The Complaining Woman

I was sad to leave Goa and leaving in the taxi in the morning with Lidia, I really second-guessed myself. Lidia is quite crazy: she is known, especially by businesses, as The Complaining Woman. No. I am not joking. She honestly complains all the time. I won't go into details, because then I'm just complaining, but suffice to say, I usually just let her choose the restaurant or seats, or whatever it might be, since she is so incredibly picky. Well, we got in a bit of a fight last night, actually, she was screaming at me in the street. It was really quite unusual and surreal. I had to bite my cheeks not to laugh. Here is this skinny, big-eyed, 50 year old, intense Italian woman screaming at me for not being grateful (oh the irony!) enough to her while these street vendors try to sell me some door decorations every time she takes a breath, or looks away, her jaw set hard, to translate some other insults from Italian into English for me.

But let me backtrack.

We initially left Agonda for Hampi in Karnataka. It is a really beautiful place. As I said to my mother last night (and maybe in a postcard too): if you can imagine that everything has a soul, but that the soul of a rock, for instance, is small and hard to feel/sense; in Hampi, these boulders are so big, and they look like they have been thrown down from the heavens, and I swear- these rocks have soul. They are magic. And it's obvious, but also kind of odd, that people would build so many temples here. The number of temples is ridiculous, and it makes me wonder why they're even necessary when nature has provided the most beautiful space to pray already.

On our last day there, I rose early to climb this mountain (to a temple) to watch the sunrise. The sunrise itself was unremarkable, but the view was astounding! I felt a bit stupid climbing up in the dark, alone, but I'm glad I did it. Later, Lidia and I climbed 500 steps to the Hanuman (Monkey) temple which was also very nice, followed by some other temples and then a great fight with the rickshaw driver (excitement!). Later still, we took a coracle boat down the river to some other temples (see? too many temples!). I got to paddle the coracle boat for awhile, it's quite easy actually. So that was our last day, but it was the busiest day. We did so much, I was truly exhausted afterward.



Yesterday, we left Hampi to come to Puttaparthi. I was lucky, and got a room in the Ayurveda center. Lidia and I went to the ashram for dinner. It is a really really weird, cultish kind of place. People are fanatical about Sai Baba, and they all seem to believe he is God. Literally. This shit kind of gives me the creeps. The ashram is like a village. It was shops and restaurants and banks, it's huge. There are some really arbitrary rules, like women must have a shawl over their shoulders, but apparently they aren't dictated by Sai Baba (but you can't come in if you don't have a scarf and you're a woman). One positive thing I'll say, is that you don't have to worry about being ripped off in there. Everyone is really fair and honest. Everything is cheap, which means that even the poorer Indians can afford to come, and there are lots of Indians there. Indians come, as well as many foreigners, as a sort of pilgrimage. Anyway, the place kind of gives me the creeps, but it's interesting to see. Heh, there is this huge bookstore and I got all excited, but then when I started looking around I realized it was all books on Sai Baba. Not a single book about anything else!

Oh well, as I said, I am staying at the Ayurveda clinic. I am going to look into to doing some treatments, like maybe Panchakarma, I'll have to see what the doctor thinks. I don't know yet how long I'll stay, I may have some difficulties getting out of here, just due to trains being full and such... we'll see.

I think Lidia won't talk to me anymore. I saw her this morning at breakfast and she would barely look at me. Don't get me wrong, her temper tantrum wasn't entirely groundless, but it was definitely an overreaction to a small affair and to be honest, I don't really care to apologize to her. Mostly, because I'm not sorry. I think I put up with enough of her crap to be a bit annoying once in a while. But yeah, wah wah wah, as I always say.

One more thing though, the fight with Lidia was about shoes. Ever since my shoes were stolen, I cannot find a decent pair of sandals. I have already broken 3 pairs of Indian sandals, and then I ditched another pair because they were so uncomfortable. Today I bought another pair, my 5th pair, I hope they'll be good. *fingers crossed* *toes crossed*