think that they would have learned from the experiences of other developed cities. Why not plan for and install public transportation before the rest of the city is to mature for it to be easy in install?

My guess is that it's mostly the poverty of the government. They just don't have the resources to make transportation in a developing city. Of course, there are ways that they could easily make developers "pay as they go" for the instillation of city-wide public transportation. (American cities like LA could do the same thing) Or at least purchase the land for future transportation development BEFORE the city is complete, when it's still relatively easy and cheap to do so.

In Bangalore, even the old bus system didn't seem like it was ever quite up to snuff... but now the roads are jammed with cars, three wheelers and motor cycles, even the buses are starting to lose their value. They are jammed up with the cars! Add to that the issue of parking... there is none, anywhere. In this respect, Bangalore is worse than any other city I've ever been in, including Boston. (The silver lining to that is the self limiting nature of the potential car culture that might develop. Like Boston, who will want to drive if parking costs 25 dollars a day!) Then, of course, is the issue of pollution. Between all the two strokes and the terrible old smokey diesels the air is nearly un-breathable. My lungs were sore after one day. I thought Chennai was bad, but Bangalore takes the cake. If they don't do something about the air quality in the cities here they are going to have an explosion of lung disease cases in the coming years.

Otherwise, the future is pretty bright. There is clearly a LOT of money pouring into Bangalore. I have never seen so much construction going on all at once in any place I've ever been. It seems like half the buildings are brand new or under construction. Sadly, they are still using the same brain-dead way of building them. No matter how big or small the building it's pretty much always the same: Ferro-cement with brink or cinder-block (i.e. fly ash / concrete blocks) infill. There often seems to be pretty poor or no engineering on the structure. For example, I've seen buildings with WAY more steel than they need. It's a total waste. IN addition, the concrete is still often mixed in small batches and carried up the building by hand. (they have "ready-mix" services here, but many contractors still seem to just use manual labor rather than concrete pumps, etc.) As a result, the concrete is often mixed and layed up completely incorrectly. Here is a photo where you can see where a whole section of concrete has totally failed:
The structure isn't even complete and it's already falling apart. I've also noticed all kinds of really bad workmanship on other under-construction buildings: Not plumb, level , or square masonry; bad bond patterns; incorrectly anchored rebar; etc. In the end, everything is always plastered over with some sort of cement based plaster. Not too many of the mistakes are visible after that. (But the problems are still there). Also the final "finish" of the building often leave much to be desired. For example, they often don't bother to put any plumbing or wiring in the walls or create wet walls. Instead, pipes and conduit can be seen running along the inside and outside walls. It's as if no one ever bothered to put them in the blue-prints. (It isn't universal, but I am seeing a LOT of it)

Often things also seem overbuilt.

I'm no engineer, but this looks like an awful lot of steel.

It LOOKS good, but what's under the skin?

It could be that there is SO MUCH construction going on that contractors can't find any skilled workers. Or, looking at it more pessimistically, maybe it's contractors looking for the cheapest labor regardless of experience. I actually saw a child laborer working on one of the construction sites I walked though. I even got a photograph. (He ASKED me to take his photo) :

My main reason for wanting to visit Bangalore was to see Michael's orphanage. As he warned me, it is a very humble operation. Right now, due to some financial complications, they operate out of a two bedroom condo. I was impressed by the energy of the place regardless. The kids are all angels; very well behaved. And you could feel the genuine love that they have for Micheal, Aleli (his wife) and Rangeeta (Their main teacher and helper). Of course, the adults love them all as well. I took portraits of most of the students. The kids were all so full of happiness, it was quite easy to get good shots. They make me look like a master photographer! It really is hard to share with words the happiness and upbeat attitude of the kids. Considering their backgrounds, it is astounding. Many of them come from the most terrible situations you can imagine. One child, who was only four or five years old, was so neglected by their former guardian that they had scars from skin infections. A few of the kids have been abused sexually and physically. Normally, the prospects for such kids aren't good. Yet after a few years of living in a place where their foster parents provide a safe home, decent care, and plenty of love, it seems that they are well on their way to a bright future. They have the safety to be allowed a proper childhood.

There are so many shots I just combined them into a single sheet. The kids are so radiant, it made my job easy. (Click the link for the image [5MB] .)

http://www.mediamax.com/lordtangent/Hosted/ContactSheet_LARGE.jpg

I met Michael at the earth architecture workshop. His reason for taking the workshop was to learn enough so he could build his new facility. Recently, the Childrens project was lucky enough to acquire some land in Coorg, which is an area in the tea/coffee region. But resources are stretched to the limit, so the money he has to actually build with is limited. They are going to have to make every penny count. He plans to build the structure himself. (But no offer of help will be turned away!) You can see more about the project at childrensproject.org

Hampi

2006-10-17T21:51:00.000-07:00

Hampi. Where to start. Wow.

Today I explored Hampi. Hampi is a large archaeological site (i.e., ruins) of a 14-16th century city in South India. The site is huge, about 26km2 One day is definitely not enough to see this site. Sadly, that's all I had. The contemporary historical writing regarding Hampi during it's hay day describe an exceedingly rich city. It is even compared to ancient Rome. For years it was the imperial city of several south Indian kings. It was then attacked, conquered and then systematically looted and destroyed over a four or five year period. It was never re-built and at that point sort of just faded out. As a result, even though there is great damage, Hampi feels like something of a time-capsule. Pottery fragments litter the ground. Some building still even have their plaster. Walking though Hampi it's easy to imagine what it must have been like. Even though the only buildings that remain are the solid stone structures their number is so vast that one cannot realize that it must have been a bustling city. My head was about to explode. Seriously. I mean, like many times during this tour, I was hit by this "I'm touching a thousand year old carving. People used to use this." Of course, in this site nothing is quite a thousand years old, but you get the idea. Hampi is a city. It was a city that for 250 years was comparable to Rome in wealth and sophistication. (Aqueducts, public baths, etc.) It's like you can feel the people who once lived there as you walk though it.

If you are going to tour south India, I highly recommend you see Hampi.

There are clay pot fragments everywhere.

"Queens Tank"

Flat Tire

2006-10-16T21:22:00.000-07:00

Today we drove. A long way. Over some of the worst roads I've seen so far. I mean, at times the road was basically a dirt road. Actually, a dirt road would have been better. What we ended up driving on much of the time was a half-dirt half-paved road, which is even worse. Along the way one of the tires got punctured. The driver pulled over to a road side tire-fixing-guy-station. It was basically a shack with an air compressor. For whatever reason, it took half an hour to fix the flat even though they had nothing else to do.

The flat-tire-fixing-guy (I would hesitate to call him a mechanic) used a sledge hammer and a couple of crowbars to remove the tire. I guess they've never heard of a manual bead breaker in this part of India.

I was surprised to see an inner-tube in our radial tire until I though about the quality of the roads. It kind of makes sense to use an inner tube in that case. Also, if a sledge hammer and crowbars is the way every shop removes tires, (I've since learned that it is) an inner tube is the only way the tire could ever be expected to hold air...

I finally got a good photo of farmers using traffic to thresh grain. In this case they are processing raggi (sp?) It's a millet like grain. Why buy a threshing machine when there is a constant supply of bus traffic?
A nice ox team.

These guys were moving camels from Rajistan to Bangalor. (He hit me up for fifty bucks just for a photo)

My view from the Boulders Resort outside Hampi.

And my cabin:

The owners home really is his castle... At least it looks like one.

More Detail Than You Can Possibly Imagine

2006-10-15T21:52:00.000-07:00

Today I transferred to Behur to see a couple more temples. On the road I began to see the first examples of rammed earth homes "outside of the lab" (In Auroville) I've seen since arriving in India. Here you can see a lady pumping water manually from a bore well, with her cows and house in the BG. One interesting thing I noticed about the rammed earth houses is that most of them are rendered (meaning plastered, for you CG folks!) on only the front. The sides and back seem to be left raw. Obviously a cost saving measure. But even in poor rural India, we must keep up appearances, mustn't we? You can see the raw earth on the side of the house. Based on the eroded quality I observed on many houses, it's pretty safe to say that they earth is truly raw. No stabilization. It appears that the builders didn't bother sieving out the larger stones either, which isn't strictly required. But it can lead to better life in the wall sometimes, depending on the soil. The buildings I observed which had the worst damage always lacked one or both of the two basic requirements for earth homes: "Good boots and a good hat" Usually the eves where too small to protect from driving rain, most usually on those raw, un-rendered sides. Often the foundation was also inadequate as well. It appears that stone is abundant in this particular area, so there is no obvious reason for the short stem walls other than maybe as a cost saving measure. Of course, when your house ends up melting away over a couple of monsoons it's pretty safe to say that that sort of cost savings is "penny wise and pound foolish". Regardless, I saw many examples of poorly constructed houses. (This house seems pretty well done)
Most of the raw un-stabilized earth houses seemed to be holding up quite well. (even the poorly constructed houses) Now, contrast the modest earth home to this gaudy concrete house. OK, it is fugly. But if that is what floats your boat, it could be executed in earth for less than concrete. I wonder if the person who contracted this abomination knew all the options what they would have chosen. They would have had so much more in left in their budget for tacky trim if they'd gone with earth...
After seeing the damage on the poorly constructed earth houses, I can see how they may have contributed to the seemingly poor reputation of earth. First of all, earth construction is associated with poverty. "Poor as dirt"... and all that. Second, it seems you only ever notice the earth houses that are falling apart, never the houses just next door that are holding together just fine. For some reason, people can look at a dilapidated wood house and not conclude that wood is at bad building material. But earth doesn't seem to get that sort of slack.

Now that I've done the earth building course I'm well acquainted with the various strengths and weaknesses of earth as a building material. As I drive though India I see so many places where concrete and fired brick is being used for basically no reason at all other than convention. Earth would do the job just fine. I'm even talking about multi-story buildings, which all seem to be ferro-concrete with brick infill. The brick is just a complete waste. They could do things in a similar way but with a different material and save money and energy in the process. Speaking of saving energy, the ferro-concrete/ brick in-fill buildings I mentioned must be TERRIBLE energy wasters. I'm sure that eventually, many of them will have some sort of air conditioner installed. They don't appear to have any insulation at all and the thermal gain of the brick is terrible. Earth would not be much better in this regard, but it wouldn't be any worse. And with earth one could afford to make the walls more massive. (Which helps fight the thermal gain with the "flywheel effect")

The first temple I visited was the Chennakeshava (a form of Shiva) temple in Belur. The quality of the sculptural detail is amazing. It's by far the most detailed temple I've seen so far. (It took over 103 years to complete!) One reason for the quality of the carvings is the material which is soap stone. Its smooth texture and softer surface allows for more detail. Unfortunately, it also makes vandalism easier. There were many areas where I saw vandalism.

Some of the most obvious modern vandalism was visible on the highly polished Nandi. I wish I could beat the jackasses who perpetrated it. (You can't see it too well in the photo)

Check out the detail on this sculpture. It's about 4 feet tall.

Lathe turned columns inside the temple.

After looking at the Chennakeshava temple we went to the Hoyasaleshwara temple near by in Halebid. Hoyasaleshwara is also executed in soapstone and also has the same level of insane detail. Actually, it is even more detailed. It's the newer of the two temples and no doubt the queen who commissioned it was trying to out-do the older temple. (Both were built
by the same dynasty.)

A child herding pigs on the road to Hoyasaleshwara temple. I never knew you could herd pigs.

One interesting thing that happened to me at Hoyasaleshwara is that some locals started chatting me up. Indians have a very different sense of privacy than Americans. They think nothing of asking very personal questions right off the bat. In this case, the guy asked me if I was traveling alone. I mean, traveling alone, huh? Why would he care? From a suspicious Angelinos point of view, you really wonder how you want to answer a question like that, especially when you actually DO happen to be traveling alone. At this point, members of his group started gathering and surrounding me. OK. So now I'm being surrounded by a bunch
of strangers who want to know if I'm traveling alone... really it wasn't a truly threatening situation. But it's tough to shift your mindset from what you know. The villagers seemed naive enough to not realize that there might be anything at all threatening to their actions. Once all of the guys group had gathered around, it was time to answer other questions. I got a barrage of the now recognisable as standard questions: Your good name? What country are you from? Are you married? But then I got a couple of new ones: What do you think of Indian culture? What religion are you?" At this point one of the group decided to display his knowledge of regional demographics "Christian"...Americans are Christians. I quickly corrected him. I told him, "Not all Americans are Christians. What about the Indians that live in America?" He looked at me with a "Whaa...?" kind of look. Apparently, he hadn't gotten the memo that plenty of Indians carry American passports. Eventually they cornered me with THE question: What religion was I? "None", I replied. They had a hard time understanding that one. I didn't have time to explain it to them.

Check out the size of the people to get a sense of the scale of the carvings. They are all so small relative to them they are hardly visible in the photo. You can see them in the foreground of the shot. Insane detail.
Each little carving is not just a relief, it's a fully dimentional carving. Each "stone" of the building has many such carvings.

One of the guardian statues of the inner sanctum. Very detailed.

It seems that, like many projects in India, even temples are never completed. So, here we have some 500 year old columns sitting in the corner of the temple grounds. (Un-installed) Are they spares? Were they for a new shrine? Maybe If I'd sprung for a guide I could have gotten the inside scoop on what they were meant for. (originally)

Holy Cow!

2006-10-14T21:38:00.000-07:00

The pace of my tour is starting to feel pretty grueling. Worse of all, the hotel I'm staying in Kings Kourt (that is really how it's spelled) is terrible. Totally shabby and the rooms smell like ass. (A mix of cigarette smoke and mould) If you are ever in Mysore don't stay at Kings Kourt. I'm serious. I would rather have my hut in Auroville over this smelly room.

Mysore is and amazing city. So far, it's the most "together" city I've seen in India so far. The streets are good. There are even sidewalks in most places. (which is, based on my observations of South India to date, rare) Amazingly, there are still cows and other livestock on the streets, even in the "downtown" areas. The level of refinement in the infrastructure of the city makes them seem out of place here.

This is India's largest monolithic Nandi, on Chamundi Hill.

I can't remember the name of this mausoleum, but it was pretty impressive. (OK, not the Taj Mahal, but I'm in South India, remember?)

Speaking of Islam, there are a surprising number of Muslims here (actually, India has the worlds largest population of Muslims under a single government) Hell of a climate for such a level of modesty, though...

People taking boat rides on the river near the mausoleum.

An old colonial era dungeon in a fort near the mausoleum. (I said the pace was getting grueling, didn't I? I'm going to have to look at my notes to figure out the names of these places)

More Wild Life

2006-10-13T21:38:00.000-07:00

My first day in Mudumalai Wildlife Park I saw a Vine Snake eating a lizard.
The next morning I did a before breakfast hike. Morning time is supposed to be the best time to spot the wild life. After about 10, the domestic animals come in a scare them off. We spotted elephants and deer. But I really wasn't able to get very good photos. Surprisingly, my best animal spotting happened as we drove out of the part later that afternoon. It figures...

Rather than waste your time with the bad photos I got while hiking, I'm posting the good photos I got on the drive out:

Some locals on the road to Mysore.

I got to my next destination, Mysore, before dark and was able to shoot some pictures.

Chamundi Hill Temple. (On one of the eight most sacred hills in India)

This is the Maharajahs Palace. It is AMAZING inside. But photography inside was not allowed. I forgot to take a daytime exterior photo.

Nuts for Coconuts

2006-10-12T21:19:00.000-07:00

We spent most of today driving from Fort Kochi to Mudumalai Wildlife Park. On the way we stopped for a coconut. Man, I love coconuts... especially the brown type. They are more expensive but they are quite tasty. Today I lucked out and my nut had a decent amount of meat. It's a good snack for 10 rupees.

The guy making a funny face is my driver, Viketasan.

On the way we passed a political rally. Notice the little gas cans the guys on motorcycles are carrying? That was for the kerosene the candidates were handing out. I actually drove by a place where I could see them filling peoples little gas cans. I choose not to take any pictures because I wasn't sure how that would go over.

One thing I find interesting is the cultural emphasis on materialism here in India. In that respect it's no different than America. The difference is the way it's expressed. I mean, if this billboard is any indication, actually wearing this much jewelry is something to aspire to. (In the west it would just be considered gaudy)

To get to Mudumalai we drove though a hill station. I think it was called Ooty. It's the only place I've been so far where I actually needed my fleece jacket.

Fort Kochi

2006-10-11T23:59:00.000-07:00

Today I'm in Fort Kochi in Kochi/Chochin.This City is another part of Karala. I wandered around the city a little with my driver/guide and picked up a cell phone. The experience turned out to be interesting. First off, they speak a different language here than Tamil (which is what my driver speaks). Second, my drivers english is not very good, and neither is that of the cell-phone guys. Anyway, he's Indian, so he was trying to do the talking though he really couldn't communicate with them much better than I could. It was an interesitng example of how Indians don't always understand each other so well. Compounding problems, the cell-phone guys required a passport size photo in order to activate my phone... you would think that this would not be an issue considering that we were in a shopping mall and that right across the hall there was a photo studio and one hour photo lab... but this is India. You need to think in "India time". The lab attempted to totally gank me on the photos. They wanted something like 300 for 8 photos. I told them, no way, I only needed one photo. "OK, OK" ...Everyone always says "OK, OK" or even "OK, OK, OK" when they are dealing...They said I could have four photos for like 100, if I waited until 3pm. (it was about 2 at the time). I tryed to talk them down, but they were not having it. I went back to the cell phone guys to tell them about the hold up which created a hubbub. It seems they had already opened the phone and recoreded all the serials and stuff. Basically, they'd pretty much already processed the sale. (No harm there, we'd already made the deal)... soon I found myself talking to their boss. Once he understood what was going on he went over to the photo place and gave them a talking to. We even managed to bargain the guy down in the process and get him to shoot the photo imediately instead of having to wait until 3 (of course, by now it was 2:30 anyway). I think I ended up paying 60 for two photos, which didn't really matter to me since I only needed one anyway and at least it was cheaper than 100. I'm not sure what the cell phone boss guy told the photo studio boss guy. But I guess it went soemthing like this "You are screwing up MY business and it's pissing me off". Whatever he said, things went much more smoothly from that point on. I got my photos and my phone and we were out of there in a few minutes.

While in Kochi I was able to catch a performance of Kathacali, Karalas calssical form of dance drama. I found it interesting in some ways and kind of lame in other ways. While the performances follow the basic framework of a classical story the exact movements are not choregraphed exactly. Instead, they are improvised as is the mucic, which is provided by two drummers and a cymbal player /singer. On the one hand, it's pretty amazing that they performances are as good as they are. On the other hand, at times the lack of precise choreography shows. The the whole thing just seems silly. Like a full sized puppet show for kids. I had to at least try it once but I don't think I'll ever go to another performance.

As you can see from the photos, the makeup and costumes are quite elaborate. It's hard to see in the photos, but even the actors eyes are dyed red! The MC told us that all the make uses natural products. For example, they eyes are dyed red using a particuar type of seed. The face makeup ueses natural pigments of certain stones in a base of coconut oil. The paper face appliances are glued using rice paste. The makeup takes about two hours to apply and is an optional part of the show. I guess you could call it the pre-show. The actors grind the pigement fresh and then take turns doing each others makeup. I found this part of the show nearly as intersting as the actual performance.

I got some great photos along the beach during Magic Hour.

As the sun set, the fishermen started to come in and auction off their catches. Standing in the middle of the fish auction was an amazing experience. I totally failed to get any pictures that can convey it. I did get a bad shots at least.

Houseboat

2006-10-10T20:48:00.000-07:00

On the way out of Thekaddy, I saw kids walking, literally, uphill to go to school. Based on when I started seeing them and when I passed the school I recon some of them must have walked at least 5 km. The area was the base of the Ghat mountains and was very hilly.

Another interesting thing I saw on the road was workers installing conduit for data cables. If you look in the background, you'll see tea bushes. India's past source of wealth meeting with it's current/future. Wow.

Speaking of wealth, there are some pretty big houses in certain parts of Karala. I asked my driver where the money was coming from and he told me that the big houses belong to people who work on oil rigs for 6 months at a time.

This is the best photo I could get of a prototypical Karala style roof. The large vents on the sides are to let cooking smoke out, as well as to help ventilate the house ( It's very humid in Karala)

Next on my program was a Karala "back water" tour in a houseboat. The house boats are built on the hulls of old rice boats. I asked the pilot of my boat how old the hull was and he told me it was from the 40's. The hull was still in great shape even though it was all wood. It seemed to be impregnated with some sort of oil or pitch. House boat tours are a very touristy thing to do. I didn't see any locals living in houseboats. The pilot of my boat said they do, in some areas. Touristy or not, boats are the only way to see this unique part of south India. The water is the only access to most of villages.

The cook on my boat was fantastic. The food on the boat was by far the best I've had since arriving in India. Karala style cooking uses coconut and coconut oil in the cooking as well as a lot of fish, which adds distinctive flavors relative to the other south Indian food. I really can't figure out why all the Indian places in the US serve only north Indian stuff. Karala style food is way better!

The milky looking drink you see to the left is Toddy. It's a young fermented drink made from the sap of a particular palm tree. By young, I mean YOUNG. They make it in the morning to be consumed the same day. This was lunch and the Toddy I'm drinking was made that very morning. It had that "still fermenting" smell and some mild natural carbonation. But boy, did it taste good! Like a not so sweet white wine with a mild coco-nutty flavor. I'm going to have to get Toddy at least one more time before I leave India.

The back water villages/ rice paddies are a model of Indian ingenuity. What the villagers have done over the years is create a system of levies which hold the water out from the shallows of the lake and create rice paddys. The village itself is on the levy. Think of it this way, if the water is the street, and the levy the front yard, the rice paddy is the houses back yard. There are no neighboring houses to the back. The top of the levy serves as a sidewalk where people can walk even if the paddies are flooded.

It's such a clever system. First of all, the villagers gain the use of the rich soil at the bottom of the lake. Second, all they need to do to flood the paddies is open a lock (They are below the lakes level). I also saw a situation where they were pumping lake sediment into the paddies to build them up/add nutrients.

Like most poor Indians, people in the Karala back waters use the nearest water source for everything: bathing, cloths washing, dish washing... sometimes even drinking. if there is no well near)

At one point the crew stopped the boat so they could collect some laundry they'd left with one of the villagers for washing. I was immediately swarmed by a group of kids who insisted that I take their photos. They also asked for pens and other school stuff. As we passed a snack shack, they begged me for chocolate. (no cash... these kids were not "beggars", just poor village kids)

A group family shot.

Wildlife

2006-10-09T20:32:00.000-07:00

Today I went to the Periyar Wildlife Sanctuary. There are several guided treks to choose from. I choose the "Bamboo Raft" tour, which is an all day raft ride/trek. The tour is guided by two guides. There is also a porter (who caries the snacks and lunch) and an armed guard. The guard is considered important because there are tigers and wild bison.

Fear my WWI era rifle!

The first part of the day was pretty un-eventful. It mostly felt like a hike through the woods. We didn't see too much wildlife. I did see a Kingfisher (which is India's national bird) and some other birds.

We also spotted some wild pigs.

Just before lunch, everything changed. First, we saw some bison. At one point, the guides and the guard got very serious. The guard loaded up his WWI era rifle and shuffled out to the bushes. It seems that we had nearly cornered the bison herd, which is exactly the thing one does to make them charge. After the close call, the guides had us skirt around the herd and wait for a while so they could get out from being cornered. We then continued to stalk them until we could get into visual range. I got a good view myself, but unfortunately the lens I had with me wasn't long enough to get a great photo. At least I did get something.

After lunch it started raining. But rain was a small price to pay for what we saw on our raft ride back to the main trail. A herd of wild Asian Elephants! The herd actually swam across the lake to get away from us. When were were our closest we were maybe only about 75 yards away from them.

Leach proof booties being dusted with tobacco powder. Double protection from leaches! (All the guides except for the "guard" wore only sandals. They had no problems. But they did need to be much more diligent in checking their feet periodically!)

Fungus and bugs:

Un-Jaded

2006-10-08T20:10:00.000-07:00

Today was a great change of pace. The tour took a radical turn and headed more for the sort of stuff I like. Seeing temples day after day was about the drive me crazy and Meenakshi temple an the gift shops around it just about did me in. Starting today I'll be on the other side of the ghat mountains. The monsoon should have moved to the east side of the ghats where I was staying before. But it seems like it's still raining here. From what I understand, the monsoon is late in moving on this year.

On the way to Thekaddy, which is in a different state called Karala, I saw many small companies producing what Satprem calls Country Fired Bricks. They make the bricks by hand. The bricks are sun-dried and then stacked in a giant pile which the brick-makers cover with a mud/dung plaster. The bricks are fired using nothing but the plaster as insulation. The process works, but it requires lots of wood. The bricks tend to be weaker than factory bricks as they are not fired as throughly. Worst of all, when quarrying for the required earth, careless brick makers often use top-soil, which of course ruins the land where it was quaryed and also makes poor bricks.

In Karala, donkeys rule the road.

One of my favorites. Fresh lime soda. You add the sugar and soda water yourself. Perfect, every time.

Part of my day I was set aside for a plantation tour. The place I toured specialize in spices, but they had some tea and coffee plants as well.

Vanilla beans

Can you see the dove in this orchid?

Entrance to the drying room

The guide shows me some cardamom in it's dry state.

Coffee plant

Nutmeg

cardamom
A colorful spider

Leaches! Leaches! [shivers] I hate leaches! ... if you walk around in one of the plantations or parks you are bound to pick a few of these up. But if you keep checking your shoes you'll see them before they have a chance to crawl up to your legs. Tabaco powder applied to your socks/legs repels them also.

Karala style architecture of the hotel where I'm staying.

Jaded

2006-10-07T15:40:00.000-07:00

Today I'm starting to feel a little jaded. Several experiences over the last couple of days have added up to this feeling.

My guides keep taking me to gift shops that all sell the same sort of stuff. "Department stores" is what some of them call themselves. But really, I can tell they are gift shops. I'm starting to suspect that the guides might get some sort of commission or kick back on sales from their referrals. (I can't think of any reason why they would take me to these places) With the exception of one shop, which deals in fairly high quality statues and antique statues and lamps, the proprietors of each and every shop have left me with a bad taste in my mouth. It's how pushy they seem. I'm not sure if it's an Indian thing, or a gift shop thing, or both. But they treat you as if you are absolutely going to buy something. As if you wouldn't have come to the store if you didn't want to buy something. It rubs me the wrong way. You see, like most guys, I go into a shop knowing exactly what I want to buy. If I don't see it, I'm not interested in half assed options or substitutes. The other thing is, I'm gaining sophistication as I gain experience. When a pushy salesman tells me over and over again that he's selling me "pure silk", "pure silk" that is obviously rayon it really pisses me of. It also makes me distrust everything else he says.

India is famous for textiles, and rightly so. I've already been to proper Saree shops and I can say the stuff they sell is phenomenal. But when a gift shop salesman trys to push poor quality crap sarees and other textiles on me for even higher prices than the saree shop, again, it pisses me off.

I'm only talking about 3 or 4 individual instances in the last 3 days. I can't go to more than one shop a night because it's just exaughsting. I'm not a big shopper. But I have been trying to pick up some things while I'm here. Even back home, shopping is hard for me. But in America, it seems like the problem is getting enough attention from a salesperson. (in addition to actually finding what I want) In India, the problem is getting TOO MUCH attention. (And still not being able to find what you want) The salesmen (so far, I have only ever had salesMEN) never just leave you alone to browse. Even if you ask them to leave you alone, they still hover. I've read about this but experiencing it first hand is a real eye opener. Add to that the issue of haggling for price. Many shops have no fixed price. That means all they have to do is take one look at me, size me up as an American and then jack the price 200%. Haggling is hard work. It wears me down even faster than a salesman who's too over-eager to find something to sell me. Who would have ever guessed that the first thing I'd really dis-like about India was...shopping.

As I said, I'm starting to build a little experience and sophistication in shopping. It's pretty easy to tell what's good and what's crap once you've seen both ends of the spectrum. It helps to shop in a few reputable shops before heading out in the uncharted territory In India, sometimes the best available is still crap, by western standards. But that is not likely to be the case in things you would be shopping for as a tourist.) I'm still working on the haggling thing myself. It doesn't come naturally to me. But I'm starting to get better at it... Sadly, I'm also almost done with my shopping. :-(

One thing that has really been driving me crazy is that I can't seem to find places to buy certain cloths that I commonly see the locals wearing. Neither my driver nor any of the guides I've had so far have been any help. Actually, it's this particular issue that has led me to distrust them. When you ask for a very specific thing. Even point to people wearing it one the street, and then they take you to a store that sells nothing similar, it starts to make you little more than suspicious. Of course, they could also just be clueless. I try to follow the rule of "Never chalk up to malice what can be explained by incompetence", but I am by nature a suspicious and hate being played as a sucker. At this point, incompetence or malice, I'm pretty much done with getting any shopping tips from guides

It's learn from my experience (i.e. mistakes) time!

Tips:
If you are not shopping at gift shops...shopping at "locals" shops at least a 10% discount is almost always possible, even on fixed price stuff. If you buy more than a single item be sure you ask for it.

Your travel guide book will have suggestions for good places to shop for particular items. Avoid the gift shops at the touristy places. Depending on what you want to buy, try to shop where the locals shop. Of course, if you WANT touristy stuff, it will be easy to find. See the following tips.

Even fixed prices usually don't really mean anything, especially in touristy areas. If you pay the price on the label you are getting screwed. Be ready to start bargaining. If you have no idea of the real value of the thing you are trying to buy, you are gonna get screwed. (I am speaking from experience so listen to me...) Try to take into account the local economy and what people really make per day. What is the lowest price you can possibly imagine? What is HALF that price? Some people in India make only two or four dollars a day. Many people make less than a dollar a day. This is common for people who have jobs you might normally consider a "good" job. Almost anything labor related is low paying. Even blue collar type work. Is the thing you would like to buy something a person who earns a dollar a day is capable of making? How long would it take them to make it? Don't forget that you are not helping that dollar a day person at all by getting screwed by the merchant selling the item. You are only enriching the merchant. (He and the dollar a day guys boss are the people exploiting the cheap labor) It never hurts to low-ball the seller. It sends the signal that you may not want to buy the item at all if the price is too high. (or that you are on to his game)

Of course, the BEST thing to do is buy stuff directly from the people who made it. That way, even if you get screwed on the price, at least it's going straight to the people who did the work. By "getting screwed" I mean, paying substantially more than they can usually get for the item... not nessesarily uncomfortably high from your perspective. Honestly, I would not mind so much being taken advantage of in this case. "Working Indians" are poor enough as it is. If you you feel the price is fair, there is no reason to haggle over the price too much. Maybe he'll be able to improve his life a little by getting a cell-phone or a motorcycle. Unfortunately, it's though to find the actual producers of most items and they usually don't have a huge selection. ( As I've mentioned before, in the case of a Saree it can take 10+ days to make a single piece... one family can't realistically make that many each year. Carvings, etc, can take similar or longer to create) Other craft items are frequently made in factory-like operations or procured though "cyotee" like middle men, and buying direct isn't possible.

About the photos:

On the way to Madurai, a farmer drying maize on the freeway. This is illegal but totally common. No one bothers to stop them from doing it. And what would be the point? They are some of the poorest people in the country. The farmers do the same with other crops. Micheal told me that they'll put rice out on the road to have traffic drive over it to help thresh it. Obviously, hitting rice straw and 60 km/h could be very dangerous (especially for a motor cycle) notice the logs around the corn. Cleaning and bagging corn (taking up an entire lane of an undivided two lane highway)

I purchased half a kilo of cashews from this family and asked if I could take a picture of the grandparents and the kids.

An heirloom "farm chicken" I was able to get a picture of. Interestingly, every Indian I've spoken to so far knows the difference between an agri-business chicken (a "broiler") and a farm chicken. (which they call farm chicken) They all prefer the the taste of farm chicken. Interesting. Most Americans don't have any idea at all where their table chicken comes from.

Rain day:

I can't remeber the name of this place ... I'll look it up.

They still use old fashion locks all over South India.

Meenokshi Temple. Very commercial. It was like Grand Central Station inside with garish neon signs and shops. The feeling of this temple contributed greatly to my jaded mood.

Donate button

2006-10-07T09:31:00.000-07:00

There is now a shiny new donate button at the right top side of the blog.

It isn't for my friends so much as for any lurkers (or any surprise torrent) of readers that may eventually find the site.

If a dude could become a millionaire by selling pixels, and some other shcmuck can get a house with a green paper clip, surely my thought provoking and informative blog posts are worth some nominal donation. Heck, skip your Starbucks for one day and give me 8 bucks! (Or whatever they cost now) So go crazy! Make me rich! I want to be rich, damn it!

Brihadeswara

2006-10-06T09:02:00.000-07:00

Today I visited Brihadeswara temple in Thanjavur. Brihadeswara was built in the 10th century by the father of the king who built the temple I visited yesterday, Airavatesvara. His name was Raja Raja. Brihadeswara is detailed, but not nearly as intricately adorned as Airavatesvara. But what it lacks in detail it makes up for with SIZE.(if this was the first Chola temple I had seen I would still be impressed by the detail, btw!) Brihadeswara is all about size. There are columns of solid stone 10 meters high, a GIANT solid stone Nandi (The second largest in all of India) and a cap stone so large it required a ramp 2 kilometers long to to install. 2 kilometers! Another interesting little fact is that none of the stone is "local" it was all brought in from over 60km away from the site. The work was done with help of elephants.

Like every other temple I've visited so far, Brihadeswara is a working Hindu temple.

Notice the way that stone is being used to emulate wood construction on the eves. Each "beam" on the eves is actually part of a larger stone that fits together with it's neighboring stones perfectly.

A tank carved from a single block of stone:

Here we can see some unfinished stones on the side of the temple. The stones were actually fit together first and then carved smooth. Another detail worth noting is that there is no mortar in used anywhere. The stones are all carved to fit together perfectly. The lack of mortar is one of the reasons the temple is so well reserved. Mortar usually fails long before the stones in a masonry structure.

Today, I had a particularly good guide. He took the time to explain to me some of the more confusing (for a westerner) details of Hinduism. For example, take the Lingam. From a westerners perspective, it doesn't look like much:

I could not help but ask what the pillar statue was all about. I'd seen in in other temples but this temple had a massive collection of them. It turns out the Lingam statue is one of the most advanced visualizations of God in Hinduism. You see, despite what most westerners think, in the most advanced interpretation of Hinduism there is only one God. The Lingam, being the most abstract avatar for God is still just a stepping stone to the MOST advanced understanding. It actually represents Shiva, Vishnu and Brahma all at once as well as male, female, creation and eternity. From what the guide told me, "God" is actually most represented by the space above the Lingam. In other words, there is no avatar for that level of understanding of God. No-God, I guess you could say. (or at least an understanding of God not requiring an avatar to comprehend) God is literally represented by nothing but empty space. Taking the concept a step further, there is the Akasha Lingam, or Sky Lingam, as found in the Chidambaram Temple. It's an empty space in the inner shrine of the temple. There is no statue representing the presiding deity at that temple.

OK, so it all still sounds very complicated. Maybe it is. Hinduism is the amalgamation and synthesis of thousands of years of regional religions. The interpretations he gave me were either his or those of scholars he was repeating. So, maybe you could say it is complex, but at least a few people have figured it out. One other thing he related was, in his opinion at least, Hinduism works for any level of understanding in the devotee. Children are started out with simple images and story's. As their understanding grows they can move on to more advanced concepts. (Assuming they care to)

Like most religions, there are many flavors of Hinduism, for example, devotion to Shiva or Vishnu... the guide described it as similar to Protestantism vs Catholicism.

There is a lot more. But I found the all the above details very interesting.

On a practical note, I'll add to the list of injuries I've sustained in India. I'm not sure if it was the hot stones at the temple yesterday, my sandals, walking around bare foot so much, or all of the above. I've developed a blister on my right foot. It's not some kind of parasite or anything. It's a friction blister, or a second degree burn. My feet have had a month to harden up. I've been walking around in Auroville bare foot most of the time. I really think it was walking around on hot stones. It was BLAZING hot at Chidambaram Temple. I just hope the blister doesn't cripple me the rest of the trip. I'd built up a nice layer of callous but now it looks like I might lose it to the blister. :-( My motorcycle burn only took about a week to heal up. But a week is a long time when your are only touring for two weeks. The most bothersome thing is that this is the first friction/foot blister I've ever had in my entire life. (Well, the first bad one!) This coming from a former boy scout who still gets in his fare share of hiking. What a drag.

The last photo is my bell-hop. He's the first person who's actually given me contact info to send him the photo. (I'm really going to have to try and get a better photo for him but tomorrow is my last day here)

South India, Day One

2006-10-05T12:00:00.000-07:00

Ok, there is some bad introspective exposition, and then photos. You have my permission to skip the bad introspection and go right to the photos if you aren't interested.

As I sit in my air conditioned hotel room watching Bollywood music videos I try to assimilate the days experiences and internalize them in some sort of coherent way. I've just driven though some of Indias least developed areas... now, only hours later, I'm watching obviously very hip (mostly Hindi speaking north Indian) actors dancing around in western cloths in extremely extravagant musical numbers. Being from Tinsel Town, I should "get it", after all, even during our depression Hollywood was cranking out the same sort of stuff. People everywhere prefer escapism in their entertainment. OK, now that I've thought that one though I can handle the disparity between what's on TV and what I see on the streets...

It's hard to face India head on and continue to think about everything you thought you knew about the world the same way. So far I've been coddled in the pseudo-India of Auroville. (What I call "training wheels for south India") But training wheels or no, nothing beats a 5 hour road trip to get a solid slap of south India in the face. My original ride to Auroville was similar, but for some reason certain things never sunk in. Let's call my state of mind today "rebound culture shock"... I'll provide details as I go...

Today I saw a lot of tenant farmers.

Tenant farming is never very profitable no matter where it is performed. I can't imagine things are any different in India than in the US in that regard. If anything, the profits are even worse here. It's hard for me to put what I'm thinking into words... On the one hand, I see obvious poverty... on the other hand, people "in the sticks" seem less poor, in many ways, compared to the people I see in the towns and the cities. If it wasn't for the intense population pressure on the land, one could say they actually live totally in tune with nature and sustainably. (Unlike anyplace in the west) Out in the rice paddys and cane fields, there isn't the kind of trash and pollution one sees in the cities. (There IS trash. But it isn't as bad) Beasts of burden are used for farming, along with basic machines like tractors and threshing machines. The only place they ARE exceeding the resources seems to be in the area of water usage. The crude "plumbing" in the boonies means that gray and even black water ends up in places it shouldn't be (like back in the fresh water) Again, if it weren't for the population pressure, the way things are done would be perfectly fine. Nature could handle it. But unfortunately, there are too many people and things are not done purely the "old way". Chemical fertilizers and other "modern" things are also being used. But with a few little tweaks to keep things sustainable and maybe upgrade the "plumbing" and things could go on that way forever. Realisticly, it's hard to look at the way food is currently produced and figure out how things could ever be "modernized" very quickly. What would all the people do for work? Even though the pay is bad, they wont have anyplace to go until everything else comes along. It's kind of a catch-22 situation. I'm certain that due to market pressure eventually it will change to be more like the west. It may take 100 years, but it will probably happen at some point in the name of progress. But will it be progress?

OK. The cities in India. The main problem is pollution and bad roads. My observations so far is that it's like an echo of the West. Or an imperfect reflection. Sure, there are motor vehicles and roads. But most of the roads seem like an after thought. And there are so many diesels and two strokes on the road that the air makes you nauseous. I don't even want to think about the industrial pollution. (I sure hope the government here is more responsible than China in that regard... but bribes are common here as well. I really, really hope that some greedy bastards aren't selling the health of their counties land and their countrymen for a few rupees) I can't wait to see more cities to get a better idea of what's going on in the cities though. I haven't seen enough yet to have more than a "first impression".

Then there is the fact that I'm staying in a hotel that the people on the street just outside could only dream about staying in. (most of them, if they are lucky enough to have a good steady job, probably only make 100-200 rupees a day... thats 2-4 dollars.) I'm wondering when the... guilt? will ware off. OK, it's not exactly guilt, I mean, I just happen to have been born in and live in a country whose economy and currency is strong. I'm also fortunate to have a decent job, even compared to many other USA-ians.
Ok, enough blather, I think you get the point. I'm trying to internalize a torrent of experience.
About the photos:

I knew It was going to be an interesting day when the first thing my driver did (after showing up late) was pull over to buy liqueur. He drinks a little at night... hm... I guess two liters of brandy might work out to "a little" spread out over two weeks. (He said he was stocking up because it's cheaper in Pondy compared to Tamil Nadu. Still, he blew a days pay on those two liters. (Yeah, that's 2 bucks for each liter of brandy)

The first group of photos is from a temple called Chidambaram. It's like the Universal Studios of temples. Or the Disney Land. The brightly painted statues have been freshly restored, (It's done every 50 years... they are only 6 months old!) The temple is dedicated to Shiva, but the outside is completely covered with other statues as well. It's a private temple run by the Brahman priests who live there. Chidambaram is a really nice temple, but being hit-up for donations every ten feet got old pretty fast: "Hello! This is a private temple... What country you from? What is your good name? Please sign book. See how much these people pay? 300 and I do special puja for you!"

I'm not kidding. That's just how it was. I got jaded pretty quickly. At least they weren't hitting up the worshipers the same way. But then again, the worshipers pay donations without being asked... only much smaller donations than the ones the priests asked of me. I had to jam though this site anyway, since we needed to get back on the road to get to the next site. (Which IMHO was more interesting in a lot of ways)

This is what the priests looked like (photos are not allowed INSIDE the sanctum, which is where all the priests hang out)

An old guy outside the temple in traditional dress. Many men in south India still dress this way, not just old folks.

The second group of pictures is from a Chola era temple in Darasuram called Airavatesvara. It was completed in the 12th century and improved upon later in the 14th and16th century. (If I remember correctly)

Every column is carved with intricate scenes depicting Shiva and his various exploits. Every inch of the place is basically covered with carvings. Some of them repeat but most are unique. It's totally mind blowing/numbing. (I'm not showing even a fraction of the photos I did take. It would take thousands of photos to document everything. I couldn't get the idea of image base modeling / lidar out of my head while looking at this place. It would be amazing to have a digital replica of it... of course the data set would be immense! )

Restoration workers:

Cute kids outside temple. (Another one of the "take pictures of my cute kids" moments)

Weavers hand weaving silk sarees. A single saree takes 10 days to complete. These particular 10 day sarees sell for 2000 rupees ( $44) (Super fancy silk sarees go for up to 16000-25000 rupees)

The brocade on the edge of the saree is done in a semi-automatic way with these punch card things and some fancy mechanics on the loom.
Three stars is a huge improvement from cold and cold running frogs, an outdoor loo, and the smartest and most persistent damn mosquitoes you can imagine. Warm Water! Air conditioning! Glass windows! It's pure luxury!
My view. The little car in the right is my ride. It's a diesel Tata Indica. Tata is an Indian make. Seems OK. I'm keen to take a peek under the hood at some point.

After settling into the hotel and having dinner I decided to do a little shopping. It's official, I've gone lungi-crazy. I already have two lungis and a couple of dhotis, but I couldn't resist grabbing a couple more while I was getting some cute little dresses for my niece. A lungi is basically 2 meters of cloth, right off the loom, sewn into tube. There is no hem. The natural edge of the weave forms the hem. (The same is true for sarees and many othere articles of traditional indian clothing. There are rarely hem stitches) If you haven't figured it out already, it's worn like a skirt. There's more than one way to wrap or tie a lungi so it stays on. One of the nicer ways is to create a pair of pleats along the front and then roll the top down to hold it. I'll get some pictures to illustrate eventually.

Lungis usually come un-stitched. But like most markets here in India, the market where I purchased the my new lungis had a tailor. They charged 10 rupees to stitch each. In the end my lungis were 95 rs all in. That's less than $2 for a functional piece of clothing... Try finding a meter of hand woven cotton anywhere in the States for a buck. The tailors use manual sewing machines. If you think about it, it makes sense given the number to power outages. Plus, manual sewing machines work perfectly well. No reason to over complicate things.

Whay are you guys so serious? I told a joke... smile! smile...

That's mroe like it!

Manual sewing machine:

India: Phase 2

2006-10-04T03:13:00.000-07:00

I was not able to change my flight (Damn Cheap Tickets!) So, no extended vacation for me. The good news is that all my tour bookings went off without a hitch. I start my South India tour tomorrow at 8am!

Even with out the extra time I think I'll be able to cram in all the stuff I want to get done.

My posts may get a little more sporadic at this point, but I'm sure to have many interesting photos for the posts I do make. Personally, I think some people might find the tour stuff boring. I'm worried I might get overwhelmed and then bored myself. (seeing so many sites back to back is really not my style)

I've set aside some time to visit Micheal's orphanage and perhaps even the site of his new facility. That should be an interesting change of pace after seeing so many temple ruins and stuff. When I get back to Auroville I'll be checking out some farms as well. (They are building a new chicken farm. Hmmm.... chicken.)

India Time

2006-10-03T05:54:00.000-07:00

Since I'm not sure if I can change my flight or not, I decided to start my India tour ASAP. I spoke to the agent and they are making the bookings for my tour to start Thursday.

In the meantime I'm working on changing my ticket. But because of the holiday yesterday the British Airways office in Chennai is extra busy. My efforts today were again futile. I couldn't get though...

The interesting thing about traveling in India as a westerner is the amazing range of options available. Because there is such a huge spread in the relative wealth of the native population (favoring the "poor" end of the spectrum) there are myriad choices for inexpensive travel and rooming. Buses, dorms and staying with friends. The South African in the earth architecture course usually goes this route to stretch his travel budget as far as possible. (he tours for 6+ months at a time...) Then there is the sort of middle of the spectrum, where one rents a motor bike and just drives. There are many choices for room and board at this level. It's still very cheap from a westerners perspective. $10-30 a day, total. I recently spoke to a German fellow who went this route. It sounded like good adventure. But maybe a bit more adventure than I'd like.

I'm somewhat adventurous, but I don't like being lost. Not that it's really very easy to get genuinely "lost" in India, there are so many people. What I guess I mean is, I don't like FEELING lost. (Which is easy...for me at least...)

Being the chicken I am, and not being able to find a travel companion at the last minute, (In which case I might have gone the motorcycle route, or at least shared a tour) I chose to go with a very tame, personalized taxi driven tour. Here we come to one of the advantages of touring as a westerner in India. I will have my own personal driver and taxi for about half a month and it will cost me roughly what a nice rental car would cost for the same period of time in the USA. That's right, my own personal driver/tour guide. Part of my room cost will go toward putting him up each night at the hotel. (The hotels have "special" accommodations for drivers... I hope they aren't too bad.) Of course, the cost of the hotel room is separate from the cost of the driver. I'll be staying in three star hotels, which lowers the price. Considering how rustically I've been living the last month, as long as there aren't bed-bugs and scabies, anything will be an upgrade. Overall, I don't consider the price of the total 16 days overly expensive. Considering that the tour is completely personalized... I was actually surprised how "reasonably" it is priced. Of course, that's from a westerners perspective. It costs what most villagers make in a year. (And it would probably still be pretty steep for many middle class Indians)

While wandering around Auroville today doing errands, like shipping home some of the stuff I've purchased, I ran across Simplicity Farms. Simplicity is the unit responsible for producing the spirulina I mentioned in an earlier post. While I was there I spoke to the main steward whose name, I'm sorry, I've forgotten. He described the process they use to grow and sun-dry spirulina. He also offered me a pinch of dry spirulina "crumbles", the raw product of the operation. I have to say, eating it in the crumble form is not nearly as nasty as drinking it in juice. Spirulina is pretty salty, so mixed with juice it's nasty. But dry it's almost like eating chips... green chips.

In Simplicity Farms we see again the interesting economy of India at work. i.e., the way everything is is done is too labor intensive to ever have any chance of working in a developed country. But here it works fine. (provided the spirulina is sold to westerners / well-to-do Indians!) The farm only makes about 5 kilos of dry spirulina a day yet it employs 7 workers full time. They are all part of the Auroville pension/social security - like system so they aren't being exploited.

Here is a video of the women setting out the spirulina to dry.
[Video once technical issues permit]

Every step up to this point has also been carried out manually.

The ladies seem to be used to guests and being photographed. As I've found many times so far on my visit, people are happy to have me take photos... in exchange for simply seeing them on my digital camera.

This past weekend is the holiday where Indians clean and bless their tools. As a result all the cars, trucks and motorcycles also had pujas performed on them. (they are tools, after all) Here we see the owner of a bicycle shop breaking a melon, which is part of the ritual near the end. The stuff on the ground burning is camphor, which was just on top of the melon (burning). I haven't bothered to ask anyone what any of it means because it seems pretty complicated and I doubt I'll understand it anyway.

[Video once technical issues permit]

Performing a Puja on a van at CSR:

Puja "goodie bag". I felt bad for taking the bag because I only showed up at the very end of the puja and took some photos. The owner of the van seemed happy to give it to me though. (This is the first apple I've seen in a month!):

South Indian buffet in Pondicherry. Yummy! (I hadn't gotten my rice before taking the photo):
Indian Super Market. Villagers don't shop here (just yet), only middle class Indians or richer and westerners. Hopefully the villagers wont ever develop a taste western junk food:

My freshly Puja-ized motorbike laden with bootie for shipping. I'm still an amateur at piling stuff on my bike. But I'm learning. (this was the first time I carried two bags. Next time I'll go for three!)
Orchids in the Botanical Garden:

More Auroville dwellings. The fancy Japanese Garden style house is Upsana Guest House, reputedly the most expensive building/compound in Auroville. It looks like wood but really the entire building is made from concrete! (Wooden buildings don't last long here against the termites) Upsana fills the roll of "Five Star Hotel" in Auroville. The last day of the intro to Auroville workshop we had lunch here. Very Nice...

These two cute little houses were tucked away in Discipline Farm. Discipline Farm... That sounds like a prison or something... but it's actually quite nice (excluding the mosquitoes)

Extending stay in India?

2006-10-02T08:00:00.000-07:00

After some consideration I decided to extend my stay in India for one additional week. I contacted my employer and asked for another week off. (unpaid) Lucky me, they said yes. Now the problem is changing my flight. I attempted to do it today via the Internet with no luck. I think I may have booked one of those non-refundable, immutable tickets. I'm not sure. My attempt to call the airline today was futile as it's a national holiday today in India.

Update: You can see the brick testing video here: http://www.mediamax.com/lordtangent/Hosted/brick_test.MP4

Or you can jump down and see it in the earlier post where I first mentioned it: Making Bricks

More wild architecture in Auroville.

Aspiration dining room:
One of the schools:
The "Pyramid Building" which is now an art school:

The Solar Kitchen cooking up tasty lunches:

These huts are typically called "Capsules" They are the most basic accommodation that can reasonably be called a "home":

The lovely Mira explains the complexities of living in Auroville during the three day Intro to Auroville workshop.

More Sight Seeing

2006-09-29T06:34:00.000-07:00

This weeks course at the Earth Unit has quite a bit of stuff I'm either not interested in or feel is just review. As a result, I decided to skip a few days of class and take the Three Day Introduction to Auroville workshop. I'm glad I did. Until this point, I knew that I hadn't seen much of Auroville. But I had no idea how little I'd seen. Even though most of the today seemed to be filled with exposition regarding Sri Aurobindos "Integral Yoga" and other stuff I don't really care about, once the site seeing portion of the tour started I got to see way more than I expected. One place that I didn't even know existed was the American Pavilion. It's a nice eco-conscience office/dorm with rain water harvesting, photo-voltaic (solar) electric generation and composting toilets. The buildings are made of rammed earth with compressed block in-fill.

We also saw Baraht Nivas, which was once a restaurant, but it now an art gallery. The building is pretty neat. I didn't get too many photos but you should get a good impression of what it looks like from this photo.

Crazy rainbow cloud:

Spirulina. It tastes as bad as it looks.

Ayyappam shows us how to use a water level:

Practicing bond patterns in masonry.

A few days ago I burned myself pretty badly on the tailpipe of my motorcycle. I'm pretty sure this one is going to leave a scar. My souvenir from India:

Over the last several weeks I've taken a few lunches at The Solar Kitchen.
Solar Lunch:
While in an outdoor restaurant a goose walked though the dining area, took a nice fat dump on the floor and then wandered around for a while.

Making Bricks

2006-09-26T07:38:00.000-07:00

We completed site management and production know-how this week. The system that Satprem has created focuses on the use of compressed earth blocks. As the blocks are meant to be used mostly in developing countries the machine is totally manual. It requires a crew of seven to run the machine at full speed. ( 2 people for mixing earth and 5 to operate the machine) It might seem a little crazy at first. But when you take into account the actual situation in many developing and the cost of labor in those countries, the numbers work out. The machine can make about 1000 bricks in one day when running non-stop. Check out the video:

http://www.mediamax.com/lordtangent/Hosted/auram.MP4

The process can be automated for use in industrialized countries. But that isn't the focus of the work being done at the Earth Institute.

We also spent one day doing a rammed earth wall.

Completed rammed earth wall.

In the first video Omar is horsing around and breaking one of the unstabilized, incorrectly produced, inferior quality bricks we made in the first section of this weeks course. Ayapam then fetches him another brick to break. ( It's one of the REAL bricks ) Check out the second movie to get an idea of just how strong "mud bricks" can be. Please observe that there is a 4:1 lever applying the pressure to the top of the brick being tested. ( Omar decided not to test a real brick with his fist, BTW )

http://www.mediamax.com/lordtangent/Hosted/brick_break.MP4

Testing the brick (Skip to the end if you want to see it actually break)
http://www.mediamax.com/lordtangent/Hosted/brick_test.MP4

After class we've taken the opportunity to poke around Auroville and look at some of the buildings. People have done some very creative stuff:

Auto-rickshaws and their drivers at the Pondicherry central bus station.

Class will be over this week and I'm finalising my travel plans for after the workshop. I'm using a travel agency to help me book everything. So far my plan is to only travel for about 16 days to leave a buffer for staying in places I find interesting for a little longer.

India, the movie

2006-09-23T08:13:00.000-07:00

INT- AUROVILLE EARTH UNIT OFFICE - MORNING

Slow day. Almost dreamlike. A man in his mid thirties walks into the office and speaks to the receptionist.

AARON
May I use the phone?

SUTA
Local?

AARON
Yes. I may need some help.
I still don't know the phone
system here.

He shows her the number. She dials it and hands the phone over to him. He listens to the phone.

AARON
Is it ringing? I don't know this sound.

Hands phone back.

SUTA
Engaged. Maybe you try later?

AARON
Sure. May I just wait here?

SUTA shakes her head side to side (yes). AARON moves to the reading/waiting area. A butterfly flys into though the open window then flys around the room and then back out the window again as AARON watches on.

...

INDIA - INT - GIFT SHOP SHOW ROOM

SALES MAN
How are you enjoying India so far?

AARON
Oh, it's just fine

SALES MAN
You obviously haven't seen too much of it yet.

Accident

2006-09-23T04:41:00.000-07:00

I have a ton of photos and not a lot of time to caption them just yet. I Figured I'd pop them up now and fill in the captions later. Stay tuned!

As a test, I decided to try and post a video for everyone. This is a movie of some of the guys destroying one of the vaults we built. Please tell me if it works for you. It's Quicktime mp4 format: http://www.mediamax.com/lordtangent/Hosted/vault_destruction.MP4

If this works OK I may post more videos in the future.

Here is some news for you. Some time mid-week (I loose track of the days here) I crashed head-on into a lady on a scooter. Everyone was ok. I'm ok. Even the bikes were OK. It was a very slow collision. The scooter did sustain a little damage... one of the lights got broken. I offered to help pay for it but the husband preferred to just scold me and then let me off the hook "The money is not the issue. What if my wives arm had been broken" I didn't know what to tell him. I mean, either one of us could have gotten hurt or killed. When he was done ranting it was all over. I was free to leave.

The only reason I mention any of this is that I've been beating myself up over it since it happened. You see, the accident was clearly my fault. I ran to the right rather than the left when the bikes got too close which only made things worse. BUT... The lady DID cut me off. As I've mentioned, people here drive nearly suicidally. They assume that everyone else is looking out for them and will do the correct thing. Well, I didn't. Old habits die hard. It's tough to suppress 20 years of driving instinct. She had no way of knowing that of course. I went right when I should have gone left.

Now, today, on the way to the net cafe I crossed the same intersection. And what happened? Someone else came out of the intersection nearly the exact way as the woman I hit! Hurrah! My chance for redemption! "Keep to the left... keep to the left" I kept repeating to myself... only this time, the other guy decided to go to his right (my left... the WRONG way) Luckily for me, he choose his line early, and committed to it. It wasn't as close a call as the last time. But what made this guy decide to go to the right? (He was Indian)

The moral to the story? I don't know what it is. The two experiences only just confirm to me that there are no rules to driving in India except for: Don't hit anything.

A huge millipede. Eating these must be how the scorpions get so big (it's about 6 inches long):

Testing our arches vaults and domes. People told me I would loose weight in India, but as far as I can tell I'm either getting fatter or staying the same weight. (Eating so much chapati and rice will do that to you) I did not build this dome.

I did build this dome

More weekend tourism. This time to a site called Mahabalipuram (sp?) The temples are carved from solid rock. Most of them are not hollow on the inside, though some of them are somewhat hollowed out on the inside. Something I didn't get a photo of was the locally produced stone statues. Amazing work. I really wish I could get one to take home but shipping would be a hassle.

The view from the Beach Cafe. Dinesh with the Beach Temple in the background.

The monkey stole a partially full soda bottle from one of the kids, ran away, and then proceeded to open and drink it. Cheeky Temple monkeys! You really need to be careful around them or they will steal your camera and other stuff. (If they mistake it for food)

One thing I really can't figure out is why people stop me and ask me to take their photos. It happens at least once every time I go out. Today it happened three times. I'm posting the nicest pic. (They guy wanted me to take a photo of the kids) I usually try to get contact info from them so I can later send them the shot, but they aren't interested. They don't really want a copy. They just want me to take the photo. Dinesh, the Tamil guy I was traveling with on this trip, confirmed it. The people really didn't want a copy. I still don't get it. (Dinesh says I never will)
As part of our practical training we've been doing visits to active building sites. This first site is a little cathedral/shrine for a local Catholic charity.

The women in India work as hard or harder than the men. The main difference is that they do in it full Saris. (The men usually work in western cloths and sometimes a lungi) This lady seems to be wearing a pretty sensible cotton sari, but I often see women working in much fancier looking polyester saris.

The second site is the Shiva temple I mentioned in an earlier post. In these shots you can see that they are beginning to add the cladding to the exterior. The cladding is made from compressed earth blocks.

A Little Tourism

2006-09-18T07:32:00.000-07:00

In spite of the crazy schedule at CSR I'm still managing to squeeze in a bit of tourism on my one day a week of free time. Sunday before last we went to Pondicherry to look around a bit. Pondicherry is a former French colony. I didn't actually get to see much beyond the market (Amazing textiles / Saris in the nicer shops) and this: An old colonial era church. Amazing masonry. As I was with some of the other students from the Arches Vaults and Domes class. No-one could resist talking about what an engineering accomplishment the church is. The church was realized in brick and stone with pure compression architecture. No steel or concrete. (It didn't exist when the church was built!) Very impressive.

This week we are studying the actual manufacture of earth blocks. As part of the process, we will be learning how to analyze soil and tweak/stabilize it as required. Part of the class was a fantastic slide show on earth archetecture around the world. I'd seen some of the images before but it was much better with Satprem narrating. He has an amazing about of knowledge in the area of earth architecture. I wish I could share some of the images. I'm going to find out if he's got a CD I can take home with me.

I'm starting to accumulate photos faster than I can post them. Next post I should have to good stuff for ya though. Stay Tuned!

End of Practical Masonry

2006-09-16T05:16:00.000-07:00

Completed domes. I didn't work on any of these. But I think they look cool.

This morning over breakfast Manuel and Siddharth regaled me with a story of a 8" scorpion they'd spotted the night before. " The rain makes them come out", said Sid.

Tonight, we caught one. This bug is as big as your hand. I'm not joking. For scale, consider the size of the fork.

One thing I've been dying to get a picture of is the common Indian practice of piling up a scooter or motor bike with anything that will fit: Full milk cans, giant bundles of sticks, large containers of diesel or gasoline, people... you name it. I routinely see motor bikes with Dad, the wife, and two kids. The best snap I've been able to manage so far is this picture of Dad, Wife and Kid.

The wife/sister/mom/etc. usually rides side saddle. The bikes are specially modified with a foot rest and often a larger, squared off seat facilitating the practice. If the bike has "saddle bags", it usually only has one on the right, so that the passenger can ride side saddle with their feet hanging off the left side.

We played hookie and went to see the Matrimandir today, but weren't allowed inside.

Afterward, we went to see Aureka, the "Unit" here in Auroville that actually fabricates the brick making machine used to make compressed earth bricks.
The first thing that I noticed was how NOT up to OSHA standards the shop was. First of all, people were working in flip-flops. Metal working in flip-flops. Another common practice was to not wear any kind of eye protection.

The next thing I noticed was the seeming preference for working on the floor as opposed to a work bench. This seems like a common thing in this part of India. This shot is the final assembly area for the Auram brick press.

Just as I was about to leave a couple of friendly fellows asked me to take their picture. I didn't get their names.

Puja

2006-09-15T01:20:00.000-07:00

OK I have the information about the Hindu event that I attended last Sunday. It's called a Puja. In this particular case, the priests were inaugurating the Shiva statue for the first time in this new temple. The temple is called Shiva Nataharaja Temple. Satprem told me that the temple was origionally cheaply built from fiberglass panels and aluminum in the shape of a pyrimid. The dimentions were incorrect relative to the classic Great Pyramid. The orientation of the pyramid was inccorect as well. Adding to it all, the temple origionally opened east, which is usually the correct direction for most temples but not for Nataharaja. As Satprem put it "the tsunami could not possibly have had any mercy on this temple"

Satprem corrected all the errors and now the temple is of the correct dimentions, oriented correctly, and opening on the correct side. (South) The pictures of the outside probably don't look like much but remember that it's still not finished. One thing you really can't see from the photographs is that the pyrimid is build from pure compressive masonry. (not steel and concrete). But, unlike the pyrimids in Egypt, this pyramid is hollow inside. Satprem calculated the stability for what's called a cloister dome finished to look like a pyrimid on the outside. As a result, the inside has the tell-tail bond pattern of brick work and a slight arch-like inward curve in the walls. It's actually quite pleasing. Ultimately, I believe that the exterior of the pyrimid will be clad in some sort of nicer stone.

The man who sponsored the temple is Karant Singh. He's a maharajah or some kind of prince from Kashmir. While walking along the beach after the Puja I ran into the local fishermen told me about him and how generous he was. They also mentioned how disappointed they were with the government for not helping after the tsunami. Their new houses were payed for by a Norwegian NGO.

Tonight it rained. Hard. It's the beginning of the second monsoon. I have not seen rain like this in a long time. It was coming down in buckets. A few of the guys were out shopping, or to get dinner and got stuck out in the rain. Omar said "It was a like a nightmare I once had. Only it was real... and in my nightmare I was walking... not riding a moped... in blinding rain."

The rain really seems to bring out the termites and ants. But at least the mosquitoes go away for a while.

Brahman priest texting while he's chanting

Sweet rice

Building Arches Valuts and Domes

2006-09-11T06:15:00.000-07:00

As of this week, the practical part of the class starts. We are building arches. The pictures speak for themselves.

There are also several new students in class. One character I find particularly interesting is Micheal. He's an American who now lives full time in India. The story is that he did pretty well in Bay Area real estate, cashed out, moved to India with his wife to start an orphanage for Indian children (mostly girls)... His own private orphanage.

It turns out that the government here is so... I don't know the right word... un-interested... (generous) in child welfare that orphans are usually simply cast out into the streets. It's not as bad for boys, who are more valued for their potential labor. But for girls the picture is pretty bleak. Micheal and his wife save the girls from the streets and from predators. Boys are preyed upon as well of course. But from what I gather, not as badly.

He invited me to visit his place. I think I'm going to take him up on it. Surely there are other "interesting" touristy things either on the way there or in the general direction that I can hit at the same time. Frankly, this is more the sort of stuff I came to India to see in the first place. Getting to see all the temples and other stuff is just a bonus.

Speaking of temples, last Sunday, I was lucky enough to be invited to the dedication of a Shiva Temple here in TN. I can't remember all the technical info and names for everything. But stay tuned for photos and more accurate information. (I need to collate my notes and pick a couple of peoples brains who were there with me)

The Cliff notes is are that the temple was architects and construction supervised by Satprem, my masonry teacher here in Aurovile. The ceremony was out of this world. I've never been to ANY Hindu ceremony. I never expected my first to be such a high level ceremony. More info when I post the photos.

No More Theory

2006-09-09T06:41:00.000-07:00

Today was the last day of Arches Vaults and Domes. I think I have a pretty good handle on everything. At the end of the day Satprem handed out little certificates and a nice spiral bound print-out of all the class notes.

So far I haven't seen much of India. But I've been meeting a bunch of great people here and getting tons of suggestions of places to go. I'm starting to formulate a plan. Tomorrow myself and a few others from class are going to head into Pondicherry and do some touring. We are also going to try to see more of Auroville, which I have to admit I haven't had much of a chance to see yet either. (Class goes from 8am to 6pm, by which point it's usually too late to really think about going anywhere.

The class consists of people from all over the world, but mostly India. There are a couple of Americans, a guy from South Africa and a kid from the Philippines. (He happens to be of German decent and speaks Tagalog, German and (very good) English. Interesting people, each and every one of them. I'm getting to know most of them pretty well since most are living at "CSR" (Center for Scientific Research)... Earth Unit. It's cosy, but fun. Kind of like summer camp or something.

The food is OK. We've been mostly eating the regional Indian veg food. I don't remember the names of most of the stuff.

I've been drinking bottled water most of the time but there is also reverse osmosis water available here that is safe and tastes pretty good. Most of the places in Auroville have some sort of filtering and UV treatment system. But the water doesn't always taste good from some of the wells. The treated water at the Earth unit tastes like crap so I usually go with the "Dynamized" (It has special mantras played into it, or something... don't ask) reverse osmosis stuff from the visitor center or bottled water, which is only about 50 cents for 2 liters.

Theory

2006-09-08T19:35:00.000-07:00

Over the last couple of days we've been studying the Fenicular method and adding in what Satprem calls "the Optimization Method". Optimization Method allows one to balance (make stable) arches of arbitrary shape (within reason) while also finding the optimum thickness. The actual process could probably best be described as a combination of the Catenary Method (what Gaudi used) and the Fenicular Method (a.k.a. Graphic Statics) with a pinch of intuition thrown in. Oh yeah, one other thing... it's loads of work. The Fenicular Method requires quite a bit of drawing and math. The math is simple but there is a lot of calculating to create the graphs needed. Very boring repetition. Of course, the first thing that sprung to my mind was "Isn't there a program for doing this?" It seems like many off-the-shelf tools could be adapted. For example, any CAD program with a built-in scripting language would be able to do all the math automatically based on the dimensions of a properly prepared illustration. As it turns out, the discipline is so specialized and the Optimization Method so new (Satprem devised it himself) that no one has bothered to make a specialized tool for it yet. There is a fellow in class, Omar from M.I.T. He is here doing research for his Masters degree. Apparently his school has created a tool to do the Fenicular Method on arches. But it doesn't do Optimization of any type. There does not seem to be any method or software for calculating the stability of masonry domes. It's assumed that if an arch is stable a dome of identical profile will be stable as well. As I mentioned, there does not seem to be any math to prove it. But it works!

We have Chai twice a day at the regular "tea times". Considering the heaviness of the material I have to admit that often it's the only thing that keeps me going.

Arches Vaults and Domes

2006-09-05T07:56:00.000-07:00

Good news. While eating dinner tonight in the Earth Institute kitchen, a driver showed up, un-announced, with my luggage. Wow. Considering how little I've gotten by with over the last couple of days, I really feel like I over packed. (My bag weighed in at about 70 lbs!)

Bags before departure:

For the last few days I've been getting by with a cheap pair of shorts and sandals I got in Pondicherry, one pair of underwear, and two shirts (I had a spare in my carry-on).

I've just been washing the cloths every night and sleeping in my boxers. The cloths USUALLY dry by the next day. :-)

Oh, yeah, I also got a couple of longies (it's a traditional skirt the men wear) They are good for covering up with when I'm moving from the showers to the dorm, or lounging in the evenings. (While it's still scorching hot).

Today in class, we studied the Funicular method for calculating arch stability. I have to admit that I was pretty overwhelmed at first. Actually, some of the concepts are still kind of sinking in. We'll be doing more tomorrow.

Studying an arch using the caternary methodË

One thing I find fascinating about the stuff we've learned so far is that none of the methods seem to require any serious math. At worst, it's just basic algebra. The interesting thing about the Funicular Method is that it is a way to calculate things in a mostly graphical way. What you essentially do is draw something I can best describe as a slide rule, and use it to help you make your calculations. It's really simpler than it sounds. Tomorrow we move on to the "Optimization Method" which is much more heavy duty, but allows for some pretty amazing stuff.

The process uses a lot of drafting aka 'Graphics Statics'. Using CAD speeds things up... provided you have a laptop and know how to use AutoCAD (only one person in the class did)

The people in the class are all great. There are some extremely interesting characters. For example, an architect from South Africa that doesn't have a phone, or a chair, in his office.

I have to get going. Hopefully I'll have some photos ready to post next time.

Ask questions if you want specific information.

India: Initial Impressions

2006-09-04T08:23:00.001-07:00

1. Humid
2. Filthy
3. Poor
4. Polluted
5. Kind of hot
6. Friendly People
7. Insane traffic and drivers.

These, of course, were just my first impressions as I stepped off the plane and made my way to Auroville.

The first thing that hit me was how amazingly humid it was as I landed in Chennai. Moisture was literally condensing on the exterior of the (cold from just being at high altitude) air-liner, and dripping off. It was obviously humid outside. As I stepped off the plane, it was even more obvious. Imagine a foggy day, only with no fog. Fortunately, as I made my way thought baggage claim and customs it was still a relatively comfortable temperature. As it turned out my luggage containing my clothing was stuck in the UK. My camera equipment made it though OK, thank goodness! As the day wore on, the temperature would rise steadily until about 4-5pm, at which point it became hard to think.

After making it though customs (if you can call it that), I wasn't quite sure what to do. My driver was supposed to be waiting for me, but I wasn't sure where he was. After hesitating a couple of minutes, I decided to leave the protective womb of the airport. I walked past the rows of drivers pitching me a ride until finally I found my driver. (I didn't catch his name, and I would have forgotten it anyway.) 3 hair raising hours later we would be in Auroville, me 1400rs poorer. Tell me any other country were you can get a 3 hour taxi ride for $31. Petrol here, BTW, is actually more expensive then the US, about $4 a gallon. My driver a little Diesel car of Indian manufacture. A Tata, maybe? I'll have to find out. Anyway, the car seemed just like what I imagine an Indian (or Russian) car would be like. But it did get us where were needed to go!

The trash in Chennai was saddening. It's very much like Mexico (the only other even remotely comparable place I've ever been personally), and I imagine most other developing countries. It seems like everyone must just drops trash and since it's nobodies job to pick it up, it just accumulates.

My drivers little diesel wasn't the only smokey car on the road. It seems like many cars are diesel. All the trucks and busses are diesel, and many of the motorcycles are two-stroke. I though LA had bad "smog". But let me tell you, it is nothibng compared to the perpetual cloud of diesel and two cycle smoke over Chennai. I was told that Chennai isn't even the worst. There are much worse cities.

There are probably traffic laws here, but I can't say that I witnessed any evidence of them. There don't seem to be any traffic lights or stop signs. Traffic can best be described as anarchy. Not COMPLETE anarchy. I mean, you are supposed to stick to the left. But it seems that many people don't even bother with that unless they is a good reason for it. (Say, like a bus or dump truck driving straight at them) The horn is an integral part of driving here. People use it like a bell on a bicycle, to announce their position... the only difference is that they do this at 80km/h. I tried to get some video clips to show the trafffic. But I seriously doubt that they can do it justice. I'll post them when I get the time. I rented a motorcycle. It's costing me 90 rupees ($2) a day. I've taken it to Pondicherry twice already. But that's only becasue I was hoping to get some cloths to cover me until I get my stuff. I'm going to avoid driving on the "big" roads if I can help it.

More soon!

Water

2006-08-30T15:02:00.000-07:00

By now, a lot of folks have given me the (now standard advice when traveling): Don't Drink the Water!

I don't even drink tap water here in California (Too much fluoride and other garbage). I sure as hell wont be drinking the tap water in India!

I've grown quite spoiled by the distilled water and super tasty Sparklets (reverse osmosis with minerals, for taste) water here in the states. I hope I can get decent tasting bottled water in India.

Good tasting water makes all the difference when it comes to "hydrating". (at least for me) If it tastes good, I find myself much more likely to drink deeply. I think most peoples aversion to just drinking plain old water throughout the day is that "it tastes bad". Well, I'm telling you. Good water tastes good! Go get some good water (I recommend distilled water) and you'll see what I mean. Making tea with distilled water makes all the difference in the world also.

Safety?

2006-08-21T16:13:00.000-07:00

A concerned friend forwarded me a news article about the recent terrorist activity in India. My friend meant well. After all, they had no idea where in India I was planning to go. I made a map illustrate where I'll be relative to the current/ongoing problems.

I should mention, even before thinking about where I was going to be I was not particularly worried about being hurt or killed by terrorists. I'm not worried about it in my own country so why should I be worried about it in India?

On my map, which is extremely exaggerated, you can see I'll be far away from the political troubles. There is the ongoing stuff in Kashmir and Sri Lanka of course. But in some ways, they are both "stable" situations in that things are not getting worse. The problems in both areas seem confined to the respective region. I also drew a little skull for the now polluted area of Bhopal. ( The water and environment there is still heavily contaminated from an industrial disaster over 20 years ago. Bhopal is a really sad story. If you have a chance to read up on it you should. The whole situation is shameful. ) I never considered much of this while planning my trip. Maybe it will help my mom feel better to know that now I have.

There is no particular reason to worry about terrorism. If anything I'm more worried about pedestrian stuff like getting sick from the food or getting hurt in the same sort of accident I might get hurt in anywhere. I'm a little worried about crime. But I plan to be as careful as possible to not put myself in stupid situations.

Destination: India

2006-08-20T01:35:00.000-07:00

It seems that everytime I mention to friends I'll be staying in southern India for two months the questions that arise are almost always the same: Why? Have you ever been there before? Isn't that a long time? Why don't you just go to Maui?

I'm not sure if people are concerned for me, or just morbidly curious. Considering I've never left the American continent, those are relevant questions. So, why am I going to India, and why for so long?

I'm going to India to fulfill several personal desires. First, to learn about earthen architecture and second, to learn more about a place called Auroville (AV for short). I learned about Auroville by chance while searching for information about rammed earth home building. There is way too much to tell about Auroville. If you are interested in learning more about it's best that you just follow the link. Bottom line: Big ideas. I want to see how the humans involved make it all work.

Regarding earth architecture, the Earth Unit in Auroville has developed a very sophisticated earth architecture system. Their system really caught my imagination; in particular, the quality of the work possible. If you look at some of the pictures of their completed projects maybe you'll see what I see. Earth Unit Projects: 1 2 3 4 5 6 Though made from earth they are far from mud huts.

The Earth Unit in AV is the only place to learn how to build Compressed Stabilized Earthen Block (CSEB) architecture "from the source". The main purpose of my trip to AV is to learn CSEB. Considering how far I'm going it seemed like a good idea to learn general masonry while I was there also. I decided to take nearly the entire course, including the theory/engineering section. The classes alone will take a month.

It's my desire to some day build my own house, either via the rammed earth method or perhaps with CSEB. I'd like to do some humanitarian work some day also. The skills might come in handy.

After finishing the training courses at the Earth Unit, I'll have a month free to explore southern India. I'll plan the details over the first month of my stay.

As for going to Maui: Isn't that what everyone does? Where is the fun in that?

Chicken Hypnosis

2006-08-14T03:16:00.000-07:00

It's a little known fact that chickens can by hypnotized. I taught the niece and nephews the trick. Here you can see Goku mesmerized by Keoni's fingers. (I'm not sure why everyone was painting their nails this day.)

Chicken Crazy

2006-08-13T13:41:00.000-07:00

It seems word has gotten out I am a fan of chickens. Now people are contacting me for "chicken rescue". My first "guest" is a cute little bantam. I'm not even sure what breed or how old he is. I'm guessing he's 8-12 weeks old, but I'm not sure. I don't have enough experience to really know. Cute little fella though...

UPDATE: Since acquiring the chicken I've discerned that he is a Silver Sebright. A big clue is the fact that he is "hen feathered" meaning that he doesn't have the usual sex feathers of a rooster. (the pin feathers on his hackles and saddle, and the long tail feathers) He now also has a name: Goku

My 3 year old niece came up with the name and it stuck.

Chicken Progress

2006-08-08T00:39:00.000-07:00

The Araucana chickens are growing up! If You would like to know more about Araucanas, you can read the information here: http://www.skyblueegg.com Don't miss this great National Geographic article from 1948 about the introduction of the Araucana to the USA.

I like the chickens I got from the eggs I acquired on eBay. But according to "The Standard", they are not ideal. Fortunately, I'm not too particular about that sort of thing. Two of my birds show the highly coveted "tufts" and a couple of them are tailless. The hen looks like any old chicken. No tufts, no tail. She doesn't even have any interesting colors.

Group Shot.

Blackbeard crowing.

Lucky, screaming his lungs out.

Duchess is my only hen. I need to get the fellas a few more girlfriends. She's already starting to look over-worked.

Does this guy look like any chicken you've ever seen?

Knife Defence: Basically Impossible

2006-07-30T03:31:00.000-07:00

Enlightening. This video really makes me wonder what would "really work"? Clearly, practicing scenarios which are as realistic as possible would be a good start.

"You are attacking me wrong" I've heard the type of attack demonstrated in this video described as "The Frankenstein Attack". Sadly, like all good satire, this sketch is rooted in reality. For example The Frankenstein Attack is a staple ofAikido.

My new chickens

2006-02-04T13:57:00.000-08:00

After a string of extremely bad luck I've finally managed to hatch some eggs. I must have set about 50+ eggs over four attempts to get these 6 chicks.

It's taken me 4 or more months since I started the project to find success. Recently, a friend joked about eating the chickens. "Are you crazy!" I said. "They are the most expensive chickens in the world. " It's not that I'm sentimental. I'm pragmatic. And these aren't eatin' chickens anyway. They are a fancy rare breed of ornamental chicken. (I bet you didn't even know such a thing existed)