Slightly delayed blog....

My thoughts from Dharamsala to Manali...

DHARAMSALA, July 14th

Arghh! I got a nose stud yesterday and just realised that I've bought one of those comedy Indian nose studs that once you put in, you can enevr take out.

July 15th - NICK's ITALIAN KITCHEN (as frequented by Richard Gere) DHARAMSALA

Next to me, a lady is playing a small Tibetan guitar. The string reverberate and send out vibrations that swell and fill the air, circling and enveloping the landscape in sound. The mountains rise high and silently in the background, exposed rock faces, jagged and blanched, juxtapose the softness of the trees and vegetation pepperred with multicoloured prayer flags dancing delicately in the breeze. In the centre, the valley slopes lazily downwards; dotted with precariously balanced houses tucked between tall alpine trees, at 90 degrees to the mountain side. It all feels so vast and wild.

I think I just swallowed a bug. Yum.

Sitting on the mountain side, sunning myself on the balcony of Tenzin's family guest house drinking Tibetan butter tea.

Tibetan butter tea is an acquired taste. It's less tea, more butter... really rich and creamy with a salty aftertaste..
Apparently, people drink it by the bucketful every day... hardcore.

I love the road to Dharamsala from McLeod Ganj, it is like one of those fantasy trails; on the left it hugs the mountainside, the right levelling off and falling away to a sheer drop, lined with traders, their tables gleaming with treasures - silver bangles, necklaces encrusted with turquoise and coral; row upon row of wooden prayer beads and silver prayer wheels inscribed with mantras. Old Tibetan women, their faces wrinkled with laughter lines, shuffle up the road in their aprons; their long chubas sweeping against the dusty road. They clutch their shopping bags and amble along, calmly, relaxed, with the self satisfaction of someone who has all the time in the world... maybe they do.

In comparison, cars race around the hairpin bends, horns blazing, leaving a trail of petrol and disturbed dust. Maybe its my G-town upbringing, but when someone hoots behind me, I always get the urge to give them the finger... it amazes me how unruffled people are about madcap traffic, cars fly within an inch of someone and they barely even flinch.

9pm - NICK's

There's a room full of people having a psy-trance rave, and we're having tea and cake and reading. Surprisingly and unsurprisingly, Dharamsala attracts alot of ravers.

After finishing our tea and cake, we followed the lasers and sauntered down to "The Himalaya Restaurant"

:Guys, this can';t be right!" I yelled, as a monk stepped ceremoniously out of the front door. About a minute later, 3 Tibetan guys, completely off their faces, ran out inviting us
"Please come, dance!"
"Come in and dance with us, its a wedding!"

A pretty happening wedding, full of green lasers, psychadelic trance, grungy hip hop and a bunch of hammered Tibetans dancing on a roof. In Dharamsala, someone obviously gets married every Saturday night.... party on matrimony. You know something's obviously wrong, when the monks have a better social life than you.

This is the new generation... it reminded me of a Tibetan guy I met this morning, who was sat contentedly crosslegged on a heap of rocks, grinning in his wrap around fake Ray Bans, chilling and clutching his portable tape recorder. I asked him what he was listening to:
"Hindi hiphop."
Bangin'. Whenever anyone walked past, he'd turn, nodding to the neat and grin, making Westside signs and being supaflygangsta.

The enxt day we went to the Dalai LAma's gompa, impressive because of its significance, beauitful thangkas hung on the walls, but full of tourists and very simple, obviously built in haste, with the aim of being a temporary structure. Sadly, temporary has translated into 57 years.